Take a look at this beautiful pesto basted turkey! For my annual family "Thanksgiving in August" dinner ... which we had in September ... I prepared an Italian themed meal. This turkey is easy to make. Just stuff it with a bunch of fresh herbs ... Rosemary, basil, thyme and oregano. Follow the directions on the turkey wrapper ... I roasted mine at 325 degrees and basted it with homemade pesto for the last hour of baking. It was tender, juicy and had a nice hint of the fresh herbs. To see how to make pesto, check right here! I served the turkey with a really unique sauce ... That recipe is at the end of this post. Here's the rest of the menu!
For ease, I turned my ravioli into a baked dish ... For the recipe of my homemade red sauce, check here!
This beautiful green salad is made with baby kale that came from my CSA. I made an easy balsamic vinaigrette for the salad by combining equal parts of fig infused balsamic vinegar with olive oil ... Add about a teaspoon of sugar to a cup of dressing. When making a salad with pecans and dried cherries in it, I always toss the nuts and dried fruit in the dressing before I throw in the salad greens. I like for them to be coated ... I also added mozzarella pearls to this salad, but feta or bleu cheese is equally good!
Here is the beautiful sauce for the turkey. The recipe is so simple. You need about 2 cups of pan drippings to begin with. If you don't have that much, stir in some water or white wine to deglaze your roasting pan and make that much liquid. Stir in 1/4 cup of balsamic glaze ... not vinegar, but the reduced glaze which you can buy in most supermarkets ... and 2 Tablespoons of honey mustard. A little pepper and thicken it with a cornstarch slurry and you are all done!
If you'd like to see the tablescape for this special family meal, check this out!
I'll be sharing this with some of the parties on my sidebar, so make sure you click through to see the other posts!
