Thanksgiving is like the Super Bowl for food. All year, this is what you train for. Everything you have done up to this point is just practice for the big day. It’s the only holiday where it’s socially acceptable to refer to it by the meat you’ll be eating that day, i.e. “Turkey Day”.

Turkey Day will test not just the limits of the elastic in our sweatpants, but also our mastery of food preparation. That’s why, when the day arrives and I need to make a big play, I know exactly what to do with that turkey — wrap it in bacon.

Prepare Yourself for this Meat Tornado

The Recipe

Ingredients

1 turkey (12 – 14 pounds, thawed, giblets removed)
4 garlic cloves
½ pound butter
1 large handful mixed fresh herbs (rosemary, thyme, parsley, sage)
1½ pound thick-cut bacon
3 carrots, chopped
3 leeks, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
1 onion, quartered
2 apples, sliced
Salt and pepper

Directions

Pre-Turkey Day Check:
A frozen turkey can take a little while to thaw. Depending on the size of your bird, it can take anywhere from 2-5 days to thaw it in the fridge, so be sure to follow the thawing guidelines to avoid a frozen turkey on the big day! Another thawing option is to let it rest in cold water for 24 hours.

Before the big day, it’s always a good idea to run through your ingredient list to make sure you have what you need. No one wants to make that last minute run to the grocery store! Also be sure you have a properly fitting pan for your turkey. We can’t afford any mistakes come Thursday.

Step One: Prepare the Turkey
Move oven rack to the bottom of the oven. Set the oven to 450 degrees. You might have noticed your turkey still has some extra parts. Reach inside and remove the neck, gizzards, liver, and heart. You can just throw them away or use them for gravy. Rinse your bird our with cold water. Now, carefully slide your hands between the turkey and the skin to separate and lift. We’re going to stick some bacon butter in there.

Step Two: Bacon Butter
Finely mince your garlic cloves using a food processor. Add in other herbs, briefly pulsing to chop them up. Finally, add the softened butter and ½ pound of bacon. Use pulses to carefully chop up the bacon with the other ingredients.

Take half of your bacon butter and spread it underneath the turkey skin. Really get in there. Once you’ve gotten under its skin, massage the other half over the skin. Season with salt and pepper.

Step Three: Blanket of Bacon
Begin by wrapping the drumsticks with bacon. Cover each one with overlapping strips of bacon.

Just below the neck (hole), lay a horizontal strip of bacon across the breast. Then place a vertical strip on one side, going from top to bottom. Continue alternating horizontal and vertical strips to weave a grid-like blanket of bacon onto your turkey.

Step Four: Cooking
Place the carrots, leeks, celery, apples, and onions in the bottom of your roasting pan. You’ll then place the roasting rack on top of the vegetables, and then the turkey on top of that.

Cook the turkey at 450 degrees for 30 minutes.

At this time, cover the bacon with tin foil. You’ll then reduce the temperature to 375 degrees and continue cooking for up to 3 ½ hours. When it starts getting close, you’ll want to check the internal temperature of the turkey using a thermometer. Your turkey should reach 160 degrees.

Simple, Yet Effective
While there is a small amount of preparation and you need to keep your eye on things, this turkey recipe is pretty easy. There’s no brine or any stuffing of weird stuff inside the bird; it’s really all about the bacon. And I think that everything should always be about the bacon.

~J.C.

The post J.C.’s Incredible Bacon-Wrapped Turkey appeared first on Metal Master Shop.

Here at Metal Master Shop, we have a lot to be thankful for. It’s that time of year again. We’re grateful all year long, but with November comes the opportunity for extra thought and reflection about how blessed we truly are.

We’re thankful for Miami, and we’re thankful for our community. There’s nowhere else we’d rather work, play, and live.

We’re also thankful for you, the skilled roofers we work with every day. We know our metal roofing supplies are in great hands, and that you make local home and business owners’ lives better with every job you do.

Thank you for your business!

In the spirit of Thanksgiving, we thought we’d share some favorite foods and traditions from a few of our team members, a couple of favorite recipes, and a couple of local Thanksgiving events that make the holidays just a little brighter.

Our Traditions

A few of our team members took some time away from their busy work lives to share their favorite foods and traditions with you. If you’d like to share your traditions with us, head on over to our Facebook page. We’d love to know how you spend Thanksgiving and what you’re thankful for.

Mike: I’m thankful for my friends and family and for their love and support. Each year I look forward to eating turkey, stuffing, lechon, and pumpkin pie. I love spending time with the family, and watching our family grow with kids (sisters, cousins, etc.)

James: I’m thankful for the gathering of family and the people in my life. I look forward to mushroom casserole every year.

Daylin: I don’t like to cook, so I like to concentrate on the eating part. We celebrate more of a Cuban kind of Thanksgiving. We have the traditional turkey, but pretty much everything else is different. We keep the main focus of bringing everyone together and giving thanks, but we’ve customized the holiday to fit our own culture. Every year, I look forward to seeing my relatives and friends, and I especially look forward to the Cuban Flan my Aunt makes.

Favorite Recipes

Like Daylin said, many members of our team incorporate our own culture into the very American holiday of Thanksgiving. We thought we’d supply you with a couple of those recipes, just in case you want to try something a little bit different this year.

Chorizo and Cornbread Stuffing

1lb Fresh Mexican Chorizo 1 medium white onion, chopped

1 carrot, chopped 1 celery stalk, chopped

3 garlic cloves, chopped 2 cups crumbled cornbread

¼ cup chopped cilantro ½ cup chicken stock

1 tablespoon unsalted butter

Cook the chorizo until it begins to brown. Then, add onion, garlic, celery, and carrot to the mixture and cook an additional 10 minutes. Add the crumbled cornbread and cilantro, then slowly pour in enough chicken stock so stuffing is neither too dry or too wet. Butter a baking or casserole dish, and add the stuffing in an even layer. Bake at 350 degrees until it’s heated all the way and lightly browned on top.

There are many ways to make this recipe, but this take from Aarón Sánchez is the closest we’ve found to the best. You can find a more in-depth explanation, as well as optional ingredients, over at the Food Network.

Perfect Turkey Brine

We tried this recipe last year at a dear friend’s house, and it was so good we had him write it out for us. It will make your Thanksgiving turkey even better. Obviously, you need a turkey somewhere in the 12-14lb range.

1 cup salt (substitute less salt for more spices) 1 lemon, wedged

1 orange, wedged 1 medium onion, wedged

3 garlic cloves, chopped 4 bay leaves

1 tbsp dried thyme 1 tbsp ground black pepper

1 ½ gallon cold water

Rub an appropriate amount of salt on the turkey. Then, place all ingredients and remaining salt (or spices) into a large pot. Add the turkey, and then add the water. Refrigerate overnight. Once Thanksgiving day comes, throw out the brine and put your turkey in the oven as usual. The turkey will be extra tender and flavorful.

We couldn’t believe our tastebuds last year. It really is that good.

Thanksgiving Events

While we love spending time with our friends and families on Thanksgiving, Miami has plenty of events to offer that range from helping the less fortunate to food truck rallies.

Here are a few we’re looking forward to.

6th Annual Space Coast Thanksgiving Basket Brigade – On November 22nd, volunteers gather to put together Thanksgiving baskets for the less fortunate. These baskets include a full Thanksgiving dinner with all the trimmings, along with snacks, toiletries, and canned food. Volunteers then hand-deliver these Thanksgiving baskets to each family. You can donate or register to volunteer here.

Santa’s Enchanted Forest – This annual attraction starts in October and ends in January. This amusement park and carnival features three million lights and a Christmas tree measuring over 92’ feet tall. If you love Christmas and lights, make your way to Tropical Park before January 3rd, and if you’ve never been before, this is your year. More info here.

Christmas Tree Lighting and Food Truck Invasion – This free event features a 50 foot tree covered in lights, holiday music, and plenty of local food trucks. It’s the perfect way to unwind on November 27th. For parking details, click here.

From our team to you, thanks for everything you do. We have plenty to be thankful for, and you’re at the top of the list.

~J.C.

The post As Miami’s Preferred Metal Roofing Supplier, We’re Thankful For… appeared first on Metal Master Shop.

Our Traditions

Our office is filled with fun people and their crazy families. So, we asked around and gathered everyone’s favorite Thanksgiving traditions. Here’s what we each came up with!

Mike said: On Thanksgiving, my family normally gets together at my uncle’s house to eat dinner and watch football games on TV in Pembroke Pines, Florida. Our family has grown to about 20 people, so we do a family prayer before eating and then have a “buffet style” self serving station. We eat turkey, ham, rice, salad, pork, plus endless amounts of desserts. We sometimes take family pictures and sometimes sit down around the couch talking about “what’s new” in our life, like work, vacations, etc.

Roxana said: Our family gets together at my aunt’s house, where we have a thankful tree tradition. She takes a dry tree branch, and makes leaves out of paper where we each write things we are thankful for. We then dress the branch with the leaves and realize there are plenty of reasons to give thanks. We look forward to this every year.

Juan Carlos said: My favorite part is the pork stuffed turkey!

Daylin said: I don’t really like turkey, so I eat other things. I love Thanksgiving because I get to see my super large Cuban family and have the food that I wish I was able to cook, but can’t and won’t. The important thing is to be together and give thanks.

James said: I get to see my girlfriend’s family that I don’t see often as they live two hours away in Okeechobee, Florida. I also share their American traditions such as playing corn hole. And I like to eat turkey, ham, and bacon… for sure all that good stuff.

Cheers!

May all of you have a happy and safe Thanksgiving with your families!

~J.C.

The post We Are Thankful appeared first on Metal Master Shop.