Those who celebrate Thanksgiving. Anyone do a main course that isn’t Turkey?

Just curious. I’d guess there’s got to be a few people around here who don’t like Turkey?

Ham is the way.

I just got a package of frozen Turkey legs because they don’t Turkeys small enough for me. Next to the turkey was frozen duck with orange sauce, but I wasn’t sure if the duck meat would be super greasy so didn’t experiment.

@lantz - do you make it any special way?

We never bother with turkey.

Last year we picked up mincemeat pie from a bakery on Bainbridge Island. It was incredible.

This year we picked up a Spanakopita pie from some folks on Whidbey Island:

I reserve all cooking energy for the making of a blackberry pie, because dessert is where it’s at man. Damn fine pie with some coffee is my mojo.

I’ve never had mincemeat pie. It looks really good.

I was rather shocked at how really good it is. I always had it in my mind it was something gross I’d want nothing to do with and never looked into what it actually is. My loss, it’s good stuff.

This year we’ll see what Spanakopita is all about.

But as I said, the main course for me at least is blackberry pie and coffee!!!

We do turkey. Mainly for the next couple days sandwiches.

I’m a big spanakopita fan. Hope you enjoy it.

Canadian here so Thanksgiving has already happened. Pork back ribs and salmon were the mains. In fact, it’s been a long time since we’ve done a whole turkey. Stuffed roasted turkey breast is the goto now if we want turkey.

The last one I went to had a choice of steak or fish.

I had the lasagna.

Spanakopita is awesome - it’s almost a spinach and feta quiche. There are a lot of recipes to make easy versions at home, and you probably have most of the ingredients already (spinach, onion, garlic, feta, egg, dill, frozen premade puffpastry, parsley, olive oil). I just made a version with cooked mixed greens (collards, chard, etc) instead of just spinach and parsley, and it was surprisingly hard to tell the difference. And it works well with non-traditional add-ins like mushrooms, sliced ham, other cheeses, etc.

It’s a cross post, and I am using it everywhere I can.

I love turkey. I usually just get a turkey breast though since it’s just me. (As an aside, I feel like turkey prices have skyrocketed during the pandemic at least around me.)

Edit: And I do eat turkey more than once a year. It is delicious! Conversely, I eat ham rarely. When I was a kid and didn’t like turkey as much as now, we would have roast beef for Christmas. Now, though, I’m all about turkey. :)

This is our solution lately and my god, it’s so much less trouble. And delicious.

Turkey pieces definitely work if you specifically want some bird.

The last few times we went with just the breast. This year I’ll be having a turkey and mashed potato microwave dinner. The wife is going to Seattle to be with family.

Please invite me to your next Thanksgiving :)

Just about any normal main dish is going to be better than turkey. If you want to be traditional, roast a chicken–basically the same meat, but better, and it’s easier.

If turkey were good, we’d eat it more than once a year.

(Alas, I’m doing a turkey this year because my father-in-law is a staunch traditionalist.)

The problem with turkey is that people don’t know how to cook it. It is very much like chicken, but bigger. So the difference between the cooking time for white meat and dark is larger. When the dark is done, the white is dry.

Spatchcocking solves this. But how many people know how to do that? Or want to?

We roast our bird breast side down, for maximum moisture. The skin is bad for you anyway. :P

You watch your mouth.