Trend Watch: Raising Turkeys May Be Cooler Than Raising Chickens

Move over chickens, there’s a new trend in urban animal husbandry: Tom Turkey. That’s according to several leading cool people in hip coastal cities.

“Chickens are played out,” says food truck owner/chef and facial hair blogger Gerry Hildebrand of Brooklyn, NY. “I mean, shit, the other day my mom was asking me about the best brand of chicken coop for her tract house in the ‘burbs. Keep in mind this is a woman who still asks for ‘the Rachel’ at her hair salon.”

Many poultry owners say they have grown dissatisfied with the nutritional content of chicken products. Proponents of switching to turkeys often cite several health benefits of “going gobble.”

“What a lot of people don’t realize is that turkey eggs are actually much healthier than chicken eggs,” says graphic designer and Etsy-preneur Sophia Szydlik of Portland, Oregon. “They have less cholesterol, more protein and a ton of antioxidants. And if you’re into butchering, the meat is leaner and has a crapload of Omega-3 [fatty acids]. Plus, a tom turkey isn’t going to wake the whole neighborhood at sunrise like a rooster. It’s kind of a no brainer, really.”

Bridge connecting Manhattan with the traditional poultry farming community of Williamsburg.

It’s not always easy, though. Making the switch can come with a steep learning curve and often entails significant added expenses.

“When I started experimenting with turkeys two or three years ago, I thought I could just use my old chicken coop,” said Alexis Little, a San Francisco barista and author of the self-published DIY guide/epic poem A Turkey in Every Pot. “Yeah, not so much. Turns out turkeys are a very different sort of fowl. They need a lot of space and a diverse diet or they’re just going to taste like some bland, Globo-market crap you’d get at Safeway.”

It’s also important for potential turkey owners to consider their resources and lifestyle when selecting a breed.

“Newbies will often see a picture of a Bourbon Red or a Royal Palm in Turkey Country and go buy some poults without really giving any thought to whether they have the space, time and patience for a breed like that,” says Allyson Cole, a poultry expert who runs the Butterball™ Chicken and Turkey Rescue in Brooklyn. “All the time I get turkeys from well-meaning rookies who got in over their heads and just gave up.”

Still, most seasoned turkey enthusiasts say that if you’re willing to make the commitment and do your homework, it can be well worth the effort.

“I roll my eyes every time I hear someone talk about how great their fresh chicken eggs are,” said Szydlik. “Please, it’s 2015. I suppose you think your Prius is still super cool, too? Turkeys are where it’s at now. I wouldn’t give up my Joseph Gobbles or Eddy Gizzard for a whole flock of chickens.”

17 Homemaking Tips for the 21st Century Male – Part I

So you’ve managed to bag a wealthy, careerist wife, squeezed a few kids out of her, and now she wants you to be a modern, stay-at-home dad. Great! You’re living the dream, buddy! Countless generations of men have yearned to have unemployment count as a respectable occupation, but until recently few had succeeded. Now that it’s possible, though, a problem remains: after millennia of oppressive male gender roles, you might find that you haven’t been raised with the skills necessary to become an effective homemaker. Well don’t you fret your pretty little head, doll. Just follow some of these ingenious tips and you’ll be well on your way to becoming a regular Martha Stewart’s husband.

IN THE KITCHEN

1. Yard Trimmings Can Easily Be Passed Off as Exotic Lettuces

With all the crazy lettuce varieties you see in grocery stores nowadays, consumers are becoming increasingly unable to differentiate between commercially grown lettuces and random leaves. I mean does anyone besides hippies even know what the fuck mesclun lettuce is? Take advantage of this trend by serving yard trimmings and leaves at your next party, or even to your family for dinner. Just sweep the shit up into a bowl and pour a little Kraft Zesty Italian over it. The trick is particularly effective if you get some tree and flower leaves in there rather than just pure Kentucky Blue grass. Just make sure they’re non-toxic (Wikipedia can be a big help with this). What you want to call your magical lettuce mix is up to you. I typically say it’s a blend of Siberian Arugula and African Savanna Kale. The key is to make sure you add exotic locales to the name of an already trendy lettuce-type. People will just assume it’s some gourmet new breed they hadn’t heard of yet.

2. Don’t Waste Good Blood

Ancient Mongolian horse archers used to use a survival technique whereby they would carefully make an incision in the shoulder of their horse, fill up a container with blood and then chug that blood. These hearty souls knew what many modern peoples seem to have forgotten: blood is a nutritious, energy rich food. My mentor, Dr. Franklin von Stugaart, used to down a glass of blood from a “cherubic Caucasian male child” every morning in order to “reinvigorate his humors.” The man had the energy of a horse and lived to the ripe old age of 102 despite the fact that he drank like Mr. Ed. In any case, don’t waste good blood. Next time you cut yourself in the kitchen, don’t just rinse nature’s iron-rich protein shake down the drain, collect it in the glass until it stops bleeding and then enjoy a refreshing glass of blood afterwards. Alternatively, learn the Mongolian draining technique and perform the procedure on your pets. I can tell you from experience that cat blood has a sweet tang you’ll learn to crave (though admittedly you’ll lose a few felines in the process of learning how to make the incision). Blood can also be mixed with other food for added nutritional kick or passed off as other things to save money. I myself mix blood with corn starch and sugar and serve that to my guests as “country ketchup.” With the skyrocketing price of ketchup in these troubled times, how can you afford not to?

AROUND THE HOUSE

3. A Green Lawn Will Suck the Green from Your Bank Account

Every year Americans pump billions of dollars into making the land surrounding their house look like a green shag carpet. This is pointless, time consuming, and wasteful. Some of these costs can be defrayed by reusing yard trimmings as salad, but to save the real benjies you need to do away with lawn care altogether. The easiest solution is just to let it die. No fuss, no muss. One of the more convenient traits of grass is that it hangs around looking like normal grass long after it dies. The only problem with this is that it turns brown after the transformation, which the anal retentives at your local homeowner’s association usually frown their compulsively groomed little faces at. Fortunately, we have this thing called paint nowadays that can turn stuff any color you want it. You can even take a blade of your current grass down to any paint store and have them make a paint that matches the color exactly. Your homeowner’s association won’t have a clue!

4. Needing to Separate Laundry is a Myth

Here’s everything you need to know about laundry: set the washer to cold, jam whatever the fuck you want in, throw in a capful of detergent, and start the machine. Seriously. Everything you own that isn’t dry clean-only will get clean just fine using this method. In fact, even some dry clean-only shit will get clean just fine with this method. The notion that you need to separate out darks and lights and use different temperatures is a total scam perpetuated by Big Utility so you remain a slave to hot water in order to fatten up its bottom line.

ENTERTAINING

5. Cough Syrup Can Provide Added Kick to Watered-Down Liquor

A good way to defray the costs of entertaining is to water down your liquor. That’s just common sense. Any homemaker or barkeep worth his salt knows this. The problem is when you have some real boozers for guests and they can tell they’re not getting as drunk as they should be. Well never fear. A good way to combat this issue is to add a bottle of cough syrup to each 1.5L handle of liquor you have. It works best with non-neutral spirits, but if all you have is vodka then mix it in there with some other shit and call it “Jungle Juice.” Make sure the cough syrup is one with “DM” on the label as this is the magical ingredient. Also, make sure it doesn’t have acetomeniphan as this stuff is hard on the liver and should not be combined with drinking. You know, for your health.

6. Mint Mouthwash is Totally Drinkable

Another good way to cut down on your party’s booze bill is to add a few tablespoons of sugar to minty mouthwash and call it “Peppermint Schnapps.” The illusion is particularly effective if you pour it into a real Schnapps bottle rather than just serving it in the mouthwash bottle. Look on the back of the mouthwash bottle to ensure it has alcohol in it. A good mouthwash will have 21-26% ABV. Not schnapps strong, but certainly enough to get your party guests the buzz they crave.

7. Cockfights are Making a Comeback

With the revival in raising chickens among hipsters and the local food movement, there has also been a recently renewed interest the ancient art of cockfighting. Chickens can be fierce little devils that provide endless hours of top notch entertainment if you know what you’re doing. They’re also inexpensive, young chicks often going for a few bucks apiece. More importantly, their soulless, reptilian minds do not feel pain like dogs do and it is therefore morally acceptable (perhaps even morally imperative) to fight them and, if you’re a public figure, you don’t have to worry about any media backlash. Raise a pair in your backyard or garage, set up a little ring in your living room, and have them fight to the death. It’s as simple as that. Your guests will be impressed at the retro-chic entertainment you provide, and you will be able to recoup a substantial portion of your party costs by collecting a vig on the money your guests bet. If you want to continue the blood sport theme you could also buy a few bettas, aka Siamese Fighting Fish, another soulless creature according to the Vatican Council of does it really fucking matter?, and take bets on them as well.

LIFE

8. Reuse Condoms to Cut Down on Your Sex Bill

Kids are expensive, but not having kids can be nearly as expensive, particularly if you’re paying full price for brand new, name brand condoms every single time you want to bone. Thing is, that’s totally unnecessary. Just turn the used condom inside out, thoroughly rinse, and then run it through a cycle in the dishwasher. Optionally, you may add some lubricant to the cleaned condom once you’re done. I just keep doing this until the condom has visible holes, at which time you can throw it out or attempt to tape them up if you’re really thrifty.

9. Teach Your Kids Pascal’s Wager and the Importance of Diversifying Your Religious Bets

With all the whacky, suspiciously convoluted religious beliefs in the world, it can be a terrifying prospect to think that one of them may be right and if you choose wrong you may end up in an eternity of limitless torture. Teach your kids the importance of sucking up to as many gods as possible on the off chance that one of them is the one true faith and that god will be tricked into sparing your immortal soul because you went through the motions of professed belief, which every religion seems to say matters more than following the philosophy of the religion itself for some reason.

Cooking Tips I Wish I Knew When I Was Younger

A common listicle I encounter in my internet travels is the advice from an old person to a young person theme. It’s usually called “Stuff I wish I knew when I was younger” or something to that effect. While these articles are all well and good, they’re typically quite general, giving basic, common sense life advice like “Texans are, without exception, horrible human beings.” This is fine. I enjoy these articles no matter how many times I read about the importance of giving back, or avoiding credit card debt, or whatever. That said, I like my advice as specific and tailored as possible. That’s why, starting today, I’m creating a series of stuff-I-wish-I-knew articles. This may end up being the first part in a one part series or I may do a ton. We’ll see.

In any case, I want to start with a topic near and dear to my heart: the noble art of cooking. My cooking education has been, for the most, part unguided and picked up from just cooking whatever recipes I’ve come across. I’m not really that old and not really qualified to teach any cooking classes, but I do know enough to point amateurs like myself in the right direction. I cook from scratch about four nights per week and have done so for years, so I would at least call myself a veteran home cook. In any case, take this advice for what you will.

1. Less is More, Particularly When It Comes to Spices

Keep it simple. I would say this is the single most common mistake beginners make and the critical difference between novices and intermediates. When I was younger, I used to think that the more flavorings I added the better the flavor would be, sort of like Texans think the more tires your pickup truck has the better the man you are. This method ravaged my spice rack on a weekly basis. This was the first and only time in my life I actually had to replace a bottle of coriander. And yet, like so many duely-drivin’ who can’t understand how they spend $500 a month on gas, I could never understand why my recipes never turned out well. Did it need another tablespoon of coriander? Perhaps my tarragon to dill ratio was off? Or maybe I just needed to add an 1/8 cup dash of Mrs. Dash to even it out? Turns out it was none of the the above actually. What it needed, every single time without fail, was less of everything but a few high quality ingredients that work well together.

How do you know what goes together well? Experience. Practically speaking, what you should do is make the same or similar recipes many times, adding or changing just one ingredient to see the effect every ingredient has. Unless you’re operating off a recipe, don’t add a flavor if you don’t understand its effect. It’s not enough simply to have smelled the herb or read about it. You need to have experimented with it personally. I have discovered many flavorings I never knew I liked this way. Adding too much stuff is like trying to operate a computer by pressing all the buttons. Press each one individually and figure out what they actually do. Once you understand them, then you’ll understand which ones go together, and your cooking will improve exponentially. You can speed up this process by making several small portions of something you cooked up, adding one new ingredient to each portion and then tasting each one individually. Just make sure to clear your palette between each one (i.e. rinse your mouth with some water) to make sure one sample’s flavor doesn’t bleed into the next.

Keep in mind that most of the best recipes out there are actually pretty simple. The pitfall most people make is ruining them through poor execution, poor ingredients, or adding a bunch of dumb stuff the recipe didn’t call for. Resist the urge! The only spice in my favorite stir fry is ginger. My favorite salsa is spiced only with cumin. My favorite vegetable soup only has parsley and coriander, and honestly would be fine without both of them. If something isn’t good before you add the spices, chances are it’s not going to be after you add the spices.

2. Fresh Herbs are Way Better

Speaking of spices, I can’t stress enough how big of a difference freshness makes. Freshness is important with practically everything, but it’s doubly so with herbs. This is something I failed to appreciate for years, always using the freeze dried crap in my spice rack because it was a cheaper and easier to get. As a general rule, l will only use the spice rack if fresh are unavailable at the grocery store, or if I’m making something unplanned and won’t be going to the grocery. The difference fresh makes really depends on which herb we’re talking about as some dry better than others. There are some things I won’t even use unless they’re fresh, though, e.g. basil. Fortunately, basil is probably the most available fresh herb at grocery stores. An example of something that doesn’t make as big of difference would be thyme, a plant that’s half dried out already when it’s still alive. Rosemary is also okay from a bottle. If you’re really serious about cooking, though, I’d recommend growing your own herbs. I live in an apartment and still manage to have a dozen different herbs growing on my porch during the summer.

3. Make Reductions

Oh how I love reductions. Nothing makes you trick people into thinking you know what you’re doing like a nice, thick reduction poured over a well-cooked piece of meat. I discovered the beauty of reductions when I first made steak au poivre (French for pepper steak). To make it, coat a steak in peppercorns, cook it in a pan, then deglaze the pan with brandy, reduce said brandy, add cream and dump over the steak. The flavor is astonishing. There are several reasons it works, but the biggest is the concentrated flavor of the brandy reduction. For those who don’t know, making a reduction just means you boil the water out of a liquid. It can be done with anything, but is often done with alcoholic beverages. Examples of good things to make a reduction with are brandy, wine, balsamic vinegar, and soy sauce. I’ve made them with many other things though, and usually a combination of multiple things. I recently made a pork chop reduction by mixing Madeira wine with balsamic vinegar. It tasted like love. The beauty of the reduction is that they’re almost always good. Really, they just range from mere goodness to spine-melting deliciousness. It doesn’t need to be for sauce either. I typically add a red wine reduction to my vegetable beef soup. Just check out some recipes, experiment and see what happens.

4. Balance

Having balanced flavors is the hallmark of a good recipe. With the steak au poivre I mentioned above, one of the things that make it so damn good is that the sweet creaminess of the brandy cream reduction is magnificently balanced out by the bitter spice of the coat of black peppercorns. If something is too acidic, add a little sugar or cream. For example, when I make balsamic vinegar reductions the result is often a little too acidic. Adding a couple tablespoons of heavy cream does wonders for the flavor. Likewise, if something is too rich or sweet, add a little lemon juice to give it some acidity.

So there you have it. Four tips that will serve you well in your culinary life. Enjoy.