Turkey trouble
Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. I love turkey, I love pie. I love all the eating and napping and playing Monopoly.
The family thing can be stressful, though. It was Thanksgiving last year at my mother’s house that I started smoking again. After I began drinking beer at 10:30 in the morning.
I brine my turkey. Brining requires that you soak your bird (that is not a euphemism, ya pervs) in a salt and sugar water solution for 18 to 20 hours. It produces a very tender, delicious end result. I’ve done it a few years now and it’s always turned out great.
Well, after a long morning of exasperation in the kitchen, my mother decided I was not doing it right. She thought it needed salt. Never mind that the thing had been soaking in salt water for 24 hours, or that I had done this a time or two before. It needed salt. She can’t stand a turkey that’s not salted enough.
I popped a beer and salted the frickin’ turkey. Then I had a smoke. Then I popped another beer.
Four and a half hours later we pulled a beautiful, golden brown, perfectly roasted bird out of the oven. The smell was orgasmic. The dressing and gravy made from the drippings looked like something out of a magazine.
I noticed there was a problem as soon as I sat down. Everyone started getting refills on their drinks and saying things like, “It’s not so bad if you eat it with the mashed potatoes.” I took a bite. At first it was normal, juicy. Then the salt hit me right between the eyes. It was a shock. So I tried to get a bite of something else, the dressing, to get the taste out of my mouth. Mistake.
The whole meal was so salty we couldn’t get enough to drink for three days. Everybody was so swollen from sodium overload we looked like a bunch of prize fighters. It turned us off of turkey for a year. We had pork roast for Christmas.
My turkey is soaking in brine even as I write this. I’ll have it in the oven before my mom gets here. There’s plenty of beer in the fridge. I’m so thankful.
The family thing can be stressful, though. It was Thanksgiving last year at my mother’s house that I started smoking again. After I began drinking beer at 10:30 in the morning.
I brine my turkey. Brining requires that you soak your bird (that is not a euphemism, ya pervs) in a salt and sugar water solution for 18 to 20 hours. It produces a very tender, delicious end result. I’ve done it a few years now and it’s always turned out great.
Well, after a long morning of exasperation in the kitchen, my mother decided I was not doing it right. She thought it needed salt. Never mind that the thing had been soaking in salt water for 24 hours, or that I had done this a time or two before. It needed salt. She can’t stand a turkey that’s not salted enough.
I popped a beer and salted the frickin’ turkey. Then I had a smoke. Then I popped another beer.
Four and a half hours later we pulled a beautiful, golden brown, perfectly roasted bird out of the oven. The smell was orgasmic. The dressing and gravy made from the drippings looked like something out of a magazine.
I noticed there was a problem as soon as I sat down. Everyone started getting refills on their drinks and saying things like, “It’s not so bad if you eat it with the mashed potatoes.” I took a bite. At first it was normal, juicy. Then the salt hit me right between the eyes. It was a shock. So I tried to get a bite of something else, the dressing, to get the taste out of my mouth. Mistake.
The whole meal was so salty we couldn’t get enough to drink for three days. Everybody was so swollen from sodium overload we looked like a bunch of prize fighters. It turned us off of turkey for a year. We had pork roast for Christmas.
My turkey is soaking in brine even as I write this. I’ll have it in the oven before my mom gets here. There’s plenty of beer in the fridge. I’m so thankful.
posted by Cas at 11:39 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home