Team Turducken

A turducken is the ultimate thanksgiving committment. You are saying to your self and your guests, look folks, sometimes a turkey just isnt enough-I am willing to push myself to the limits to provide for you a unique and strangely satisfying meat treat experience. In return, all i ask is that you open your minds and your stomachs and prepare to enjoy that which is not what you expect. Or something like that.

Anyways, this evening Team Turducken convened for some baking and bird boning ( I know, de-boning sounds so much more appropriate but as these things go we shall make use of the proper terminology). The afternoon was full of last minute shopping errands, running the wrong red lights that will get us an overpriced ticket in the mail and having the 5 nails that decided to embed themselves in my tire extracted only to be told that in fact the tire should probably be put to rest due to some bubbling near the rim. Oh happy happy happy joy joy joy.

Dinner was provided courtesy of my dear friend in Alaska who apparently caught too many halibut for his freezer to handle and thus mailed some down this way. I will have to take this into consideration when i run out of fridge room next year and send him some raw poulry and a case of butter. Max (one of the visiting Michiganders and he who will be promoted from wingman to turkey fryer captain) was kind enough (or just smarter than the rest of us) to sit out the afternoon errands and make haste of the prep work. Upon arriving home we were treated to vats of crumbled cornbread and diced veggies as well as 15 heads of roasted garlic, and neatly stacked dishes. From there things slowly began to come together until we had 5 people operating in the kitchen peeling and blending yams, cooking sausage, washing and drying dishes, and performing surgery of the most disturbing kind on the poultry. Last year's experience taught us many things and as a result we were able to perform efficiently and with great skill at the bone removal. The addition of roommate Jon's knives to the equation made a large difference as well as even a small paring knife was able to deftly make a slice in a bony joint.

All the birds featured far too many tendons and other white, tough, sinewy things that were a burden to remove. Perhaps in the furture scientists will take into account the needs of the average chef and breed birds without such things, thus improving boning efficieny. Having solved all of the marvels of human form I challenge the Italians to this task.

The illustrious Ms. E requested that the bones be saved for stock making, which resulted in a piling of carcus in the freezer. I cannot wait to see what comes out of the delicably fatty duck and chicken wings that found their way into that pile, since bone removal proved futile for these smaller areas.