the christmas of the giant turkey

This Christmas Eve I awoke later than normal, even so the rest of the family were still asleep when I left to get the final shopping for Christmas dinner. On arriving at Waitrose I virtually turned out my handbag to find the order for our Christmas turkey. Whilst they arranged for it to be brought up I did the shopping. On returning to collect my order I was surprised by the size of it and tried to find it's label. Evventually a young assistant escorted me to the butcher's counter where it weighed in at 10.5kg!!! Priced at £7.98 this came to £83, emotionally I hoovered between shock and panic, the cost, the idea of being without a bird, my call to Chris - "better too big than too small", in the end I purchased the bird.

I hardly slept that night, visions of collapsing oven and undercooked meat danced in my head. Early Christmas morning I was wrestling the legs from the crown in order to stuff them with sausage meat. Cooking wise things started well with everything on track, but tiredness was creeping in and I could barely stand. I went and had reviving bath. Upon returning I felt overwhelmed with tasks ahead, luckily Kieran helped by peeling veg (cutting his finger in process). Panic was settling in again. Eventually I managed to get all components together and dinner was served, it was delicious but I was a course behind everyone and rushed mine.

The turkey took 3 and a half hours but was cooked. The oven had not collapsed. We seem to have finished it (not sure where it went, except for a turkey and ham pie I did not make any meals from it). And upon seeing customer service (as I thought turkey should have been charged at £7.39) I ended up telling her everything and she was able to see original order (paper had not been returned to me) she refunded me difference between my order and what I had actually paid - so all's well in the end.

Next year it's a 5-6kg bird at most though!