Turkey Dinner at Kathy's; Roast Turkey, Stuffing, Orange Cranberries and Gingered Carrots

Who best to tell you how to cook a turkey? Why Butterball of course, and you can follow their instructions at How to Roast.

And starting in November, you can always call the Turkey Talk-Line Info at 1-800-BUTTERBALL or 1-800-288-8372. Open to residents of the United States and Canada.

I've included my recipes for my stuffing, cranberries and gingered carrots below. Keep in mind I do most of this by eye and not exactly sure on exact measurements, although any recipes you make should always be to your taste.

And I couldn't believe how hard my turkey stuffing recipe was to write out, it's amazing how we make certain things for years and never really pay attention to measurements and quantities, but think I have it down correctly LOL

Try my stuffing recipe the first time as I have written and then try it later to adjust the ingredients to your own taste and preferences.

I have tried other brands of packaged Turkey stuffing and didn't like them, so I only use the Kraft Stove Top brand. But use whatever your favourite is.

If you use more or less packages, depending on how many you are feeding, you then have to adjust the rest of the ingredients accordingly.

This is made by the grocery store bakery, they are cut up bread pieces, like tiny little crouton pieces. I use approximately a 1:3 ratio of the bread pieces to the Kraft Stove Top bread pieces.

The package our local store makes up is very reasonably priced and is a wonderful a mix of different bakery made breads; white, multi grain, rye, pumpernickel, sourdough etc) which adds again to the flavor.

If I can't find the bags of dried bread pieces, I will buy a selection of these breads on sale in the two day old bin and make them myself.

As we live in a small community and many of the things I like are not in stock all the time, I purchase special items such as my Uncle Ben's Classiques Brown & Wild Rice with Burgundy Wine Flavour in bulk as I never know if it will be there the next time! LOL

I was starting to get low in 2008 so added this to my shopping. Unable to find this in any of our stores, * gasp * it appears they don't carry this brand any more or at least sell it here! This is one product I will definitely miss.

I took a look over the varieties they have now, and if they don't have it in your area, the closest one appears to be Whole Grain and Wild Rice. Of course you can use your favorite rice, but using a mix of both brown and wild rice really does add a nice flavor and texture to the stuffing.

This is what makes any stuffing so flavorful. Don't use water or commercial stock, unless you absolutely have too, but if you do that's ok, it just won't taste as good. How rich and flavorful the stock is depends on the overall taste of how your stuffing will turn out. I prefer a more drier stuffing, so I tend to go on the low side of the liquid. I know a lot of people like moister stuffing, so add the amount of liquid to what your preferences are.

Tip - Most people make turkey stock using the parts left over (after cleaning the bones and meat from the turkey) and simmering them in water. I take these bones and left over parts and throw them back into the oven first, before I simmer them.

Bake at 325 degrees for 1-2 hours or until nicely browned.

By doing this one additional step, I find my turkey stock ends up far more flavorful!

I do this the night before only to reduce a couple of things on cooking day. If you want to do the almonds and pecans on the same day, that is fine.

Almonds

Melt approx 3/4 Becel margarine and 1/4 butter in a fry pan on the stove. This truly is a waste, as you throw out the melted mixture at the end, but you need a lot to do fry up the almonds nicely.

You may have to do in two batches, depending on the size of your fry pan.

Once margarine/butter mixture melted, add almond pieces.

Slowly and on a medium-low heat, continually turn over the almond pieces until browned. Be careful and watch closely, they burn easily.

Once browned, remove from pan and put onto paper towels to drain and wipe off melted margarine/butter. I continually keep putting on clean paper towels until they are relative clean of the melted butter mixture.

Lightly salt, and let sit until completely cool.

Keep them spread out, don't have the almonds all piled on each other or they don't get nice and crisp.

Once completely cooled, you can put into a bowl and cover.

This is not added to the stuffing mix at any stage. These are put on the table and added to the stuffing on the plate.

Pecans

Toast the pecan pieces in an oven or toaster oven and thoroughly cool - put aside until added to the stuffing mixture.

So far we have:

- a beautiful roast turkey
- with my orange cranberry sauce
- my fabulous turkey stuffing
- gingered carrots

And to finish off my delicious turkey dinner, I will also have:

- whipped mashed potatoes and homemade gravy
- baked sweet potato and apple with brown sugar
- young corn with butter and pepper
- fancy pickles
- fresh buns

And of course, Pumpkin Pie for Thanksgiving desert, no, I don't make this, who has time? One of the larger stores out of town has a fabulous bakery.