Cooking My Wild Turkey

So once I had everything in the freezer, I was able to think about what I wanted to do with my bird. I had already decided to cook the bird without disguising it too much. When I butchered him it was pretty clear to me that it was fine meat that would taste good. I had left the meat in the freezer for a couple of months waiting for an opportunity to share my bird with the family. My mother in law was very interested in trying it out, since she'd never had wild turkey before. I defrosted the turkey in the fridge over a couple of days. The first dish that I wanted to make was a boned drumstick wrapped in bacon and stuffed with turkey stuffing. This effort turned out to be a disaster. Here's what I did. I cut the meat of the drumstick down at the tendons and then worked the meat off of the bone so that I had a small rectangular slab of meat. Then using a knife I picked out all the tendons and fine bones in the meat. This job was very time consuming and I missed one of the tendons while doing this. I whipped up a little turkey stuffing from a pre-seasoned box that I bought at the store. Then laying some of the stuffing on the meat, I rolled up the meat with the stuffing inside. After that, I took some turkey bacon and wrapped the whole thing in bacon. Once it was all wrapped up, I secured the roll with toothpicks. I took the two wraps and put them in the oven. When it came out, the turkey meat was gray and dry and shriveled, the bacon wasn't crispy, the toothpicks had popped out and the stuffing had squirted out of the rolls. Needless to say, I wasn't very happy with this result. I'm not sure I will do this again, but if I do, I'll pre-cook the bacon some so that it ends up crispier. Also, I used turkey bacon for my bacon, which was a mistake. Next time I will use real bacon. Second I would use butcher's string to tie my rolls shut instead of the tooth picks. In addition, I might use a higher temperature in the oven to sear the bacon on the outside without over-cooking the turkey meat. After this failed experiment I was a little worried about cooking the rest of the bird. I loaded the rest of the meat in a cooler and went over to the in laws to cook the rest of it. I decided to cut everything into strips coat it in seasoned breading and fry it in olive oil. The thighs felt a little tough from the freezing so I de-boned them and pounded them with a meat hammer before cutting them into strips. I took a couple of strips along with the wings and put them on the BBQ to see what would happen. The wings turned out very tough and the strips on the BBQ were dry. The rest of the bird was fried up and the result was very good. My niece had never had wild game food before and is a very picky eater. She ate more than I've ever seen her eat, without complaining. It always really pleases me to see how the kids go after the game meat I bring home. It is a special treat for them, as it should be, and it makes me proud to bring it home and share it with them. There is no ick factor like with a lot of adults that have never had game meat. There was plenty for everyone with four adults and four kids. The thigh meat was a little tougher, but not bad. Also, I think the thigh meat had a fuller flavor, which was very nice. The breast meat was very tender and tasty. I had left overs to share with some of my co-workers who expressed an interest in trying it. They weren't as receptive as the family, but none of them failed to finish what they took. I asked a guy I work with what he thought of it just now and he said it was ok, but that he was surprised and a little let down by the ordinariness of it.