For most folks, the answer is yes. In our case, we're more concerned with eating healthy especially when it comes to a meal where everyone is going to gorge themselves. Publix has frozen turkeys for .59 a pound. Fresh Market has organic fresh turkeys for 1.99 a pound. On a 15 pound bird, that's a difference of $21. A lot of money? Perhaps, but how many times a year do you cook turkey?

No no the same

I can't tell the difference but turkey isn't an important meat to me. I have a butterball and a brand from Aldi's this year. My former sil used to buy an organic, free range turkey each year but she roasted it in a bag and I always though my cheap turkeys tasted better mainly because they came out crisp and brown.

Ricky, I think the exact opposite about organic. What I eat on a daily basis is organic but a once a year meal is not worth it, particularly for people who don't care anyway. (my people) But my daily coffee, half and half, apples, greens, chicken, flours, grains, all organic.

Depends on the cheap turkey. Our Walmart carries a cheap brand that is definitely not as good as the supermarket brand. They are usually about $.79 a pound and the ratio of meat to bone is much less and they are to me, more "gamey" in the dark meat.
But for say a supermarket brand at say $.99 a pound vs a Butterball at $1.99....I say you won't be able to tell the difference.

Personally, I do not care as much for Butterball turkey. Our turkey is going to be a Norbest at $.59 a pound. We have a second one in the freezer for Christmas too. Happy Thanksgiving.

Sue

I don't know about between a dirt cheap turkey and a merely inexpensive turkey, but there's a huge difference between a standard supermarket holiday turkey and the free range top grower turkeys I get. You pay for it, but when the guests all rave about the turkey--just plain wet roasted (yes, crisp and brown) with some seasoning, herbs and (cheap but palatable) wine; no fancy treatments, nor pound of butter, nor brine, nor frying, nor any trick to improve a bird--it's easy to tell the difference. The raves were even better for the giganta-breasts I cooked sous vide with very little on them.

If the turkey isn't dead easy and really good, I'm not cooking it!

Like plllog, I cook a free range locally grown turkey, fresh, I even raised my own one year and it was the best turkey I've ever eaten. Also the most labor intensive and expensive, I'll never raise turkeys again!

As for the frozen turkeys, I also do not like the Butterball/etc., they seem too salty and kind of mushy, an odd texture, but maybe that's just me.

Other than that, I can't tell the difference between the 59 cents per pound Meijer turkey and the $1.99 "specialty" brand at the grocery store. (shrug) If I cook them each the same way, they turn out pretty much consistently the same.

Annie

To each their own. I've seen other threads where people bashed Butterball (mushy, fake, unhealthy, etc.). But you know what? I LIKE Butterball. As Ricky said, "Perhaps, but how many times a year do you cook turkey?"

Donna Loomis, you are right, to each their own. I've often said that taste is subjective, not objective, and what others love I do not. I don't care for beer, wine, olives, caviar, blue/bleu cheese, many things that others enjoy.

Apparently a lot of people like Butterball, as they sell millions. I just don't.

Annie

All I want is a fresh turkey - one that has never been frozen. I don't like Butterball etc as they stick a bunch of stuff under the skin.

The best turkey I ever made was from the live poultry market. Tomasina was still warm when we picked her up with instructions to ice her down well before I put her in the fridge. No chemical injections, no nothing added until I rubbed herb butter under her skin and on top.

I agree on all the "stuff" in a Butterball....but many consider them the epitome of modern turkeys.
Actually I like a Honeysuckle white for a frozen turkey. And, don't even mention these faux never frozen "fresh" turkeys that are hard as a rock and kept at about 25 degrees....frozen but not "deep frozen"....and the juice leaks and they are not nearly as good as a bird that was frozen quickly soon after killing.

If you are hosting the Thanksgiving meal it can get very pricy. Many need to keep the cost down and any Turkey this time of year is often symbolic and tradition. Just keep the temp in mind. Timing is everything and don't fret. Read and study a good turkey cooking 101 from FoodandWine or any internet source and study a few methods.

My mother gets whatever has the best price always, and i make all the sides. Fine as long as DH makes the gravy.... ; )

Not traveling this year because of work so we will be staying home.

We buy an organic fresh kill and don't mind the cost but we are also making stock from it and will be having soups through the holidays into the NewYear and want a good quality local bird...and Turkey is only once a year for us. I love the flavor from a good bird.

My sister, the one time she hosted, mom's stuffing came out of the bird at serving time with the giblet/heart bag....we just laughed it off and all was fine.

Do what ever is comfortable in your budget but i do fret when i see someone buying a big frozen bird wednesday afternoon. yikes. Most groceries will start partially thawing their selection a day or two ahead....and give good advice for success.

I find that the preparation is the biggest part of a "good" bird. However I do not like the mushy Butterball even though some do. It's funny how when one person expresses an opinion, they're "bashing", yet when the other bashes, they're exercising "free speech"! :) People are curious animals!

People are often fooled by the "faux fresh" birds due to ignorance of what "fresh" means. And often they pay for it. I too prefer a deep frozen bird, properly thawed and properly cooked but in reality, I enjoy most any turkey, especially covered with tasty gravy.

I always get the cheap frozen turkey which is usually a Jennie-O in my area of the country. Jennie-O's are good birds; have never been disappointed in one--- so long as it doesn't get overdone!

As Ci_Lantro said, "so long as it doesn't get overdone!" Personally, I can't taste any significant difference in any turkey... name-brand or not... fresh or frozen. I also pretty much over-cook every poultry item I eat?!? I go by what my grandmother taught me to test doneness... if you wiggle a leg/wing and it feels about ready to just pull off... bird is done. I KNOW that's way more "done" than THEY say it should be, but that's how I like it. In my mind/mouth... the white meat is almost supposed to be "dry"?!?

From the Ecowatch website:

"Butterball is not in fact a preparation of chicken or a specific
heritage breed, but rather a business investment, as so much of American
cuisine is. In fact, there is no actual butter in or on a Butterball
turkey. The fresh turkeys are injected with a basting solution made of
salt water and “common household spices,” one brand representative told
me. Butterball will not share the ingredients of its secret basting
formula."

Yes, Butterball produces a great tasting turkey. There's no argument there. But I don't need any additional salt in my diet and I'd much rather be the one choosing the spices.

I don't think they are "just as good."

The quality of the meat depends on how they were raised and fed, and cheap turkeys are raised pretty inhumanely.

These factory farms are going to spend the least amount of money raising turkeys so they can sell them for pennies a pound.

Stress hormones can have a real effect on quality and quantity of the meat.

Even turkeys deserve a "happy Thanksgiving".

Here’s Why Pasture-Raised Turkeys Are So Expensive. More Importantly, Here’s Why You Should Buy Them.

Chase nailed it. I couldn't believe Marilyn_Sue paid just .59/lb for her turkey!! I'd kill for that.

Thanks for all the responses! I ended up getting a 17lb. turkey for $.39 per lb. ($6.73) but I had to buy $35.00 worth of grocery's which I didn't mind because I needed other stuff. The regular price was $1.59 per lb. I hope it's good!!!

Reading the grocery store flier....and they are giving a free 14 pound their own brand ( which is good!) turkey with a $50 meat purchase....and larger birds are similarly discounted....$9.95 for a 24 pound bird with a $50 meat buy.
We grow a lot of turkeys in Iowa!!

I am remembering one Christmas of extreme turkey overload! My husband was always given a turkey for Christmas as part of a Christmas bonus. That bird I thawed and planned for Christmas dinner. And I entered a drawing at the grocery store and won a turkey, had to be picked up by the 24th, so I crammed that into the already full freezer. Then the 26th my husband went to the Post Office to get the mail for the Dairy Farms and a supplier had sent him a turkey that had been sitting at the PO all Christmas day and the dry ice was gone and it was starting to thaw. So he brought it home and I roasted it that day.
Lots of containers of turkey in the freezer and his p[arents got a lot of the bounty!

Turkeys here are 69 cents a pound w/ purchase of another $25 worth of groceries. Aldi has Butterballs for 99 cents a pound/ no addt'l purchase required.

Sometimes you can designate your extra free turkey from the grocery stores go to the food bank.

Usually it won't matter but if you get heirloom turkeys, they WILL cost more. I'm in favor of the heirloom as they increase the (tasty) dark meat ratio to the (dry and sorta tasteless) white meat.

If I had spent $400 at my local grocery over the past month or so, I could have gotten a free supermarket turkey. But I'm only one person usually, and I was out of town for two of those weeks. And I wasn't that interested...

If you think the white meat is dry and tasteless, you need turkey cooking instructions!

Good point about getting more dark meat, Artemis. I don't care for the white meat, either. Wish turkeys came in all dark!

But fortunately the rest of the family likes the white meat and I get all the dark meat.

I'm another who is amazed at the CHEAP prices you're all talking about! I haven't seen a turkey for .59/lb since the 1970s. lol!

Perhaps the title of this thread should be:

"Is an expensive turkey just as bad as a cheap one?"

Turkeys are not very good tasting. That's why they don't sell turkeys except for Thanksgiving, and they sell them cheap. Hey! No one will complain if you serve prime ribs and lobsters instead of turkey.

You really have to season the bird well for it to taste good.

I can't tell the difference between an e$pen$ive one and a cheap free give-away one.

dcarch

I love the taste of turkey!

That's why they don't sell turkeys except for Thanksgiving -- DCarch

Huh? You live in New York, right? It seems there's a lot of stuff they don't sell where you live, but I thought New York had everything!

We always have turkey available. It's a very popular meat. Of course, the growers do a big push for Thanksgiving and Christmas because a lot of people only really cook those two days in a year, and then they make a gazillion turkeys. If I want a big turkey in the Spring, I have to order it from the butcher, and it'll be frozen, because they slaughter the big ones in the Autumn, but the butchers always have some kind of turkey available fresh (not lightly freezing fresh).

It's important to remember that grocery stores have teeny tiny profit margins. If there isn't a goodly demand for a product, they won't continue to carry it. Add to that the discount or club grocery, which sometimes have a margin of a third of the normally tiny one, and you'd better want what everyone else wants when everyone else wants it. OTOH, if you want a turkey and your store doesn't have one, go to the butcher!

And my turkeys have a lot of flavor without a ton of seasoning. Some, but very casual. It's not my personal favorite, but my family would revolt if I made ducks.

I'd say yes, but it's all in the cook's ability, I think!

plllog, when you say butcher, I assume you mean a meat market. Here, meat markets only sell turkeys as special orders for the holidays. I ordered a fresh turkey from a local meat market for T-Day one year... it was going to be dinner for two, so I asked for a 12-13 lb. turkey to be picked up Wed. afternoon. When I went to pick it up on Wed. afternoon they had already sold my turkey to someone else and all that was left was a 23 lb beast. Yes, I cooked a 23# turkey for two people. LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I don't like turkeys that have been pumped with any kind of solution because it does give it a weird texture and taste, so that is my criteria for buying a turkey. I am able to usually get a 15-17 lb turkey for a very reasonable price that meets that criteria. Several of our stores have them for .37-.39 a lb. I will be going out tomorrow to get ours.

Update-no cheap turkey for me, every variety was pumped full of solution. Yuck!

Aldi here has Butterball for 99 cents a pound too, and the "cheap" Meijer brand is 59 cents a pound if you buy $30.00 worth of groceries. They are, of course, frozen.

But even in my small rural Northern Michigan area I can get a frozen turkey whenever I decide I would like one, they are available pretty much year round, although not at the above prices. Those prices are just "loss leaders" to get you to buy your other dinner items at that store to get the cheap turkey.

dcarch, I LIKE turkey. I like it better than I like chicken. Frankly, I like duck better than either, but they're darned expensive here, I'd go broke feeding duck to a dozen people and half of them wouldn't eat it anyway. Turkey is also my Mother's favorite protein, so I've been known to buy a fresh local turkey as an "extra" and keep it in the freezer for Easter or another dinner when I know Mother will be there.

The local farms don't grow small turkeys, though, there are no 12 or 14 pounders. The "small" ones are 20 lbs or more, so I always ask for a small one, usually a hen turkey. If I wanted I could go there a week in advance, choose my bird out of the field where they are all wandering about, and then processing it myself, but I just don't want to. Here's a look at how some of the local turkeys live...

http://www.provisionfamilyfarms.com/turkeys.html

As momj47 said, commercial birds are raised in horrendous conditions. A plethora of pictures can be found on line, so I won't ruin your appetite with any of them.

Annie

PM, a butcher who will sell your holiday meat order to someone else is just plain bad! I was talking both about the ones with independent butcher shops, and the ones in the supermarkets. I meant any butcher shop where there are butchers cutting meat. I've seen the meat displays at the discount stores, and they don't have much variety, which sounds like what DC might have been talking about. Sad that your meat market is so neglectful about the turkey!

plllog, this place is a lousy meat market and it's the only one in the area. :( I got a bad chicken there once and that was it for me. Maybe that's why I like my salads so much. :o)

Re the original question, IME, the cheapest off-brand frozen grocery store turkeys are every bit as good as, if not better than, the more expensive fully-injected Butterballs. :p

For those who have mentioned Meijer, you may be interested to know that the Meijer brand turkey are Honeysuckle or Butterball. At least in Michigan - not sure about anywhere else. Just something I recently learned from a woman at my gym whose husband works in the Meijer meat department.

I don't like the greasy dark meat on turkey so that's why I buy turkey breast. For the ones who so adamantly despise white meat, why don't you just buy the thighs and drumsticks and be happy? It's supposed to be a fun time of year. Then you can cook the daylights out of it and it will still be good and greasy.

How often we see the Gee, I cooked the white meat to 175° so the dark meat could get cooked and now the white meat is dry... Well DUH!

Here we had one store chain giving a free turkey with the purchase of a ham. Whole turkeys around here are around $1/# and up but you can't get a turkey breast for less than $2/# and usually closer to $2.50. How I long for the days of 88¢/# turkey breast. I'd buy 4 or 5 of them at a time. But fewer people want dark meat in this area at least. So the turkey breast goes for a premium. Whole turkeys are available here year round.

Butterball is what I refer to as a "fuel injected" bird. Salt + water = mush in my experience.

Jasdip, how about I send you a few birds and a list of names? :) No, that would be wrong. Wouldn't it? Yeah, that would be wrong.

Cynic, here I've almost never found fresh/frozen turkey thighs or legs, Elery is always bemoaning the fact that he can't just buy turkey thighs. I sometimes find smoked wings, and occasionally smoked drumsticks, but almost never turkey parts other than frozen turkey breast. Sometimes I can buy backs and necks, so I'll use those for stock if I can get some.

I don't know about the Meijer turkey, but I can tell you they sell Butterball for $1.99 and the Meijer brand was 59 cents a pound, so that doesn't seem very cost effective, but they do seem very similar after cooking. And Aldi had the Butterball turkeys for 99 cents a pound. I don't really like any of the "injected" or "flavor enhanced" or "salt added" or "pre-brined" turkeys, although I'll cook and eat them if I can't get something else. They seem soft and mushy, too salty and I don't like paying (in the case of that $1.99 Butterball) a couple of bucks per pound for salt and water, it just adds to the weight and you know you are paying turkey price for salt water.

So, I'll keep buying turkeys from my neighbors. The local Amish community are good, hardworking and responsible farmers and a couple of neighbors like the ones at Provision Farms are farming as a livelihood, so I'll continue to give them my money.

Annie

I like the taste of injected turkeys. Yes, I find that cheap turkeys are as good or better than expensive, fancy ones. We thought that the few fancy turkeys I bought were ok, nothing special. And I thought that I would treat my family, nope. Just dont overcook any turkey.

Annie, here's another reason to head to our coast. We can buy Turkey drumsticks almost throughout the year. Yesterday I roasted a 13.75lb bird, 2 half turkey breasts from Empire Kosher (Trader Joe's) and two enormous drumsticks from our Gelson's Supermarket. My turkey was a Gelson's brand and it was excellent. I paid handsomely for it, but it was very, very good.

Well, that's a pretty long trip for a turkey leg, LOL!

Annie

For the ones who so adamantly despise white meat, why don't you just buy the thighs and drumsticks and be happy?

Great idea. Except 'no can find'. Not available around here. Besides, I have three people who like white meat turkey.

Buying the whole turkey means there's plenty of dark meat for me.

We can get legs and necks year round. And the breast. My mother likes to roast a breast a few times a year for a Sunday meal and the rest for sandwiches. Turkey is a common deli sandwich so i suppose the legs and necks come from that processing. Necks a great for stock.

I did put a couple legs on the grill/smoker last summer when we did a mixed grill of various things. I did consider getting an extra bird to trim and freeze parts but our freezer is so full now.

I grew up with the big injected birds and never anything special. Our bird this year was D'Artangnan. Gorgeous and no comparison to any i've had in the past. The Friday brunch casserole with dressing/stuffing, poached eggs on top, the sandwiches, the stock, the soup last night, ...stock in the freezer. A few breast slices with gravy, frozen with a packet of dressing for a later meal.

At 3.99lb i consider it a bargain for all it gave.

If i had to feed an army of Aunts and Uncles, and kids and teens, i would look for the cheapest to 59cents a lb. non-enhanced/injected. We often had a ham as well. This goes back to the 60's when my Grandmother hosted. 6children all had 3-4, i was the youngest of 22 grandchildren. My Grandmother had a Diner and her specialty was cake and pie. (that is all us kids cared about)...she had a glass countertop commercial pie safe, two commercial gas ovens, and even a two glass door sliding fridge in her home kitchen. Raised chickens for the eggs and fryers. Turkey from a near-by farm friend. Usually three. Pop alway had a Smithfield ham. So that was easily 38 and she always invited some friends and employees....i was probably 3-6 yrs old during those few gatherings before we dispersed to individual holiday family meals. I remember the pies and my Uncle holding me up by my ankles with one hand and showing off around the room, "we'er going to roast you!". Sometimes 3 or 4 times. I hated it. Tramatic experience and spent the day hiding from him. (i think alcohol was involved).