After reading art b’s thread about a Turkey Free Zone, it reminded me of the one & only time Ms.T & I tried to cook a turkey with the help of friends. It was 1996, we were living in Singapore at the time & in the same apartment complex were our friends Eammon & Karen, John & Shell & Dean & Miranda. None of us were heading home for Christmas so decided to do a communal Christmas Dinner & invite the various ex-pat strays & waifs around to enjoy it with us. So, a trip to Singapore Cold Stores to acquire the said bird was undertaken, it’d better be a big one we agreed as we didn’t know exactly how many people we were feeding. We (myself, Eammon, John & Dean) purchased the largest one we could find & then dropped in to a nearby hostelry to celebrate being great white hunters & managing to bag such a magnificent bird. After a couple of rounds of cleansing ales we departed the hostelry, we hadn’t got more than a couple of hundred yards down the road when a waiter came chasing after us, seems we’d forgotten the turkey & it was still in their cool room. Back we traipsed to collect the bird, better have another beer someone suggested, so we did but this time with the bird sitting in the middle of the table. When we got home, it seemed to be a good idea to see if it would fit in the oven. It did ……………. just Now it’s Christmas Morning, time to get the turkey cooked. Who knows how to cook a turkey? I asked (having no clue myself). Only to be greeted by a deafening silence, not one of us had a clue. The few cook books we had between us gave no real clue, did it go breast up or breast down in the oven? Arrgh, too many questions, better open some champagne & contemplate the problem. After contemplating through 2 bottles of champagne Karen suggested calling her sister in Sydney ( a trained chef & lecturer in hospitality & catering). So a phone call to her is made, the basics are passed on to the chefs in kitchen & we set too with a will. Oh dear, more questions ….. quick on the phone again to Sydney. Anyway to cut a very long story down to a reasonable length, after a lot more international phone calls, we had the thing well under way. I might add that the rest of the meal was prepared without any drama at all. When we came to the time to serve the turkey we seemed to have lost the little temperature thing that was used, well we reckoned it couldn’t have gone far so carried on. Pulled the bird out of the oven, doesn’t look ready someone muttered, no it doesn’t, we agreed. Poked & prodded it with sharp implements, is blood supposed to ooze out like that? Much shaking of heads. Quick phone your sister again was the cry. No, apparently it’ll need more cooking time, so it is just as well we are well stocked with alcohol to ply the guests with. Eventually by about 8.00p.m. it was decided that it was ready. Ms.T was elected to do the carving as she has some experience in slicing up bodies & away we went. All looked good (but still no sign of the wee pop up temperature thingy) until some mentioned there seemed to be something in with the stuffing. It wasn’t the temperature thingy but a plastic bag full off odd looking things. How were we to know that they put the giblets back inside the turkey & that they should have been removed prior to cooking? It was well cooked & delicious but by that time & with the amount of alcohol we had all poured into ourselves we would have thought that a cardboard box was tasty. The wee temperature gauge turned up on someones plate & the meal finished at sometime in the early hours of Boxing Day. This was the one & only big Christmas Dinner we prepared & people wonder why we choose to work over Christmas these days.
20 mins per pound plus 20 mins eg 9lb bird 3hrs20mins My problem is spilling the hot juices on my feet as I remove the bird from the oven I now wear wellies for that operation
