Having grown up on sterile, deep frozen turkeys, I have always had the sneaking suspicion that my Thanksgiving was missing something. About a year ago, my wife and I moved into a Dominican neighborhood, an experience that has brought me into contact with an almost endless array of new, exciting foods and food services, notably the collection of "Vivero" joints in my area. Basically, these are sort of like a cross between a butcher and a pound. You go in, choose your bird or rabbit, tell them what you want done with it, and come back in a half hour to pick it up.

I've been circling the Vivero for a while, curious but also a little nervous about getting my poultry from a place that looks so much like an animal shelter. Still, with turkey costing a fortune in my neighborhood, I felt like this might be the year to try out a fresh bird. Because of the season, the owners recently got in a shipment of about 400 turkeys, and I found that the whole process was surprisingly easy. Basically, I picked out my bird (I was looking for an animal in the 15-pound range that looked guilty), and told them that I wanted it plucked, cleaned, de-legged, beheaded, but generally left intact. Explaining this took a while, as the workers only spoke Spanish and I only spoke English. Still, between us, we managed to get it all worked out.

About a half hour later, my bird was ready. When she saw that the legs were still attached (my Spanish, clearly, is not very good), the lady at the window gave me a funny look, but immediately endeavored to make the package a little less unwieldy. Her method was to, basically, jam the turkey's feet up its rear end. She managed to get one in before giving up.

So, anyway, I found myself wandering home with a big black bag containing a 16-pound turkey. One leg was poking out at an odd angle; while this didn't draw any strange looks, I still felt a little weird. For the first time in my life, I could understand just how hard it is to dispose of a body in New York City. I found myself whispering "ch-ch-ch-ch-ha-ha-ha-ha-gobble-gobble-gobble-gobble," Friday the 13th-style. When I got the bird home, I quickly unpacked it, only to discover that the head was also still attached. While this didn't particularly bother me, I was surprisingly freaked out by the (still warm) internal organs. In addition to the heart and liver, which I recognized, there was also a bizarre meaty thing that looked like something out of a 1950's horror film. Seriously, I don't know what to do with it. I think it's related to the kidneys.

I removed the head and legs with the help of my trusty chef's knife, packed them away with the rest of the organs (and the freaky alien thing), and started brining the bird. Tomorrow, before I cook it, I'm going to remove a few of the feather tips that the Vivero folk left behind, stuff it, and see if there is any significant difference between a fresh turkey and a frozen one. I hope there is, because the vivero also had some very interesting looking pheasants...