Leftover turkey and chips was a staple Christmas week meal when I was growing up. Mum’d always make the chips fresh, boiling them in hot Stork margarine. Whereas she’d usually serve us chips straight from the pan, one serving at a time, we’d sit down together to eat the Christmas leftover turkey with chips and she’d put a casserole dish in the oven and cook about three chip pans of chips, adding each to the casserole dish to keep warm until she’d filled the casserole dish and it could be put on the table!
It was never fancier than that. If you wanted more than leftover turkey and chips she’d butter some sliced white bread, again using Stork margarine (we grew up on that stuff!).
So, faced with leftover turkey, it made complete sense to me to use up some of the leftovers with some chips – but I used the microwave to cook this. I also had cranberry sauce – not something I’d bought/eaten before – so decided that’d be a great way to keep the turkey moist.
Ingredients:
- A couple of slices of leftover turkey
- A couple of teaspoons of cranberry sauce
- 250 grams of frozen oven chips
Method:
- Spread the frozen chips out in a wide microwave safe dish. Microwave the chips on high power (800 watts) for 3 minutes. Give the chips a toss to turn them over. Microwave the chips for a further 3 minutes, set them aside.
- Cover the turkey with cranberry sauce in a microwave safe dish.
Microwave the turkey on high power (800 watts) for 1 minute. Set it aside to “rest”. - Microwave the chips for a further 3 minutes, making a total of 9 minutes’ cooking time.
- Check the turkey is hot – microwave for another 1 minute if it’s not.
- Serve the hot leftover turkey and chips together on a plate!
… only another 3-4 portions of turkey to get through!
When reheating turkey just ensure it’s PIPING hot – you should be able to hear it sizzling throughout when you remove it from the microwave.
Freezing Turkey:
You can freeze turkey, but I try not to freeze food where possible. I try to use it up while it’s fresh – this prevents the freezer being filled with food that still needs “using up” as once it’s in there it’s easy to forget it and/or not fancy it any more!
There are no special instructions to freezing turkey, beyond the usual way of wrapping it well and putting it in there!