Turkey ? can be a difficult bird to cook. While rewarding when cooked well, the common mistake is not prepping and cooking too long, which results in dry meat. To begin, wash the bird thoroughly, then pat dry with paper towels. Place upside down in a large baking pan and remove as much of the spine as possible. You can do this with a sharp knife or hefty kitchen shears. Just be very careful! With the spine removed, flip the bird back over to begin prepping. Mix a large knob of butter, at room temperature, with freshly chopped thyme. Carefully pull up the skin around the breast and legs, and stuff in the herb butter mixture. Roughly chop an orange and a red onion. Stuff the cavity of the bird with the orange, the red onion, thyme and a couple of bay leaves, then tie the legs together with cook safe twine. Mix up a small bowl of honey, orange juice, olive oil and salt. Rub this all over the outside of the skin for a beautiful glaze. In the bottom of the baking pan, drop in the giblets (neck etc.) along with a roughly chopped carrot. Chuck that bird in the convection oven at 180°C, and cook for about 25 minutes per kilo. The bird is done when the juices run clear and you measure an inner temperature of 72°C. You can wrap the legs and wings in tin foil to stop them from burning, and wrap the whole bird if it begins to get too much color. When the bird is done, remove the organe, onion, thyme and bay leaves from inside and transfer carefully to a serving plate. Wrap with foil and allow to rest while you make the brown sauce. 

The brown sauce is very easy. Simply mash up all that remains in the pan, and strain through a fine mesh strainer into a saucepan. Add as much cream as you’d like, tasting as you go to achieve the correct flavor. Season well with salt and pepper, and thicken with ‘redning’. If you find the sauce is too ‘birdy’ or strong in flavor even after adding several deciliters of cream, drop in a few click of applesauce to balance it out. Pour over the freshly cut, juicy turkey and enjoy with a GO West IPA ???.