Issue #78: Going Cold Turkey

My Approach to Leftovers, Two Sichuan Recipes for the Day After Thanksgiving

Nov 23, 2022

Wishing all of my American subscribers a very happy Thanksgiving. And happy cooking to all. —Mitchell

Seems hard to believe Thanksgiving is upon us. As I noted in the last issue, I’m not going to give you a bunch of recipes for tomorrow. For one thing, it’s probably too late to change your menu. Or rather, it ought to be. Also, you don’t want to be going into a grocery store the evening before Thanksgiving. And, if our Thanksgiving is any indication, nobody but the cook really wants new recipes for the holiday, anyway. Everyone is expecting to eat the same things they eat every year.

The Maine event. The menu doesn’t change much from year to year.

When I first met Nate, we had two Thanksgivings each year. The actual holiday was a given, of course. But a couple of weeks before that we hosted friends for what Nate called his “Thanksgiving Dry Run.” This tradition began the first time he invited his family from Alabama for Thanksgiving at his place in New York. Nate wanted to try making all the family recipes at least once before he served them. He invited his friends to the dry run and it became a tradition in and of itself.

Two smaller birds are better than one large one, plus there are bound to be more leftovers.

The thing is, two Thanksgivings meant we cooked and ate the same menu twice, had the same leftovers twice. There were lots of leftovers to find a use for. For the first couple of years after I came along, I wanted to change the menu up a little. But to do so I had to make all the original recipes, and then make new things on top of that. Eventually, I weaned Nate off of Stovetop Stuffing. But even now that we have Thanksgiving just once every year with friends in Maine, there’s not a lot of wiggle room on the menu.

Leftovers are where the Thanksgiving creativity begins.

My usual approach to leftovers is to turn them into something completely different, unrecognizable, a dish you might have made from scratch on its own. I confess to sometimes liking leftovers better than the original. I realize that around Thanksgiving, for many, one of the traditions is eating leftovers just as they are, cold from the fridge. I have partaken in this tradition, sometimes even without a plate.

Turkey Hash with Poached Eggs, one of our traditions on the Sunday after Thanksgiving.

In Issue #75, I shared a recipe for hash, a great use of leftover turkey that is a mainstay for Sunday brunch after our Thanksgiving feast. (See Issue #12 for how to poach the eggs.)

Today I offer you two of my favorite leftover turkey recipes, both from the Sichuan tradition, both based on recipes from Fuchsia Dunlop, the go-to source of Sichuan cooking advice for most of the English-speaking world. (Do they have Thanksgiving in Chengdu, I wonder?)

You could just spoon the Fish Fragrant Sauce over this platter of turkey to spice things up at Thanksgiving. But better to wait for the leftovers so the family doesn’t revolt.

The first, a spicy, pickled chili sauce curiously known as “Fish Fragrant Sauce,” is traditionally served over cold, poached chicken or rabbit, or the same flavors are combined in hot dishes, such as eggplant. There is no fish in it. It turns anything that it’s spooned over into a spicy, ma-la treat. Dunlop’s genius innovation was to use the common Indonesian fermented chili paste known as sambal oelek to replace the harder-to-find pickled Sichuan chilies that are traditional. Make this sauce, spoon it over leftover cold turkey, and you won’t stop there.

RECIPE: Fuchsia Dunlop’s Fish Fragrant Sauce for Cold Turkey

(Makes about 3/4 cup, enough to dress 10 to 12 ounces cooked meat)

2 teaspoons sugar
2 teaspoons Chinese black vinegar (Chinkiang)
1 tablespoon light soy sauce
2 tabelspoons stock or water
4 tablespoon peanut oil
4 tablespoons sambal oelek (Indonesian fermented chili paste)
1 tablespoon finely chopped ginger
1 ½ tablespoons minced garlic
3 tablespoons scallion greens, finely chopped
1 teaspoon toasted sesame oil

In a small bowl, combine the sugar, vinegar, soy sauce, and stock. In a small pan, heat the peanut oil over medium heat. Add the sambal oelek, watch for splatters, and cook until the oil takes on the red color. Scrape this all into the original bowl and mix well. Add the ginger, garlic, scallion greens, and sesame oil. Spoon this over slices of cold turkey.

The second dish has a similar Sichuan flavor profile, but is more like a salad main made with shredded turkey. It is a play on Bang! Bang! Chicken, whose onomatopoetic name comes from the sound of the banging action used to break up the meat into shreds. It works perfectly with cold turkey

RECIPE: Bang! Bang! Turkey

14 ounces cold turkey, pulled apart into shreds
4 scallions, white parts only, thinly sliced
½ cucumber, peeled, seeded, and julienned
1 cup other vegetables, such as julienned carrot, bean sprouts, or shredded daikon radish, or a combination
3 tablespoons roasted peanuts, chopped
2 teaspoon toasted sesame seeds
Handful cilantro leaves
2 tablespoons toasted Chinese sesame paste
2 tablespoons cold water
½ teaspoon salt
1 ½ teaspoons sugar
2 tablespoons light soy sauce
1 ½ teaspoons Chinese black vinegar (Chinkiang)
½ teaspoon ground toasted Sichuan peppercorn, or 1 to 2 teaspoon Sichuan peppercorn oil
4 tablespoons chili oil plus 1 to 2 tablespoons sediment
2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil
Scallion greens, finely chopped

In a large bowl, combine the shredded turkey, scallions, cucumber, other vegetable(s), all but a teaspoon of the peanuts, and all but 1/4 teaspoon of sesame seeds. In a small bowl, make the dressing by whisking together the sesame paste and cold water until blended. Add the salt, sugar, soy sauce, vinegar, Sichuan peppercorn, chili oil and sesame oil, and mix well. Pour the dressing into the bowl with the turkey and other vegetables, and toss well. Serve on a large platter and garnish with the reserved peanuts, sesame seed, and scallion greens.

Kitchen Sense

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