In addition to, you know, eating nothing but turkey and stuffing for like a week, we had a few other leftovers to contend with in terms of ingredients aftermath. I had asked Grant to pick up buttermilk even though I don’t think I actually used it for any of my recipes, and I also had a bunch of chives, a tub of sour cream, various veggies and of course a giant turkey carcass. What to do?
One of the obvious answers is “make buttermilk chive biscuits,” but that just seemed too easy. Besides, we have loads of leftover pumpkin cheesecake which I actually don’t much care for, and I was jealous of Grant eating dessert without me. (And while I usually just eat delicious tangy cranberry sauce with a spoon, well… it’s almost all gone now.) So I wanted at least the buttermilk or sour cream to go towards something sweet.
I eventually settled on David Lebowitz’s recipe for Lemon-Buttermilk Sherbet, from The Perfect Scoop. I modified it slightly by straining out the lemon zest and whisking in a tiny bit of lemon curd from a nearly-empty jar, so I imagine my version is a tad richer and smoother than his.
There was some leftover gingersnap-pecan crust crumbles from my Thanksgiving pumpkin cheesecake that I had saved in the freezer, so I mashed those with some melted farmstead butter to make some little crust-cuplets. The combo, as I suspected, was lovely (though I think I might also try the sherbet with some cranberry sauce!).
I also made a proper stock out of my turkey carcass and remaining drippings, which eventually became a hearty turkey barley soup with carrots, onion, herbs (including chives), and spinach. This was even better with our short and heavy but delicious whole wheat homemade bread. And I have loads of stock and even a glaze to freeze and season my cooking for the next few months, yay! I’m glad I took the time to save the bones and everything after our meal. Leftover success!
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