'Cook for 10 Seconds at 4 or 5 Degrees': Kindergartners Share Their Turkey Recipes

Most every family has its traditional technique for prepping the perfect bird on Thanksgiving Day. 

The kindergartners at have their own strategies, too—though perhaps not as time-tested.

Every year since she was a student teacher, kindergarten teacher Jill Cerny has had her classes share their thoughts on how to cook a Thanksgiving turkey. This year, all of Concord's kindergartners dictated their ideas to their teachers, who typed them up and had the kids add pictures.

The illustrated recipes are charming, sweet and often hilarious.

"It's funny when they say they go out and hunt for the turkey and pull out its feathers," Cerny said. "Very few actually do."

The one exception: a former student from Galesburg who's dad was a taxidermist.

Other students suggest popping the poultry in the microwave for a few minutes or cooking it at downright frigid temperatures.

Many note that preparing the feast is a family effort, with mom, dad, grandpa and grandma all getting in on the act.

Copies of the recipes will be compiled into a book the kids get to take home with their original drawing. 

Above is a gallery of illustrated recipes, and below you'll find a sampling of some of the other techniques students suggested.

• Nathan: I will wait at the side of the road until I see a turkey in the trees. I will take my bow and arrow and shoot the turkey. My dad will skin the turkey and my mom and dad will drive to my grandma’s for Thanksgiving. My grandma will roast the turkey in the oven at 350 degrees. It will cook for five minutes. While the turkey is cooking, we will make a stew. We also make some drinks, like Kool-Aid. The turkey is put on a big table and some people sit at the small table, and we eat the big feast.
• Ella: My dad gets the turkey from the farmer’s market. He starts to cook it in the kitchen. He puts it in a pot on the stove with a lid. It cooks for 45 minutes on warm, not hot. My dad takes it out of the pot and he puts it on plates for us to eat it, but my sister doesn’t like to eat it.
• Tommy: My dad will go out to the woods and get a turkey. He will get a bow and arrow and he will shoot the turkey. He will take it home and cook it up. He will cut off the feathers and then put it in the oven. It will cook at 100 degrees for 20 minutes because it takes 20 minutes to cook chicken. My dad will take it out of the oven and place it on the table, and then we start eating it.
• Linda: My mom will buy a turkey from a farm. She will take the feathers and feet off. She cooks the turkey in a pan in the oven for 40 minutes at 10 degrees. This is very hot. My mom takes it out of the oven and puts it on the table and we eat. 
• Cadel: We go to the woods and get the turkey from there. I shoot the turkey with the bow and arrow. We shoot another turkey and bring them home. We take off the feathers, the heads and the feet, and we cut them in half. We make a fire outside and stick the turkeys on sharp sticks, and the sticks turn over the fire to cook the turkeys. It takes about four hours to cook the turkeys. The fire is so hot that it turns blue. When the turkeys are done cooking, we put them on a big plate and chop them up. We eat the turkey outside because it is very crumbly and messy.
• Immanuel: My neighbor buys a turkey from the store. He brings it home and cooks it in the oven He starts cooking it at noon and it is done when the sun is just about to go down. The oven is very hot, around 50 degrees. He brings the turkey over to our house in a special metal pan with a glass lid that you can see through. We make other foods at our house while the neighbor is cooking the turkey.
• Parth: I don’t know how to cook a turkey because I am a vegetarian and I don’t eat meat. We make a special bean dish. We get the beans at the grocery store. We cook them in the kitchen on the gas. The beans cook for 10 minutes at just right heat. I play with my sister while the beans cook, and when they are done we put them on plates and we eat them.