9:20 pm

That's when we finally sat down to our Christmas supper.

For turkey cooking time guidance, I checked my trusty Canadian Living Complete Cookbook and my Mom, too. Both provided times based on a stuffed 6.5 kg bird, about 3.5 hours at 325F. Our turkey was just 4.6 kg, so surely it would take no longer, right?

Wrong.

I got the stuffed critter in the oven at 3:12 pm. Five and a half hours (and a few incremental jumps in oven temperature) later, I hauled it out for the last time. I'd used one digital instant-read thermometer and one dial-type leave-in thermometer to monitor the bird's progress, and they were finally closing in on the magical 82C mark. The juices were running clear. The scent of roast turkey had finally permeated the house.


During the turkey's rest (nap?), the veggies (potatoes, yams, butternut squash, carrots, parsnips, and shallots) roasted, the white asparagus steamed, and I made a Hollandaise sauce and (yuck) gravy. The cranberry sauce I'd made earlier in the day. When Werner carved the turkey, we were reassured that the bugger was well and truly cooked (though not overcooked, which I would have expected after that long in the increasingly-hot oven.)

The meal was good, if far too late in the evening for our liking. By the time we'd finished eating, it seemed too late for dessert, and the Yule Log, which I'd struggled to finish on Christmas Eve, was left untouched.