A large, brown, juicy turkey sitting in the middle of a dining room table is an image that evokes warm holiday memories for millions of Americans.

So why does this American bird share a name with a Mediterranean country?

Well, when European colonists first came to the shores of North America, they saw this large brown ground bird, and it reminded them of a Guinea fowl that was imported into Europe from Turkey.

They called these new birds turkeys, and the name stuck.

I'm Charity Nebbe.

On this episode of Iowa Ingredient, we'll visit Lucky Star Farm in Eastern Iowa to learn more about domesticated turkeys.

Then, Chef Dean Luttrell will stop by the studio kitchen to share some unique recipes.

All that and more, coming up next on Iowa Ingredient.

Funding for Iowa Ingredient is provided by the WT and Edna M. Dahl Trust, Chef Lisa Lavalle of Trellis Cafe and the River Center, and Chef Michael Lavalle of the Des Moines Embassy Club-- for more than 100 years, the Des Moines Embassy Club has provided a place to dine, celebrate, and do business, located in downtown Des Moines and in West Des Moines-- and Friends, the Iowa PBS Foundation.

I want to just put that on the side.

Add some more cantaloupe flavor.

Chef Katie, you've done it again.

Thank you so much.

Cheers.

Benjamin Franklin once claimed that turkeys were the most American of birds, a more fitting national symbol than the bald eagle.

And since becoming an American export, turkey has become an incredibly popular food all across the globe.

It's eaten on all seven continents.

It's a mainstay in European poultry production.

And turkeys can be found on farms from Poland to South Africa to Iowa.

[MUSIC PLAYING] These guys are-- they're really curious.

And so I think they have a lot more personality than other poultry.

We started raising turkeys about five years ago.

I had a lot of pastured eggs that customers were buying.

And around Thanksgiving, my customer said, Susan, you should raise turkeys.

We can't find local turkeys that are pasture raised.

And so, the next year we did.

And the customers loved them.

And so we've been doing it ever since.

We have broad-breasted white turkeys.

And we also have a heritage turkey called Spanish black.

There are some main differences between the two.

The flock of heritage turkeys came first.

They're much slower growing, and so they take several months to reach the size that's appropriate for a Thanksgiving table.

The heritage birds that we have here-- they will be all dark meat.

And their body type is much more balanced.

They have longer legs, and they're more balanced with the amount of breast meat that they have, whereas the broad-breasted white flock that we have-- they grow really rapidly.

In about half the time it takes those heritage birds to reach full production size, those broad-breasted whites catch right up.

They're all white meat.

And they're mostly all breast.

And so it's the more commercial, traditional bird that you would find at the grocery store.

I'm going to get you, maybe.

Turkeys have something called a snood.

It's this little protuberance over their beaks, here.

And in male turkeys, they're much longer.

They dangle down.

They're a few inches long.

These fleshy bumps called caruncles-- they change color based on how they're feeling at the time.

Sometimes they're blue or red.

Come on, you wild things.

I order my poults from a hatchery.

And they arrive here at about two days old.

We teach them how to drink and how to eat.

We sort of act as mama turkey for them.

And once they're fully feathered, weather permitting, that's when we take them outside on to the pasture.

And they start moving through the pasture in mobile coops surrounded by electric poultry netting to keep them safe.

Hey, little snooty boy.

So in the mornings, we throw open the door.

And they get to spend their day looking for crickets and grasshoppers and worms and all the other things they find.

The turkeys eat a little bit of everything.

You know, they are definitely omnivores.

They do have a ration that they eat to help provide a balanced diet for them.

But they also-- if a mouse happens to run through their paddock-- they're all over that too.

So they really balance their diet living on the pasture.

One of my favorite things about doing this is I guess, hearing back from my customers after Thanksgiving.

People are really delighted to take a pasture-raised local bird to their Thanksgiving table.

And so each and every year, I have customers that send me photos and send me messages saying, thanks again for another really great turkey.

My family loved it.

It was the centerpiece of our table, and it was really great to spend time enjoying a bird that had a really great life.

I'm in the kitchen now with Chef Dean Luttrell.

Dean, welcome back to the show.

Thanks for having me.

Thank you very much.

And we're going to talk about something a little different than we did last time you were here.

We're going to talk about a fraternal organization of chefs and foodies, a worldwide organization, De Chaine des Rotisseurs.

Yes.

Yes, it is.

Chaine des Rotisseurs-- I'm actually the bailli of the Chaine des Rotisseurs in Des Moines Bailliage.

And that's a big thing?

It's a big-- I guess it's a big thing.

What we do is, we were started in the 13th century by King Louis IX.

Wow.

And what it was is, he started the trade guilds.

And we take our customers from the goose and the pheasant guild.

So if you look at our little logo, we have the threading needles, or the larding needles from the goose and the guilds back then.

And then in 1950, the organization actually started in Paris, France.

And then, we are just a bunch of food and wine lovers.

And we get together, and we have a foundation that we grant scholarships to, to young chefs and hospitality professionals.

And we also do culinary competitions and sommelier competitions.

And so we're just a bunch of food and wine lovers that like to get together and eat and drink wine and raise money for a good cause.

Yeah, that sounds amazing.

And so a lot of food professionals in this organization, although you don't have to be a food professional to be a part of it.

No, no.

Yes, we have like I said, your foodies, we have chefs, we have sommeliers.

We have all kinds of folks that are interested in the Chaine.

So you are of course, involved in the organization here.

But this is worldwide.

Right, all over the world.

Our home office is in Paris, France, actually.

So yeah, so we're all over the world.

And every major city has a large bailliage.

I think we have approximately 60-plus people in the Des Moines area that are members of the Chaine.

Very cool.

Well, now our expectations are even higher.

Why don't we get cooking?

Oh, no.

Right, let's go.

All right, it's time to talk turkey.

Let's talk turkey.

That's right.

What are we going to make?

You've been saving that one, right?

I have.

Today, we're going to make a turkey roulade.

So it's a turkey that's rolled with the stuffing in the middle.

And every called it-- if it was Italian-- "roulade" is a French word-- OK, if it was Italian, we'd call it a braciole.

So it's the turkey stuffed with turkey.

Turkey stuffed with turkey-- Perfect.

--right.

All right, so we can take our turkey might, throw it in the bowl.

Take our onion, throw it in there.

Just some white onion.

Just some white onion, yes, ma'am.

Spinach-- I don't think I want to use all that spinach.

I think I just want to use a portion of it.

All right.

OK?

Hard to go overboard with spinach in my book.

Oh.

I trust-- I trust you.

OK, and then, we're just going to use our utensils here.

And we're going to mix all this up, all right?

And then what we're going to do is we're going to cook it in this pan over there.

All right.

All right, until we get that nice and cooked.

Once that's cooked, we're going to sit there, and we're just going to let it cool.

And we're going to go get our turkey and we're going to start working on our turkey.

All right, so we'll just let that rest for a minute.

All right.

So we've got a good start on the filling.

Now, we're going to work on the outside of the roulade.

Right.

So here we have a turkey.

This turkey is a hen.

We generally use hens, because there's elongated breast muscle in it.

So you get more white meat in a hen.

What we're going to do is we're going to take the skin off of this turkey.

And we're going to use that for the outside of our roll.

Make sure you have a good sharp boning knife.

And what we're going to do is just fillet the skin off this turkey.

[MUSIC PLAYING] Just take the wing off here.

And so now, I'm going to take this breast off.

So my assistant, Haley, is going to take this turkey out of my way.

She's going to take all that.

And I'll be keeping that.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Haley.

We should all have an assistant like that.

That's a good idea for Thanksgiving day too.

All right, so I have my skin here.

And I'm going to-- OK, what we'll do is we'll pound our turkey breast out.

We'll place it here.

And then, we'll put our stuffing in here once we finish it.

And then we'll tie her up.

Awesome.

[MUSIC PLAYING] So we just pounded out this turkey breast nice and thin and placed it in the skin.

The skin again, is the outer casing.

And we want that.

We want that-- when we brown the skin and when it cooks, we get a lot of flavor from there.

We get a lot of texture from their.

It's the yummiest part.

Oh, yeah, it's the yummiest part.

Can you do me a favor and mix the egg and the Parmesan cheese into our filling?

Out filling should be nice and cool now.

Yes.

And why am I putting an egg in here?

An egg is a binding agent.

So when we roll this and cook it, the egg helps to keep everything together.

And so this will be our filling for our roulade-- our turkey roulade.

Think you can help me out?

Oh, sure.

We're going to roll this and tie it.

All right, so this is a two-person job.

This is a two-person job.

So I take this piece, and I will carefully-- I don't want to get the skin flapped into this portion.

I just want to use the skin on the outside.

[MUSIC PLAYING] So then, we're just going to tie this off.

Kind of like we're doing a surgery.

Yes, we are-- turkey surgery.

All right, so we got a nice little the roulade here.

So what we'll do is put a little bit of oil in that pan.

All right.

You have to use probably the biggest pan that you have for this, because depending on how long this is-- you kind of do a-- Yea.

All right.

Oh-- Nice.

And you can use tongs.

It's not getting hot enough for me to-- I can do it with my hands.

So if you're not comfortable with that, you can use tongs to turn it.

I'm just getting a nice brown on the outside.

I'm not cooking it all the way through by any means.

Just getting the nice brown.

[MUSIC PLAYING] All right, and you're going to bake this off in the oven.

What temperature?

Yes, I'm going to bake it at 300 degrees until it's golden brown on the outside, and it's at least 165 degrees on the inside.

All right, our roulade is out of the oven.

It looks amazing.

It smells amazing.

Right.

Right.

Wow.

See how nice and crispy the skin got?

Yeah, perfect.

OK, so what we need to do now is we need to cut the string off of it.

OK. You ready?

Yes.

See how this goes.

All right.

Oh, look at that.

That is gorgeous.

Yes, it turned out great.

Didn't it?

Perfect.

All right, let's get some medallions off this and plate them up.

All right, and how many medallions would you serve one of your-- I could probably eat three or four of these.

Nice.

And if you did the whole turkey, you could come up with-- Probably 30 medallions out of this.

All right, that's a good family meal.

Oh, Dean, thank you so much.

Well, you're welcome.

All right, we've had the super fancy turkey roulade.

Now, we're going to go a little simpler.

We're going to make some turkey sliders.

Yeah, we're going to tone it down a little bit.

Nice.

We're going to make some turkey sliders.

This is one of the things that we do-- I do this a lot at home.

I grill them outside, or I do them at maybe a tailgate or something like that.

Yeah, awesome.

We have several different ingredients and several different accompaniments that we'll put on each slider.

We got some guacamole, caramelized onions.

We got some turkey bacon.

Nice.

But we got to start with the burgers, right?

Yeah, we got to make the burgers first.

So what I have here is about a 1/2 a pound of ground turkey.

And it's a real simple recipe.

I have a mixture here-- salt, pepper, and garlic.

And the way I make this-- this is probably my go-to mixture for a lot of stuff.

It's two parts salt to one part pepper to one part garlic.

I always have this sitting on my counter at home.

It has a great flavor.

So two parts salt means if I have a cup of salt, I have 1/2 a cup of pepper, 1/2 a cup of garlic, OK?

So I take a little seasoning, season that burger.

I put a little cumin in their.

I love cumin.

I love the way cumin smells.

And I put a little chili powder in there.

OK?

And I'm just going to mix all that up.

And that's it.

That's all we're doing for the burgers.

It's going to have a lot of great flavor in there.

And then, our accompaniments with the burgers are going to make it-- Really set it off.

[SIZZLING] OK, third burger, we're going to do a little surprise.

We're going to put a little piece of smoked Gouda on the inside.

Oh.

And so what will happen is as this thing cooks, this smoked Gouda will be oozing a little bit.

Oh, that's amazing.

Yeah.

What a good idea.

We'll put that there.

We're going to let this brown on one side.

And then, after it's golden brown, we're going to flip them over.

But we need to make sure-- since this is poultry-- that we have to cook them to 165 degrees.

All right.

All right, we've got our burgers made.

They look fantastic.

They smell amazing.

Good.

Good.

You know that's the one has the Gouda in it.

I can tell.

You can tell?

So I didn't surprise you.

That's the secret ingredient.

I would be surprised at a tailgate.

So let's put these together.

OK, I need another plate.

Sure.

And then what I'll do is I'll take my bun.

So our first one we'll make a guacamole burger.

Nice.

So we'll do that.

I just take a little scoop of our guac that we made.

Great thing is, they're so small.

You don't have to choose just one, do you?

No.

Yeah, you can have all three, right?

Yep.

And then our second burger, we're going to use our caramelized onions.

I'm just going to use my gloved hands here.

These are wonderful onions.

We caramelized them in balsamic vinegar.

Oh, yum.

And then our last burger with our Gouda-- put our Gouda burger there-- we're going to take our bacon, and we'll do something to that effect.

So actually, what I want to do is-- A little bit of lettuce.

--a little bit of bibb lettuce-- butterhead bibb lettuce.

Nice.

And then, what kind of condiments would you put out with them?

Oh-- They don't really need anything else.

No, they don't.

There's going to be a ton of flavor here.

So if I was to put a condiment out, I'd put some sort of mustard or something.

Definitely wouldn't do ketchup that's for sure.

All right.

And then, I have these little picks, you know?

Yeah, you can put them all together.

Oh, Dean, that's fantastic.

We just-- now, we need to have a party.

That's true.

Let's do it.

Let's wait for football season company.

All right.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

We are in the heart of Des Moines.

We are just north of downtown in the Riverbend neighborhood.

And when everything really started shutting down in March of 2020, and a lot of the programs in the neighborhood that feed people every night couldn't operate because it wasn't safe, my neighbors and I really noticed a huge hole.

And it's not new.

The pandemic certainly didn't create food insecurity.

But it did exacerbate it.

I remember listening to a podcast about community fridges popping up in the Bay Area.

And I just texted my friend Aubrey, who runs Eat Greater Des Moines.

And I said, wouldn't that be so cool if we had one in Des Moines?

This is the fridge.

This is our insulated shelter.

This is what make sure that the fridge itself doesn't freeze or get too terribly hot.

This is just the weather-proofed structure.

So we have one side that is pantry.

This was completely full this morning, so things move fast.

There are rules.

And really, the rules revolve around protecting the community.

You know, we really just ask people to give what they would eat, right?

So people ask me like, well, what should I shop for and what should I bring?

What does your family like?

What doe you like to eat?

What would you give to your children?

There's no waiting period, sign ups, et cetera.

It's that you feel like you need food, you take the food.

I believe you.

That's it.

There's no qualifier.

And so it is very empowering to see such direct action happening.

I mean, we'll have days where we see 20, 30 cars an hour stop by.

And so it's a pretty utilized resource.

In terms of the volunteers and our partners, no expired foods, no opened or eaten foods, and no alcohol.

We do get lots of hygiene products-- diapers, wipes.

When it was really dangerously cold, we got a lot of mittens, scarves, things to heat yourself with, blankets.

We really just listened to the folks who are utilizing the fridge.

Soon, there will be four community fridges in Des Moines.

These are all places where there's a lot of foot traffic.

There's a lot of people.

And it's going to be really accessible.

And it's just going to be more options for people to get what they need.

And really, what I hope people can understand is that a community fridge is really about mutual aid.

And mutual aid doesn't mean that you're saving someone.

It doesn't mean that you're putting up a charity.

It means that we understand that we are all connected and we all need to take care of each other.

I've been thinking a lot about why I do all of this.

You know, I just really realized that it doesn't matter who you are.

And it doesn't matter what you've done or what you do.

You have to eat.

It doesn't matter what language you speak or where you come from, we all have to eat.

And it is a primal and simple and loving way to connect with people that really transcends all of that, right?

It transcends language.

It transcends everything.

And so to me, it is an ultimate act of love and of radical love to create a system in which there are no restrictions and there are no barriers.

And you deserve good food, because you exist.

And that really is what drives me.

That's it for this week's show.

Thank you for joining us on this culinary adventure.

I'm Charity Nebbe.

See you next time for another food-filled episode of Iowa Ingredient.

Keep in mind that circumstances are always changing.

So please take a moment to check ahead if you're planning to visit a restaurant, farm, or event featured on the show.

[MUSIC PLAYING] [Captioning provided by:] [Karasch] [800-621-5689 www.karasch.com] Funding for Iowa Ingredient is provided by the WT and Edna M. Dahl Trust, Chef Lisa Lavalle of Trellis Cafe and the River Center and Chef Michael Lavalle of the Des Moines Embassy Club-- for more than 100 years, the Des Moines Embassy Club has provided a place to dine, celebrate, and do business, located in downtown Des Moines and in West Des Moines-- and Friends, the Iowa PBS foundation, generations of family and friends who feel passionate about the programs they watch on Iowa PBS.