The signature dish of Canzano in the Teramo hills: a boned female turkey sewn tight, slow-cooked for seven to nine hours in water with crushed bones and aromatics, then set overnight in its own natural jelly and served cold in trembling slices. A recognised Abruzzo PAT, famously chosen by NASA as freeze-dried astronaut food for the 1969 Apollo Moon mission.
The dish arose in Canzano, province of Teramo, around the mid-19th century. Local tradition, cited in the dish's PAT documentation, credits farmers Egidio Cimini and Francesco Roscioli, who prepared turkey broth for dinner guests; left to stand through the day, the broth set of its own accord into a clear, trembling gelatin, and the happy accident became the village's defining recipe. Commercial production began in the 1930s with village butcher Domenico Piersanti. A cherished local legend — repeated proudly across Abruzzo but not documented in NASA's own Apollo food records — holds that a freeze-dried version flew as astronaut food on the 1969 Moon mission. Today it is celebrated each August at the Tacchinando festival in Canzano and listed as an Abruzzo PAT.
Served cold, the turkey arrives in firm, moist slices enrobed in lightly quivering, crystal-clear jelly: the meat concentrates sweet poultry flavour through the long cook, while the gelatin dissolves on the tongue with a clean, refined depth quite unlike any stock or aspic made with added gelatin.
Seven to nine hours of gentle simmering leaches collagen — primarily type-I gelatin — from the crushed bones and connective tissue into the cooking liquid. On cooling below 35°C, the dissolved collagen molecules reassemble into a triple-helix network that sets the broth into a firm, clear jelly without any added setting agent. The crushed bones also release calcium phosphate and glutamates that deepen the savoury base. Careful straining removes fat droplets, preserving the aspic's crystal clarity.
Variations
A simpler version skips deboning: the whole turkey is poached with aromatics and served cold with the broth-jelly. Some Canzano cooks add a half-glass of dry white wine to the cooking water. Leftover jelly is eaten spread on bread as a rustic snack. A modern restaurant version may include a small amount of dry Montepulciano d'Abruzzo wine for colour.
On the Palate
Where Tacchino alla Canzanese sits in the Italian flavor cloud
Ingredients
Serves 8How it's made
7 steps · 1 hour
- 130 min
Debone a female turkey completely, keeping the skin intact. Season the interior with salt and pepper, then sew the skin closed with kitchen twine to form a compact, tightly bound roll.
Watch outSew the deboned skin into a tight, even roll with no gaps — a loose roll falls apart when you slice the cold meat.
- 210 min
Place the turkey roll and all crushed carcass bones in a deep terracotta pot or heavy casserole. Add garlic cloves, bay leaves and peppercorns.
- 35 min
Pour boiling water over the turkey at a ratio of roughly 1 litre per kilogram of meat, ensuring the roll is fully submerged.
- 4480 min
Cook in a wood-fired or conventional oven at 140–160°C, or over the lowest possible hob heat, for 7 to 9 hours, topping up with hot water as needed to keep the turkey submerged throughout.
Watch outKeep it at a bare simmer, never a boil, and topped up with water — seven to nine hours is what melts the collagen into clear jelly; a hard boil turns the meat stringy and the broth cloudy.
- 515 min
Lift out the turkey roll and set aside on a tray to cool to room temperature. Strain the cooking broth through a fine-mesh sieve, discarding all bones and aromatics.
- 6720 min
Pour the strained broth into a clean shallow dish. Refrigerate the broth and the turkey roll separately for a minimum of 12 hours until the broth sets into a firm, clear jelly.
Watch outChill at least twelve hours until the broth sets into a firm, clear jelly you can slice — if it's still runny, it needed longer or more bones.
- 710 min
Slice the cold turkey roll into rounds and arrange on a platter over slices of the clear jelly; serve cold.
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