Thanksgiving Dinner Wild Turkey Poppers

We love to serve wild turkey for Thanksgiving, but cooking a wild bird whole isn’t usually the best way to serve one. For starters, wild turkey legs and thighs are tough. They need a long, slow cooking process with plenty of moisture to break down the muscle and make them tender. Wild turkey breast, meanwhile, is lean and it works best with hot and fast cooking methods like grilling and frying. Because of this, we tend to cook the parts of our turkeys separately.

These poppers pack all of the traditional Thanksgiving flavors into a wild turkey meal that can be cooked on the grill. Images by author

This recipe is a quick and easy way to get all the flavors of a traditional Thanksgiving dinner in an easy to make, and eat, popper. Because who doesn’t love a popper?

Start by making the dressing, because it isn’t Thanksgiving without dressing. Brown a pound of breakfast sausage and a diced yellow onion in a skillet.

Brown the sausage and onion together.

Once the sausage is cooked and the onion soft, remove the pan from heat and allow to cool. In a large bowl, mix a 12-ounce bag of cornbread stuffing, the cooled sausage and onion mixture, three cups of chicken stock, and the cranberries.

Blend the dressing ingredients.

Turn the mixture out into a 13x9 baking dish and bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.

Turn the dressing out into a dish and bake.

Allow the dressing to cool slightly while you work on the turkey.

Remove the dressing from the oven and allow to cool.

Slice the breast across the grain into half-inch thick steaks.

Slice the breast across the grain for tenderness.

Put those steaks, one at a time, into a 1-gallon zip-top plastic bag. Take a meat mallet and pound the turkey flat, down to a quarter inch thickness or there about. This will help to make the poppers tender.

Pound the cutlets flat.

Once all the turkey steaks have been tenderized, season them with sage, salt, and pepper. Spoon an egg-sized amount (adjust up or down depending on the size of your turkey breast) onto the turkey.

Spoon dressing onto the flattened turkey.

Roll the turkey around the dressing. Wrap the turkey popper with a slice of bacon. Secure with a toothpick or two.

Roll the popper and wrap with bacon.

Place the poppers onto a pre-heated grill. Brush the tops with BBQ sauce. Grill for 10 minutes, flip, brush with more sauce and continue cooking, brushing with sauce on each turn.

Brush with BBQ sauce as the poppers grill.

Once the bacon is cooked through and the center of the poppers reaches about 155 degrees, remove them from the grill. Total cooking time will depend on thickness, but these took about 35 minutes.

Cook until the bacon is cooked through and the center reaches around 150-155 degrees on a digital thermometer.

Serve hot as an appetizer or main course at your Thanksgiving meal.

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