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It's November! Which means that Thanksgiving (or Turkey Day, if you prefer) is just right around the corner. Last year we skipped the turkey dinner since not long after Thanksgiving we headed out of the country for an extended trip to Nepal, not to mention that most of our kitchen goodies were already packed up due to our impending move from Laramie to Philadelphia. Prior to last year we've sourced our turkeys from Whole Foods or from local farmers that pasture-raise their turkeys. Over five years ago, my Thanksgiving dinners were turkey-less and I enjoyed a plate full of fruit (cranberry sauce!) and veggies (mashed potatoes!) and other vegetarian side dishes. This year D and I are planning to head to Ohio to spend Thanksgiving with my family. I think this year's turkey will be a free-range Bowman & Landes turkey sourced from Dorothy Lane Market. If you live in the Philadelphia area, here's a great list of places where you can source a local, free-range turkey for your Thanksgiving dinner.
As I've mentioned in previous posts, how food animals are raised is extremely important to me -- for me, if I must consume meat, I would much rather that it came from a small, pasture-raised (or not confined) farm operation, as opposed to a large-scale, factory-farm operation. For me, purchasing meat produced by a large-scale factory farm is just not an option. In my mind, animals should not be treated as commodities, where the bottom line is more important than their welfare before and at the time of their deaths.
As part of my day job, I am editor of the BioZine, an online companion to the Holt McDougal high school biology textbook. This month's feature article is about the comeback of the heritage turkey. Though heritage or heirloom turkeys are exponentially more expensive than the standard turkey you can buy at your local supermarket, I don't think it's a stretch to say that these turkeys have a much better life than the standard broad-breasted white turkeys that spend their days confined together in huge barns. I would much rather pay a higher cost for a turkey that has had the chance to actually be a turkey than one that, due to breeding for specific characteristics, has trouble walking, standing, and requires human intervention to reproduce.
What do you think? Where does your Thanksgiving turkey come from? Does a turkey even grace your Thanksgiving dinner table? What fills your plate on Thanksgiving?
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