How to make a TurDuckHen

So I got a wild hair up by arse and decided to make a Turduckhen for Christmas. I've never had a Turduckhen, I've never even had duck, but I decided to give it a go. This thread will document my progress as today goes by.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Terduckens (Like me, your faithful cook) it's a New Orleans recipe, said to originate in Chef Paul Prudhommes kitchen. I don't know if that's true but I read it somewhere. It is made by taking a chicken, de-boning it and stuffing it. Then you take a duck, de-bone it and stuff that. Then you take a turkey and debone it (except for the drumstick bones and the wings ends) and stuff that. Then you take the stuffed chicken and lay it on top of the duck and it's stuffing and wrap up the whole lot. Then you take the chicken/duck combo and lay that on top of the turkey and it's stuffign and bring the ends together and sew it all up.

I decided to make three different kinds of stuffing, a different one for each bird. I started with a sweet cornbread that I made on Monday. I cut that up and let it get good and dry. Then I cooked up a few onions, 4 andouille sausages and some spices. Mix it all in with some chicken stock and it was good to go. That is the stuffing for the chicken. I didn't think to take any pics of that part of the process.

This morning I made the stuffing for the duck. I had cooked up some wild rice yesterday and let that cool on the porch overnight.


This morning I cooked up some onions, added a pound (give or take) of small shrimp and the wild rice.



Some bread crumbs finished it off, It's cooling on the porch now.

While the stuffing is cooking it gave me time to work on the birds. I started by brining the birds in a brine of salt, sugar, pepper corns and some other spices. (I'd tell you what they are but I've been sworn to secrecy.) This is the chicken and the duck brining together.



The most important part of the whole process is a REALLY sharp boning knife. Take the time to stop and sharpen it even if only on a steel as it dulls. You start by making a long cut down the backbone and filleting the meat off the bones, just like boning a fish. It takes some work to get the joints of the legs and wings broken and the meat teased off the bones but go slow, take your time and you can do it. This is the duck about half done.



The turkey bones, along with the giblets and neck. They are all going into a pot for soup/gravy.



And here is the turkey, without any bones except his drumsticks and the ends of his wings. Unfortuntaley, I didn't follow my own advise and didn't pay enough attention to my knife edge and so had to push a little bit on the shoulder/wing joint and cut thru the skin. I'm sure it will be ok, I'll sew it up if it really looks bad.



That's where things stand right now. The stuffing needs to cool and I still need to bone the chicken, but I want that to brine a little longer so I'm running out to do some errands, I'll pick up again when I get home. I'm not taking as many pictures as I might otherwise because it it a wicked PITA to have to worry about getting schmegma all over the camera, so I'm only doing it when I stop a procedure and wash my hands

PTN

looks great Paul... schmegma and all.

I will look forward to seeing the progress.

I have never brined a duckisnt there a jewish law against that... like not feeding milk to calves? [fro]

Christmas shopping all done, I'm headed for home. I have a date with a chicken a duck and a turkey. And no, I don't mean Yeager, Babalu and Cape Brewing.

PTN

Ok, Here goes round two.

The chicken gets layed out and the stuffing gets layered on top. Be sure to fill up the cavities where you took out the wing and leg bones.



Then I added my own little twist. I put a log of Jimmy Dean Sausage in the middle of the chicken.



I used a skewer to temporarily hold the chicken closed.



Then the whole lot goes inside the duck and the duck's stuffing. I needed to use a needle and butcher twine to sew the duck/chicken combo shut.



Both ends get sewed up as well as you can do it. There is a considerable amount of stuff in there and it downs't want to close up. Patience is the key. I pulled out the chicken skewer after I sewed up the duck.



PTN

Nice add with the sausage...

maybe wrap the whoel thing in bacon too?

NICE!

How are you cooking this beast? I mean... 20 hours? at 222?

Not quite done yet Mike.

Here is the turkey with stuffing ready for the rest of the dance card. (Please, I don't want to hear from the salmonella police. I cleaned the counters before and after.)




Now the chicken and duck combo go in top.



I wish I didn't have to use butchers twine on the inside but the duck just wasn't big enough to hole everything together by using a skewer.



It's not the most beautiful job of sewing but it's holding everything together.



In the roasting pan. I put the package of salt there for perspective of just how huge this monster is. I need to weigh it so I can figure out how long it needs to cook.



PTN

35 1/2 pounds! Holy Sheet! I've honestly got no idea how long this is going to take. Research is required.

PTN

Thats a nice looking bird....errr birds

Impressive work. You did one heck of a job on that mess. Let us know the details on cooking the thing.

You need to deep fry that bad boy

jspence1 said:

You need to deep fry that bad boy

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Are you serious? I'm already thinking I need to get SWMBO to write me a script for Lipitor tonight, so I can fill it and have bowls of pills strategically placed around the house as a safety precaution. I fully expect my cholesterol to hit 200 tomorrow. (Amazingly enough, considering all the crap I eat, my cholesterol is in the 140 range. If SWMBO so much as looks at meat or cheese her's bumps up over 200. and she's already on a statin.

Besides, I'd need to use my keggle to fry it, no way it would fit in my bayou pot. And that ain't happening.

P

deep fried duck stuffed with sausage.... holy grease bomb!

low and slow

VERY VERY SLOW!

It went in the oven at 1 am at 250*F. I covered it with foil at 7:30am. It looks wonderful. The temp was 155 in the thickest part at that time. I turned down the heat t0 225*F and I think I'm going to turn it down again to 200. I want to take it out of th oven at 2pm to be at my parents at 3ish. That should give it an hour to settle.

As you can see I've already turned down the heat as low as my oven will go. It's at 170*F and I'll shut it off in 1/2 hour. Here is the bird, or as has been pointed out, the birds.




An UNBELIEVABLE amount of drippings and grease came off. The pot nest to the roaster is full and there is still a bunch in the roaster. I've got it cooling on the porch now, I'll use some of the fat and the drippings for gravy.




PTN

Come and worship at the Alter of Pork Rinds indeed!

My hat is off to you sir. That was one heck of a journey. Well done! B e sure to let us know how it tasted and how everyone liked it.

This is awesome. No matter what kind of looks you get at your parents, we need pics of this thing cut open!

Thank you for the illustrated food porn. Bravo! I am standing up as I type this.

How do you plan to cut it. It would be nice if you could get full cross sections as slices but they would be ginormous. It would also require a 24" carving knife. Do you have a 24" carving knife? I'll let you borrow mine if I can come for dinner.

Wow!

I am impressed it came up that fast.

Did you pray over that thing or what!?

What is the center at?

dontman said:

Thank you for the illustrated food porn. Bravo! I am standing up as I type this.

How do you plan to cut it. It would be nice if you could get full cross sections as slices but they would be ginormous. It would also require a 24" carving knife. Do you have a 24" carving knife? I'll let you borrow mine if I can come for dinner.

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One of these might work...



NICE work, Paul, I need to make something like this.

Bravo !!!!!!!!!!

Really impressive! I hope that it tastes as good as it looks.

the_bird said:

One of these might work...

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(This is what I was planning to show up with if I wrangled the invite. And the kerf would be delicious!)

Holly birds!

I want to be a foster child at PTN's.
I promise I will be good.

Wow.....Just Wow.

Beer/wine pairing..?

beergears said:

Beer/wine pairing..?

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I was really grooving on my 2006 Chilean Cab Sav, it stood up quite well to the bold flavors of the Turducken. Then I picked up my B-I-L's glass of Syrah by accident and it was so much better. The Syrah was just an amazing pairing, you couldn't ask for a better match.

Here are a few final pics. I took an electric knife and cut the bird lengthwise and put half on a platter, then cut the half in cross sections for serving.




And here is a really good pic of a chunk of the leftovers (and there were a ton of leftovers) showing all the layers.



From the bottom left of the pic you see the sausage, then a layer of cornbread and andoullie sausage stuffing, then the chicken, then a layer of shrimp, wild rice stuffing, then the layer of duck. Next is the pecan, cranberry stuffing and finally the turkey breast! There were about 35 people over for the meal and one half of this beast fed them all, the rest was gobbled up by people who were glad to take some home. I was surprised that everyone enjoyed it, I was afraid that the duck would turn people off. I think that because it was such a novelty people were more willing to try it and once they tried it they were hooked. Hooked because it was REALLY good.

PTN

That picture has a lot of flavor.

AWESOME!

And the sausage in the center did fine? It looks perfect!

What did you cook it on?

250*F overnight, then dropped to 170*F for a few hours while I slept. It was out of the oven for 4 hours before I carved it. It held together quite well.

PTN

This is pure win. Great Job, thread prosted!

My wife and I have a long tradition of serving a roasted duck as our Christmas dinner. This year was no exception but somehow it seemed less festive seeing this perfectly executed feast. Next year I will for sure be trying this.

(BTW a couple weeks back we were invited to a Turducken party for a New Years Day feast but we declined the offer. I am seriously reconsidering that decision now.)

Great work! That bird(s), those... birds... Well, whatever... That monstrosity looks amazing! Some tv show was profiling them about a year ago and I have had it in the back of my mind to try one, eventually.

It wasn't really that hard to do, like I said, the most important thing is a really sharp flexible boning knife and taking your time.

There is one thing that has me so disapointed in the final result of my turducken dinner. I had one half of the bird left over after I cut into it to feed the crowd. I gave large chunks of it to both B-I-L's and there was a good 5 lb block for me to bring home. Well, I got into the wine and when it was time to go I left my tupperware dish in the fridge at Mom's. I'm working all week and won't get a chance to go back up there to get it. Damn, damn, DAMN!!!!!! I should recruit Spawn to go fetch it for me, she's home from school for the week and not doing anything else nearly as important.

PTN

ps
One thing I didn't spend a moment of time thinking about was the shrimp going into the duck's stuffing. My Mom and my nephew are both highly allergic to shrimp and so were not able to enjoy any of the turducken. Think about who your guests are going to be and plan accordingly. My Mom's seafood allergy totally slipped my mind (I didn't know about my nephew's.)

Interesting, everything I've seen when looking up how one was made was to stick the duck inside the chicken because the chicken usually a bit larger around than the duck.

Going to have to try this one day....

I agree, it would have been much easier to do the chicken around the duck, but I hadn't ever done one before and I followed the instructions I found. Next year I'll do it with the duck on the inside.

Moving from one wacky food group to another, I'm thinking about making a haggis. I'll probably spare you all and refrain from posting pictures.

Unless I get to drinkin' in the middle of the process, which given what the process entails, is pretty damned likely.

PTN

paulthenurse said:

Moving from one wacky food group to another, I'm thinking about making a haggis. I'll probably spare you all and refrain from posting pictures.

Unless I get to drinkin' in the middle of the process, which given what the process entails, is pretty damned likely.

PTN

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Spare us nothing... I cannot wait!