How to Make a Turducken

Cy and I have a secret handshake when we celebrate small and big things. After we pulled off this turducken, we must have done this handshake like 100 times. I mean, we had to pull this off. We didn’t want to disappoint ourselves and the friends that we promised to feed.

So, this is how we did it!

Buy all of these necessary ingredients: Whole turkey, whole chicken and duck breast. Meatballs are optional.

Buy or make your favourite stuffing.

1) Preheat the oven to 375 Fahrenheit.

2) Debone the chicken – yes, the chicken first before the turkey! You can “practice” on the chicken, and it doesn’t matter if it looks “bad” since it goes in the turkey. Use a sharp knife – we didn’t have a filleting knife, so Cy used both a Chef’s knife and utility knife.

3) Debone the turkey.  If you are using a frozen turkey, make sure that it is completely defrosted!

4) Remove the duck skin from the duck breast.

5) Brine all the meats overnight. Use 1 cup of salt, 1 cup of brown sugar dissolved in 1 gallon of water.

6) Remove meats from the brine, and start the meat layering! Open the turkey breasts, and place stuffing inside. Then, layer the chicken, and duck on top.

7) Sew up the turducken. We MacGyvered it, and used the twine we had at home. Once sewn up, we stuffed it with meatballs to “fill it up”. Tie the turducken so it holds it’s shape – across it’s “waist” and from “head” to “butt.”

8) Season the turducken however you want. We used a mixture of rosemary, garlic powder, basil, freshly ground salt and pepper. Plus, we added garlic slivers in the skin.

9) Slather the turducken with melted butter, and cover it in foil. Throw it in the oven, and baste every 30 minutes.

10) Remove the foil with 1 hour left to brown it! 25-30 mins/lb of turducken.

Slice, and serve! And, secret handshakes.

*Happy Thanksgiving to everyone*

First and last picture by Susan – thank you for being our star photographer!