The funniest story I have about turkeys is this: our house was a few hundred feet from the barn and one day I happened to hear a racket coming from the driveway. I opened the door and heard gobble gobble gobble and saw a gaggle of white turkeys waddling down the driveway with our black pot-bellied pig, Chloe, in the lead. I was astounded and couldn’t stop laughing.
Are you talking about me?
Chloe, as my husband liked to say, epitomized everything that was wrong with our farm, she consumed everything and gave nothing back. But she sure was fun (and cute.) Considering our lack of farming backgrounds, that statement was probably true.
But, back to the stampede of turkeys. The one thing I learned early on owning a farm is that animals run away when you least expect them to and that they usually respond to food. So, with a bucket of corn in hand, I gently persuaded all 50turkeys and one pot-bellied pig back to the barn.
A little history—I grew up in an apartment so the closest I ever got to a pet was our pet turtle, Hermie, whose demise I can’t write about in a family blog. Consequently, years later when my husband and I bought the farm in Vermont and started populating it, we were clueless about animals and their care. Suffice to say we learned very quickly. As I’ve stated before, we are not a family that dips their toes into anything—it’s always a plunge. We started the farm with six Black Angus, four Morgan horses, sixty sheep—most were pregnant and due at some unspecified future date (I think the farmer who sold them to us knew). We ordered laying hens and broilers, pheasant (but that’s another tale), turkeys and my present to myself—Chloe, the aforementioned pot-bellied pig. Oh, there was also the German Short Haired Pointer, Max, who thought we stocked the birds just for his pleasure.
Birds are easy to raise, although a lot of menial work. Feed them, keep them safe, allow them freedom to go in and out of the barn and they’re happy—unfortunately, getting them to their final destination stressful.
One lesson I learned a little too late for our first season is that even if the turkeys look hungry, it isn’t necessary to feed them all they can eat. I couldn’t stand to see them scratching for more food when it was gone, so I gave them quite a bit of the grain (which was at its peak price that year). The turkeys grew up nice and plump. I was so proud.
However, when they returned in their plastic shroud, I realized they were really, really plump. My average turkey weighed about 33 pounds cleaned. Hardly anyone no one wants a 33 lb turkey. Thirty-three pounds is a lot of meat and most normal ovens can’t accommodate that size.
We couldn’t sell those big boys. We didn’t lose too much money on our 50 turkeys, however. Luckily, I’m married to the ultimate salesman. He sold the turkey farm all our average-sized turkeys. The sale helped but back to the mutant turkeys. What to do?
There’s always an answer though. After I separated the meat, I cut the breasts into cutlets, prepared a few casseroles with some of the other meat and made a lot of soup with the carcasses. Then we made sausage. All kinds of turkey sausage. I had to buy an extra freezer to hold all my sausage.
We love turkey but most of all, we love turkey at Thanksgiving. It won’t be brined though; I just don’t like the texture and taste of brined meats. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday and here are a couple of tips for the best turkey.
TIPS: Melt a stick of butter with a cup of white wine. Soak cheesecloth in the mixture and cover the turkey breast with it, basting every half-hour with leftover butter and wine. Also, thinly sliced mushroom tucked under the skin make a pretty presentation
