Christmas turkey

Ingredients for 8 servings:

• 1 large turkey, approx. 7 kg
• 5 apples
• 6 onions
• 1 organic orange(s)
• 200 g celeriac
• 3 carrots
• 2 tbsp tomato paste
• 750 ml chicken stock
• 10 sprig(s) mugwort
• 250 g butter
• 4 tsp, heaped powdered sugar
• 400 ml red wine, dry
• Salt

Instructions

Working time approx. 1 hour 30 minutes; Cooking/baking time approx. 6 hours 30 minutes; Total time approx. 8 hours

Peel the onions, apples, celeriac, and carrots and dice them into approximately 1 cm pieces. Finely chop the oranges with their peels and grate the mugwort with your hands. Mix both ingredients together with the remaining ingredients (onions, apples, celeriac, and carrots) to make the stuffing. Wash the turkey inside and out with cold water and pat dry. Rub the abdominal cavity and outside well with salt, then fill with half of the vegetables and seal (either with roulade pins or kitchen string). Tie the two legs together with kitchen string. Line the oven floor with aluminum foil and preheat the oven to 150°C (fan oven). Lightly caramelize the icing sugar in a saucepan. Stir in the other half of the vegetables and sauté slightly, stir in the tomato paste, and then deglaze with half of the red wine. Let everything simmer slightly. Now pour in the remaining wine and bring to a boil. Pour in the broth and then pour the mixture into a deep baking tray or an XXL casserole dish. Place the prepared turkey in the casserole dish on top of the vegetable mixture and place in the oven. Melt the butter and brush the turkey with it. Throughout the roasting time, alternately pour the vegetable broth from the casserole dish over the turkey and brush with the butter. Halfway through the cooking time (3 hours 15 minutes), turn the casserole dish once so that the back is now at the front. After the total cooking time of 6 hours 30 minutes, turn off the oven, remove the turkey from the oven and place it on the oven rack. Now place the oven tray on the lowest rack and then place the turkey back in the oven on the rack above it. Pour the vegetable broth into a heatproof blender and blend until smooth and chop. If you don’t have a blender, you can also use an immersion blender. Now remove the stuffing from the turkey and shred the turkey and serve.