When it comes to Thanksgiving, turkey, stuffing and mashed potatoes are the items I look forward to the most. Oh sure, the other “fillers” are important too, but they change from year to year depending on the number of guests and my mood.

Turkeys have come a long way since I was a child. From the way we stuff them, to the way we eat them, the chewy dried out over cooked bird has become a thing of the past.

I have always been intrigued by deep fried turkey and turducken, (turkey, duck and chicken) and if anyone has had any experience with either of these, I would love to hear from you. I have learned there is more than one way to cook turkey and I’d like to share with you, how we cook ours. It all starts with the stuffing.

I used to be a big fan of bread crumb stuffing. I ‘d make it with cooked breakfast sausages, onion, celery, poultry seasoning,a little bit of salt and pepper and voila - stuffing that was moist and spicy. That all changed when I met my husband, who is Chinese.

Our first “family” Thanksgiving dinner with his parents was a bit of a shocker. There was no green jello with shredded coconut, no tomato juice, dinner rolls or baby peas, and instead of bread stuffing, his mom made sticky rice stuffing! This was a bit of a culture shock coming from Cobourg, Ontario.

Sticky rice dressing has become part of our family’s tradition. You can make it and add it to the bird or serve it separately. It goes great with turkey and gravy.

Sticky Rice Stuffing:

To prepare the sticky rice combine the following ingredients:

2 1/2 cups of sticky rice (called sweet rice in Asian supermarkets)

2 tbsp oil

salt

Using a rice cooker, and if you don’t have one buy one, (they are very inexpensive and make perfect rice every ti me) pour rice into cooker and cover it with water so that it just barely covers the rice. Let it soak for 2 hours. Make sure the rice cooker is turned off.

Soak 2 cups of dried Chinese mushrooms in hot water. Keep changing the water and rinsing the mushrooms until they are soft and pliable. Once they are hydrated, discard the stems and chop the heads finely.

Chop finely, 5 sticks of Chinese sausage and fry over low heat. Add the mushrooms, cooking over low heat for about 7 minutes. Careful you don’t burn the sausage.

After the rice has soaked for two hours, add 2 cans of chicken stock to the rice cooker, and pour the mushroom sausage mixture on top. Do not mix. Turn on the rice cooker - it will automatically turn off with the sticky rice is done. Use a wide spoon to stir up the mixture and keep it on warm until you are ready to serve.

Dressing the Bird

When it comes to choosing the bird, I love pre-basted ones and generally count on pound per person. I thaw the bird in a cold water bath, and keep changing the water so it stays cold. Once it is thawed, I cover it with Oyster sauce and raw bacon and bake it at 350degrees F. The drippings from the bacon combined with the oyster sauce makes wonderful gravy and the bird is alway golden brown.

For the gravy, I pour the drippings into a separate pot.  I mix 2 heaping tablespoons of corn starch with 1 cup of cold water, stir and add to the drippings.  I heat it on high, using a wisk until the mixture has thickened and is bubbling.

I don’t stuff the bird with sticky rice to eliminate the threat of bacteria, but my mother-in-law always did.

So there you have it, our family tradition. I don’t miss the green jello, but giving up the tomato juice and white buns was a bit of a stretch.

Stay tuned for next week when we get into the desserts.

Cheers,

Julie

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 4th, 2005 at 2:38 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.