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I can’t ever forget, the Christmas seasons where my beloved grandma used to prepare that tasty, classic, stuffed turkey! For me, Christmas back in Greece were always filled with the smell of great food and with such a cook in the household… the holidays, were heavenly!

When I moved here, one of the things I dreamt ever since my first Dutch Christmas was that amazing turkey. The next year I decided not to accept fate lying down and to went on to try and cook this delicious stuffed bird. So, I had my grandma face skype and in the end I managed to get on my hands that magical recipe, that might took a while to implement, but it was surely worth it!

What we will need

For every 2 kilos of turkey
1 big onion
2 glasses of rice for risotto
1/2 kilo of chicken livers
1 kilo chestnuts
black pepper
a lot of salt
nutmeg
pine nuts / raisins by choice (1 handful sweet, half on medium)
butter, 1 kg, better fresh
garlic

Εxecution

We chop the onion and the livers into small cubes.

In a large pan, saute the onion in butter.

Once the onion is wilted, add 2 cups of rice (Italian or risotto); the chopped giblets, more than half of chestnuts and at the end the pine nuts at the raisins.

We add 3 to 4 glasses of water and we let it boil.

When it starts rising a little, we add the pepper, the salt and the nutmeg. When it pulls the juices, the aside, the stuffing is ready.

After we thoroughly have wash the turkey, we burn the bird around to pull out the last feathers and we put it in a large pan or pot, that we have just buttered.

We spread butter everywhere, that we have before shuffle with garlic, inside the turkey. 1 plate of butter at least. We carefully lift up the skin and put also down there.

We put the stuffing inside the belly and we are sawing it, so i will be closed.

We slice potatoes and put them outside to cook together with the turkey broth.

We brush the turkey and externally with butter and season very good.

One secret trick is butter injections in the turkey breast.

At the potatoes we only put lemon, orange juice and oregano. We do not put water. The meat will bring out its one juices.

If there are leftover stuffing, we put it in a foil in the pan. We put also the remaining chestnuts.

We cover the turkey (like a house) with foil that closes up, tightly into the pan. What we want to achieve is to be cooked inside the foil along with the vapor to become juicy.

Times - Over - (no air)

250 degrees for 30 min
180 degrees 1 hour
150 degrees 1 hour
120 degrees 30 min

We open the bag, take a spoon and smear all the time the turkey with the juices that have butter with lemon and orange, until you get the desired color ruby.

Preparation time: Wake up very early!