Christmas Saver…

There’s no two ways about it – Christmas is expensive.  When I used to raise turkeys even the smaller ones would sell for £60 or more.  Add to that in 2022, rising input costs for producers and the spectre of avian flu wiping out many UK flocks – rest assured buying a decent local turkey this year is not going to be a cheap date!

There are of course cheaper alternatives, frozen birds prepared & preserved during the course of the year, imported birds – many a table will be graced with an Italian turkey this year I am sure.

However what if you’re on a budget but you still want to support local farmers and growers?  Can you still create a locally sourced Christmas centre piece for your table and feed 6 hungry adults a turkey dinner for under £20?  I think you can and it’s not that hard either…

Each year many consumers shun the humble turkey leg, with many homes prefering a crown or boned and rolled breast.  For the big processors the legs will be minced and sold in supermarkets.  For smaller farms they’ll end up with a glut to sell during the course of the year.

I managed to lay my hands on a whopping fresh turkey leg from Etherley Farm, just outside Dorking.  I coupled it with sausage meat and streaky bacon from my good friend Tim McEntire of Dorking Bred, who rears the most fantastic Gloucester Old Spot Pork close to us.

Turkey legs are simple to bone out, just follow the bone on the flesh side of the leg working round the bone with a small sharp knife.  My only note of caution would be to make sure you get all the little tendons and sinew out of the foot end of the leg, these are hard thin bone like pieces that need to be cut out as otherwise you won’t get a clean carved slice when it’s all cooked.

Then I took around 250g of Tim’s plain sausage meat, I put a tablespoon of cranberry sauce, the zest of one orange and a little handful of crushed pistachio nuts and mixed them into the sausage meat.

I Placed the ball of sausage meat squarely into the centre of the leg and folded the leg meat in around it.  The I tied it neatly round the middle into a little parcel.  I used some of Tim’s dry cured streaky bacon to lattice the top of the turkey leg.  Turkey is tremendously lean, the bacon fat helps to keep the meat moist when it’s cooking – plus when it all crisps up it’s seriously moreish too!

I tied the parcel up tight with string 6 times across it, in a start formation.  If you can use a butchers knot, if not a good double bow will suffice.

I let the whole thing set up overnight in the fridge.  To cook we heated the oven to 180c, put a little butter and half a cup of water onto the turkey, wrapped it in foil and cooked it for one hour.  Then I removed the foil and cooked it for a further hour and ten minutes.  I use a temperature probe when I cook any meats, for Turkey like this get the core temp to around 69c, then take it out of the oven, wrap it up tight in food wrap or foil and the latent heat in the turkey will take the temp over 70c, ensuring it’s totally cooked but not dried out.

Once rested and at temperature, slice and serve.  If you are really keen you can use the discarded bone to make a turkey stock for your gravy.

The bacon and sausage meat came in at well under a tenner, plus a few pounds for the cranberry, orange zest and nuts, brings this Christmas turkey special in at under £20.  A lot cheaper than a whole free-range bird and all locally sourced too. If you’re from my neck of the woods try The Food Float as a fabulous source of local Surrey produce, they sell Tim’s pork as well as poultry from Etherley too.

Skip to our Instagram page to see our reel of how we made it.