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Turkey troubles — when Christmas dinner doesn’t go quite as planned

We asked readers to share their best holiday ‘disaster’ stories. Grab some popcorn and enjoy.
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It’s the most wonderful time of year, but let’s face it, things don’t always go according to plan during the busy holiday season.

We asked to hear readers’ best and funniest Christmas ’disaster’ stories and you deliverede. It turns out there are more than a couple of ways to ruin (and subsequently save) Christmas dinner. Have read, have a laugh and then, if you’d like, share your own story in the comments below.

First Christmas, first seven months of marriage — 1962. I thought I’d cook a goose for my European husband. He said that’s what his mother did. She was long dead, so I asked my mum. She had never cooked one, so we assumed it was like a turkey — wash it, stuff it and bake it.

We lived in a three floor walk-up apartment building. There were no such things as oven fans or hallway air conditioning. That goose started smelling strange at about the 45-minute mark. I opened a window in the bedroom (only one in the apartment), and waved a tea towel at it to send the odour out — it was definitely not an aroma!

What we didn’t realize was that a goose has fat that will burn and cause a horrid stink, which was happening!

Soon, a neighbour knocked and asked if we had had a small house fire.

Then another gent appeared and was quite huffy. He had a British accent and knew immediately what was going on. He said, after a quick look at the bird in the oven, “Take it out, girl. Wrap it in bin liners and get rid of the nasty thing.Then go somewhere for a nice turkey dinner, the pair of ye, and for the Lord’s sake, leave a window open!” We did as instructed and went to mum’s and had some wine and a lovely dinner and laughed and laughed over my first ‘bird in the bin’. I must say, hubby has never once mentioned that episode even after 54 years of more efforts! Merry Christmas, everyone. — Marilyn McIlvena Sergi

The first turkey I cooked for my family after my parents passed away , I was 19 yrs old. Cooked it okay , but when came to cut the turkey I saw red. Oh my god, I thought it was raw. It happened to be the bag inside the turkey with the heart, liver and giblets and the bag was white with red lettering. But the turkey was cooked, and we all had a great laugh. — Cindy Forbes

New to cooking turkey, I googled the cooking time for the turkey, proceeded to look at the price sticker and rather than taking the kilo weight I mistakenly thought the price per kilo was the weight of the turkey. Needless to say the turkey was barely cooked by the time dinner time rolled around, so we ate dinner, then dessert and then had turkey. — Colleen Gib-Rogo

My favourite Christmas memory/ mishap was years ago the power went out on Christmas Day and my mom was having a house full of guests, so my dad decided to barbecue the turkey. But it was too cold outside so he barbecued it in our garage (we were in the process of closing in the garage at the time). When we went to check on it he was happy as can be, but lots of smoke. — Jaime Dickson

Christmas 1996 — Huge snow storm had shut down the highway. We were living in Lac La Hache at the time. We are a trucking family as are a lot of friends. Everyone re-routed to our place, then the power went out. I was stocked up with food, booze and firewood. Luckily enough, we had a wood burning oven/stove and it was 30 below, so the food stayed fresh. My father in law helped me with the turkey, I was in my early 20s and never used that kind of stove. I dream of that turkey. We all had our Christmas dinner under candlelight, ate too much, drank too much and laughed ‘til we passed out. Best damn Christmas ever! —Angie Colley Venne

We went through some tough times for a few years and could not afford a stove. Cooked an entire Christmas dinner using a borrowed barbecue, coleman stove and microwave. Was quite the effort to keep food warm. I think we had Christmas dinner at my parents’ the following year. — Jennifer A. Webster

I was so happy to be in my first apartment and having family over for Christmas. I read my Christmas cookbook and placed the turkey in the roaster. It came out toasty brown. As Dad carved it he mentioned, “There’s not a lot of meat on this bird. I don’t know if there will be enough.” Then he realized it wasn’t the turkey breast he was carving. I put the bird upside down. Oops. It was sure juicy, though.— Terri Greer

One of family memories was when my youngest was two; he loves food, and he took the glass pickle of the tree and started eating it. Oh no! Luckily, no harm done and now we laugh every year when we see the new pickle in the tree. — Denise Lockhart-Antifeau

My mother once cooked the ham but forgot to remove the plastic wrap so we spent a lot of time picking plastic. — Brandy Maxwell

Thanks for sharing. — Teri Shigley (Brandy’s mother).