Search This Blog

Monday, February 3, 2014

The Turkey Shoot



At the end of December a friend called to ask if I wanted some turkeys.  He had a friend that had 2 toms and 4 hens that needed new a new home.  I, thinking I am sooo capable, said "Sure, I'll take them!".  I got my handyman busy adding a turkey coop onto the chicken house so I'd have a place for them to live as well as fencing off a yard for them.  I was all prepared for when they arrived - until I saw them.  I thought my sisters turkeys were big but these birds were ENORMOUS.  Even the hens were huge.  The coop and yard I had built wasn't even remotely big enough for all 6 of them.  I inspected them and noticed one of the white hens had a bad leg and was spotted with blood so I put her in the brooder section of the coop. The blood was from the white tom trying to mount her and had given her some severe lacerations on her backside and she was just dripping blood everywhere.  I kept her there for 5 days and, although the mating injuries healed over, she never was able to bear weight on that leg.  Since her leg was so badly injured I decided to slaughter her. Now, I had seen my grandmother process chickens many times in my life and I figured it wasn't much different, just a bigger bird so I texted my oldest son and asked if he wanted to come watch and he did (thank goodness).  I made a butchering surface, had a water hose and all my knives sharpened and ready, took my big copper pot and some cinder blocks out to the back yard, grabbed my 22 rifle and set up shop.  While I was waiting on my son to bring his cooler and a blow torch, I built a fire under the pot and got the water hot. I was excited and nervous and also reluctant.  I was excited because it was a skill that I was perfecting for the future yet I was reluctant because I didn't want to take a life.  Still, I made myself a promise that I would only have livestock that contributed to my family and if they didn't contribute anymore, they would be used in other ways.  The hen was suffering and it was the most humane thing I could have done.  By the time he got there the water was hot and I was set to do it.  After we began plucking her I saw the mating injuries and was even more glad we had done it.  I kept remembering how my grandmother did it and in about an hour we had her plucked and dressed out.  She ended up making 18 lbs of meat for the freezer and canning.  Two weeks later, we slaughtered the white Tom and he contributed 31 lbs of meat to the freezer.

Since it was well after the holidays and she was 9 mos old when we butchered her, I decided to debone her and grind up the meat for burgers, tacos, chili and sausage, etc. I was going waste nothing at all of the hen.

Here's my process:

Deboned entire hen, separated dark from white meat

Ground dark meat and made Turkey Breakfast Sausage

Ground breast meat and vacuum sealed it

Added skin, giblets and bones to pressure cooker and cooked for 1 hour

Removed the cooked meat from the bones

Canned the cooked meat and broth

Used the skin and cartilage and various bits for dog food

Dried the cooked bones in the oven, ground them up and added them to the garden soil

Rendered the fat to use for cooking

 

 
The following Sunday morning we had a feast for breakfast. Everything but the fried potatoes was made by hand by me. There was Turkey Sausage, fried turkey eggs, homefried potatoes (fried in turkey fat) and Honey Wheat Bread with Beauty Berry Jelly.

 
It was delicious and made me so proud that I did it all.  I even made the Beauty Berry jelly over the summer and canned it so we'd have it for a special occasion like this.  It's a Jewish delicacy to use rendered chicken fat (aka Schmaltz) to fry potato latkes in so I figured I could do the same thing with turkey fat.

Even if you don't raise your own meat, you can make homemade sausage and use any kind of meat you want: pork, chicken, beef, turkey, etc.  This recipe will work with any kind of meat.  It's super easy and delicious, give it a try and you'll never buy it from the store again!
 

Turkey Breakfast Sausage with Fennel and Sage

1 lb ground turkey

1 clove minced garlic

1 T rubbed sage

1/2 t dried fennel seed, crushed

1 1/2 t coarse salt

1/2 t black pepper

1/4 t crushed red pepper flakes (or more, according to your preference)

1 egg white

2 t olive oil (I used bacon grease)

Mix all together well, refrigerate for 1 hour.  Shape into patties and use immediately or freeze in single layer then store in baggies.

 

Enjoy!

No comments:

Post a Comment