Marco and I, we're like this...
Christmas dinner is a load of hassle and that's why we only cook it once a year. Right?Wrong actually.
Short-fuse celeb chef Marco Pierre White shared his festive cooking tips with a bunch of bloggers (bunch? a collective noun needed here) at his shiny restaurant at Chelsea FC. And I was there too.
He's all about making a juicy turkey dinner without getting up early or working yourself into a lather. He made it look very easy.
Here's what I learned:
A 10 -12lb turkey is best. Those monster birds are too big to work in a domestic oven.
Marco suggests chopping off the legs and delving inside to remove the wishbone (and spine, now I've read his notes). I fear this won't be as easy as he made it look. The reason, he said, was that it makes it easier to carve and you don't get a pocket of flesh no one can reach.
Doing it this way the turkey resembled something out of Jaws... but it worked.
Gravy is king. MPW reckons it's the most important component of the meal and must be good. Thus he chops the thighs and anything else with a really big chopper. This is much more dramatic than necessary, but in a good way. Then he bungs the chopped bones into the oven with some onion and garlic to roast. Once roasted he adds water, turkey paste and cooks for ages.
The celeb chef who isn't too posh to sieve his own gravy
Stuffing for Marco is a 50:50 Paxo sausage meat mixture. Only with a bit less water than the packet suggests.Stuffing the smaller cavity protects the meat from cooking too quickly.
"Don't take anything Jamie says too seriously." To reports that JO doesn't advocate stuffing a bird for fear of dangerously undercooked flesh.
Don't season the bird too much before it is cooked as it won't penetrate the flesh. Best to season while you carve.
There's a telly chef for every taste, apparently.
Cornflour is good enough for Marco to thicken his gravy and his Christmas sprouts are frozen... therefore it's good enough for me.
Bloggers show enormous restraint. Not what you'd expect, but they do. Imagine, you've watched a chef cook a delicious meal and serve it to you with his own hands. Then what do you do? Unrestrained scoffing? No. You take a photo. Of course you do.
It's only cranberry sauce in the pan!
At last the eating begins...
There are videos of Marco talking about the perfect bird on the Lean on Turkey website and he really does make it look simple. All apart from that bit where you take the wishbone and neck out - I think I'll need to practice before the big day.
I was invited to Marco's kitchen as a guest of Lean on Turkey and was compensated for my time.