Breaking it Down – Wild Turkey Breast and Legs
Eugene L. 04.30.24
Spring is here and so is turkey season. One of my buddies had a good day out in the woods and brought a good-sized Tom back. While the standard farm-raised bird is very hit or miss for a lot of people a nice wild bird is a much nicer eating quality animal. Today I’m going to show a rough breakdown of taking out the breasts and legs off a wild turkey.
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The first step is to find the ridge of the breastbone of the bird using your hand. You will feel the ridge of it right along the midline of the bird, there grab the skin and take a sharp knife to open up the skin. Then using your knife make a slit up the skin over the breast of the bird and open it up wide. You can pull on the skin to break the membranes and connective tissue as you go, the skin should come off relatively easily.
Once you get the skin lifted from the breast, start working on the legs of the bird. Continue cutting the skin open on the thigh and drum working down towards the feet of the turkey. Do this for both legs.
Once the skinning of the legs is done get back to the breast. You are going to take your knife and just start filleting the breasts out of the turkey. Find the breast bone ridge again and take your knife along it, cutting the meat away from the bone as you work your way down toward the ribs. Be aware of the crop that sits right at the top of the turkey’s body. This is where they store what they have been eating, so make sure not to puncture it or cut into it on accident. There will be some more connective tissue when you get closer to the shoulder joint. So once you start getting close to that keep the ligaments in mind, you will almost have to the circle to the joint to detach the breast from the shoulder.
Once you take the first turkey breast off the frame, work on the second breast. It is the same method of just running your knife along the big breastbone of the turkey. Don’t worry about making a lot of little cuts versus long sweeping cuts. Just work your knife at the pace you are comfortable with and you won’t lose a lot of meat.
Just pull off the skin by hand on the second turkey breast. Pluck off of the big feathers now, it’s easier the faster you do this.
For taking the legs off the turkey its pretty easy as well. Grab the turkey legs at the thighs and push them away from the body of the turkey. You want to angle the legs away from each other as much as possible, you can even hear the hip joints popping as you do this. Then take your knife and work your way cutting through the connective tissue till you reach the hip of the turkey. There you cut through the hip joint of the bird and scrape along the hip bone with the knife. Repeat this process for both sides. After the legs are off the bird, remove all the skin and feathers as well.
The only step left in order to complete dressing the legs of the turkey now is to take the feet off the legs. You want to take your knife and circle the skin right around the ankle of the leg. Then with some weight behind it, press the knife through the cartilage, not bone, of the joint. Once you break through that first layer of cartilage, and the skin is properly detached, the feet and spurs should just pop off the legs with a bit of a twist.
The only thing left to take from the turkey frame now is the offal. The heart, liver, and gizzard are edible and quite good. To take them out it’s pretty simple: just open up the body cavity and reach into the turkey and pull them out. The connective tissue that holds them in place can be easily parted by hand. The heart and liver are ready to cook pretty much right out of the bird. The gizzard needs to be split open and have the inner membrane pulled out before being given a wash. While we grilled the heart and liver this time, the gizzard went to the dogs as a healthy treat.
