![\"turkeys\"](\"http:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/10\/turkeys.jpg\" "\\"turkeys\\"")
History is alive in an edible way on a cheerful 20-acre farm atop Kilby Ridge in Dennysville. All around the bright yellow farmhouse are gardens full of exotic heirloom vegetables\u2013Flashy Trout\u2019s Back lettuce, Irish Cobbler potatoes, Musselburgh leeks, Fortex beans, Bantam corn, Red Beard onions, Chestnut garlic, and more. Under the Sheep\u2019s Nose and Yellow Transparent apple trees graze Icelandic sheep, another antique variety. And in pens out by the old barn, Narragansett turkeys with their bold black and white plumage strut and banter in their gobbledy sort of way.<\/p>\n
The Willises, who own and run the farm, followed their taste buds to this place. Mark, 40, was a counterintelligence agent and software programmer living in Virginia; his wife, Violet, 41, specialized in late 18th and early 19th century fashion. \u201cWe\u2019d started a garden and a small orchard, growing some heirloom fruits and vegetables, raising some chickens, but we knew we wanted more,\u201d says Mark. Finding the most flavorful ingredients and cooking them well \u201cbecame my passion,\u201d Violet adds. \u201cAfter we ate a heritage turkey, we loved it so much we knew we had to raise some ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n
When they found this 1820 farm in Washington County three years ago, it seemed like the perfect place to take their vision of culinary excellence from pasture to plate. \u201cThe Narragansetts were the first bird developed in Colonial America,\u201d says Mark. \u201cIt\u2019s something that would have been raised on this farm when it began, and the turkey flavor is really great.\u201d
\nThe Willises are among a growing number of Mainers who say the heritage breeds are moister, chewier, more intensely flavored, and healthier than the standard, factory-farmed turkeys sold in most grocery stores. They have names like Royal Palms, Bourbon Reds, Bronzes, White Hollands, Slates, Buffs, Chocolates, Cinnamons, Blacks, and Narragansetts. Their plumage is a decorative array of reds, browns, blacks, whites, and blues, with extravagant tail feathers. Their taste and texture, as well as their behavior, leave the common industrial turkey\u2013generally known as the Large White\u2013in the barnyard dust.<\/p>\n
You could think of the Large White as the Jane Russell of the turkey world. It was developed in the 1940s and \u201850s, the era of mass industrialization of American agriculture. \u201cChefs and restaurant owners wanted to be able to cut lots of fat slices of meat off the carcass, so factory farms started breeding turkeys with bigger and bigger breasts,\u201d says Robert O. Hawes, a retired professor of animal and veterinary sciences at the University of Maine at Orono and author of a book on domesticated turkeys called Birds of a Feather.<\/p>\n
The effort was innocent enough at first, Hawes says. But soon the birds developed such big breasts \u201cthat they couldn\u2019t fly or even walk without tipping over. Their legs became too weak to support all that body weight.\u201d If they wanted to get romantic, those big awkward breasts got in the way. They had to be artificially inseminated.<\/p>\n
These bionic birds were efficient eating machines that could be raised in close quarters and fattened quickly. But their flesh became increasingly dry and bland. They needed antibiotics to ward off disease, which has begun to worry consumers.<\/p>\n
Heritage turkeys, by contrast, still retain much of their wildness. They can fly and mate and roost in trees. They forage for their food. When they\u2019re well-cooked, they have a nutty, pure turkey taste and a fine graining that discriminating eaters appreciate.<\/p>\n
In one recent test in Virginia, 70 chefs, food writers, and other food professionals compared a Large White turkey and eight heritage varieties prepared exactly the same way, evaluating each one for flavor, texture, tenderness, smell, and appearance. All eight heritage birds ranked ahead of the industrial turkey, a Butterball. Judges found the Large White to be soft and bland, almost mushy by comparison.<\/p>\n
The rub, alas, is the cost. With prices ranging from about $3 to $6 a pound, the heritage birds have a tough time competing at the cash register. Still, owners of the roughly half-dozen farms that raise them in Maine say they have no problem selling what they produce, especially as a Thanksgiving treat.<\/p>\n
Those who buy them also have the pleasure of getting to know an interesting group of farmers, who in some ways are as exotic as the turkeys they raise. In addition to the Willises, these farmers include a farmer-framer who specializes in gold-leaf work, a former crane operator, a vegetarian, a nurse, and a blind farmer who doesn\u2019t let his disability stop him from marketing his birds. Some, like Kathy Shaw of Auburn, often take young turkeys with them to farmers\u2019 markets so consumers can see them alive. Others, like the Willises, invite the public to observe their operation first-hand.<\/p>\n
Compared to the Large Whites, which \u201cseem like grumpy old men standing around their feeders, just waiting for the food,\u201d according to Hawes, the heritage birds \u201care like school boys running along the fence, gobbling at you and each other, flying on top of their shelters.\u201d They\u2019re curious, intelligent birds with lots of personality. \u201cThey will get to know you, come and sit right next to you,\u201d says Shaw. \u201cI had one who liked to sit in my lap. I didn\u2019t mind so much, except that he was kind of stinky.\u201d<\/p>\n
Because the heritage turkeys typically are smaller, leaner, and more muscular than the Large Whites and have a more even balance of white and dark meat, they require different preparation. Violet Willis recommends roasting them at 350 degrees for 15 minutes per pound, with tin foil covering their legs until the last half hour or so.<\/p>\n
Lawrence Klang, executive chef at Natalie\u2019s in the Camden Harbour Inn, served Black turkeys last year and hopes to have Bourbon Reds and Royal Palms on this year\u2019s menu as well. He advises brining the bird in a cider-based liquid. Then he removes the legs and thighs and debones them, replacing the bones with a stuffing made from cubes of bread lightly fried in olive oil, fried chopped gizzards, apples, leeks, and perhaps a little Calvados. He gives this a quick saut\u00e9 and then cooks it at 350 degrees. He roasts the breast separately at 425 degrees for the first half hour, then drops the temperature to 325 degrees. He also recommends about 15 minutes in the oven for every pound of turkey. He says he likes the flavor of the heritage turkeys so much that last year he cooked one for his own family, as well as serving them at the restaurant.<\/p>\n
It wasn\u2019t so long ago that some of these birds were on the endangered list. In 1997, a national survey of heritage turkeys in hatcheries around the U.S. found only three female Narragansetts in existence, four White Hollands, and 60 Slates. Now, with support from groups like the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy, the Maine Alternative Poultry Association, the Heritage Turkey Foundation, and the Slow Food movement, as well as consumers wanting healthier, tastier turkeys, they\u2019re having a marked resurgence.
\n\u201cI don\u2019t know if heritage has become the new buzzword,\u201d says Shaw. \u201cBut these birds were almost forgotten, and now they\u2019re coming back.<\/p>\n
“Think of the Large White as the Jane Russell of the turkey world\u2013a product of post-war mass industrialization.”<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Emma\u2019s Family Farm Kilby Ridge Farm Ledge hill Farm Valley View Farm Fair Share Farm Frelsi Farm Icelandics November 2009 It\u2019s no longer good enough to \u2018break out the good stuff\u2019 for the holidays. Now you have to order a special bird, too! History is alive in an edible way on a cheerful 20-acre farm atop Kilby Ridge in Dennysville. All around the bright yellow farmhouse are gardens full of exotic heirloom vegetables\u2013Flashy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1310","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-extras"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1310"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1310\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1313,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1310\/revisions\/1313"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nSteve and Rose Hoad
\n135 Windsor Neck Road, Windsor
\n445-2141<\/p>\n
\nMark and Violet Willis
\n109 Main Street, Dennysville, 726-4765<\/p>\n
\nJohanna Moore
\n201 Ryder Road, Farmingdale, 582-6512<\/p>\n
\nKathy Shaw
\n1200 Soper\u2019s Mill Road, Auburn, 320-1969<\/p>\n
\nMichael Small
\n641 Canton Pt. Road, Canton, 597-2746<\/p>\n
\nElaine Clark
\nP.O. Box 54, Limerick, 793-4640<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"