Turkey Talk: How Not To Burn Your Biscuits, Make Gritty Gravy Or Dry Out Your Turkey

The answers to your Thanksgiving questions coming up on Turkey talk. This is KPBS Midday Edition. Coming up it is the who, what, when, where, and why report on all things Thanksgiving. It is our annual Turkey talk with Chef Bernard Guillas. How do you keep your turkey moist or make the most marvelous mashed potatoes. With a Turkey be done when your guests are ready. What will you do with your leftovers. Call us and Chef Bernard is here to answer all your questions about preparing the dinner. 1888 895-5727. I am Maureen Cavanaugh KPBS Midday Edition is next but first the news. Don't yes, don't worry, and don't give up. If you have questions about making your Thanksgiving feast we have answers. Stay with us for one hour of Turkey talk. It is midday edition. I am trying to and it is Wednesday November 23, 2016. We have Chef Bernard Guillas with us who is give you tips on spicing up your meal and making traditional recipes even more delicious. It is our annual KPBS Midday Edition Turkey talk. Joining me is my one and only guest for the our the one and only Chef Bernard. Always a pleasure to share the love with you here. Chef Bernard Guillas is executive chef at the Marine room and the Ohio beef -- La Jolla Beach tennis club. Please call us with anything you want to know about. Colonists the number is 1-888-895-5727. While any new tastes you are intrigued with the season. Julie inside a company does amazing fighters. I love this signer named cherry bombs. We have a gorgeous flavor so I use it to make a brine. I brine my turkey with that and sage and beautiful sea thought. It is really awesome. I brine it for about 24 hours. The other thing I love a celery root. It is very ugly but it tastes so good. You take beautiful potatoes, half potatoes half celery and you make your mashed potatoes with celery and potatoes. It is really awesome. Has a nutty and really nice well-balanced flavor. Of course you need to put butter. We will talk better a lot today. Never a dish without butter. Two nights ago I came home and said let's do some cranberry sauce. Instead of using a lot of regular sugar I put persimmons and they came out so awesome. I put a little bit of ginger and it was really delicious. In the cranberry sauce. Yes you have to jazz it up a little bit. The color is so bright red. You want to just dive in and the ball and just eat it before the turkey. I love -- using local citrus. Tangerine, ginger glazed carrots instead of doing regular vegetables. It is really awesome to. I love my brioche. I use center -- sun dried plums. You get a different flavor and it goes really well the sausages. I add sausage and some really nice vegetable and a little bit of stock and I just make it so good. And for dessert I changed it a little bit. Instead of a pumpkin pie in the house we will have a pumpkin cheesecake. Something a little bit different. Some candied pecans with that. There's a bit of maple syrup. It will be lighter than a pumpkin pie. To do something a little bit different. That's what everybody should do. Of course you have already made everybody hungry. People are already on the phone so let's take a call. The number is 1-888-895-5727 for all of your turkey questions. Belinda from San Diego is on the line. Welcome to the program. Hello. How do you do? Very good. I just ask my question? Please do. Thank you. I bought my turkey kind of late which was last night and so I was wondering -- I left it out on the countertop last night to try to thaw. I was wondering if that is not a good thing to do if I should thought it in the refrigerator or do something else. The best thing to do when you are buying a Turkey is to buy it a few days ahead of time so you have a few ways to defrosted. In your refrigerator or in cold water. If using cold water it is about 30 minutes per pound which is what it equates to. Now you left it outside on the counter and I am not quite sure that it will be really good. I would say you may want to go to the store and buy a fresh turkey because you never know. I do not want your family to be ill on this beautiful celebration. It is not that expensive so I would say just go ahead and buy a freshman. I know they have some fresh ones available. I was at whole foods this morning and those guys had some fresh ones there. That would be an example of where you can buy them. Thank you very much. Happy Thanksgiving. Judy is calling from Encinitas. Welcome to the program what is your question? My question is about gravy. I have a Grady situation. It had no flavor last year and it is because I cannot rely on having any drippings. My husband cooks the turkey on the grill. For the last two years he has managed to set the drippings on fire. I need to make the gravy today. I see. This is a little bit of a challenge. My recommendation would be to do the following. Make a Roux. That is made with flour and butter. You cook it until it is starting to brown a little bit. Then you add your vegetables and picket a little bit longer than you add your wine so if you want good flavor a Madera are my sod would be just fine. Then you add some chicken stock. By some roasted chicken stock if you can find it otherwise just use regular chicken stock. Cook it slowly for about one hour and then I would definitely add some aromatics so if you have some sage and Thyme in the garden and then you cook it and reduce it and finish it with a little bit of utter -- butter and then if you can get some drippings just in case that he did not spill the drippings all over the place put some and that Grady and it would be good. The other thing that you can do is try to get the Gravy before he moves the turkey around. With a baster for example and you would be able to fortify. So it is all about being ahead of the game on that one. Also what you can do is when you bring it up to temperature tomorrow and bring it up to a simmer tomorrow you can add a little bit more if you lose Madera or masala at a little bit to give it a really nice flavor and because the alcohol will be cooked the whole family can have fun. Thank you so much for the question. Now Judy is going to make this gravy today. What should cooks be doing today? You should be doing your stuffing and should be already prepared. I like to cook my stuffing outside the bird but if you like to cook it inside the bird you can prepare it and bake it tomorrow. I want my cranberry sauce done I will have already bought my root vegetable, my potatoes, I will have my wine of course, and pretty much everything. You have to make a list and if you make a list you do not stress out. All of the store will be very busy today. Everybody wants to go shopping. You will be in line you -- losing a lot of time instead of having fun cooking in the kitchen. Exactly getting already and making your plan and your stuffing and all of that. So stuffing and cranberry sauce maybe some Gravy. Do not cook the mashed potatoes today. Do not rest the vegetables today but you can peel and slice and dice and you put this back in the refrigerator and tomorrow the kitchen will have a party. All of the aroma and sent and everything will make the house happy. When the family and friends come in it will be a true celebration. 1-888-895-5727 is the number. I am Maureen Cavanaugh and I am here with chef Bernard taking your questions about turkeys. It is turkey talk. Now we go to Derek downtown. What is your question? Hello I am cooking a kosher turkey this year and it's the first time I have made one. I was wondering if I can get some tips for cooking it on the grill. It depends what grill we will be using. Will you be using a charcoal grill or gas? Ask -- gas grill. I brine my turkey today -- you can brine or do a dry rub. When you grill doing a dry rub is the great way to do it. I will do my dry rub already will start it today and then the rubble will already penetrate and when he cook it tomorrow it will be really awesome. So on the gas grill you want to make sure that all of your rocks are really well distributed make sure that your burners are nice and clean. You want to preheat the burner for about 10 to 15 minutes until it's about 350 degrees and then he will be able to start cooking. Does that make a difference if it is a kosher turkey? That's what he wanted to know. It will not make a difference whatsoever. The kosher turkey is going to be really awesome. That will taste really delicious. The way that they farm raise the turkeys is a little bit different. I would use a little bit of aromatics. If you have some woodchips you can put some on the side so as you are cooking it will give you a little smoke. You can put some fresh herbs such as Thyme. I would not do Rosemary and has a tendency to take over the whole party. I would do Thyme and some beautiful sage for example. These would work really well. There's another thing that I do once in a while is take some fennel bulb. You take a fennel bulb and cut in half. You really at the same time you are grilling your turkey. You can eat the bulb but it gives a really nice aromatic flavor which is really awesome as well. Thank you Derek for your call. Just remind us because I know that there are a lot of people with this question on their minds? How long does it taste -- take to roasted turkey? The first thing you should do is preheat your oven to 325 or 350 degrees. Member that your oven is different than mine because they are not calibrated the same. They should be but they are not. I would say 15 minutes per pound is pretty much what you have to put together and you have to basted every 20 minutes. You have to cook it until the thigh reaches 165 degrees. So it will be cooked properly but you have to based a lot. We will be talking a lot about everything. You are listening to KPBS Midday Edition our annual Turkey talk with chef Bernard. Call us with your questions about Thanksgiving dinner side dishes dessert holiday entertaining. He is answering everything today. Our number 1-888-895-5727 we will be back right after the break. This is KPBS Midday Edition I am Maureen Cavanaugh. I am back with Chef Bernard Guillas . We are taking questions about everything having to do with Thanksgiving dinner. It is our annual Turkey talk. Collis at 1-888-895-5727. I think we have to go right to the funds there are a lot of people that want to talk to you. Mary is calling from San Diego. What is your question? I cooked my turkey with an electric roaster. It seems like for a 21 pound turkey approximately it always gets done way faster than it is supposed to and I have it around 350 on the temperature and then when I stick the firm -- the thermometer in the turkey it is way above 165 and it is done in like three hours or something like that. Is there anything I should be doing differently. Should I have a lower temperature? What you should do is to maybe take the temperature to 325. The important thing is that even if the guidelines are about 50 minutes for every pound, what you want to do is just after a couple of hours you should start to take the temperature really. You want it to read about 165 degrees. If it goes over that it will be overcooked. If you based it on a regular basis you would be able to know that it is done. Will cook a little bit faster in a roaster. Let me talk about basting for a minute. How often should you Baste and what are you basting with? You have to based -- Baste every 20 minutes. What you want to do is Baste with the butter -- the way that I cooked the turkey is I lather the turkey with butter before I put it in the oven. Are you have all that better in the pan and then you have the drippings. So you take this and then with a spoon or a baster you just based -- Baste your turkey every 20 minutes. If you do so you will have a better quest and he will have a moister turkey and definitely much more flavor so it is so much better to do it that way. It is important to really keep on basting on a regular basis. Let's go to Rosie in San Marcus. I am going to be making two turkeys for Thanksgiving rather than one huge one. I was wondering -- I was thinking maybe I would roast one today and then carve it and put it on the platter and then try to bring it up to temperature slowly and gently tomorrow but I don't know if the turkey will dry out if I do that. I'm just not sure if it is a good way to go. I just thought it would be efficient. You can do it that way and if you do do it that way the great thing about it is that you would bone the turkey said he would use the bones to make a great gravy for tomorrow on Thanksgiving. You will have your gravy done and you will already have one turkey cooked. The best thing to do to reheat it is to make sure that you are slicing your turkey already and you put it into a half sheet pan where you can reheat. Put a little bit of some chicken stock or broth if you have and you cover it -- this is the trick. You cover it with lettuce leaves so there's a leaf of lettuce right on top. I use romaine lettuce. Remain has a lot of moisture. When you reheat it does not dry out the turkey. It's a brilliant way to do it. You just mentioned -- actually a collar just mentioned presentation. Presentation is everything. Talk about the right way to present turkey platter. First of all make sure that your turkey is really sexy. It means that you wanted nice and roasted. Nice and brown not dark. By basting on a regular basis you will have a beautiful turkey. You have to have a large platter and the way I like to do it is I rest my vegetable separately so I will have my turkey which is the main course and around that I will have the supporting cast which is all the vegetables that I put around. And then you have a gooseneck with your gravy on the side and a nice side dish with the mashed potatoes and that is the way that we do it at my house. We do -- we don't have Thanksgiving turkey but you said turkey for Christmas. So you have the presentation and everybody is happy. But here now with technology everybody takes their little sulfone and take pictures because that is the way they will remember. A long time ago around the table with my family we would take the camera and everybody take a picture. Because you have such a sexy turkey. It is really important. When you cook a turkey this is love. It is a labor of love it's not like put a turkey in the oven and who cares. We do it for our family and friends it is a special day and we look forward to it between the stuffing and the vegetables and the gravy and a pumpkin pie and everything else that you have that day it is special. It is family time and this is where we bring everybody together. 1-888-895-5727 is the number to call . Let's go to John in San Diego. What is your question? Hello happy Thanksgiving. Happy Thanksgiving. My question is about mashed potatoes? I have family members that love creamy mashed potatoes. And I think that is discussion -- disgusting. I like my mashed potatoes fluffy. Every year it is whether having the lumpy or the creamy and nobody seems to win because it usually is creamy. Does the chef have any suggestions on what is the right kind of mashed potatoes and how to maybe set up a situation where everybody can be happy with just one dish of mashed potatoes. I will bring the whole family together with this recipe. The first thing you need to do is to use the right potatoes. The best years are the simple russet potatoes they are not gummy and they cook very well. When you cook your potatoes and you peel them and you start cooking them use cold water do not use hot water. You bring it to a boil and then you cook it and reduce it to a simmer you don't overcook them. If you overcook them they will absorb the water and then it does not work well because they become really pasty and lumpy at the same time and then you have to pass it through a ricer. If you put it through a ricer they will be really smooth. And then you have to add the right ingredients. Crème fraîche marscapone and butter. If you like it with fresh herbs you can put some herbs you can put some horseradish but the bottom line is when you are making a mashed potato don't overwork them because this is where they taste gummy and they don't really taste good. If you follow my recipe your family will be happy forever. Nobody will have another argument about the mashed potatoes. 1-888-895-5727 is the number for turkey talk. You know chef we had a feature on midday edition about a couple in Spring Valley celebrating their first Thanksgiving as new US citizens. They are very excited about it but they do not like turkey. They will be celebrating with a chicken dish from their original country. What are some hardy alternatives to Turkey if you don't like turkey for Thanksgiving. I came here about 30 -- 30 years ago so it's my home now and I would like to welcome that couple to the -- to the US. You can cook a chicken exactly the same way as the turkey. A fantastic great way to do it. I would say a rib roast is awesome. It cooks very slowly as well and you make sure that you have the right quality. Have to go for a choice of prime when it comes to beast -- beef. I love him. The way I do the ham is I marinated overnight with pineapple juice and a little bit of soy so when it cooks any of it it becomes lacquered and the kids all fight to get the first crust because it is sweet and salty. Kids will love it and there are people that are vegetarians who like to celebrate Thanksgiving. So you have tofu turkey. Guess what. I tried it and I loved it but I give it a massage. So I Brian and I injected and a little bit of apple cider. So when it cooks you have all of that flavor and a little bit of cinnamon. It is just exactly the same as a regular turkey except that it is tofu. Also vegetables. Today is the day to go to the farmers market. See if there are a local farmers market where you are and then he could buy some beautiful route -- vegetables that are in season right now. It really is awesome. When it comes to another protein that is actually interesting you can do Rizzo toe or fire oh from the old country. And everybody should celebrate Thanksgiving whether test no matter what you eat. It's family. Let's take another call. Alice is calling from Mount Helix. What is your question? I am making my two stuffings today so the flavors can blend. The question is do I add the broth to the stuffing today or will that oversaturated and my second part of the question is when I bake it do I bake it covered or uncovered? First my recommendation will be to get the stuffing Reading and tomorrow you have to do the broth. It will be much better. You cover it with plastic wrap and then foil. It's very important that you don't put the foil right away because somehow the foil will dissolve as you are cooking as it touches the stuffing. You put the plastic or the foil and the last 15 minutes you just remove the plastic and the foil and then he put a little bit of butter on top. Just thought it was a little bit. It will create a really nice question that's the way I do it as well. This is a really great question because by preparing your stuffing today and doing the finishing touch tomorrow it is the perfect recipe for a great Thanksgiving. Thank you for that call. I think everybody knows that when you cook meat it needs to rest for a while before he served. Is that the same for turkey? Does it need to rest when you get it out of the oven? Yes it needs to rest for about 20 to 30 minutes. Turkey is very big. You have a 20 pound turkey most people do about 18 to 20 pound per -- turkey. Four and 18 to 20 pound turkey when it goes to 165 degrees in the part of the thigh it becomes almost must -- almost like an oven. You have the bone structure which will retain the heat. The heat will continue to penetrate and if he is. Test diffuse. If you cook it to 100 60 degrees it will go to 180 degrees. All the juices really spread all throughout the turkey. If you slice it it will be nice and moist. If you take it out of the oven and you slice it you will lose a lot of that juice and water and the flesh will start to drip. It is very important that you do so. 1-888-895-5727 . We have a question from Don from the Mesa he called and asked -- he is using a convection oven. Any special tips? Cook at 325 degrees. Do not go to 350 it will dry out. You need to baste every 10 or 15 minutes instead of 20 minutes and most likely it will shorten the cooking time by I would say -- if it is an 18 to 20 pound turkey most likely 45 minutes. But still you have to let it rest. What is really great about a convection oven is if you are using a lot of aromatics they really flow and travel through out the time that the bird is to -- cooking so I can set a really nice flavor. The thing you should do is stuff the cavity of the bird with aromatics. Some people like stuffing but I like aromatics better. This is for anyway you cook up. Celery, onion, carrots, Thyme, Sage, I like my garlic. That I put a little bit of butter in there as well. It is going to melt and then as you tilt a little bit the roasting pan that juice the drippings will go into the p.m. and then you use it to baste which is really awesome. That is a great way to do it. We did not talk about deep-fried turkey but I would love to because I discovered as a Frenchman when I immigrated into this beautiful country 30 years ago that we could deep fry turkey as a chef. I was really puzzled. I was like how is it going to come out and be moist? It does not make sense. Guess what. It works fantastic. There are a couple tips that you have to remember. Make sure that you use a turkey fryer or a 30 court stockpot. You have to make sure that you have a lot of space with the turkey to be able to cook properly. You bring the oil to 250 degrees but make sure that the turkey is fully defrosted and very dry because otherwise it will create some bubbling and the bubbling means that it goes into the oil and the oil goes over the pot and then we have a fire. You have to be very careful but the cool thing about it when it cooks it is three minutes per pound. Three minutes per pound so what you do is you put your turkey at 250 degrees you raise the heat to 350 degrees. The reason you do not want to put it at 350 is because it has a tendency to bubble and go over. You cook it at three minutes per pound and then he removed it and when the breast reaches 155 degrees. So it's a little different way to cook it than the other one at what you have to do is let it rest for a minimum 30 minutes. We will continue to take your calls at 1-888-895-5727 this is our annual Turkey talk with Chuck Bernard. Colors your question. We will move on to desserts and a little bit more about entertaining. If you have questions keep them coming. 1-888-895-5727 this is KPBS Midday Edition. This is KPBS Midday Edition I am Maureen Cavanaugh here with Chef Bernard Guillas . He has taken your calls on how to prepare Thanksgiving dinner and have a wonderful loving holiday. Our number is 1-888-895-5727. I'm going to go right back to the phones there are a cause -- couple questions about Brian. Melissa is calling from San Diego. What is your question Hello so I have never used a Brine before. This is my second turkey and I love a robust and flavorful moist turkey. What would you recommend? I would recommend that you do it with apple cider. I have a recipe for you. It is three cups of sea salt one cup of maple syrup, I use 10 cups of apple cider but do not use Martinelli. Use a hard apple cider. You do not want that extra sugar. Then we add some bay leaves and some Thyme. Makes everything together make sure that your turkey is submerged and then cover it and by tomorrow you just have to dry it and put it in the oven and it is going to be awesome. Thank you for that call. 1-888-895-5727 I want to move on if I can to the meal itself. What kind of wine do you service turkey? The important thing if we could just go to wind because in France what we do with the family coming in and we have little munchies. We have munchies and an apple teeth. So that's what you have to kind of plan into the gathering. What would you serve your friends when we go through the door. Not too much cheese but three different kinds.. Denny have some crackers and some grapes and maybe some fig jam or something like this. A few things to nibble on and I say crudités because I like to go to the farmers market and then you have Mark tells for the kids in the Monica's -- and then when it comes to this turkey itself I like enough a nice Pinot Noir I would not go for a very had -- heavy wind but that would not be the case. And a wine that works well is rose. It is a light flesh and it works very well with rose. Sometimes Pinot Noir can have a little too much acid. So it is nice and round and he can really play with -- a lot of people in this country and I love them because most of them are my friends but have a beer. They just have a beer. You don't have one. They have a lot of beer. Remember that here in this city we are the beer capital so you should go to get some really cool beer as well. So some people of wine and some people it here some people like cocktails but you have to drink responsibly. It is family and you have a little bit of a drink and it is with your meal. 1-888-895-5727 -- once again 1-888-895-5727 it is Turkey talk here on KPBS Midday Edition. Earlier you were talking about the kind of pumpkin cheesecake that you will be serving this year. What are other kinds of suggestions for desserts because everybody is so full and you like to round out the meal with a dessert. There are a few things that you can do. If you want to stay really classic instead of pumpkin you can ask Abuja which is sweeter and is really delicious. You can eat sweet potatoes and I like Japanese sweet potatoes you have a purple pie and the thing that you want to remember is cut down on the amount of serve -- sugar that you are using in your pies and or desserts. You can have a nice apple tart for apple turnover are caramelized apple upside down. So we will do an Apple preserve cherry cobbler with an ice cream on top anemic individuals. When you make individual it is your flavor and recipe that you cater to everyone -- Monique is calling from San Diego. What is your question? I would like to find out what chef Bernard thinks about using the bags -- the cooking bags for cooking turkey. They are really popular. It is very popular because it browns the turkey really well and it is really contained when it comes to cooking a turkey and it is full press desk proof. You know it is missing? The beautiful aroma in my kitchen and my home. This is what's missing. For me it is really celebrating the gathering of friends and family and celebrating the harvest It does not hurt the turkey but it hurts the atmosphere. It is a Safeway. To cook it. They take it out and my friends at the time ticket out and I said unbelievable. Cooks perfectly with a nice color Let's go to Elisa and point Loma. What is your question? I would like to know what is a great way to prepare turnips for Thanksgiving? That is a classic. That is what my grandmother went to There are a couple ways to do it. My grandma used to roast them is a little bit of honey butter of course so honey, butter, Thyme, sesame seeds, cooking honesty -- sheet pan but roast them at no more than 350 degrees because they will caramelized too much. When we will finish them I will put a little bit of balsamic. You can put some toasted almonds with that. It is really good. It is really funny because turnips is one of those vegetables who is really not recognized as so delicious and it really is delicious Rutabagas as well. Rutabagas suites. It is very nutty and sweet. Those are the ugly vegetables that just have so much flavors. It is so delicious. I cannot let you go before we talk about leftovers because first of all I want to talk about getting the food off the table for Thanksgiving. How important is it to get the food off the table and into the refrigerated as soon as possible? It has to be done as soon as possible. When everybody is done the Turkey goes back in the kitchen and many bone the turkey. That is the way you do it. You bone the turkey. With the turkey bones you make a turkey stock or turkey soup. And with the me what I do is I keep everything to make a pot pie. We can make a turkey pot pie or a shepherd by the day after if you have leftover breast you can do sandwiches -- a really nice sandwich with a slice of turkey. You have a little bit of lettuce and then he have your leftover cranberry sauce and it is really perfect. Are you make turkey tacos. I do that. Turkey tacos are so good. You can do so much and nothing should be wasted. This goes to that. We have a question from Facebook. I boil down the bones and use the leftover broth and turkey to make up is only. What is the best soup for leftover turkey? This is really a great way to do it. With the bones you make the broth and then you put new vegetables so you put leeks and carrots and onions and he can use that as a base coat that is really awesome. So there is maybe a little rain coming this weekend. That is just awesome. Nice warm soup for that. Let me try to get in one more call. Dave from San Marco's. Welcome to the program what is your question. Hello. I need some advice. A girlfriend of mine found out she can't have anything to do with milk but that means no butter, no milk, no cheese, no chocolate, no pie, no cake. What can I do for Thanksgiving? She should come in and have dinner with me at the Marine room. Here is the deal what you can do is when you're making a mess potato you can Anish the mashed potato with light extra-virgin olive oil. It is very good. When it comes to your stuffing you still can do pretty much everything you want there will be noble -- no milk or dairy. For cooking the turkey you will -- I would use grapeseed oil instead of butter and you are able to really still get a nice basting. The way you eat chocolate is you make a chocolate soufflé it is really easy to do. You need chocolate, eggs, sugar and a lot I love. It is super easy to do. Thank you and good luck. I want to and by asking you -- you will be working on thinks given won't you? It will be up 5 AM and I will get there but hey -- the buffet going and I will go to the shores and my chef will take care that when 960 reservations. We want you to enjoy and look at the waves and have a good time and my day will most likely be five all the way through about 7:00 We have a nice but bottle of champagne. I have been speaking with Chef Bernard Guillas . You will find several of his recipes on our website at Kpbs.org. Thank you so much. I want to thank everyone happy Thanksgiving and a wonderful holiday season.