ChefSteps is a team of chefs, writers, and food lovers who develop recipes, techniques, and guides to help people cook better at home.

ChefSteps

1 crown, 2 leg quarters, 2 wing flats, carcass for stock

Once you know how to properly butcher one kind of poultry, you can pretty much butcher any kind of poultry. Turkeys, chickens, Cornish hens, pheasants—they all have the same structure (or “morphology”).Here we show you how to break down a turkey—which, due to its size, is an excellent demo bird—into its wings, crown, and legs for great presentation, as well as how to remove a wishbone and preserve the delicious oyster meat. After some practice, you may never buy pre-portioned poultry again.