I’m just now digging out from my turkey-induced Thanksgiving coma. It was quite a time here in Zumbrota, we had my whole family up from Missouri (or Colorado as the case may be) to celebrate. It sure was good to see everyone and hang out for a few days.
But we did run into one real conundrum. What to do with the 32 pound turkey that we raised?
We got a few turkey poults this past spring, and despite losing two of them, those little poults turned into full grown toms. Having never raised turkeys before, we weren’t exactly sure how long to let them grow before they were ready to butcher. Turns out we let them get a little large. After being plucked and cleaned we had a 32lb bird, and a “small” 29lb turkey.
Turns out that finding a roasting pan for a 30lb turkey is a bit of a problem. Roasting-pan manufacturers are more inclined to offer models to accommodate the normal 15lb birds. The biggest roasting pans we could find weren’t even going to come close to holding this behemoth.
Time for plan B.
Cut the turkey up like a chicken.
Half a turkey in each pan just fits!
We’ve got to keep on top of this turkey weighing situation next year, a 15lb bird will suit me just fine next time.
BTW, the turkey turned out delicious! Hope all your Thanksgivings went as well!
Sounds like a delightful time Andrew! A 32 lb TURKEY jeez that sounds about normal for a couple that has a 10 lb plus baby! 🙂
Happy Thanksgiving! Your post gave me a chuckle as we also raised 2, too-large birds this year. The tom weighed in at 36 lbs and the ‘much smaller’ hen was 24 lbs. My brother asked “what did you feed those turkeys?”. The answer, of course, anything they wanted! Free range birds do well here, except for when they wander too far and get picked off by predators.
Having a bird that big does present problems; we opted to force ours into the roaster with legs overhanging. Required me to tie the wings tight to the body so they wouldn’t stick out. then placed a pan under the end where legs stuck out to catch drippings. What a sight! Oh, and we tethered the legs down to the roaster handle or they would have hit the oven ceiling.
Big birds give us lots of extra meals too. I love leftovers,so not a problem. We had 16 for dinner,sent some turkey home with guests, had 12 for leftovers the following night and 13 for hot turkey sandwiches on Saturday. The remainder went into making soup and pot pie. We are so very lucky.
Well, I’m thankful for the big friendly tom that fed all of us so well, and for that last piece of harvest apple pie that I had for breakfast this morning. I enjoy your posts. Best wishes on the new farm.
Enjoy your new
Glad to hear you got your turkey cooked too!
I’ve been amazed at how docile the turkeys were compared to chickens. Ours got a little unnerving when they started fanning and strutting around people, but they never were aggressive.