Move Over Barefoot Contessa

There were a number of years in my life in which no meat passed my lips.  Not because I am partial to animal causes, but because meat kinda grosses me out.

It started when I was eleven or twelve.  We stopped at Carl’s Jr. after a day on the boat at the lake.  I ordered a hamburger.  When the food came I opened the top of my hamburger to place french fries inside and I saw something on the meat that completely grossed me out.  It wasn’t something that didn’t belong there, like a cockroach or a fingernail.  It was just part of the meat, gray little swimmy things that had gone unnoticed before.

I didn’t finish that hamburger.

I went for many years eating poultry, but abstaining from red meat or pork.  My mom never liked fish (and never cooked it) so it wasn’t something I had to make a decision on.  And while part of me missed the taste of my dad’s bbq’ed tri-tip, overall the absence of beef from my diet didn’t faze me.  I just went along happily opting for chicken when possible and making a meal out of meat-free side dishes when not.

That is, until one Thanksgiving dinner when I helped pick the meat off the carcass after the meal.

Oh friends.  I was thoroughly and completely disgusted.

It’s not that the fact that there was a carcass was a surprise to me.  It’s more that I got up close and personal with aforementioned carcass.  My fingers were greased with its fat.  I stripped meat from bone.  Bone that, not long before, had been the inner structure of a real, live bird.  Again, it’s not an animal rights thing.  It’s a matter of just being plain grossed out by the fact that I was eating something that had eaten too.  Had peed.  Had pooped.  Had bled.

Ick.

After the turkey cleaning incident I swore off meat completely, though I did still eat eggs and had no problem drinking milk.

My stint as a vegetarian didn’t last long though.  It was interrupted by a pregnancy.  Considering I was already “at-risk” based on my age at the time, my midwife urged me to resume eating meat because the baby and I needed the protein.

Suprisingly it wasn’t hard to pick back up where I left off.  I just banished the turkey carcass from my mind and I’ve been consuming poultry ever since.

But only a certain kind of poultry.

It has to be dry.

Really dry.

I tend to overcook meat because only when it is free of juice can I convince myself that it has been thoroughly cooked.

My family is not fond.

When I plan the weekly menu I tend to avoid meals that include large pieces of stand-alone meat.  I opt instead for dinners that incorporate meat, but don’t let it take center stage.  Chicken tacos, for example, are ideal while baked chicken with rice is not.

Every once in a while I get tired of the standbys and a stand-alone meat meal slips through.

Such was the case tonight.

We had baked chicken and rice.

Midway through the meal I noticed that everyone at the table was unusually quiet.  I looked around and saw that it was because they were all involved in some serious chewing maneuvers.

Because I get great pleasure in inadvertently torturing my family I had to laugh.  Out loud.  As I watched them struggle to produce enough saliva to swallow the chicken I laughed so hard it brought tears to my eyes.

I know what you’re thinking.

And yes, you totally missed out by not being born to a mother like me.

Back at the dinner table a conversation ensued about my admittedly freakish meat fixation.

I’ve always known that Jeff takes issue with the dry meat I so proudly serve.  But until tonight I didn’t realize the kids even noticed.

I guess I should have clued in when, years ago, they started drowning their stand-alone chicken in a bath of Ranch dressing.

Much like the way Jeff smothers his in Tabasco sauce.  Or salsa.  Or pickle juice if it’s all we’ve got.

I have noticed that, at Thanksgiving, he doesn’t go overboard with the gravy.  And tonight I realized why.  I go to great lengths to brine the turkey for 48 hours before roasting it so as to infuse it with moisture and flavor.  I do this because that is what the women in the know do, not because I’ve ever given great consideration to how I want my particular turkey to turn out.

I’ve also noticed that I’ve never cared much for the turkey I’ve made on Thanksgiving.

Now I know why.

It’s too moist.  And too moist, in my subconscious mind, equates to one thing: too close to life.  To close to a time in which feathers graced it’s backside and it walked around on those scaly, scrawny turkey legs with that wattle wiggling to and fro as it pecked at its feed.

I’ve really got to stop now.  If I continue along this train of thought my family will go from complaining about dry meat to complaining about no meat at all.

Because I won’t be cooking it.

Don’t ask how I got to be such a spaz.

My mom swears she has no idea.

Just lucky I suppose.