Thanksgiving Turkey and Stuffing

I love holidays, and perhaps most of all Thanksgiving. I love it for the fact that you don't have to shop for any particular gifts or decorate in a particular way ( aka Christmas and Easter). There is no dreaded 'Thanksgiving office party'. There are no special, long and seemingly double church services ( aka Christmas and Easter). The food involves no raisins or candy peel, both of which I detest and are involved in Christmas Cake and Hot Cross Buns. The weather is pleasant with very little chance of snow, both a very real possibility with the C & E holidays. No dressing up, no itchy gift sweaters that you have to wear, or funny hats, or dreaded white shoes. No, as a matter of fact, you just have to show up and ready to eat. We eat our dinner on Sunday so that gives us a lazy Monday, good leftovers and a short work week. What a great Holiday! ( I also really like Boxing day, for much of the same reasons) I picked up a cookbook called 'Les recettes Perigourdines de Tante Celestine' recently in France. I think it could be actually a kind of French 'Little House on the Prairie' sort of cookbook. In it there is a recipe for 'Dinde farcie de Noel', or literally translated from my good friends at Babblefish as 'Turkey Stuffed with Christmas'. I was cooking a double turkey breast rather than the whole bird do I had to adapt it in a few places and here it is. 1 double turkey breast, ( its really just a turkey with all the parts cut off except for the breast) 1 or 2 thick slices of Pancetta ( or ham if you like) blanched 1 cup of pork stuffing 5-6 slices of double smoked bacon ( meat counter at Sobey's) 3 small onions 5 shallots 1 cup of port 2 eggs 1 cup of bread crumbs soaked in 1/2 cup of milk 1 jar of vacuum packed chestnuts ( 250 gm which I bought at Dominion of all places) 2 tablespoons of duck fat ( in a pinch you could use butter) two chicken livers sliced 3 or four truffles (I used Valette extra choice #1 which were from France, you can get French truffles in Canada or send a child to university for about the same price, just kidding) Soak the turkey breast overnight in the fridge in a pot of water with about 1/2 cup of salt. Soak the truffles and chicken liver in the port for 1 hour. Preheat oven to 400 degrees Chop the blanched pancetta, the onions and shallots. Heat 1 tablespoon of the duck fat in a pan and saute the onion, shallots and pancetta until translucent, about 15 minutes over medium heat. Add the pork stuffing, saute until cooked through. Add the chestnuts in the last 5 minutes and break them up a bit. Remove from heat Fish out the truffles from the port and carefully peel them into the frying pan, put the peeled truffles aside. Mix in the drained livers reserving the soaking liquid. Mix in the bread crumbs. Crack in the eggs and mix. Bring the turkey to room temperature, pat dry inside and out, salt. With the breast side down, mound in the stuffing, and cover with the bacon slices, fill the neck cavity with stuffing and either truss the bird with kitchen string or turkey pins or a combination of both. Flip the bird breast side up and place snug fitting roasting pan, don't worry if a bit of stuffing rolls out this is after all home cooked food. The bacon should act as a band-aid and keep the stuffing in. Thinly slice two of the truffles and pop under the skin ('the husband' , scarfed these up later, as he carved the turkey thinking that it was a special chef's treat, not so!). Liberally grease the skin with the remaining fat. Put the turkey into the preheated oven for 1/2 hour at 400 then reduce the heat to 375 until the juices run clear or the internal temp reaches 185 on a meat thermometer. Remove the bird from the oven and let rest tented for about 20 minutes to 1/2 hour. Drain any pan juices, the reserved port marinade, slice the 1 or 2 remaining truffles and reduce in a saucepan. Add turkey stock and thicken with a bit of butter and flour for a pan gravy if desired. I served with bread, greenbeans with 'Herb's de Provence', mashed potatoes, green salad with a shallot vinaigrette and cranberries. For desert was my adaption of Nigella Lawson's 'Massacre in a Snowstorm' (that is a whole blog in itself) . Today I lazed about eating leftovers and reading 'On the Rue Tatin' by Susan Loomis, dreaming of France. Inspired, I looked up houses for sale in France on the internet, 'the husband' is now ignoring me. Why? The ones I showed him and that we could afford are somewhere between, 'a fixer upper' and 'condemned'. Actually much closer to the latter. Is it my fault that 'the husband' is handy? He just needs to have a bit of faith, and cash! Bon Appetite and Happy Thanksgiving