As the calendar turns, around once again comes Thanksgiving, an annual holiday event, though probably as misunderstood from its origins as Spam is. Not that I've tried to understand the origins of Spam, but I digress.

Of course, it's not only the season of Thanksgiving: it's football, hockey and basketball season. It's the beginning of the Christmas decorating and shopping season. Among certain animations, it's wabbit or duck season. And we have the benefit of the remnants of a couple shooting wars in the Middle East, which is good practice for anyone planning to engage in the shopping end of Christmas season.

However, for my purposes I'll stick with the Thanksgiving theme, and something near and kind of dear to my heart and gastrointestinals: bachelor recipes.

Being a bachelor -- not to mention having to work the traditional holiday this year -- I'll be missing out on the standard Thanksgiving family gathering, sporting the usual Thanksgiving fare: turkey, dressing, potatoes, salads, pies, breads, veggies, antacids. That means I'm left to my own devices this year, and from previous references to my acumen in the kitchen, you know that mine tends to resemble a terrorist camp HQ after a US air attack.

However, this year I've come up with something different, to give me the festive spirit of Thanksgiving, the culinary feel of same, and probably a few dozen other things in the aftermath I've not yet considered as consequences. My very own, just invented and unique 'turkey' recipe, created in my guise of bachelor chef and culinary barbarian implosionaire:

Culinary Barbarian Turkey Surprise

First, collect the following ingredients:
- 2 Cans of Spam
- 2 Chicken drumsticks
- 1 (ample) portion of cornbread stuffing
- 1 can of chicken or turkey broth (whichever you can find)
- 1 cup diced onions
- 1 cup diced turnip greens
- 1 cup diced celery
- 1 egg
- 1 cup flour
- 1/2 cup milk
- First Aid kit (pays to be prepared, especially when it's me)
- 1 teaspoon of Crisco oil or fresh bacon grease
- assorted seasonings for desired taste
- 1 fire extinguisher (see previous parenthesi)

Next comes the preparation:
- scrape off the gelatin residue from the Spam and set it aside for gravy
- mix Spam, stuffing, diced onions/turnip greens, egg, Crisco/bacon grease, can of broth and seasonings in mixing bowl, shaping into equivalent shape of a turkey
- add drumsticks (secure to turkey with toothpicks, staples, rivets, barbed wire, whatever works)
- preheat oven to 375 degrees
- place culinarily barbarianed turkey in roasting pan, cover with aluminum foil
- cross yourself for luck (unless you're atheist, then just run with it)
- bake for 75 minutes

For the gravy:
- disconnect smoke detectors
- mix gelatin, flour and milk in frying pan on low heat
- stir occasionally
- if it starts to smoke enough to cover a re-enactment of the 82nd Airborne's Waal River assault crossing at Nijmegen in WW II, stir much more frequently
- if on fire, stir/stomp furiously

After removing culinarily barbarianed turkey from oven:
- pour gravy residue (or at least that still in liquid form) over finished turkey
- place in hermetically-sealed bag, and throw out the whole thing, roasting pan included
- call the nearest Cracker Barrel restaurant for reservations, delivery or derisive verbal abuse ("Ya dun what? Ya danged fool!")

Disclaimer: the aforementioned recipe is not approved or recommended by Betty Crocker, Martha Stewart, the USDA, EPA, US Army Department of Re-Enactments or any other recognized chef, living or petrified after having read the above. If you do try this at home, you'll keep that to yourself if you're smart; on the other hand, if you tried this at home, you've already debunked the notion you had any smarts, and can disregard it. Feeding residue to pets will likely get you in deep kimshi with the ASPCA, PETA, and The Anti-Spam Defamation League. Burying it will likewise involve you with the EPA, The Sierra Club, or the salamanders that suddenly morph into Swamp Thangs.

Mike Bay is a free-lance humor writer and accomplished ceiling pencil sticker during writers' block. Born in Iowa, subsisting in Colorado, he has parental and other ancestral links on both sides of the Mason-Dixon line. He's a former newspaper columnist, a member of the NetWits and National Society of Newspaper Columnists, and has been published in the quarterly Satire, on various websites and ezines, on his very own website (outofthinair) and in an upcoming book, Serenade of the Stinkweed, an anthology of marital experiences by Jeanni Brosius, Bandal Books. A life-long bachelor, he's still waiting to receive his BS in it, and trying to figure out why he needs a degree to prove what he's full of.

Critiquesters may write Mike at cowfethers@yahoo.com

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Gravity Bites



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