This past weekend I got the opportunity to hunt Turkey with my 5 year old son here in AZ. What an awesome experience to say the least. I hadn’t stepped foot in this unit in 5 years and was going off where I had seen Turkey while elk hunting, and some tips from friends. My son and I woke up in Scottsdale at 2 am , I put him Jammies and all in the truck we were on the road by 2:30am. We arrived to the unit about 6:15am and began to work.

I’m a run and gun type of guy, I like to cover ground with my truck and call in areas I think would hold birds. Long story short I had called in 5 spots that morning without a response. On the 6th spot Luca and I jumped out of the truck waited 3-5mins and I ripped off a very loud series of yelps, only to be supersede with a thundering gobble of a close Tom. This bird was close… really close… I saw the amazement in Luca’s eyes I told him “Buddy we are gonna get this guy!” I grabbed my gun and pack and we moved forward in his direction 50 yards or so and he let out another thundering gobble . He was on top of us, I quickly ushered my son under a fir tree and set up to shoot. I let out some quite yelps and he let off again… I began to purr and make feeding clucks real quite and he was coming in on a string gobbling the whole way. I lifted up my binos and I could see him now working down the ridge to our position “He’s coming buddy sit tight” I reminded my son… I got my gun pointed toward the opening that I believed he would come through, popped off the safety and readied myself. 15secs later he was coming through the opening and I squeezed off the shot. I had never been so happy and excited in my life. Sharing that with Luca made it so much more than I had ever felt before. We took some photos, then we began the process of plucking the bird. Which if you haven’t done before is a real tedious chore, Luca was eager to help and we made “quick-ish” work of him. My original plan was to pluck him and dress him whole so I can do a whole bird in the smoker. But when we were done I saw how much skin we had ripped in the plucking process that I abandoned the idea of the whole smoked turkey. Good thing too because I tried to smoke the turkey legs and over cooked them to the point they were inedible, my thermometer was not calibrated and it was giving me a false reading. So for the breast I decided to go with an old stand by, pulled Turkey Sliders with the breast meat.

Pulled Turkey Sliders

Ingredients:

1)large wild turkey breast

3/4 stick of butter sliced into 8 slices

1 teasp salt ( I prefer pink Himalayan)

1teasp coarse ground black pepper

3 bay leaves

1 teaspoon of Caldo de Pollo or ground chicken bullion

pinch of dill weed

pinch of cayenne pepper

Heinz Carolina Vinegar style BBQ sauce

Mayo

Juliane shredded cabbage or cole slaw

Sweet Hawaiian Rolls

Smoked Gouda sliced

Cooking wild turkey sliders:

Salt both sides of your turkey, place half of your butter in slices or pieces on bottom of crockpot , then place the wild turkey breast on top. Then season the top with the black pepper, Cayenne, Caldo de Pollo, black pepper, dill, and bay leaves. place the remaining butter slices on top. Apply your lid and set the cooker for 8hour cook time. After about 5-6 hours check the meat with two forks to see if it will pull apart if it does, continue to shred it (pull it apart) once you have a uniform shred , mix it all into the juices and let continue to cook for an additional hour.

Building your sliders:

1 Take your shredded cabbage and add mayo to your liking some salt and black pepper and mix in a separate bowl

2 Cut your Hawaiian roll add BBQ sauce to both sides and the gouda cheese on both sides and put in a toaster oven or similar until cheese melts

3 Take you cheesy bun on a plate and with tongs grab a heap of turkey place on the bun and squirt some more bbq sauce on the turkey (optional)

4) place a heap of coleslaw on top of the turkey and crown with the other half of the cheesy Hawaiian bun

Enjoy!!!!!