{"id":21,"date":"2026-02-22T22:38:37","date_gmt":"2026-02-22T22:38:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/recipes4thecook.com\/maple-roast-turkey-and-gravy"},"modified":"2026-02-22T22:38:37","modified_gmt":"2026-02-22T22:38:37","slug":"maple-roast-turkey-and-gravy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/recipes4thecook.com\/thanksgiving\/blog\/2026\/02\/22\/maple-roast-turkey-and-gravy\/","title":{"rendered":"Maple Roast Turkey and Gravy"},"content":{"rendered":"<p align=\"left\"><b><font face=\"comic sans ms\" size=\"5\">Ingredients<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n<p>2 cups apple cider<br \/>\n 1\/3 cup real maple syrup<br \/>\n 2 tablespoons chopped fresh thyme<br \/>\n 2 tablespoons chopped fresh marjoram<br \/>\n 2 1\/2 teaspoons lemon zest<br \/>\n 3\/4 cup butter<br \/>\n salt and ground black pepper to taste<br \/>\n 14 pounds whole turkey, neck and giblets rese<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\"><b><font face=\"comic sans ms\" size=\"5\">Cooking Instructions<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n<p>apple cider and maple syrup in a heavy saucepan over medium or high heat<br \/>\n until reduced to 1\/2 cup (about 20 minutes). Remove from heat and mix in<br \/>\n 1\/2 of the thyme and marjoram and all of the lemon zest. Add the butter,<br \/>\n and whisk until melted. Add salt and ground pepper to taste. Cover and<br \/>\n refrigerate until cold (syrup can be made up to 2 days ahead).<br \/>\n Preheat oven to 375F. Place oven rack in the lowest third of oven.<br \/>\n Wash and dry turkey, and place in a large roasting pan. Slide hand under<br \/>\n skin of the breast to loosen. Rub 1\/2 cup of the maple butter mix under<br \/>\n the breast skin. If planning on stuffing turkey, do so now. Rub 1\/4 cup<br \/>\n of the maple butter mixture over the outside of the turkey. With kitchen<br \/>\n string, tie legs of turkey together loosely.<br \/>\n Arrange the chopped onion, chopped celery, and chopped carrot around the<br \/>\n turkey in the roasting pan. If desired, the neck and giblets may be added<br \/>\n to the vegetables. Sprinkle the remaining thyme and marjoram over the<br \/>\n vegetables, and pour the chicken stock into the pan.<br \/>\n Roast turkey 30 minutes in the preheated oven. Reduce oven temperature to<br \/>\n 350F, and cover turkey loosely with foil. Continue to roast, about 3 to 4<br \/>\n hours unstuffed or 4 to 5 hours stuffed, until the internal temperature<br \/>\n of the thigh reaches 180F and stuffing reaches 165F. Transfer turkey to a<br \/>\n platter, and cover with foil. Reserve pan mixture for gravy. Allow turkey<br \/>\n to sit about 25 minutes before removing stuffing and carving.<br \/>\no Make Gravy: Strain pan juices into a measuring cup. Spoon fat from juices.<br \/>\n Add enough chicken stock to make 3 cups. Transfer liquid to a heavy saucepan<br \/>\n and bring to a boil. In a small bowl, mix reserved maple butter mixture with<br \/>\n flour to form a paste, and whisk into the broth. Stir in thyme, bay leaf, and<br \/>\n apple brandy. Boil until reduced and slightly thickened. Season with salt and<br \/>\n pepper to taste<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;While they were eating, Jesus took some bread, and after a blessing, He broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is My body.&quot; (Matthew 26:26)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Thanksgiving<\/p>\n <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/recipes4thecook.com\/thanksgiving\/blog\/2026\/02\/22\/maple-roast-turkey-and-gravy\/\"><span class=\"more-msg\">Continue reading &rarr;<\/span><\/a>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-thanksgiving"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/recipes4thecook.com\/thanksgiving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/recipes4thecook.com\/thanksgiving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/recipes4thecook.com\/thanksgiving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/recipes4thecook.com\/thanksgiving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/recipes4thecook.com\/thanksgiving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/recipes4thecook.com\/thanksgiving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/recipes4thecook.com\/thanksgiving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/recipes4thecook.com\/thanksgiving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/recipes4thecook.com\/thanksgiving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}