Let's talk turkey

[Jacquester]

As I'm sure we all agree, quality of ingredients can be important for most meals. I'm wondering whether people have a take on their turkey types and sources. I see things like Heritage, free range, all natural, organic, grain fed and more. Then there are those that just head to the local supermarket and get the .79 a lb turkey.

I"m especially interested to know if anyone has noted a difference in how the turkey type affects the flavor or outcome, or if it's a bunch of hooey(good word ehh?) I understand that the Heritage Turkey is supposed to be a bit gamier for example. This year I decided to splurge and get a "natural" turkey with no anitbiotics.

[therippa]

I've cooked both the run-of-the-mill supermarket turkey and a fresh-free-range-never-frozen turkey, and the only discernible difference I found was the price. This could be due to me brining both of them though.

[echriste]

My turkeys come from the farm. We have Thanksgiving on Saturday so I will pick up the turkey this morning from the farmer. Then it gets a dry rub rather than a brine as this year I don't have the time or space for a brine.

[djyee100]

A few weeks ago I attended a cooking demo for heritage turkey, the turkeys that Bill Niman raises, originally from poults from Frank Reese. The turkeys were brined (one brined with herbs, the other with plain salt brine). I didn't think the meat was gamy. I thought the meat was very tasty, with a full, turkey-ish flavor. However, you do have to accept that domestic turkey is a bland bird to start with--the heritage turkey makes the most of what can be done in breeding a flavorful bird.

Niman said at the demo that he detected little flavor difference in the various heritage breeds that he raises. The biggest difference is the size of the bird.

The price of the bird can give you pause: $6-$7 per lb, and the smallest turkey you can buy is 10 lbs. I seriously considered buying a heritage turkey for Thanksgiving, but then it turns out I won't be cooking turkey after all--so I can postpone my decision for a year. (When I mentioned the high price to a friend, he suggested driving to a small state park near here and running over one of the wild turkeys that crisscross the roads. My friend was just kidding. I think.)

If you haven't seen it yet, Saveur wrote an entertaining article about Frank Reese, the keeper of the flame for heritage turkeys. Here:

http://www.saveur.com/article/Kitchen/Rare-Breed

[budrichard]

I've just about had them all, from the supposedly 'Heritage' turkeys which I believe are just usually just Broad Breasted Bronze a commercial variety that looks like a wild turkey to the white ones, Broad Breasted White and on to wild turkeys that I have shot myself. We have a local grower that I have purchased a fresh bird a few days before thanksgiving for many years. This year he was sold out and my turkey is a 'White' butchered on last Monday. The wild turkey in Wisconsin mainly feeds on acorns and has a little more of the flavor I usually associate with squirrels, I rate them very good but because I usually shoot them well before Thanksgiving, I break them down in more manageable parts and therefore have not cooked one whole. I find no difference between the bronze and the white varieties. Where I do find the difference is between one that has been in the pipeline for a month or two and one that is slaughtered a few days before cooking. All the 'heritage' turkeys that I have found readily available are sold frozen and I just don't purchase my turkeys frozen. Those turkeys that are basted in a chemical cocktial are of course not even considered

I don't know what you mean about a turkey sold as "with no anitbiotics" as 'natural'. I thought that if commercially produced some sort of antibiotic is used?

All the rest is hype to me.

-Dick

[djyee100]

I've just about had them all, from the supposedly 'Heritage' turkeys which I believe are just usually just Broad Breasted Bronze a commercial variety that looks like a wild turkey to the white ones, Broad Breasted White ...

I think that's a good point. It may be that some producers are tacking the label "heritage" onto Broad Breasted White/Bronze turkeys, which, ironically, are not recognized breeds by the American Poultry Association. ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_turkey_breeds ) I don't know if any laws prohibit the use of the label "heritage" for these commercial breed turkeys, and if not, that's an issue to be addressed down the road.

Frank Reese's definition of heritage turkey, including the heritage breeds :

http://www.goodshepherdpoultryranch.com/heritageturkeydefinition.html

It seems to me that if you're going to pay the bucks for a heritage turkey, it's worth asking which of the heritage breeds you're buying. If the producer says Broad Breasted White/Bronze, move on. Or if the store and/or producer doesn't know or won't say, that's an answer, too. It takes extra effort to acquire and raise the heritage breeds, and the store and producer will know when they're selling the real thing. At the cooking demo, Niman said that Frank Reese will not ship his poults, which is standard procedure for the industry. Reese considers shipping as too stressful for his babies. Instead someone has to show up at Reese's ranch to pick up the poults. And that's what Niman and his wife did: they drove to Kansas from California, and returned home with the poults in the back seat. Their breeding flock began with chauffeured turkeys.

[Peter the eater]

I haven't tried them all, not even close, but the last few years we've raised a handful of Broad Breasted Whites from chicks from the Co-op with outstanding flavour, and I'm a dark meat guy. Nurture is as important as nature, in my experience.

[Florida]

I’ve had Heritage breed turkeys before and there is most certainly a difference. For one, the legs on heritage birds appear enormous as compared to their mass produced brethren. In my opinion heritage birds tend to have a stronger flavor, though I wouldn’t go so far as to describe the flavor as “gamey.”

[onrushpam]

The best turkey I ever ate were the ones my Uncle Doug shot in the wild. I remember one Thanksgiving dinner about 15 years ago where we realized everything on the table was grown, gathered or hunted by family members (except for dairy, spices, flour, etc.)

This year, I asked DD to snag a small organic turkey from Publix, where she works. Thank goodness I called her about it last week! She got the turkey and immediately put it into Alton's brine solution! It would've been brined for about 5 days! She took it out of the brine after about 24 hours, rinsed it, put it into a HUGE ziplock and brought it to me on Sunday. It's drying now. We'll see how it is. It's MUCH bigger than I expected. She said it's 12 lbs, but I'm guessing more like 15. We'll have a ton of leftovers.