Dry plucking a turkey?

[Kim_NC]

I like to dry pluck chickens. But have never done a turkey that way.

Anyone ever dry plucked a turkey? How did it go? Would you do it again?

 

[TarzantheChickenMan]

Never again i did it with the first one i butchered last year, i scalded the rest. I spose that if you have enough time it wouldn't be an issue. I was kinda short on time my self.

 

[jaku]

We did 10 birds yesterday, and some of the wing feathers were tough to get out even AFTER a good scald. I can't imagine doing them dry.

 

[Buster52]

I did two this year. After having skinned them, it seemed like a breeze at the time since skinning was so incredibly difficult. But, have scalded the rest, which was much easier.

All that to say, yes I have done it and yes it is possible. I would recommend doing at least one for the experience.

 

[GBov]

I have only ever dry plucked turkeys. It takes a bit of time as they are so big but the feathers come off really easy, just the wing feathers are hard and a pair of pliers do teh job with them.

Oh, and the breast skin will tear rather easily so go slow there, and the back where that line of fat lies just below the skin, it tears too.

 

[DCS]

I did it this afternoon... was much easier while he was still hanging. (I took the first one down, but left the second one up.) I usually give up and just slice the big feathers off the wings with a knife than try to pluck them - the wings aren't worth the trouble, IMHO.

 

[ProductionRed09]

I also dry plucked my turkeys, it was time consuming but not too bad.

 

[Kim_NC]

Will let you know how it goes. I plan to do them Sunday. Thinking of dry plucking only the beasts & remove from the bird, then skin out the rest of the body. We planned to grind the dark meat anyway and cook down the carcasses for canned turkey stock.

There are two birds that I expect to finish at over 30 lbs each. That's why we want the breasts only for roasting. It's only DH & I here....the breast alone will be plenty of meat in one meal for us.

Thanks for the replies.

 

[Buster52]

Having done it before, there is no way I would ever again skin a turkey. I would dry pluck the whole thing. It is much much easier than skinning, at least from my experience. Skinning a turk is the hardest poultry processing thing I have done in my brief history of it.

 

[kees]

I dry plucked a turkey and it wasn't bad at all. That might have been because I immediately began plucking after the bird died. The wing feathers were a little tough but I was able to use a Leatherman tool to pull out those feathers.

Suzy