Inflated Turducken

Remember the commercials "Charlie Murphy's got Johnsonville Brats!"? The lone man grilling meat on the barbecue is soon joined with his friends and neighbors. Turns out, my excitement has reached out to our friends and neighbors. Tomorrow's event has turned into quite the event. After the initial "Oh sh&*, where is everyone going to sit, will there be enough to go around?" I've come to terms with how many people we've spread joy to through Turducken and I say "The more the merrier"
And for the off-chance, dare I say it, the Turducken is afowl we'll have enough booze to erase the whole thing from our minds.

Butcher block

My dear Mom has always been of the belief that knives are never for gift-giving and I'm fairly certain that others are of a similar mindset, or at least generation. But as my sister discovered with her wedding gift registry, sometimes a knife is all you need. For Henry and I, with the exception of one paring knife, the knives that inhabit our residence are anything but sharp. And oddly enough, we also have a pair of durable kitchen scissors my Mom gave us last Christmas, they're probably the sharpest. This is a problem. Cutting meat alone is a grand task for any knife. For Turducken, something homemade and possibly delicate the sharpest knife in the drawer will be required. As to not disturb the precisely placed alternating layers of poultry and stuffing this knife must be able to slice with the greatest of ease. So here I go, another step on the journey to Turducken, in search of a knife sharpener.

Bone those birds, bone them.

Needless to say my excitement is building. One may wonder how much more excited I could get about three birds I've been waiting to eat for a year? Much, much more. Some would appropriate Tourettes syndrome to my sudden bursts of ornithological joy and anticipation. Chanting the names. Turkey! And Duck! And Chicken! Our cats just don't understand.
In a fit of obsession I called to check on the order I put in with QFC. Yup, they'll be ready on the 17th. Oh boy! I can't wait! Turducken!

Birth of the Turducken and Setting a date, would you call this setup a Shotgun Turducken?

I should preface my first post and our journey overall. Why Turducken? Why now?
First, the Why. It was roughly a year ago, my boyfriend Henry and I discovered our supreme infatuation with the novel culinary concoction that is Turducken. Over time, our friends, coworkers, acquaintances, complete strangers and certain family members may say this has developed into an obsession. And, unabashedly Henry and I would have to agree. Being that it is simply a fun word to say, how can one refrain from saying it over and over again and glittering one's speech with it. No, one can not. It all began with the intimately developed language we created for our cat, Ben. Ben, the grumpiest of creatures, has distinctly angry facial features, and the all around persona of a curmudgeon, which is in high contrast to our other cat Lulu. One afternoon's pondering led us to believe Ben walked around the apartment with an inner monologue consisting of sounds like "Duck duck duck" or "Durk durk durk" (These are in no relation to the World Police movie but they sound similar) Then one day I asked "What does Ben eat for Thanksgiving?" and the obvious answer and birth of our obsession was "Turducken!" Three birds in one delicious place, three birds became the holy trinity of poultry and the nirvana of the epicure.
For people who have never tasted the no doubt delicious meat of Turducken we've stayed faithful to the idea of it. When times were rough, dinner was undecided or crankiness just prevailed the Turducken was there as our golden goblet. Some day our Turducken would come.
Why now? Why now, why not? In August, we were lamenting the dwindling hours of summer and completion of most of our adventures; my graduation from the University of Washington, the fabulous surprise trip to San Fransisco, backing and various brief albeit fantastic camping expeditions. In need of something to look forward to in the coming dreary Seattle darkness Henry finally said, "let's set a date". And soon enough we'd set October 18th of 2008 as the Date of Turducken.
I couldn't think of a more grand and frivolous way to ring in the Holiday Hibernation season.

Two weeks... begin the journey

"How do you solve a problem like Turducken?" I've heard conflicting perspectives on the subject of boning birds. No, not philandering, I'm talking ducks and chickens. Various blog and vlog sources give simple pedestrian guides on the subject while others say, don't do you dare, don't even think of doing this yourself. I've been a flip flopper as I read the mass of articles. All of the sources state that you can take a day or two before the Big Day to bone the birds so that you're not wasting precious basting time on surgical tasks. So, with time aside I believe my biggest qualm is stomaching the sound of flesh leaving bone, etc. But lets agree right now that if it comes down to a DIY dissection it will be after all of Seattle's resources have been tapped. Either way, I should become well read on the topic of avian anatomy.
Here we go:
#1 University Seafood & Poultry. My top choice and an overall awesome place to go, if only to chat up the old coots who work the counter and flush the streets after big deliveries. Months ago I spoke with a few guys there about boning birds. And I thought I was set until today when I called I spoke to some older female who shall not be named. "We have Turduckens around the Holidays." "Well, do you bone birds other times?" "No no, its far far to time consuming." "Any other places you know of who might?" "No" I gave her a nice little irritated OK, then thanks and hung up.
#2 QFC at Broadway Market. This chain annoys me and this location is bordering on department store in its size and, well, departments. However, absolutely friendliest service compared to my favorite little Indy market of the U district. I told the woman in the meat department the project and I got the answer I wanted. Not so hard after all. They don't normally carry duck but if I ordered today they would get it by Saturday. And she said "Boning the birds takes 10-15 minutes" That sounds about right since I've seen Youtube videos of chefs boning birds in under 5 minutes.
#3 Would have been Whole Foods (Paycheck) and probably wouldn't have benefitted the funding of our stuffings.
I would not say that the hard part is over yet but I can say, +1 for Broadway Market QFC! Here's looking at you Turducken!