Turkey Breast (Buche de Noel)

Difficulty:
1/5

Servings: 6

Ease of Preparation: Medium

This recipe is part of the One BIG Holiday Recipe

Ingredients:

Turkey Stuffing:

  • ½ pound (227 g) goat’s cheese (chèvre/fresh)
  • ½ cup (120 ml) pumpkin seeds
  • 1 yellow onion, cut into ¼ inch (6 mm) dice
  • 1 tablespoon (15 ml) butter
  • 1 tablespoon (15 ml) chopped garlic
  • Salt and pepper
  • 3/4-pound (300 g) spinach
  • ½ cup (60 ml) dried cranberries
  • 1-2 eggs

Turkey Roast:

  • 1 whole fresh 2-3-pound (1-1.5-kg) turkey breast
  • Turkey Stuffing
  • Salt and pepper

Velouté:

  • 3 cups (710 ml) light turkey broth (or chicken/veg)
  • 1 cup (240 ml) whipping cream
  • ½ yellow onion
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 1 clove
  • 4 stems summer savoury (no leaves)
  • ½ cup (120 ml) butter
  • ½ cup (120 ml) all-purpose flour
  • Salt and white pepper

To Serve:

  • 4 tablespoons (60 ml) vegetable oil
  • 2 ounces (57 g) butter
  • Turkey Roast
  • Salt and pepper
  • Turkey Velouté

 

Special equipment:

Precision cooker/tub or large pot, large (2 gallon/8 L) zip-top bag, clip

Kitchen twine

 

Method:

Prepare a water bath for sous-vide cooking: choose a spot that will not be in your way for the remainder of the cooking process. Use a large pot or rigid tub for your water bath, fill it with water and clip a Sous-Vide Precision Cooker to the side, making sure the intake set below the water level. Set the cooker temperature to 140 F (60 C). NOTE: When filling with water, be careful not to overfill as the roast will raise the water level.

For the Turkey Stuffing:

Preheat the oven to 325 F (160 C).

Place a large pot of salted water on to boil for the spinach.

Pull goat’s cheese to room temperature to soften.

Toast pumpkin seeds in the oven for 8 minutes, until aromatic and just starting to colour. Set aside and cool completely.

Heat butter in a sauté pan over medium heat. Add the chopped onion and chopped garlic. Season with salt and pepper.

Sweat the onions and garlic for 4-5 minutes until just soft and translucent. Transfer to a plate and let cool completely.

Prepare a bowl of ice water, place near the pot of boiling water on the stove.

Blanch the spinach: plunge into the boiling salted water for 30 seconds, use a slotted spoon or wire mesh strainer to immediately transfer to ice water to stop the cooking.

When cool, strain out the spinach squeeze until completely dry.

Chop the squeezed-out spinach into small bits.

In a medium bowl combine the spinach, room temperature goat’s cheese, the cooled, cooked onion-garlic mixture, toasted pumpkin seeds, dried cranberries, and egg. Fold all together until fairly uniform.

For the Turkey Roast:

Lay out turkey breast, trim away any fat and silver skin. Remove the tender, if attached, and reserve for another use.

Choose a long edge of the breast, then, using a long sharp knife, make a long cut along the edge, horizontal to the board, at a depth of about 1-2 inches (2.5-5 cm). Imagine that you are unrolling the meat like a scroll, and keep making cuts, following the first cut, and keeping the same depth, until the breast is completely ‘unrolled’, leaving a wide, flat thin piece of meat (about 12-inches/30 cm square) on your cutting board.

Lay a piece of plastic wrap over the butterflied meat and use a meat mallet (or the back of a small pan) to pound out the meat to an even layer.

Season with salt and pepper.

Add the Turkey Stuffing over the breast in a neat, even layer. Leaving space at the edges.

Starting along one side, carefully roll the turkey in a single, long log.

Cut 5-7 lengths of kitchen twine that are long enough to reach around the turkey roll.

Tie the roll with the lengths of twine at even intervals, securing the shape. Trim away excess twine.

Transfer the roast to a large zip-top plastic bag.

Use ‘water displacement’ to remove air before sealing the bag: in other words, lower the open bag with the roast into the prepared water bath, leaving the bag’s opening above the waterline. When the meat is below the water, the pressure from the water will naturally push the air up and out of the bag. Seal the bag while the roast is still submerged, and the opening is not. Do not allow any of the water to get into the bag.

Clip the bag to the side of the water bath to keep it from clogging the intake on the precision cooker.

Cook for 4 hours, then pull and rest, in the bag, for at least 20 minutes.

For the Velouté:

In a medium saucepan, combine prepared turkey (or light chicken) stock, whipping cream, stems savoury, onion, bay leaf, and clove. Spear the bay leaf to the onion with the clove.

Bring to a simmer, reduce heat to low and let simmer for 20 minutes.

After twenty minutes, strain the simmering stock-cream mixture into a bowl, reserving the liquid and discarding the solids.

Return the liquid to the saucepan and return to the heat, bring to a simmer.

In a sauté pan over medium heat, melt butter. When just melted, whisk in flour. Whisk for one minute until uniform and bubbling at the sides, do not brown.

Whisk the butter-flour mixture into the simmering broth-cream mixture and continue whisking until the sauce is smooth and slightly thickened. Reduce heat.

Taste and season with salt and white pepper. Keep warm until needed (or cool and reheat).

To Serve:

Heat vegetable oil in a large skillet over medium heat.

Remove the turkey roast from the bag and pat dry. Season with salt and pepper,

When the oil is shimmering, add the turkey roast and sear, rotating, 1-2 minutes per side.

When evenly seared, add the butter and use it to baste the roast through a second rotation.

When ready, set aside to rest, covered.

When rested, slice the turkey into neat rounds.

Ladle Velouté onto a platter. Place slices neatly over the sauce.

Serve immediately.