Talkin’ turkey
Employees at the Butterball Turkey Talk-Line man the phones to answer questions.
Butterball Turkey with Seven-grain and Squash Stuffing
For 32 years, guys have been giving thanks on the Butterball Turkey Talk-Line. Now they will give advice.
Men this year will be operating the Butterball phones for the first time. They will talk turkey on the Turkey Talk-Line during the extended holiday season, and provide guidance, assurance, opinions and reminders that 911 is the way to go in case of fire.
The kitchen, traditionally, has been a woman’s domain, but the male presence there has expanded markedly over the past decade. This emergence is one of two primary reasons why Butterball LLC actively recruited men for the phones. The other, incredibly, is that since 1981, only women had sought the job.
“No male has ever applied to work on the Turkey Talk-Line, so this year we wanted to get proactive about adding men,” Mary Clingman, director of the Talk-Line, said in an email.
Garner, N.C.-based Butterball took the bull by the horns, so to speak, by running a “Man the Talk-Line Search” on its Facebook page from Sept. 16 through Oct. 20. A spokesman has been selected, but will not be named until the week of Nov. 11.
He will not be the only man in the talk-line room.
“In addition to the nationwide search, two to three Chicago area men will … share their cooking advice and Thanksgiving tips,” Clingman said. “We look forward to having more men on the talk-line this year and in the future.”
More men are calling and cooking, to be sure. Clingman said that today “about 1 in 4 callers are men,” compared with less than 10 percent in 1981. She added that 58 percent of men say they “are primarily responsible for providing meals for their family throughout the year,” and 84 percent are “involved in some aspect of holiday meal preparation.”
The main queries, from men and women? “How to thaw your turkey, how to check for doneness and … food safety.”
Preparing a turkey dinner should be a fowl endeavor, not foul. Grand plans, however, sometimes degenerate into the latter, as several posted on the Observer-Reporter Facebook page.
Nick Kratsas, online editor at the Observer-Reporter, recalled a Thanksgiving that seemed as if it would never end.
“One year, my mother was hosting our whole family,” he wrote. “For some reason, she forgot to thaw the turkey before cooking it, so she figured if she cooked it longer than normal, it would thaw as it cooked.
“At dinnertime, she presented a turkey that looked like it came out of a magazine – golden brown with a crispy skin. Unfortunately, the entire bird was raw inside. The turkey thawed while it was in the oven, but never cooked.
“The solution my aunt came up with was to cut the turkey into slices and microwave it a few pieces at a time. While the turkey did cook, it was dry and stringy from the microwave, and we all waited forever to eat.
“It was years before my aunt would let my mom cook the turkey again!”
Linda Toland Miller can relate to the havoc the Bumpus Hounds wrought in “A Christmas Story.”
Miller, a Toys R Us employee, said her parents had a turkey in the oven on Thanksgiving morning years ago when they had to go to a store. They innocently left their two canines in charge.
“The dogs got in the oven and ate the turkey,” Toland Miller posted. “There was only a little bit left.”
Many lament the overcommercialization of the November-December holidays, but few can relate to it as well as Arlene Davis Snatchko of Oakdale.
“My sister cooked the turkey and didn’t remove the paper bag with the neck, heart, etc.,” Davis Snatchko wrote. “Better yet, I know of someone that used a ‘cooking bag.’ However, it said Walmart on it!”
The late November holiday, of course, is devoted to giving thanks, and Brent Fulton’s family should be enduringly grateful for how he rescued the fourth Thursday in 1994 while avoiding speed traps.
Fulton, an X-ray technologist with Washington Health System, and his clan lived in Lone Pine, where his mother awakened early to prepare the feast. She quickly realized “the turkey she thawed out was freezer-burned. She was devastated.
“After calling many stores (most were closed), I found a little market in California (18 miles away) that had one fresh turkey left. I flew in the car and bought the bird, saving our dinner!”
Canon-McMillan graduate Eric McGrosky pointed out that turkey disasters, incredibly, can be multigenerational.
A young mother, he writes, “is cooking her first Thanksgiving turkey. As she cuts the turkey in half, putting both halves into the oven, she asks her mother, ‘Mom, why do we cut the thanksgiving turkey in half before we put it in the oven then hope it won’t be dried out?’
“Her mother replies, ‘I’ve always done it that way, and you’re right, it does always end up being a bit dry. Let’s ask your grandmother since she taught me how to cook.’
“Grandma said: ‘I never really thought about it. I’ve always hoped the turkey would turn out moist, and it never did. My mother taught me how to cook a turkey so many years ago; let’s ask her.’
“The family matriarch was sitting in the den when the great-granddaughter approached. ‘Great-grandmother, we want to know of our family traditions. Why do we cut the turkey in half before we place it in the oven, hoping against hope that it will not dry out?
“Darlin’, that’s easy. Cutting the turkey in half was the only way I could fit a whole bird in that tiny oven I had at my first house. We only dreamed of having an oven as big as yours back then.”