You Bunch a Turkeys

Welcome to Raised in the Woods.

I'm Joel Clayfish.

I get to have an awesome time with you on the radio, on the podcasts, alongside Chef Ellie Lawton, the co-host of this show, the co-hostist with the mostest recipes of anybody I know.

Oh, thank you.

Well, you are a chef after all.

We all hold the smartphones, so technically we all have all of them.

That is how it

goes now.

We've got an all-star cast today from the Wisconsin Waterfowl Association Executive Director.

Brad Heidel is here.

Mike, the meat man, Kretschmer from Nye's Meets up here in Wisconsin.

And of course, we've got...

Megan Salazar, who is not only a Somalia, but quite an experienced hunter.

And a

volunteer for the WWA.

She does.

It is quite the incestuous group here.

I get to work with them.

Well, I mean metaphor.

Well, we are up north.

Metaphor.

Where's the banjo?

Queue the banjo.

OK.

No Arkansas jokes, come on.

I thought

it was Alabama.

I thought it was Ellie's favorite state of West Virginia.

Don't come down to my West Virginia box.

All right, everybody.

Let's, let's just, we

love the

Midwest.

Let's bring it back in.

We don't want to.

I've got

a hog getting taxed,

dermied in West Virginia right now.

They're good people.

West Virginia, the East Coast has got its awesome people too.

I love the South.

I mean, I love Florida.

I love it all.

And Gator hunting, you name it.

I love the Midwest, but there is no better.

Well, I'm saying we've all hunted together.

We've all been in different states hunting together.

We've fished together.

Mike Kretschmer was one of the first people to ever take me on a waterfowl hunt in my life, which

we look at you now.

Yes, the diapers are off and he killed more animals in a year than I have in my

life.

Came off and I think it's going back.

We keep down this road.

I'm

going to need

it.

I gotta give you

some grief

when I'm on the

show.

I'd expect nothing less.

If you had diapers, you wouldn't have to waste your socks sometimes.

Unfortunately, oh my gosh, are we going to really go in the hunting blinds?

We've

all discussed about where certain articles of clothing are in the world due to certain situations.

I have underpants buried in five different states and I think a couple of foreign countries.

I

think that's called what's

that's called lack

of preparation.

I think

that's

called TMI.

So it's called lack

of preparation.

I mean, rule number one for me is always to have the TP in the bag.

Well,

when nature calls, nature calls.

That's fair.

We're in nature

and nature calls.

What's the call?

A gurgling

stomach.

Got

to

go.

We're off the rails already.

When

the hair

on your arm

is standing right.

Mike's

call sounds like Dave's call when he's off into the woods and we need to know where he is and he shoots something and he calls to us.

That was so funny.

I wish Dave was here so he could do his call.

Well, Megan's lover Dave is predisposed in Texas.

Shout out to Megan's lover Dave.

She can't

even talk.

Formerly known as Tad.

He's still known as Tad.

What

does that stand for?

That's

gotta be an inside joke.

It talks a lot, Dave.

That's what it says.

She says it with a straight face too.

However, the other day we went to a friend's house and his wife talks a lot and she talks more than Dave and Dave

was

like... No.

Whoa.

She talks a lot and I was like, now you know how everyone else

feels.

Oh, man.

Well, if you're just joining us, welcome to Raised in the Woods, a show about the outdoors that goes off the rails quite frequently.

My name is Joel Clayfish.

I love making my life in the outdoors of the Midwest.

I have the

Honest to God blessing to be able to have not only as part of my career and livelihood But my biggest love spending time in the outdoors hunting fishing and eating what we harvest We've got co-hosting this show is chef Lawton who is not only a French

culinary certified French chef but also someone who likes spending time in the outdoors and Bringing that harvest to the table in a way that we love

to

share with you how to do it in a simple way But to make some really fantastic creations.

I think very often people get

far too caught up in.

I have a piece of wild game.

It's got to go butter and onions to the table.

And I think that gets boring.

And I think some people just don't like that.

Yeah, I think people lose

interest, you know, they get scared of wild game because it's usually leaner cuts of meat.

And you kind of have to get spicy and add some seasoning to it or prepared or marinate it or tenderize it.

These are simple things, though.

And it can really make a big difference, you know, from the butter and onions, which is a classic and great way to have a piece of wild game.

But, um, people get scared

and I think once people start, you build confidence in it.

Absolutely.

It's almost a whole nother hobby.

Yeah.

Like I've seen people go and make one or two dishes outside of what they were normally making and just nail them and then they're addicted to it.

And that's how I am.

It's like,

OK, I've conquered that.

Now I need to find something else.

And then I keep building from there.

And it's so much fun.

I mean, at the end of the day, become a little scientist in your kitchen.

It's a lot of fun.

I just think don't be afraid to make mistakes.

Right.

That's I mean, you can make something if it doesn't turn out great.

You've learned from it.

And so the next time you're making something, you make it a little bit of a different way.

But I also think people don't think of wild game as Chinese food.

or Mexican food.

I make more Asian and ethnic dishes out of my well game than anything.

So do I, because the sauces and the marinades and those really heavy, bold flavors, and also fresh, like the freshness that you can put in these dishes, like fresh herbs and fresh fruits and vegetables, gosh, they're so good.

And I would have to say that probably you said people make mistakes.

I say the biggest mistake most people make is overcooking it.

Right.

The second biggest mistake is how do they handle their meat?

Yeah.

Prior to even cooking it.

Correct.

Like when they're harvesting it and how do they clean

it and

everything.

Yeah.

Well, that is, I mean, I think we've stumbled onto a really fun topic because this, you can do things simply and easily, but still not boring.

And that's a, that's a,

Dicky wicket and it's tricky for people who don't have the confidence out of the gate.

And if there's one thing I do want you to have listening to the show is to understand what a bunch of mess ups we are and we still end up with fairly decent stuff.

I my daughter just recently I brought some wagyu home and made tacos out of beef wagyu beef wagyu beef and my daughter

goes, I want the meat out of the freezer in the basement.

I like it a lot better.

I was like, you just had $22 a pound ground beef and you would take venison over that when making tacos or whatever.

I

would

too.

But when you are used to

it, I mean, you

get that

flavor and some people, when they start eating wild game for the first time, Oh gosh, it's gamey or it has that, that different flavor to it, but you eat it a few times and you turn it into one of your favorite Asian dishes or your favorite Italian dishes.

You're you get so used to that so when you go back to like a store-bought beef or or beef in general or something like that You taste that and and now you're like Joel you say this you're like, oh that beef is gamey

When I buy beef from the store, I still like it but

it's

different to me tastes funny to me

beef tenderloin I've said that forever.

I'm like, I mean I'm eating backstrap and my wife will pick that over I'm a rib eye all day and I'm like

From eating that, I'll just stay home and eat backstrap.

Yeah, I do prefer that myself.

And you can literally make any food that you make with normal store-bought meat

with wild

game.

Absolutely, Brad.

We've been talking a lot about some different Asian foods.

We make a ton of wontons out of duck

and

goose and egg rolls out of goose, and it's absolutely delicious.

I tell people that are new to cooking with wild game, start with your favorite dishes.

If stir-fry is your favorite,

Make stir fry with that wild game, right?

You know just pizzas your favorite make pizza with a shredded wild game on it You know like make your favorite dishes with those Proteins swapped out and start from there because then you're at least comfortable making those dishes because you've already made them like spaghetti and meatballs or something like that But you're getting used to working with the wild game.

So there's a guy in Florida bucks pizza.

I met him actually in the international

pizza show in Vegas.

I was kind of cool to run into him and talk to him.

But well, sorry,

your name dropping

me with the

fancy

places.

But he ran into him, but he did an iguana and venison pizza in South Florida when they had all those when all the iguanas were falling out of the trees.

They still are.

I mean,

iguana, it's absolutely

delicious.

It tastes like crab meat.

It's phenomenal.

I saw him on TikTok.

We need to get to our

wild of the week.

Yeah, we're going to get to the wild week.

I want to we can talk about this off though.

And we may come back to it because this is a great topic.

I have to confess.

for quite a while when I early early on didn't know what to do with meat I would take a hamburger helper and just put my wild game in the hamburger helper and that was the very first step I took into the wild game cooking arena you know more than a decade ago but I will tell you even doing that shows you that wild game can be a fantastic you know meal

Regardless, you don't have to buy the meat and cellophane at the store in order to make it delicious.

Cause I'm telling you, hamburger helper is really good.

Talk about this, like creating our own company, like bagged and tagged and bagged and

yeah, yeah, like marinades and stuff.

Yes, yes, we did.

We should do that.

You guys, I've never

had hamburger helper.

Me either.

And I've never had, oh, actually, I've never had ramen noodles, like packet.

I

can't, they remind me of frogs.

Yeah,

and you hate frogs

That's a very bad childhood

memory.

That's

gonna come up in another part of the show.

So I

know

back to that.

I

yes Well, I think we should get into our wild of the week and mine is frog watching no My wild of the week is

being outside in the tumultuous Wisconsin weather.

We had one day.

She's angry.

And it was 20 degrees.

And the next day is 70 degrees.

But with 50 mile an hour winds.

And back and forth.

And the only thing I can say I love about it is because I love spring and fall clothing the best of the whole year.

So my wild of the week was trying to figure out what the ever loving hell I was gonna wear to be comfortable in whatever that weather took the turn of the day.

Mike,

what do you got?

Mine is going food.

Oh, I'm not doing the recipe this week.

Somebody else can do a recipe.

Well, you just signed yourself

up.

No, I'm doing it right now.

Wild, wild turkey breast fillet out really thin.

Did you

do this already

this week?

All right.

I did this already.

And then so you kind of like make a roll with it.

And then you I put a cranberry and apple stuffing in the middle, rolled it back up, took the skin from the turkey.

wrapped it up over it, and then I smoked it at 225 and it turned out awesome.

Well, dang,

Mike.

How come we're not eating that?

Next time.

That's a great while

at

the week.

Wow.

Megan, what do you got?

I went shed hunting at our lease in Minnesota, in

Rushford,

Minnesota.

How'd you do?

We didn't find any, but the thing that was really good aside from me losing the bad thing, I lost my Ray Vans.

So sad.

Yeah, that's

they're in the woods.

You're kind of famous for leaving sunglasses places.

Yeah.

Well, I had to buy a new pair.

So we did not find any sheds.

We did pick up all the cameras, but we saw a lot of woodcock and that makes me very

wonderful.

Something I've never set out to hunt, but I would like to do that.

You

hardly ever see them, but we flushed 25 in about two and a half hours.

So.

I

like to see

that migrating bird come back.

Oh,

that is awesome.

Brad, you're wild of the week.

Quite simple for me.

Wild of the week is going to be I had my turkey hunting season and bagged a beautiful Tom opening day.

Oh, that is absolutely awesome.

Chef Lawton.

Um, I got my first tick of the season.

Oh, that's a horrible while.

Whoa.

God.

Sorry about that.

Well, having had Lyme disease, it's

actually a friendly message.

Public service announcement.

The ticks are, they're out.

Watch out for them in the Midwest.

They're out already.

We got it.

Awesome show.

We're going to talk about turkey hunting, what to do with your turkeys, your favorite turkey recipes, how spring is going to bring the best fishing we've ever seen with Mike the Meat Man, the expert on angling as well.

You're listening to Raised in the Woods.

Raised in the Woods is your one-stop shop for everything in the great outdoors of the great states of Minnesota, Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, and Iowa soon to be more states as we continue to expand.

My name's Joel Clayfish, the host of this show, along with co-host Ellie Lawton.

We've got an awesome panel of folks along with us this week.

Mike the Meat Man, Kretschmer from Nye's Meats, Brad Heidel, the executive director of the Wisconsin Waterfalls.

and our frequent flyer contributor, Megan Salazar, who happens, just happens to be a sommelier, and we're gonna start talking about using wines and recipes.

That's something I came up with over the break, and I'm excited about talking about it.

It's news to me.

It's news to Megan.

But we like to wing it on the show, don't we?

Yeah, we do.

It's all right.

Look, everybody who's an outdoors person who loves to hunt, loves to fish, loves the fall in the Midwest.

There's no doubt about it.

But if there's any season that brings about renewal of the spirit, it is the springtime.

The sap is running.

People are making maple syrup.

The turkeys are strutting.

The waters are rushing.

What an awesome time to be in the Midwest.

You're like a little house on the prairie right now.

What is that supposed to

mean?

I don't know.

You just.

I was going to say the ticks are out.

Oh, gee.

Honestly, though, like nothing is as bad as the freaking ever loving tick hell of Scotland that I experienced.

Yes, if you do go to Scotland, make sure to invest in the tick-free clothing.

I mean,

I don't even know if it matters.

I'm not sure.

Megan was with me.

She saw the whole meltdown.

It was ours.

Yeah, it was bad.

I think by the end of the day,

I picked like 127 ticks off of me.

Wow.

And

I...

will never return to Scotland because of it.

I

got Lyme disease in Scotland.

Yeah, you sure

you really brought the big one back.

I

did not.

I dealt with that Lyme disease for two months.

Yeah, that's terrible.

It was miserable.

So if let that be a warning to you, make sure that if you

If you go out in the woods right now, the ticks are out, so make sure you watch for them and check yourself over after.

And I want to add, because I didn't really know this actually until we went to Scotland, there's actually really good tick repellent pants that all the guides actually wear out in Scotland.

And you can order them online and they're not supposed to be super bad for you or like soaked in chemicals or

something.

I was going to say, while you're looking for ticks, you can be looking for morels too, because those are popping any day.

Yeah, but.

Make sure you have all your stuff with you to put the ticks off of you.

I do have some of those tick repellent pants and shirt.

Yeah.

And they work extremely well.

The shirt is really, really long.

It tucks

into the pants.

And then there's actually two cuffs in the pants.

OK.

So

you tuck one cuff in your boot, and the other one goes over the top.

How nifty.

There's no way for the ticks to get

in.

Yeah.

You know, I need to just buy that.

They'll find a way.

They

will find a way.

You know

what?

I'm going hazmat suit.

All of hunting season, all summer.

You see me

outside, I'm

rocking the hazmat.

Do they make hazmat suits in Camel?

In my size.

What are you going

to say?

Bright yellow.

I'm not turkey hunting with you.

You

know they say nobody trusts a skinny chef.

Yeah.

So what are you saying?

So what exactly are you saying?

I'm

not going

there.

Either you don't trust me or I'm fat.

You choose.

Which one is it going to be?

I'm going with I don't trust you.

I'm taking the high road.

Wow, I'm super

offended,

Brad.

Could you hand me

a shovel?

I'd

rather you call me fat.

Could you hand me a shovel?

I'm just going to keep digging.

Hey, how's the air down in that hole?

Oh my god.

Well, all I can say is people like me in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.

That's all I really know.

Which glass house?

The trust

or the fat?

Either

one, I really messed that one up.

Oh my gosh.

Back on track.

But we're all going to be in the outdoors anyway because it's the spring and it's turkey hunting season.

And I want to talk about, I want to get into some of the best gear for that and how to make your turkey hunt successful.

I want to hear about Brad's hunt.

I want, yeah.

Brad, how did you know?

Thank you, Brad.

You, I mean, you got it done like in too sweet.

No, I didn't

get it done that quick.

But you know what I'd rather really talk about is a mentor, huh?

I took two weeks before that.

Yeah.

I want to hear about that too, Brad.

Yeah.

Don't hold back.

So we took a gal out from DSG outerwear, who makes wonderful gear for women in the outdoors.

Yes.

And she had never hunted before.

And we were together doing some work stuff, and I said, would you like to go?

And she's like, what do you mean?

I said, do you want to go turkey hunting?

And she goes, no one's ever asked me before.

She says she comes from a hunting family.

No one from her family has asked her before.

So we took her out for a mentor hunt.

And there's really great opportunities to put mentor hunts together where we actually

We take them out, we take them to the range, we show them how to shoot, we answer questions for them, we show them how to clean the bird, et cetera.

We do everything.

And then we were out for the first morning and literally we had 20 toms gobbling around us.

It was phenomenal.

That's the greatest sound in the world.

Isn't it though?

Yes.

And we had two toms.

come strutting into our decoy.

Ooh, perfect.

At 7.30 in the morning.

And actually, when I say decoy, I had the whole flock out for her.

I had seven decoys

out for this camp.

We were going to get something coming in.

He was in it to win it.

I was in

it to win it.

Go pick her, go home.

And we had two beautiful times come in, and she got her first bird on the first morning

out.

Oh, wonderful.

And it was so exciting.

It is awesome.

Did she do?

I always think whenever I take a new hunter and I love that's my favorite thing when they shoot and they're successful and they kill that bird.

The first thing they do instead of celebrating or jumping up and down or cheering, they look at you and smile.

They look at you like, did I really do that?

And then they

ask, when can I go again?

Yeah.

Okay.

And then you have to block their number.

Blocking from seven.

Oh my God.

This is such a great show.

We're going to talk about what to do with that bird.

We're going to talk a little bit about setups and gear, too.

And fishing is upon us in full swing.

The opening of game fishing across the Midwest, too.

We love having you along.

Make sure you stay tuned.

And if you don't catch us live on Saturdays at 11, you can check out Raised in the Woods on CivicMedia.com, Spotify, and Apple Podcast.

This is Raised in the Woods.

Hey, if you're not listening to Raised in the Woods, you're missing out on how to make food from the outdoors on your table, how to get out there and experience it.

If you're a brand new outdoors person, if you've never hunted before, if you've never fished before, if you've never foraged, kayaked, camped, climbed a mountain, this is the show to listen to because half those things I haven't done either.

I'm just playing.

Pretty sure you've done all of them.

Well, you

have to climb them out every time you dig yourself into a hole.

That's a fact.

My name's Joel Clayfish.

This show is Raised in the Woods.

This is a show about the Midwest of the United States and all of the wonderful things we have to do when we step foot out of our domiciles into the beautiful outdoors.

Chef Ellie Lawton is the co-host of this show.

She is a culinary.

But for the purposes of this show, she talks quite a bit about wild game, how to prepare it, how to not be afraid of it.

and not be afraid of trying something new in your kitchen.

And Chef Lawton, I think that you are one of those people who really gets out there and gives her hell when it comes to the outdoors.

I try to.

I really like being outside.

Yeah, well.

There's not a lot of people out there.

Yes.

There's fewer people outside per square foot.

I'm sure that's

true.

Before we move on in this segment, I have some questions for Brad to put them on the spot about this mentored hunt because we may have some listeners that might be interested in turkey hunting.

So do you do a lot of mentored hunts?

And if so, like, would people reach out to you?

Do you do that through WWA or was that just kind of the one you did?

Was that just kind of a off?

one off.

You know, this was a personal one that I do with the National Wild Turkey Federation.

Oh,

wonderful.

So I work with them as part of this.

But I can also tell you that all the states that are listening to us right now have opportunities to do mentored hunts in their states.

And I would encourage those people who are looking to get into hunting and just don't know where to start.

Get in touch with your local department, with your wildlife department, and they will be happy to point you in the right direction.

And what I can also tell you is, if you're interested in becoming a mentor, it probably did more for me as a mentor than the actual person I was a mentor in,

or mentee, if you want to call it.

Yeah, the mentee, yeah.

I would 100% agree with that.

I've done it numerous years up in Horecon and the Marsh, and I have more fun taking these kids or adults.

can be either one depending on the program into some actually it's protected areas even that they allow some of these hunts to happen and it's some of the best memories I have of taking people out that are.

And Megan can talk a lot about that as well.

Yeah, Megan

and I have

both done mentored women's hunts and it's very

fulfilling.

I look forward to those weekends more than like I'm not a morning person at all.

I hate it.

I hate it.

But if I'm getting up to mentor someone, I'm like up and at them.

Yeah.

You have to drag me out of bed to go hunting in the morning.

Sometimes

it's just me.

There is nothing.

I think there's an evolution of a hunter.

I think when you first start hunting, you kind of want to get out there and you kill stuff.

You want to have the experience of killing stuff and being successful.

But the evolution of a hunter as far as.

I was concerned as well.

I get much more joy out of taking somebody and seeing them get their first harvest or even spending the time in the woods with them or in a field with them, giving them that experience is more satisfying to me.

And the cool thing about the mentored hunt in Wisconsin and the youth hunt is you can get somebody who can even get a leftover tag, but you can still take them out before all the regular hunters are hitting the fields and using all of, you know, hitting all the good spots.

You can take them.

previous to the season.

It's bonus time.

It's bonus time.

That's a great way of putting it.

And it's really fantastic to be able to take people and know those fields aren't going to be swamped or you're not going to have to be fighting other people because our season structure in Wisconsin is different than a lot of other states.

We assign weeks.

But even when you get those weeks, very often you're running into people and you end up having to go to a second or third spot.

And as a new hunter, that can be extremely intimidating.

and frustrating and frustrating right i mean he's frustrating to an experienced on it right but

These mentored hunts, they really are a way to kind of get out there and show somebody the reins.

And when you have a mentored hunt, you're going before the season starts, right?

So very often a lot of those turkeys are still grouped up and you'll get two or three or four toms to come into your decoys at some point.

And I wish I could be a mentee for every turkeys.

No kidding.

No kidding.

But you get you get a show with lots of turkeys because they're all still together.

You're not

having to usually be as patient or as adept at the hunt.

Those birds aren't decoy shy by then.

They've had no pressure.

They've had no pressure.

They've been, you know, they're not thinking about being hunted.

Whereas you hunt, you know, season three, four, five, six year, you know, you're dealing with turkeys that have seen some decoys.

They've heard some calling.

But this is just a real great

time.

And they get beat up from each other.

So there's a lot more hesitant to come into the spread.

or you know there's

no better time for a someone who is thinking about getting involved in hunting or starting hunting than spring turkey I think that is

Honestly, the best place to start is do a mentored turkey hunt.

I mean,

you will have a great show, if anything, even if you never pulled the trigger.

Because obviously, a mentored hunt, you know, that's the whole point.

There's no pressure.

You go out there with someone who is experienced.

You get to watch nature wake up.

It's just so wonderful.

Hey, I want to detail.

I want to hear from everybody on this panel.

What's your go-to setup early in the season for decoys?

Mike,

what do you

got?

Half strut Jake and a hen, a lay down hen.

Oh, a lay down lay down.

So she's laying there.

Oh, that Jake like three breeder.

Yep.

So for the listeners, it's like literally the turkey cut in half the hen and it's laid on the ground.

So she's in the ready position and then the Jake is half strut, like two to three feet on an angle behind her.

So I kind of get the instead of straight heads going the same direction, I put the

Jake.

So you're trying to make the toms mad.

Why is that guy with my lady?

Yes.

Right.

And it works.

You know, I love it in late season even because it's a one on I've had three, four times coming in on the one Jake and it puts on a show.

Yeah, that is a great.

That's a great setup.

Brad, what did you run?

You know when I took a when I took a Liz out a couple weeks ago.

We had seven decoys out so I had the whole flock

I've never turkey everything that many decoys that sounds awesome I have

but it's a lot to

carry.

Yeah, that's a lot of work

Well, I took I drove the truck out there today before and threw everything in the plan So we had a

we had a full strutter mentor.

Yes, absolutely We had we had a full strutter a half strutter and a lay down

So you,

but you were cognizant of the fact that they haven't broken up yet.

You were going through that mentality and, and you wanted those times to feel like that's my group.

I got to go over by them.

Exactly.

Beautiful.

I run, when I run early season, I have two, if I have a long walk, I'm taking three decoys and I'm going to have a quarter struck, strut Jake and I've made a Jake fan out from a real Jake and I will put that.

I put it on like a political yard sign hanger.

And I'll put it at an angle behind the Jake.

Like, it's a Jake fan that can't quite get his fan up all the way.

He's young.

He really is going to tick off the toms.

I've

seen that decoy.

Yes, you have.

You've seen it worked.

I think I've shot that decoy.

You've seen it.

Well, I'll tell you what, Chef Lawton, if you can make that decoy taste good, you are a good chef.

I've had and that's I run in front of that a full upright dominant hen and then I run a feeder hen as well and the reason I run that dominant hen is because early on

oftentimes you will still in those groups of hands you'll get the dominant hen who will be very angry that there's another dominant hen she'll come over and if those birds are hand up if they're following a hen around and they're not interested in fighting because they got their lady if their lady brings them over close enough then you can get that kill so it's kind of like a two I think it's a two pronged approach and then as time goes on I'll take away that

it's kind of like when my wife wants to go to the bar I'm gonna go with her

That's right.

I want to go to the bar and she doesn't you know that kind of mentality.

You never know.

I have a she's going.

I'm going.

Hey, you're the quarterstrat Jake.

We

know I have a theory about that.

I think that hunting turkeys is very much like the social dynamic of a bar.

You got the you got the guys who are from the bar.

They go to the bar quite a bit.

They walk in and they see someone else talking to one of

their ladies.

And at the beginning, they're like, you know, hey, what's that guy doing talking to our that

woman we know over there.

And then one of the other guys says, oh, just, just have a drink.

Don't worry about it.

But as time goes on, they get more and more frustrated and they can't help but going over to it.

And that's what happens in the turkey field very

often.

And then they start pushing each other with their chest and you're looking at a blind like what a bunch of high schoolers.

Come

on,

get it together, boys.

That's a decoy you're pushing against right now.

But it's so fun to watch.

It is literally like a great

movie.

Then you're like, okay, one of these dum-dums have to go.

And then you have a

really good dinner.

Megan, what do you like for a set up in Turkey in the springtime?

Honestly, this is only my second year turkey hunting, so I still have no idea what I'm doing.

Oh, well, you and I went on a hunt.

You seemed to do just perfectly there.

Well, I consider that a great honor then.

Well, see, that's why the show is so great.

Every one of us has a different range of experience.

And having Megan along on that hunt and watching her kill her first turkey, that was really exciting.

It was a

perfect shot.

It was a perfect shot.

We

both shot at the same time and shot two Super Jakes.

Yeah, we had some Super Jakes.

They had like five-inch beards, you know, and they came in.

right together.

We both looked at each other like, yeah, this is going to happen.

We counted to three.

Boom.

It sounded like one shot and they're both turkeys were dusted.

And that was really awesome.

Awesome.

What do you like for a springtime set?

Quarterstrat

Jake and upright hen.

Yeah.

Yeah, that you can't go wrong.

Now, as time goes on, I will definitely

take that fan on the back and keep lowering it because as time goes on, they're much leery, more leery to come in and fight,

it feels

like.

And that's when you're starting to hunt those subdominant or less dominant toms and you don't really want them.

And some people pull the Jake on those

and they'll just

run

the hand.

I was just going to say that as I go on with running and gunning versus a blind, I'll take a feeder hand and an upright hand and just run with that quick and see what happens.

I'll let the bird sometimes tell me what

what's going on.

I've had days show up and then they get 100 yards, 80 yards out and they don't want nothing to do it.

They switch it up the next morning and they're right in the spread.

To be fair,

I only have three decoys.

I play decoy roulette.

I'm grabbing two.

I don't know which ones I'm grabbing.

I'm grabbing two.

I think you're just fine because I'll tell you

this

prior.

If I wasn't doing that mental hunt early in the year, I use no decoys.

Zero.

Really?

I rarely use a decoy.

Really?

Growing up, we hunted turkeys.

We never used a decoy.

I

have more birds hang up out of range than actually come in.

See, I and I have a theory about hanging up birds.

I think that.

Or at least my experience has been that there's nothing in the world that kills turkey.

The number one thing in the world that kills turkeys is patience.

And even hung up birds over time.

They cannot resist their social creatures.

I have never seen a more social animal in the woods or in the field than turkeys.

And they have their curiosity gets the better of them.

That happens with fishing too.

Really?

Oh, you don't catch anything for an hour and then they go home.

Yeah, no, it definitely does.

It's I think it's tougher with fishing than if you can see a bird in the field.

I believe a hung up Tom, I have everyone say they hung up, they hung up and then you get frustrated and you leave the blind, you leave the situation.

You stay there.

If you will outlast that bird, that bird will eventually get within the 30, 40 yards to shoot them, you know, ethically and safely.

There's no doubt about it.

Man, gosh, the show flies so fast and so fun to talk about.

When we come back, I'm really excited to talk about our recipe of the week because we're going to talk about everyone's favorite turkey recipe.

Ooh, which we just found out about.

This is Raised in the Woods.

This is Raised in the Woods and this is the time to talk about food how to take from the outdoors and put it on your dinner table and It's turkey season around the country right now and look if you listen to the show and you're part of it But you're not a turkey hunter Fantastic go buy a turkey from the store because these recipes definitely cross whether you get it in the wild or you purchase it at a store all of our recipes can be

done and made with anything from the store or anything from the woods.

So don't be afraid to try this.

I'm going to start mine out super simple with a recipe that my kids absolutely loved and that is a crowd pleaser and crowd favorite and it couldn't be more simple.

You're going to take your turkey breast pound it out and cut it into one inch cubes.

Then you put a

fondue pot in the middle.

Now you got to be a little careful because you're going to boil some cooking oil in it and you're going to give all the kids fondue sticks and the fun of this recipe is coming up with all the sauces to dip it in.

I

love the right wing sauce,

buffalo sauce, ranch, cheese.

You can have three, four different kinds of cheeses and then put some chunks of bread on the side and the kids will have fun, adults will have fun.

You're just, you're frying those cubes of meat and you don't have to worry because they get cooked really fast.

They get a little glaze on the outside and they're perfectly juicy inside and dip them in those sauces and just have a really fun way to cook turkey.

And wild turkey is absolutely delicious this way too.

Oh my goodness.

We're starting out, that's my turkey recipes.

Wow.

Quick and easy.

Shall I do my next?

Chef Lawton,

let's hear your turkey recipe.

Okay.

I'm going to breast out my wild turkey.

Then I'm going to rinse the meat.

I'm going to put it in a glass baking dish.

I'm going to cover it with either butter, olive oil, or tallow.

I need to add some fat to it.

I want to cover the outside.

I'm going to do salt, pepper, maybe some fresh herbs, whatever I have in my fridge or my cupboard for herbs that I like.

And then I'm going to put some whole cloves of garlic in that pan.

I'm going to roast it 350 until it temps at like 155.

I'm going to pull it out, let it rest.

Then I'm gonna take that roasted garlic clove and I'm gonna mix it with some mayo.

And I'm gonna put some cranberry chutney or like a lingonberry jam or some sort of jam in that mayo, okay?

Put that aside.

I'm gonna slice my turkey, put it on some sourdough bread, brie, arugula, drizzle of olive oil, some of that mayo, butter the outsides, put it in the oven, crisp that sandwich up, and that is my favorite way to eat it.

Good gracious.

That sounds delicious.

Yeah, it's it.

It's actually really easy.

Well, why are

you laughing?

We're not laughing.

I'm not memorizing kind of right now.

You just pulled that.

Like, that's phenomenal.

Memorized or mesmerized.

Oh, here we go again.

I

was

trying to memorize what

she was