Christmas is a big event and one that deserves the best, fresh Christmas turkey. Too often, though, we make do with low quality birds; stringy flesh that has no taste. Free range turkeys, on the other hand, taste just as a fresh Christmas turkey should.
Free range turkeys only come from the best quality chicks. There’s no battery farming here. No cramming as many birds into a dark and dingy barn as possible here. The tastiest fresh Christmas turkeys are housed in a barn bedded with straw and with plenty of room for them to move around, along with access to roam in an outside yard to range once they are 8 weeks of age (the earliest age at which it is safe for them to do so). This means the farmers are able to raise fewer birds per year, which does in turn effect the price: but for that slightly higher price tag you are getting a far superior bird and one which know lived a happy life.
Only the fittest chicks are chosen to become your fresh Christmas turkey; some battery farmers are happy to use any old mangy chick, but they only grow up to become mangy turkeys. Free range turkey farmers want their product to be better.
Free range turleys are grown from slow growing strains. Though fast growing turkeys are a cheaper and quicker product to produce, you pay for that in the loss of taste. You get what you pay for. Slow growing strains allow the turkeys to develop at a natural rate while retaining their flavour. Typically, free range turkeys will have a 22 week growing period; a full month and a half longer than industrially farmed, fast growing birds.
Your cheap, supermarket turkey is also likely to have been fed on an array of growth additives and growth promoting chemicals. While there are various claims around the health implications of eating chemically promoted livestock, the most important point to remember is that it really affects the flavour. Additives have their place in farming and livestock rearing, but it should be done in moderation; to encourage development, not force it. Do you really want to eat a turkey that in life was pumped full of steroids? Fresh Christmas turkeys are fed on 70% cereal.
Of course,these birds are still being raised for slaughter. But it doesn’t have to be cruel. When the time comes, free ranger farms hand pluck the turkeys on the farms on which they were raised, causing minimal stress to the bird.
And just in case there were any lingering worries; the best, fresh Christmas turkeys come from farms which are inspected annually by Environmental Health and the Traditional Farmfresh Turkey Association (TFTA). Their accreditation means you can be sure the fresh Christmas turkey you are buying was raised in the very best conditions.
Some non-meat eaters decry animal farming as cruel, but that’s just not true. No one has greater care and love for animals than free range farmers and they want the animals they raise to have the highest quality of life. It’s best for the poultry and it’s best for the buyer . A happy turkey is a tasty turkey.
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Fresh Christmas turkeys is run by third generation turkey farmers. For fresh Christmas turkeys raised to the highest welfare standards, get in touch with them now.
