Turkey Chili and Stock, Served Seperately

I found a few frozen turkey necks in my freezer this morning that a roommate left behind after moving out recently, so I decided to do something with them. I'll be up-front: My process is time consuming.

First, I unthawed them and then plopped them into a pot with enough water to just cover them and simmered for about 2 hours on medium-low heat with the cover on. I added water periodically to keep the necks covered, but if you want to avoid that, just add extra from the start to be safe. You can also do this in a crock pot, if you want to save kitchen time and leave it alone all day.

Once the meat starts falling off the bone, it's done. Put a big bowl in the sink with a colander on top, then slowly pour the contents of the pot into it. The bowl will be full of stock, which you can freeze in baggies or keep in a pitcher or bowl to use for cooking in the near future. 

Now, the meat should look like this.

Now is the part that's kind of annoying: removing the fat, ligaments, and bones. My method is pretty simple. I put the colander in the sink for cleanliness, then I just use my fingers to pick off some meat and rinse it off with cool running water until the fat slides off and then set aside the yummy dark meat. This way, all the mess is contained in the colander and easy to dispose.

Now dispose of the mess and put the meat in a pot. I rinsed out the same pit used for simmering before. Next, I put a big bag of frozen veggies and a couple cans of beans into the colander and rinsed them out before adding them, too.

Now add in two cans of tomato sauce, some minced garlic, chili powder, salt, pepper, basil, oregano, paprika, and crushed red pepper, simmer, adjust spices to taste. Afterwards, serve up and enjoy!

I love it on brown rice with a dallop of sour cream and shredded cheddar on top, on a bed of spinach, or all on its own!