A: All right, it is time to put together the
turducken.
All right, so we've deboned out our chicken
and our duck.
We gave smashed up our turkey, taking out
his breast bone and backbone, as well as his
thighbones, giving us nice real estate to
work with.
And we have stuffing.
We have sausage and cornbread stuffing.
Now this is how you put it together.
Now, because I'm going to be dealing with
a lot of poultry, I just went ahead and set
aside the seasoning that I am going to ditch
when I'm done because it's going to be nasty.
All right, this is just equal parts of black
pepper with onion powder and garlic powder.
I forgot [what it is].
Remember, we grind this briefly, so we're
kind of being careful with the salt.
We really don't want over-salty anything,
but this stuff you can be pretty generous
with.
We want to open everybody up and give him
a good sprinkle.
All right, now layer one, you just dig in
and put a nice layer of your stuffing, so
it's in the bird, so it's stuffing, and this
goes all over in a nice thin layer on the
inside.
And you can use any kind of stuffing that
you like, I just happen to like this one.
It's just an old Southern traditional yummy
thing, and it's got bacon or sausage in it.
You got to have the protein in this dish,
can't skip out.
Somebody might leave hungry.
All right, so a nice layer of the stuffing
in here.
Normally, or traditionally, I guess, when
you add the duck, you leave it just like you
would the turkey, just go ahead and take out
the rest of the bones.
However, I think it's too greasy.
I really do.
Duck is so fatty.
So I went ahead and took out all of his bones.
So we've got the breast meat, the thigh meat,
and the leg meat right there.
If you want to, you can put a piece of the
duck skin on top for flavor.
I forgot.
And you just repeat the process.
Season him up, and then over the top with
more of your stuffing.
You've got to love the sheer audacity of something
like this.
Although, when I was poking around and I was
writing the articles on turducken, and I ran
across arguments on where it started, who
invented it, and Paul Petrone got credit.
I don't know.
It's actually a version of this.
It's been around forever.
The Romans did it, except they went completely
crazy.
They did seven to 15 different birds, stuffed
one inside the other, starting with a buster,
and then a turkey, and then ducks, then chicken,
then geese, ending up with some kind of thrush
that was just big enough to hold an olive.
That is ridiculous.
I decided that turducken was not over the
top.
I hope that I don't have him overstuffed.
I pretty well could have.
Now, this is when it gets a little bit tricky,
because you've got to have another pair of
hands.
I don't think that it is possible to do this
on your own.
If you can manage it by yourself, I'm impressed.
You do better than I do.
Okay, give me a half a second.
I'm going to grab a paper towel real quick.
I'll be back and then we're going to roll
him up and stitch him up.
All right, we're going to stitch him up.
I'm going to get my cameraman to come over
here and give me another pair of hands.
Sometimes I use a big fat upholstery needle.
Actually, let's turn him this way... and sometimes
I use skewers.
It just depends on what I'm in the mood for,
but this is when all of this extra skin comes
in handy.
Alright, what I need you to do is pull him
shut, alright?
We're going to do it... there we go.
We really want to enclose everything we've
stuffed him with, and this part is a little
bit tricky.
Got it?
And we want to come back in here, this way.
Come on.
There.
All right, watch out so I don't get your wrist.
B: So you don't want to stitch your hands
to the bird.
A: Don't want to stitch your hands to the
bird.
I'm going to get your finger in a minute.
Serves you right for that comment.
All right, that is step one.
All this stuff, we want all of this in the
bird.
And this also gets a little bit tricky.
Oh, we've got skin splitting.
So what I'm going to do is grab my butchers
[twine], alright?
So give me just a second, I'm going to grab
the butchers [twine] and show how to come
around here, so we can save all of this wonderful
stuffing that's trying to escape.
Okay.
I've got to wash my hands.
Okay, so what we are going to do is tuck his
legs.
Can you hold him like this?
Just like this.
And there's all sort of fancy knots you can
use when you're dressing.
I don't see why.
What you are trying to do is hold it closed.
There, it's a bow.
It's a present.
All right, hang on.
I've got to do it again.
I have seen a very few pictures of turducken
that somebody had actually managed to put
back like, you know, it looked like a turkey.
Mine don't, which is fine.
There you go.
All right, one more after these wings.
If you want to, I've never done this, but
I've heard that if you would like to...
You need to come right over here.
Can you set these wings [in], just like that.
Make sure those wing bones are tight up against
him.
Hold him there for me.
I've heard of people that will actually cover
the back with a piece of cheesecloth to help
the stuffing not escape.
I've never had a problem with it, but I also
never tried that method.
Okay.
Here we go.
We both need to wash up.
I'm going to grab the baking rack and the
other sheet.
We're going to transfer him over, and I'm
going to show you the last step before he
goes into the oven.
Okay, I went ahead and added another piece
or two.
What's happened on mine, and this will happen
a lot, is that I've got a piece of skin splitting
on the topside, so I want to be very, very
careful with that.
I don't want to move him anymore than I have
to until I him turned over, and I can make
a little repair.
So, it's going to be a big old mess.
Can you help me?
We're going to squeeze him down and flip him
this way.
Which way?
Ready?
Did we get it?
Yeah, here we go.
All right, here is where his skin has split,
so here is where I want to come in and make
my little repair work, and otherwise, I think
we are doing okay.
This particular one, it got a little messy.
It happens.
Alright, so, I am going trust him one more
time right here.
And then I need a big old bunch of aluminum
foil.
I have my oven set to 225 degrees.
We're going low and slow.
This is a lot of protein, solid packed in
here, and we want to make sure that it stays
nice and juicy.
Now, there we go.
Okay, so at 225 degrees, I'm going to cover
him with aluminum foil.
I'm going to pop him in the oven and in a
few hours, I will put a probe thermometer
right down here.
What I want to do is aim for that center layer
where the chicken and that stuffing is, the
very middle stuffing needs to hit 165 degrees.
That's going to take a while, and that's okay.
I'm not going to worry about time, because
I'm going to let my thermometer tell me when
it's safe to eat.
So that's it.
I'm wrapping him up, shoving it in the oven,
and I'm going to walk away for a little while.
All right, I'm coming.
Okay, that's not like [inaudible 00:09:59].
All right, we did 165 degrees.
And all I did was kind of keep an eye on the
skin.
When it started getting about, I guess about
120 or so, I took all of the foil off and
let it brown up.
I ended up foiling this again.
You've just kind of got to keep an eye on
it.
You don't want it to get too brown, but you
do want all of this nice, yummy, crispy stuff
that's happening here.
Now, unfortunately, he's got to rest.
Now, resting is critical.
Never, never, never skip resting.
What happens when you cook proteins, when
you cook meats, all of the juices that are
inside, go rushing to the outside surface
of the meat, and if I cut into this right
now, it's all going to run down into the bottom
of my pan.
It's not going to stay on the inside where
we want it.
So, I had it at 165.
Oh, he's already come up another two degrees,
and this will continue to rise for a little
bit.
What I'm looking for to know that it's rested
long enough is for the temperature to peak
and then to come back down.
So, when that happens, then we'll cut him
open and I'll show you what he looks like
on the inside.
All right, we're ready to do.
Needless to say, we need to put this bondage
apparatus here.
We can't leave him like that.
[Got to] carve him up.
He just got pass 170, and frankly, to tell
you the truth, I should let it rest for a
little bit longer, but we've got soccer practice
and conferences at school, so I'm kind of
in a hurry.
I'm going to cut a little bit early.
We've got it right above 170, and he's come
back down.
How about a little platter I picked up for
this giant bird?
Okay, so there is really not much finesse
at this point for carving turducken.
There's no bones anywhere in here, so that's
what we're after.
[It's coming] straight down, through the middle,
because what we do want to display and what
we do want to see, are all of those layers
inside.
And I've got to come all the way down, because
I want to... there we go... get a skewer out
of there so that I can cut through it.
Oh, there we go.
You know that whole serious culinary evil
thing?
Let's see if I can show you what we've got
going on here.
Just a bit [inaudible 00:12:40] rack.
Get him up.
Hang on.
I'm going to turn him around for you.
Oh no!
There I go.
All right.
Ready?
Check this out.
Can you see it?
See all of those layers?
We have turkey, and duck, and stuffing, and
here's more stuffing, and chicken, and stuffing,
and all of those layers have worked together
and look how, oh, [inaudible 00:13:12] juicy.
Look.
This little piece of duck gave itself to me.
Oh, yum.
Now, if you just let it rest a little longer
than I did, it would actually be much easier
to carve.
And to carve and serve this, all you want
to do is take slices down this way, right
across the breast, because that way, every
slice has all the layers of everything that
you've put in there.
All right, so there you have it.
This is just like poultry ridiculousness.
It is a turducken, a turkey stuffed with a
duck, stuffed with a chicken.
There's a lot of stuffs in it.
It's a little of a labor of love.
But as you can see from the videos, it's just
not that hard.
You can pull this off.
Mm, that's good.