For the Birds

Sitting at the local Poultry A-Go-Go and fraught with worry over what to order? Order the turducken and get the best of everything. This ingenious dish is a boneless duck, stuffed inside a boneless duck, stuffed inside a boneless turkey… then roasted. In the United Kingdom, it goes by the Dickensian moniker of the “three-bird roast” or “royal roast.” Here in the States, we just squish all the words together to make one super-sized gibberish word: turk-duck-en. Ugh. And frankly the made-up nature of the word itself is a marketing problem. Childish names deserve childish consideration. Now, a “royal roast” sounds like something you’d want to try, doesn’t it? You should, it’s delicious!

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Nesting

“Nesting,” the technique of cooking foods stuffed inside other foods, dates back to the golden days of stuffing. Although the turducken wasn’t produced commercially until 1985, “nested” meals were often prepared for royalty by the ancient Romans.

Nesting always reminds me of being wrapped inside my sheets inside of a blanket inside of a quilt in my bed like a sleeping turducken. Sleep is very important to your health. It’s especially important for kids. When you are growing, your body is working really hard and needs time to recharge its batteries. Kids between the ages of 5 and 12 typically need 10 to 11 hours of sleep every night.

Illustration by Chuck Gonzales

Portmanteau

The word “turducken” is a combination of three words: turkey, duck, and chicken. Combining words to make a word is called portmanteau. Here are a few others you might be familiar with:

BREAKFAST + LUNCH= BRUNCH

MOTOR+ HOTEL= MOTEL

SMOKE+FOG= SMOG