Turkey Noodle Soup and Yet Another Amazing Sandwich

This isn’t a recipe.  This is a cop-out.

With cold & flu season well under way, I found myself a few days ago struggling to stay on the right side of the flu.  I was nauseous, my throat was hurting no matter how many cups of tea I downed, and I couldn’t move for fear of something hurting.  I decided it was time for some soup.

Thanks to Julie over at A Finger in Every Pie, I’d thought to reserve the turkey frame from my potluck dinner (recipe coming, I swear!) on Saturday and made stock from it.  Thanks to Grocery Guy (this is a really good article, I swear), I’d been saving the ends of everything I chopped and cut for the past few weeks in a plastic zip baggie in the freezer- cilantro stems, onion ends with all the skins, garlic pieces, celery middles and fronds, carrots, whatever, I can’t even begin to list everything that I had in two baggies (gallon each).  I also had some fresh herbs from making the turkey itself (sage and rosemary), some thyme leftover from something else, I threw those in, too, since I knew I wasn’t going to be cooking with them anytime soon. 

So basically, after I cut off what big hunks of meat I could from the frame (into as even as possible slices/pieces so I could make a sandwich from it, of course), I broke it into 3 smaller pieces (for stirring purposes), tossed everything I just mentioned into a huge stockpot (I think mine is 12 gallons?) and covered it all with cold tap water, then turned the flame on low.  It was New Year’s Eve, so I knew I wasn’t going anywhere.  I don’t think it actually started boiling until 2 or 3 hours later, which was fine by me, and I just let it stay like that for another few hours.  I strained it, tossed all the mushy veggies and picked what meat I could from the bones, but honestly?  I set that aside and still haven’t used it.  I’ve been preferring the meat I cut before I boiled the heck out of everything, in my soup. 

What soup, you ask?  Well, Julie had given me the idea to make soup from turkey stock but when it came time, I was too sick to start trying to do things I’ve only thought about before.  Instead, I took some of the broth, sweet as it is, and brought it to a boil on my stovetop in a saucepan.  I chopped some celery and some carrots while it came to a boil.  When it boiled, I wound up throwing in some dried Japanese noodles I had (the same ones I used here, because I haven’t used them again since then!  about one “bundle”) because I ran out of egg noodles.  I threw in the carrots, celery, and some of the turkey meat to heat it through and let it all boil for a few minutes.  See first picture.  Unfortunately, I stupidly didn’t think to break the noodles up, so it was pretty hard to eat that without splattering all over myself. 

Second time, I broke the noodles up but not quite enough.  See second picture.

Finally, I got it right, breaking it into about 4 pieces (see third picture).  Not bad.  Just about right.  And I figured out that these noodles, in this context, when overcooked slightly, bloat up with all the excess flavor of the broth and really make this a delight to drink while sick.

And you know what?  I felt 100x better just the next day.  I continued eating the soup (as you can see, I made it three times already) and now have much less turkey stock than I did to begin with, but that’s okay.  I still have enough for some turkey stock soup and if not, whatever.  There will be other meals, but I am loving turkey right now.  And I seriously feel so much better as to consider the possibility this was a magic stock. 

Of course, after eating turkey with gravy and stuffing slices nearly every day, you’d think I’d be sick of eating turkey noodle soup as well, right?  Nope.  Funny because before this, I’d have told you I wasn’t a fan of turkey.  Ehh, not really for me.  Too much diet food meaning to me for turkey sandwiches.  Whatever.  But this week, I’ve come to truly appreciate turkey and love it so much, that I have dreamt about feeling well enough to make a sandwich (my throat feeling scratchy as it did, I try not to eat dry/scratchy/crunchy/crispy foods). 

So I made this sandwich.  I toasted up two slices of white bread (D’Italiano Seeded Italian Bread slices, if you must know, but I hate how the sesame seeds burn and burn the shiet out of my fingers when I go to grab a slice), placed a few beautiful slices of turkey on one side, and… check this out… a few slices of stuffing on the other side, then slathered both sides with gravy and mushrooms.  I also had a bowl of soup on the side just for good measure. 

You know that episode of Friends where Ross freaks out on his boss for taking his lunch from the office fridge and eating his Thanksgiving leftover sandwich?  (Which, by the way, EW? buy your own lunch, you freak!)  And Ross flips out?  Well, I may not have included a “moistmaker”* as Monica did for him, but I would seriously flip out just as much- if not more- if someone tried to take this sandwich from me.  It was that good, that satisfying.  That delicious and amazing.  Try it.  I still have some leftovers…

*Moistmaker- what Ross calls the third piece of bread Monica includes in the sandwich, that has been soaked in gravy, to prevent drying of the sandwich

And yes.  I mopped up all of that lovely gravy with my sandwich while I ate.  I cannot tell you how much heaven I was in today during my lunch. 

Happy Eating!!!