Making turkey soup can be a dicey situation at best. The gravy and stuffing can be so rich, the skin to die for and the meat tender and yummy. And yet, when you boil down the carcass, add your goodies … well the damn thing is tasteless.
Here’s how I handled it this time. Instead of doing the whole carcass (too darned little tiny bones to pick out) I just cut off the pieces I wanted and tossed them into a large pot with water just barely covering. Sure you can simmer the poor thing for 15 hours if you want to. But I simmered it for about 30 minutes, just enough so the meat was barely coming off the bones. Yanking out the pieces was easy and trimming off the flesh was even easier. Back goes the meat into the broff.
Dice up the carrots, celery, onions and tons of fresh garlic (look close I had roasted garlic as well). Sautee the suckers in olive oil, butter, sage, salt/pepper until the onions are clear. I suppose that’s called sweating. Add to the simmering meaty broff. Oh and if you have some nice fresh Italian parsley, add that.
I suppose one of my secret weapons for turkey soup is having leftovers from a traditional turkey meal. This means gravy and dressing. Add all the gravy you have and enough dressing to thicken it a bit. These last two ingredients really dial in the turkey flavor. I suppose it would be fine without, just not nearly as rich.
Simmer the soup maybe 40 minutes, maybe even 30 would be fine.
Get some crusty bread and make it go!