Recipes: Turkey Tinga and Charred Tomatillo Salsa Recipes (as featured on The Splendid Table)

Turkey Tinga, photo from Elysian Kitchens, photo credit, Kristin Teig

Honey-Glazed Turkey Tinga

From Elysian Kitchens, as featured on The Splendid Table

Brother Pedro Alvarez, a monk from Mexico, introduced this dish to Saint John's. The honey is the monastery's own; the turkey, wild and donated by local hunters. It's comforting in winter and perfect for a summer barbecue.

Serves 4 | Preparation Time: 2½ hours (it’s worth it, promise!)

Ingredients

For the tinga:

• 2 pounds boneless, skinless turkey breasts, cut into six pieces

• ½ teaspoon salt, plus more to taste

• ½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, plus more to taste

• 4 tablespoons honey

• 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

• 1 large yellow onion, coarsely chopped

• 2 ribs celery, chopped

• 6 garlic cloves, finely chopped

• Leaves from 5 oregano sprigs, coarsely chopped

• Leaves from 5 thyme sprigs

• 1 teaspoon cocoa powder

• 2 teaspoons cumin seeds

• ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper

• 1 bay leaf

• 2 (7-ounce) cans chipotles in adobo, coarsely chopped

• 6 ounces adobo sauce

• 1 (14-ounce) can chopped tomatoes, undrained

• 2 tablespoons tomato paste

• 1 cup chicken stock

To serve:

• 16 flour tortillas

• Queso fresco, crumbled

• Tomatillo Salsa (recipe below)

• Sour cream

• Avocado chunks

• Finely sliced scallions

Directions

Season the turkey all over with salt and pepper and slather with 2 tablespoons honey. Place in an even layer in a slow cooker.

Heat the oil in a sauté pan over medium-high heat. Add the onion and celery and sauté until the onion is translucent, 5 to 7 minutes. Add the garlic, oregano, thyme, cocoa, cumin, cayenne, and bay leaf and sauté until aromatic, 2 to 3 minutes. Add the chipotles in adobo, adobo sauce, tomatoes with their juices, tomato paste, stock, and remaining 2 tablespoons honey and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium-low and simmer gently for 8 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.

Pour the sauce over the turkey, cover, and cook on low until very tender, about 2 hours.

Transfer the turkey to a plate. Discard the bay leaf. Once cool enough to handle, shred the turkey into bite-size pieces and stir back into the sauce.

Serve in warm tortillas topped with queso fresco, tomatillo salsa, sour cream, avocado, and scallions.

Brother Aelred’s Tomatillo Salsa, photo credit: Jody Eddy

Brother Aelred's Tomatillo Salsa

Makes about 1 quart | Time: 45 minutes

Brother Aelred makes a big batch each fall when the tomatillos and chiles are in season. His tip: char the skins until they're black and blistered. The smoky note really makes it sing.

Ingredients

• 7 large green chiles (Hatch, Anaheim, or poblano)

• 3 small green chiles (serrano or jalapeño)

• 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for brushing

• ½ teaspoon salt, plus more to taste

• 12 tomatillos

• 1 small white onion, coarsely chopped

• 2 garlic cloves, coarsely chopped

• 1 bunch cilantro, leaves and stems coarsely chopped

• 1½ cups chicken stock

Directions

Preheat the broiler.

Brush the chiles with olive oil and season with salt. Arrange on a broiler-safe baking sheet and broil until blistered, about 4 minutes per side. Transfer to a bowl and cover tightly with plastic wrap. Once cooled, remove the charred skins (they should slip right off), stems, and seeds. Coarsely chop.

Remove the papery husks from the tomatillos and rinse. Place in a pot, cover with water by 5 inches, and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer until tender and slightly olive in color, 5 to 7 minutes. Drain, reserving about 1 cup of cooking water.

Combine the chiles, tomatillos, onion, garlic, and cilantro in a blender with ½ cup of the reserved water. Blend until a chunky puree forms.

Heat the oil in a large pot over medium-high heat. Carefully add the salsa and stock and bring to a vigorous simmer. Reduce heat and simmer to your desired consistency. Season with salt.

Cool to room temperature before serving. Keeps refrigerated for up to 1 week or frozen for up to 2 months.

Recipe excerpted from "Elysian Kitchens: Recipes Inspired by the Traditions and Tastes of the World's Sacred Spaces" by Jody Eddy. Copyright 2024. Used with permission of W.W. Norton & Company.

Order Elysian Kitchens →

Listen & Learn More

In November 2024, The Splendid Table featured Elysian Kitchens and Saint John's Abbey. You can hear me discuss the book, Brother Aelred, the recipes here, and Minnesota in the interview below.

Listen to The Splendid Table episode →

Listen to The Splendid Table supplement on Instagram →

Read more about Brother Aelred in The Central Minnesota Catholic →

Read more about the Story Feast collaboration with Brother Aelred Senna →

My newsletter

Every Wednesday in my Substack newsletter, What’s Good Here, I share a new, well-tested recipe alongside guides, how-tos, interviews with inspiring people, and stories about what it means to live a good life. Every other Friday I also share five original recipes plus a step-by-step guide to host a Fantasy Feast inspired by your favorite movies, books and television shows.

Subscribe to What's Good Here →

Interested in partnering with us for a future gathering? See partnership opportunities →

Interested in joining a future gathering? See upcoming events →

Brother Aelred Senna: A Years-Long Collaboration

Brother Aelred Senna

The Monk Behind the Recipes and The Story Feast Gathering at St. John's Abbey

When I sat down to write Elysian Kitchens, the cookbook that inspired the Story Feast Collective, I knew I wanted to include Saint John's Abbey. It was a place I'd grown up visiting, a place that held deep meaning for my family, and a place where food played in integral role, just like I’d witnessed at so many monasteries in other parts of the world.

What I didn't know was that including Saint John's would lead to a collaboration, and a friendship, that would span years and eventually culminate in our inaugural Story Feast gathering.

Meeting Brother Aelred

I first met Brother Aelred Senna in 2018. I'd come to Saint John's to interview monks for the book, and Brother Aelred was the obvious choice for the kitchen. He's the monastery's resident cook and baker, making breads, cookies, desserts for special occasions, and even wedding cakes for couples married in the Abbey Church.

But Brother Aelred isn't just skilled. He's thoughtful about what cooking means: the way a meal can bring a community together, the way a recipe can carry memory across generations, the way feeding people is itself a form of prayer.

We spent hours talking. He cooked recipe after recipe. And he shared stories, about teaching himself to cook as a kid in Texas using the Betty Crocker Cookbook, about his years as a teacher in New Mexico, about the winding path that brought him to Saint John's after nearly two decades away from religious life.

"The Holy Spirit came snooping around," he told me, "and I told her she needed to go away and mind her own business."

She didn't.

The Recipes

Several of Brother Aelred's recipes appear in Elysian Kitchens, including his charred tomatillo salsa, a recipe rooted in his years teaching in New Mexico. He makes a big batch every year when the tomatillos and chiles come into season in the monastic garden, canning most of it as "a welcome reminder of summer during the unrelenting Minnesota winter."

The salsa is served alongside Honey-Glazed Turkey Tinga, a dish introduced to the monks by Brother Pedro Alvarez, a young monk from Mexico. The tinga reflects its journey: Mexican in origin, adapted to Minnesota with local wild turkey donated by hunters and honey from the monastery's own hives.

"Take it slowly," Brother Pedro advises. "Let the house fill with the smoky aroma. It will bring everyone to the table."

Brother Aelred on the grounds of St. John’s Abbey on the day of the Story Feast gathering when fall was in all its Minnesota glory

From Book to Table

After Elysian Kitchens was published in November 2024, an idea that had been quietly forming finally took shape: What if I brought the book to life? What if I gathered people at monasteries and other unique, often hidden places around the world, and created the kind of gatherings the book celebrates?

Brother Aelred was instrumental in making it happen at St. John’s. He helped coordinate with the abbey and connected me with the chefs for our inaugural event, Mateo and Erin Mackbee of Krewe and Flour & Flower Bakery. He advised on the flow of the evening, and embodied the Benedictine hospitality that defines Saint John's.

On November 1, 2025, 180 guests gathered in the Great Hall for our inaugural Story Feast. It was everything we'd hoped… and everything the book had been building toward.

Listen & Learn More

In November 2024, The Splendid Table featured Elysian Kitchens and Saint John's Abbey. You can hear me discuss the book, Brother Aelred, and Minnesota in the interview below.

Listen to the Splendid Table episode →

Read more about Brother Aelred in The Central Minnesota Catholic →

Get the Turkey Tinga and Charred Tomatillo Salsa recipe from Elysian Kitchens →

My newsletter

Every Wednesday in my Substack newsletter, What’s Good Here, I share a new, well-tested recipe alongside guides, how-tos, interviews with inspiring people, and stories about what it means to live a good life. Every other Friday I also share five original recipes plus a step-by-step guide to host a Fantasy Feast inspired by your favorite movies, books and television shows.

Subscribe to What's Good Here →

Interested in partnering with us for a future gathering? See partnership opportunities →

Interested in joining a future gathering? See upcoming events →