Homemade turkey dressing is the ultimate side to any holiday turkey dinner. This one holds it’s own. Really, really good.
It’s based on the famous bread salad served with the Zuni Cafe roast chicken. That is one seriously fantastic dish. This version is just as good. But adding leek, sage and savory puts it squarely in holiday turkey territory.
Turkey stuffing or turkey dressing. That is always a tough decision. Which way to go? What to do?
I love turkey stuffing. It’s amazing. How the drippings combine with the stuffing in the cavity while the bird roasts. Fantastic.
But it comes with a big price. It makes roasting a turkey even harder. And it soaks up the delicious drippings that I want for gravy. I love my drippings for gravy. All that wonderful fond. That’s the stuff that makes great gravy.
Dressing doesn’t have those problems but it’s usually not anywhere near as good. And that’s a problem in itself. Maximum stuffing flavour or bland, mediocre bread on the side.
This Zuni turkey dressing takes care of that. It’s a whole new take on how turkey dressing is made. And it tastes every big as good as traditional turkey stuffing. Better even.
There’s crispy golden bits. There’s moist turkey flavoured bits. It’s so good it doesn’t need gravy on it.
If you’ve tried Zuni Cafe roast chicken with bread salad then you know how good this homemade turkey dressing is going to be.
If you haven’t then you are missing out. Google it. Make it tonight. Then you’ll understand why this dressing is going to be the best you ever taste.
Homemade turkey dressing packs in the flavour without adding the price. It’s rich. It’s loaded with turkey goodness. Take a leap of faith. Try it. It won’t disappoint.
homemade turkey dressing - zuni cafe style
Ingredients
- 12 oz day old sturdy white bread unsliced
- 2 cloves garlic finely sliced
- 1 large or two small leeks white and light green portion only, chopped
- 2 Tbsp pine nuts
- 1 tsp ground sage
- 1/4 tsp dried savory
- olive oil
- clear turkey drippings - the fat
- concentrated turkey stock - recipe link below
- salt and pepper
Instructions
To prepare the bread
- You can do this at any time. Remove the crust from the loaf, then slice it about 1 1/2 inches thick. Brush liberally with olive oil. Heat your broiler and toast the bread until golden brown. Be very careful here. The bread can burn easily under the broiler.
- Let cool and rip into 1 inch pieces. Set aside in a large bowl.
To prepare the turkey dressing
- Toast the pine nuts in a dry pan over low heat.
- Heat 2 Tbsp olive oil in a frying pan over medium low heat. Add the garlic and cook about 45 seconds. Next, add the leeks and sweat until translucent - about 5 minutes. Now mix in the herbs and continue to cook over medium low heat for another 3 minutes. Season generously with salt and pepper.
- Combine leek mixture with bread and add the pine nuts. Moisten with concentrated turkey stock and place in a shallow oven-proof dish large enough to hold the all the turkey dressing.
- Pre-heat your oven to 375F if not already roasting your turkey.
- Thirty minutes before you plan to serve (around the time you pull your turkey from the oven), drizzle 5-6 Tbsp of turkey fat siphoned from your roasting pan over the dressing. Cover with foil and place in oven for 20 minutes. Remove the foil and bake, uncovered, for another 10 minutes.
- Serve as you would stuffing.
Notes
homemade turkey dressing - zuni cafe style
Ingredients
- 12 oz day old sturdy white bread unsliced
- 2 cloves garlic finely sliced
- 1 large or two small leeks white and light green portion only, chopped
- 2 Tbsp pine nuts
- 1 tsp ground sage
- 1/4 tsp dried savory
- olive oil
- clear turkey drippings - the fat
- concentrated turkey stock - recipe link below
- salt and pepper
Instructions
To prepare the bread
- You can do this at any time. Remove the crust from the loaf, then slice it about 1 1/2 inches thick. Brush liberally with olive oil. Heat your broiler and toast the bread until golden brown. Be very careful here. The bread can burn easily under the broiler.
- Let cool and rip into 1 inch pieces. Set aside in a large bowl.
To prepare the turkey dressing
- Toast the pine nuts in a dry pan over low heat.
- Heat 2 Tbsp olive oil in a frying pan over medium low heat. Add the garlic and cook about 45 seconds. Next, add the leeks and sweat until translucent - about 5 minutes. Now mix in the herbs and continue to cook over medium low heat for another 3 minutes. Season generously with salt and pepper.
- Combine leek mixture with bread and add the pine nuts. Moisten with concentrated turkey stock and place in a shallow oven-proof dish large enough to hold the all the turkey dressing.
- Pre-heat your oven to 375F if not already roasting your turkey.
- Thirty minutes before you plan to serve (around the time you pull your turkey from the oven), drizzle 5-6 Tbsp of turkey fat siphoned from your roasting pan over the dressing. Cover with foil and place in oven for 20 minutes. Remove the foil and bake, uncovered, for another 10 minutes.
- Serve as you would stuffing.
Notes
A perfectly cooked turkey is not a difficult thing. Pick a good quality bird, keep it under 14 lbs, don’t stuff it and dry brine it. Dry brined roast turkey deserves a whole lot more attention than it gets. It works. Well.
Judy Rogers of Zuni Cafe fame pioneered the dry brining technique. It’s easy. It doesn’t the take up tons of room in your fridge like wet brining and it works. It works really well.
I recently saw a study that compared wet and dry brining. It was on a reputable food site so I believe the results. They had a blind taste testing. They compared wet brined, no brine and dry brined roast turkey.
Dry brining won. Second went to no brine. Last place – wet brine. Last place. Crazy, messy work to make your bird worse.
Dry brining is dead easy. One Tbsp of kosher salt per 5 pounds of bird. 3 days. Done. Better product. No brainer. Dry brined roast turkey for me every time. It works great for pork and poultry.
Serve it with zuni style turkey dressing and super intense gravy for a memorable holiday meal.
Dry Brined Roast Turkey
Plan on 10-12 minutes per time roasting time to an internal temperature of 165F for the breast and 175F for the thighs. Make sure you insert the thermometer in the deepest parts of the turkey but don’t hit bone – that messes up the temperature reading.
You will also need a roasting pan that can go from oven to stovetop and a v-rack (or rib rack) to keep the turkey off the bottom of your roasting pan. You definitely need an instant read thermometer for this recipe.
The initial breast side down roasting step protects the breast and exposes the thighs. This is the secret to an evenly cooked bird. No way to do easily flip it with a huge bird – that’s why 14 lbs is the upper limit.
A good friend of mine, a fine cook himself, gave me a great tip. You can get super heavy duty dishwashing gloves for next to nothing. Slip them on and your hands are insulated. To clean them, leave them on and wash your hands as you would normally. Genius!
Simple gravy
If you aren’t going to go the distance on the super intense gravy then go with a more conventional gravy. Make it in the roasting pan while the turkey rests.
