Roast Turkey, The Guardian Service Way

We began our culinary adventure with a trip to LA's Farmers Market at Fairfax and Third, a food-lovers' destination since 1934. (Side note: that's me crooning pop songs of the era at the Market's 75th Anniversary with vintage swing and big band Dean Mora and his Orchestra).

We were shopping a bit ahead of the Turkey Day rush, but the good folk at Puritan Poultry supplied us with a free-range, hormone and antibiotic-free turkey which was locally-raised—so local, in fact, that the Sun Valley ranch from which it originated was closer to our apartment than the Farmers Market itself...

Weighing the bird at Puritan Poultry at LA's Farmers Market

As this was our first Guardian Service turkey, we opted to cook it stove-top, a hallmark of Guardian Service cookware, and found that the stove-top method yields a rich and succulent turkey. While it is not "steaming" a turkey (as Joy of Cooking's Rombauer disparages it) this method employs lower temperatures, using the meat's own juices and is very similar to braising, a type of pan roasting. The bird can be browned at the finish using the "stove-top browning" technique to reflect burner heat back onto the food's surface. The result is a delectably juicy bird that excels in flavor, tenderness and ease of slicing. It may not have the uniformly  mahogany appearance and crispy shell of the Norman Rockwell ideal, but you won't suffer the dry and flavorless meat that often results from open-roasting in an oven, nor need to brine it for hours to ward against an arid turkey.

The large Guardian Service roaster is an impressive and beautiful design. The oval pan has claw like handles which allow for a firm grip, and jutting from either side of the deeply-pitched dome lid are wing-like handles, reminiscent of Mercury's helmet. But while the roaster may be the Big Bad Boy of this cookware line, it's still modest by today's out-sized expectations—its internal dimensions are 11" wide, 16.5" long, and about 9" high, if you're cooking with the rack. Our turkey was an ideal size for the roaster—just over 13 lbs—but I don't think the roaster could handle a turkey exceeding 15 lbs.

Roasting a turkey "The Guardian Way" employs a similar technique to the one we presented when roasting a chicken. It's just a bigger roaster and a bigger bird, so you may want a friend or two handy for some of the hefting and turning.

Guardian Roast Turkey

1) Prepare the turkey (bring to room temperature, remove the neck and giblets from the cavity and rinse thoroughly, pat dry and salt the bird, inside and out). Lather with butter, stuff and truss. In a medium pan (we used the 2 qt dome cooker), roast the neck and giblets over a layer of celery and garlic for an hour, then add water and continue to simmer on low until you're ready to add it to the stuffing and/or gravy (see below).

2) Over a medium burner, heat 2 Tbsp. fat and 2 Tbsp. butter in roaster and coat pan well. Place turkey in roaster and sear, browning all surfaces of the bird, 90 seconds per plane so that the skin caramelizes. (This keeps the juices inside the turkey as it cooks). Be bold! We used two large spatulas, rolled the bird in the pan, and grabbed it with a clean towel. Properly trussed the bird can take some handling. Remove turkey from pan; pouring off and reserving excess fat. Place turkey on its breast on roaster rack and lower into roaster. (Optional: we added two whole jalapeños to the roaster to scent the bird and compliment the Californio theme of our stuffing—see below). Cover with lid and cook over both burners at low heat for 15-20 min/lb.

3) Halfway through the roasting period, flip the bird—that is, turn it to  distribute the juices. Remove the roaster lid and invert it as a resting tray, then remove the rack from the roaster and place turkey in the lid. Turn the turkey on its back, reposition on the rack and return it to the roaster to continue cooking. 

4) The turkey is done when its juices run clear, the wings give and the thigh meat reaches 165℉. Now comes the fun part, finishing by browning the turkey using the deflected heat of the Guardian Service stove-top browning technique. Set roaster to one side of stove, remove lid and position it so it channels the heat over the turkey. Now you are a knight using his shield to roast his catch over an open fire! Turn it any way you please, letting each side of the turkey get a good toasting. Meanwhile baste well to give a healthy brown glaze. 

The Lee-Peterson-Robinson Gravy

My mother's family's method for making gravy is a long-held tradition passed down through my great grandmother Ruth Lee Peterson, as Yankee a Puritan as they came. The method is simple, but requires patience and diligence, for which you'll be rewarded with unparalleled flavor.

1) Over medium heat, reduce the roaster pan drippings until they caramelize and stick. NOTE: It can take 30-40 minutes for the sugar in the drippings to properly caramelize and the fat to separate and run clear. During this window it is crucial that you ignore your nagging doubt and the hand-wringing of loved-ones who think you're burning the gravy and wondering why dinner is getting cold and why you're ruining this festive occasion... Patience—and DON'T SCRAPE the bottom of the pan.

2) When the fat separates from the browned turkey drippings, pour off all but a Tbsp or two of the excess fat and return the roaster to a low heat. NOTE: Because the Guardian Service pan heats evenly, it's harder to get drippings to really hold to the bottom of the pan*. (We used a free-range bird which has very little fat—just enough for the following step, the roux—but if you're cooking a Butterball, you may need a gravy separator for this step).

3) Whisk 2-3 Tbsp. of flour into the giblet stock and add gradually to the roaster, de–glazing the pan and blending continuously until smooth and thick. Salt and pepper to taste and serve. (Note: You can also use leftover water from boiling potatoes (or  pasta) to de-glaze the pan, in which case there's no need for the extra flour—but if you're using the "waterless method" to cook your potatoes, you may not have any starchy water handy!).

Optional: for a heartier gravy, use a blender to incorporate the roasted neck and giblet meat (first removing meat from the neck bones) into some of the giblet stock and add to gravy as well.

*Don't fear a clean-up nightmare—the even heating of the Guardian Service cookware means an easier clean up than cheaper enamel pans which are more likely to scorch.

And now, as a bonus, this year's creation: a '49er, Californio–style stuffing!

Gold Rush Stuffing

Inspired by Hangtown Fry, an oyster-bacon omelet first concocted at the Cary House Hotel in Placerville, CA (then called "Hangtown" for its numerous hangings). A prospector who'd just struck it rich requested the most expensive dish the hotel chef could prepare. Eggs, bacon and oysters were precious ingredients, due to their delicacy, perishability and the distance from which they were brought in the 1850s... an early example of conspicuous consumption via "Food Miles."

3 cups jalapeño cornbread, cubed

1 cup bacon, cooked and crumbled

6 fresh whole fried oysters (dipped in beaten egg and cornmeal, fried in bacon fat)

3 celery ribs, chopped

2 leeks, chopped

2 tomatillos, chopped

4 leaves fresh sage, minced

1 sprig fresh thyme

1/2 cup giblet stock

1 egg, beaten

freshly ground salt and pepper

1) In the large GS fry pan, cook up 6-8 slices of bacon, crumble and reserve.

2) In bacon drippings, sauté the leek, celery and tomatillos. Remove and reserve.

3) Dip each oyster in beaten egg, dust with cornmeal and fry in bacon fat, adding butter as necessary. 

4) Mix all ingredients. Stuff turkey and top each end with half an apple before trussing. Cook excess in separate unit for about 30 minutes at 325℉.

- Damon Kirsche/Andrew Martin

For side dishes, we served up Roasted Brussels Sprouts with Garlic (a perennial favorite from the NY Times) and another family favorite which we'll write about in our next post: the renowned Butternut Squash Bisque once served at Denver's Brown Palace Hotel.

Until then, thanks for reading and from our home to yours: Happy Thanksgiving!

Guardian Service Backyard Tandoori

We were spared the scorching temperatures that socked most of the nation last month, but yesterday's warmer weather drove us out of doors rather than face heating up the kitchen for dinner. Our improvised meal was not only memorably delicious, but a solid adaptive use of Guardian Service cookware—a Pan-Asian Fusion meal undreamed of by the cookware's designers, yet one that honors their tenets of nutrition and economy in our common pursuit of "Good Health, Pleasure and Profit."

This method is inspired by tandoori* cooking, though instead of a clay oven, we use a portable 14 1/2" charcoal grill and our Guardian Service Casserole unit. When the coals are hot, the Casserole unit builds up a head of steam, gently cooking the vegetables at the grill's center, while the meat is grilled on the perimeter. The seared meat is then added to the mix. As the fire cools, it finishes the meal at the perfect low temperature required for "waterless cooking" with Guardian Service Ware.

Guardian Service Backyard Tandoori

(Five basic steps. Try any combination of vegetables and/or meats.)

1. Marinate the meat or fowl.
2. Layer the vegetables in the Casserole unit according to cooking time required—fibrous vegetables (carrots, celery, turnips, parsnips) in a "basket" layer (the bottom and sides), starchier vegetables (potatoes, sweet potatoes) to the center and the juicier, more delicate vegetables, which require little to no cooking, on top (tomatoes, onions, cauliflower, peppers).
3. Place the covered unit over a small amount of charcoal (12-15 briquettes) in the center of the grill.
4. Grill the meat: place the pieces of marinated meat around the outside edge of the grill, searing the outside edges until brown. (We use the Guardian Service Economy Trio trivet to prevent grill marks from burning into the Casserole, but it's not a necessity).
5. As the meat browns, place each seared piece into the Casserole along with any remaining marinade and cover. Finishing cooking for 30 minutes.

Note the color retention in the vegetables (and thus nutritional retention) from start to finish. The low, constant, contained heat of the waterless cooking method creates an incredibly nutritious meal and works wonders with inexpensive cuts of meat and any variety of vegetables and sauces.

Andrew improvised a Chicken Masala Tandoori last night employing the above method (carrots, sweet potatoes, heirloom tomatoes, cauliflower, jalapeño peppers, scallions, basil and chicken thighs marinated in Masala Sauce  with sesame oil, juice of half a lemon, juice of half an orange, salt and pepper). Served withbread and chutney. Bon Appétit!

Chef Andrew. Not only does he cook an outstanding meal, but he suffers this dopey apron. And he's kinda cute too... I guess he can stick around.

*A true tandoor is made of clay and is used throughout India, the Middle East and Central Asia and employs high temperature cooking in a cylindrical clay oven or a grill. Andrew combined the grilled, smoked effects of tandoori cooking, with the slow, low heat requirements of Guardian Service Ware.

* * * * * * *

Stretch the fuel economy even further? As dinner was served, we placed a carafe of water over the remaining coals, enough fuel to bring it to a boil and brew a pot of Guardian Service Coffee (with dessert accents of fennel and cinnamon added to the grounds).

Guardian Service Roast Chicken and Potatoes

Here in the San Fernando Valley, daytime temperatures are already climbing into the 80s, so when the afternoon sun floods our mid-century kitchenette and we muse over what to fix for dinner, roasting a chicken isn't the first thing that springs to mind. But cooking stovetop with the Guardian Service roaster means there's no need to fire up the oven—we can cook most of the meal over a single low burner. And no need to burn still more energy running the air conditioners. In the dog days of summer, we've even cooked this meal over coals on a hibachi (sans gravy).

Roast Chicken and Potatoes

We started with an organically-fed, hormone-free, free-range, whole chicken and organic vegetables (russet potatoes and a white onion, though carrots, turnips, parsnips are welcome additions). The groceries came out to just over $20, but we'll use every bit of this bird to make several meals that will feed us over the week, finishing with a soup from the carcass. Now that's Depression Era cooking the Guardian Service Way.

First, prepare the chicken: with a commercially processed chicken, this typically means removing a bag of giblets from the cavity and rinsing, drying and salting the bird.  If you're prepping a minimally processed chicken (perhaps through a Community Supported Agriculture co-op or Farmers' Market), similar to those available when this cookware was manufactured, Betty Gay notes, "singe over an open flame, remove pin feathers with a small knife or tweezers. Cut out oil sac above the tail." My grandmother Pauline butchered her own chickens and little was wasted: our pillows were stuffed with the feathers, she canned the chicken feet along with its meat, and she'd reserve any yolks forming inside the chicken for making egg noodles.

The giblets: In a saucepan (1/2 qt cooker pictured), simmer the neck, heart and gizzard with some chopped onion and celery (we substituted lovage, which has a similar flavor) and enough water to cover. This giblet stock can simmer on low until you're ready to add it to the stuffing and/or gravy.

After removing and rendering the fat deposits near the tail, we used one Tbsp. of fat to sear and brown the chicken in the roaster and the remainder to make the roux for the gravy and to fry the chicken liver for the stuffing. (Note: When cooking a chicken or a smaller roast, we sometimes use the inverted platter in place of the higher, domed lid because it affords an additional cooking surface—pictured above cooking the surplus stuffing in the "Tom Thumb" unit).

Chicken Stuffing
I rarely fuss over a stuffing recipe—bread crumbs, corn bread, challah, herbs, fruit, nuts... keep a varied larder and the sky's the limit. Here's what we had on hand:

1 onion, chopped

3 large slices stone-ground, whole wheat bread, cubed

1 lb. mushrooms, diced

1 chicken liver, chopped, fried in chicken fat

2 Tbsp. chevre

1/2 cup raisins

4 leaves sage

2 sprigs rosemary

giblet stock

freshly ground salt and pepper to taste

Sauté the onion and chicken liver in butter or chicken fat for five minutes, add mushrooms and continue to cook for another ten minutes, stirring frequently, until the mushrooms have released some liquid. Remove from heat and mix with remaining stuffing ingredients.

Roast Chicken and Potatoes

After stuffing and trussing the chicken, lather with butter or, as our friend Nancy Lamb prefers, mayonnaise. Heat a tablespoon of the chicken fat in the roaster over medium heat, add the chicken and sear the skin, turning on all sides until browned. Remove chicken to platter and layer the bottom of the roaster with:

6 potatoes, cut in wedges  (russets pictured above)

1 onion, sliced

Return chicken to roaster over bed of potatoes and onions and set over medium flame. Cover and roast for 20-25 min/lb.

Cooked in the roaster, the potatoes and onions will absorb the chicken fat and caramelize together as a delectable, mealy side dish. If you prefer to roast the potatoes separately, any additional excess fat can be poured off from the roaster and reserved to make the gravy*.

When the chicken is cooked, remove the chicken to the tray and, if further browning is desired, cook using the stove-top browning technique, reflecting the burner heat back onto the chicken.

At this point, we added a cup of broccoli flowerets around the chicken on the platter, covered it, and set the lidded plater over a barely lit burner for twelve minutes. The radiant heat and low additional burner heat was just enough to cook the broccoli to perfection as I prepared the gravy:

Add flour to the last of the rendered chicken fat, cook the resulting roux and add the giblet stock (I also added some left over pasta water) to bring it up to a gravy. Salt and pepper to taste.

*It should be noted, tomorrow being Mother's Day, that my mother's method for turkey gravy (a family tradition) begins with caramelizing all the drippings until they stick to the roaster pan, then pouring off the excess fat and creating a roux from the bottom of the roaster drippings—and nothing compares. BUT, when all that essence is cooking directly into the potatoes, the result is equally delectable. (Pictured below, the Guardian Service gravy boat—a beautiful and functional design—warming over a barely lit burner).

  

Guardian Service Chicken Schnitzel

As promised, here’s another in our series of recipes adapted for Guardian Service cookware. We've come to call this dish "Chicken Schnitzel," not just because it's fun to say, but because it's an adaptation of a traditional veal Weiner Schnitzel recipe from “Lüchow’s German Cookbook” (by Jan Mitchell, Doubleday, 1952).

Lüchow’s restaurant was a New York destination for fans of traditional German fare, operating for a full century from 1882 to 1982 on E 14th St in lower Manhattan. The restaurant provided an atmosphere of theatrical Gemütlichkeit (arguably the pre-Sardi's Sardi's) while serving celebrities such as operetta composer Victor Herbert (he founded ASCAP in one of Lüchow's booths) and screen star Marlene Dietrich and hosting the post-concert party for Judy Garland’s legendary Carnegie Hall concert.

I’ve simplified their approach to the batter and find it browns to perfection on the Guardian Service Griddle/Broiler. It’s not unlike a “chicken-fried” chicken, although greaseless, one of the chief selling points of the Guardian Service Griddle/Broiler technique.

Chicken Schnitzel

4 6-ounce chicken breasts

3 Tbsp. Grated Parmesan cheese

2 Tbsp. Flour

1 egg, beaten

1 tsp. minced parsley

½ tsp. salt

¼ tsp. pepper

¼ tsp. grated nutmeg

2 cups minced breadcrumbs

Juice ¾ lemon

Parsley for garnish

In a shallow baking dish mix cheese, flour, breadcrumbs, parsley, salt, pepper and nutmeg. Pound chicken breasts until thin; dip in beaten egg and coat well with breadcrumb mixture.

Meanwhile, set the Guardian Service Griddle/Broiler over medium low heat until it passes the “water test”; see previous posts for more info and photos. (NOTE: this is a crucial step for success when cooking with this unit).

Place the breaded chicken breasts on the griddle and cook over medium heat until browned on each side. Remove to platter, squeeze fresh lemon juice over the dish and garnish with parsley and lemon wedges.

Optional: serve with cream gravy with shallots and mushrooms (pictured). Sauté shallots and quartered mushrooms in butter for 10-15 mins, remove from saucepan and reserve. Make a basic white sauce, reincorporate the shallot/mushroom mixture and ladle over fried chicken cutlets.