Christmas is upon us and there is a festive vibe all over the world. But along with celebration and occasions, comes a lot of food wastage. Food wastage is a serious issue across the globe, and we mustn’t forget that. Therefore, this Christmas, we wish to bring awareness about food wastage and how it can be avoided significantly. While restaurants, eateries and butchers’ shops need to take the lead concerning food wastage, even homemakers and families can contribute to it in their way.

Today, we will talk about a simple technique to butcher your own turkey at home, this Christmas to avoid any food wastage. Most people these days opt for smaller turkeys, but does that mean food is not wasted? Not really. The larger turkeys that were brought for Christmas by butcher shops still go wasted!

Tips to Butcher your Turkey

In this post, we give you some quick tips on how you can buy a bigger turkey, butcher it yourself and utilize it for multiple meals over Christmas and New Year. The best thing with turkey is that its breast, wings and legs share the same part and can be broken down in a similar way. If you have ever butchered any poultry or broken down a cooked bird, butchering a turkey will not be extremely difficult for you.

•         Always start with the legs. Don’t go for the breast as it is important to leave maximum skin attached to the breast.
•         Just to set the pace, pull the leg away from the bird and cut its skin as close as possible to the leg. Similarly, you can do the other leg.
•         Now that the legs have loosened, you can head for the wings. Pull the wings away from the bird. You will be able to notice where the wing joint meets the breast of the bird. You can just cut through this joint by slicing through the middle.
•         Back to the legs now because the wings are removed. You can pull the legs away from the bird and cut it as close as possible to the carcass. This leaves you with the thigh and drumstick connected with each other and can be further broken down later.
•         Now you have two options for the remaining meat. You can roast it as a crown or further break it down into separate breasts.
•         If you wish to break it down into separate breasts, start cutting the skin all the way down the centre of the bird, this helps you define the muscles better.
•         Once you are able to see the breasts clearly, you need to follow the incision down again. But this time, you must slice down to the keel bone and follow it down the turkey to the wishbone.
•         Now for removing the breasts, gently just cut along the crown. This will let the muscle fall off naturally and separate it from the joint.