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Dear Reader,
It just isn't right. It's one of the most bizarre (actually a little frightening) things I've seen advertised to serve for the holidays.
Martha, a reader at the book club, sent me a note, "I laughed when I saw this today in our local grocer's ad. I thought you would enjoy seeing it, too."
The flyer advertised: "New for 2013--6 Legged Turkey"
A traditional turkey has two legs, but what if everyone wants a drumstick? Problem solved: our butchers can truss a turkey with 6 legs that will be the centerpiece of any feast and the talk of the table. With 6 legs, it's more turkey to love!"
I admit it's true, many families have squabbles over who gets a turkey leg at Thanksgiving, but there won't be any six-leggers served at my house. It's too strange for me. But if my mother were still living I'd be sending her a six-legged bird for Thanksgiving, and I know she would love the idea, because apparently my mother was ahead of her time.
Enjoy this memorial column about my mother, Thanksgiving and her turkey legs. At the end of today's column is a link to see the six-legged bird and there's a cute holiday giveaway.
Some people want the white meat, some will only eat the dark, and for years our family members used to argue over who was going to get the turkey drumsticks on Thanksgiving. Every year it was the same routine. My mother would ring her china bell, "Dinner is ready. Come to the table," and we'd all start calling "dibs" on a turkey leg.
When there are only two turkey legs, but ten people want one...well, it used to be a huge problem until the year my mother made her famous Turkey Drumstick Thanksgiving Dinner.
It seemed like a normal enough Thanksgiving meal, until my mother announced, "I've got a surprise. No one will be disappointed this year. Everybody gets a drumstick, because that's all that I cooked." And Mom plopped down a serving platter, piled high with 20 turkey legs, in the middle of the table. "Dig in."
This felt a little strange. What, no bird this year? Only drumsticks?
Mom was smiling, so proud she'd finally found a solution for the annual turkey leg squabble. Apparently she'd begun working on this year's Thanksgiving surprise the day after our last Thanksgiving dinner. Clipping coupons and always keeping an eye out for a turkey leg sale, my mother had been buying up turkey legs for the past year. It sounded okay in theory, but either Mom didn't wrap the legs in freezer paper, or the turkey legs were on sale because they were near their expiration dates, or it was just a bad year for turkeys--because when we tried to stick a fork into our drumsticks--we couldn't!
I'm not exaggerating here, the turkey legs were nowhere near fork-tender. The tines of our forks actually bounced off of our drumsticks when we tried to pierce them. A table knife wouldn't even saw through the sinewy--who knows how old--freezer burnt, turkey legs. My son suggested we fire-up the chain saw.
Sometimes when you try to solve a problem, it merely shows up in another form. Those were some tough birds. We ended up dueling with our turkey drumsticks instead of eating them. And the next year--nobody in our family fought over drumsticks. Nobody even wanted to look at a drumstick, the memories were still too fresh in our minds.
To see that six-legged bird and to enter the cute holiday giveaway, go to: http://www.emailbookclub.com/photo/six-legs.html
Thanks for reading with me. It's so good to read with friends.
Suzanne Beecher
Suzanne@DearReader.com
* This month's Penguin Classics book is DEMIAN by Hermann Hesse. Start reading now and enter to win a Penguin bookbag. Go to: http://tinyurl.com/November13Classics
AUTHORBUZZ: AuthorBuzz authors are on vacation for the next two weeks. Instead of writing, they'll be roasting turkeys and baking pies. They will return the week of December 2nd.
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