Thanksgiving Turducken

Thanksgiving Day finally arrived and it was time for the Turducken. I started it after work Wednesday. First, though, I called my sister Christine for Mom's Cornbread Stuffing recipe. Thanks, Christine! I didn't actually start until about eight o'clock that evening. That's when I went first to the co-op for whole grain rye berries and wild rice, then to Safeway for everything else. (I wish I could buy everything at the co-op, but their prices are a bit....pricey.)

Anyhoo, back home and mixed up a batch of cornbread for Mom's Cornbread Stuffing. Then I cooked the rye and wild rice for the Wild Rice & Rye Stuffing. I didn't start the Sausage Stuffing until the next morning. I was about to start deboning the birds when I heard a knock on the door at about 11 P.M. I assumed it would be my neighbors, but it turned out to be a drunk girl who had lost her money and her cell phone. She needed to call for a ride, but was a little too wasted to remember her mom's phone number. (!) When she couldn't get anyone to answer, her plan was to go back to Fourth Avenue and walk around until she found a ride. (!!) That didn't seem wise to me, so I got her to come inside and she sat at the kitchen table for an hour while I cooked, eventually sobering up enough to remember her mom's phone number. Mom came right away to pick up her drunk 23-year-old daughter. Living so close to the university bar district, we get stuff like this fairly often, but this was one of the most interesting cases. Drunk Girl ended up dozing on my couch until her mom arrived in the family minivan sometime after midnight.

Back to the Turducken--by 2 A.M., I had deboned the three birds and skinned the duck and the chicken. Figured it didn't need that much fat. I still took 2 quarts of juices from the pan as it baked the next day.

Long story short, the next morning I was up at the early (not) hour of seven, made the three stuffings, and at nine or so when my neighbor Erin came over to invite me for a run, I was ready to assemble Monsieur Turducken. Her husband Aaron came over a bit later and he photographed the process. I've put the photos up on Flickr.

The turducken was awesome--we're still eating it. Five of us only dented about one-third of it Thanksgiving night. Two days later, about half of it is still left! With all the stuffing, it was probably 25-30 pounds of bird and stuffing!

Check out the photos here.