This time just over a year ago I was sat on my sofa mulling over the past annum, broke but happy, watching the marginally better festive TV line up and peregrinating around the caverns of my mind in search of a Cash Cow to pay for my forthcoming travels.
A year later and sure as eggs is eggs I found myself back on the same sofa, in the same room, with the same emaciated cats and Labrador that’s convinced he’s a Jack Russell and subsequently climbs all over your face, still broke, and still happy. The money I’d managed to scrape together pre-vagrancy had been blown, quite literally in some cases, on everything from curries to coca leaves. I needed a nice little earner.
Cue Facebook, (which continues to supply me with paying jobs through no effort of my own and by complete accident), a message from my elder sister pinged into my inbox instructing me at once to get in touch with Charlie Pyper, the founder, owner, manager and festive farmer responsible for what can only be described as some of the best breasts on a bird I’ve sliced with my Sabatier. The next two days were spent driving round London and the South East delivering Turkeys of all shapes and sizes to places as far fetched as Ilford, where a man identical to Winston Churchill tipped me £6, and Croydon, home of Kate Moss. I even dropped a bird off in a fictional place called Epsom, which up until now I thought was a make of printer.
After two days, 20 birds, 300 and something miles and a Thermos of Heinz chicken soup, I was on the home stretch with a single lonesome Turkey left in the boot of my car. Now I have a confession to make, in my eagerness to get home I navigated a roundabout rather too aggressively and out flew the bird, thumping with biblical force into the side of the car before rolling to a rest on it’s back, I felt the car snake from the sheer force of the blow and struggled to regain control of the back end as under steer took hold. By the time I managed to pull over my load had collected a fair amount of dirt from the floor of the boot, I brushed it off and stuffed it back in its box, and like a mischievous delinquent swore I’d never tell. Alas, my conscience has got the better of me only a week after my foul faux pas, so I am using this here web to purge my guilt ridden soul.
Fortunately for me my mother can’t work her mobile phone, let alone a computer, so the chances of her reading this and uncovering the truth about our Christmas lunch are slim to none. Not that it made any difference to the meat however; Fieldshires Turkeys are reared ranging free, they have a healthy diet and plenty of sun (Essex is statistically the driest county in Britain), pound for pound they are fantastic value and I can guarantee you wont find a better tasting bird in Britain.
Check out the Fieldshires website @ www.fieldshires.com and buy your Turkey for 2012.
Top Tip:
Get the dog to help with the sprouts.