Speaker 1: I am all in again.
Speaker 2: Let's just you.
Speaker 1: Luke's Diner with Scott Patterson, an iHeartRadio podcast. Hey everybody,
Speaker 1: Scott Patterson, I Am all in Podcast, want eleven productions.
Speaker 1: iHeartRadio Media. iHeart Podcast. We're doing a special happy Thanksgiving
Speaker 1: episode for you with somebody very interesting guest we have
Speaker 1: this week. She is Nicole Johnson. She's the director of
Speaker 1: the Butterball Turkey talk Line and we're doing a special
Speaker 1: episode of Luke's Diner with her. We're celebrating Thanksgiving, obviously,
Speaker 1: and we think Nicole is the perfect perfect guest. There's more,
Speaker 1: so much more to your bio. But why there's so
Speaker 1: many questions that we want to ask you, So let's
Speaker 1: just get into it. Nicole, welcome, Hello, Thank you.
Speaker 3: Thank you you having us. Oh we're good, Scott. We're
Speaker 3: busy today. We're getting ready for our busiest week, so fantastic.
Speaker 1: Well, thanks for taking the time. So before we get into.
Speaker 4: The meat of it, little Turkey chuck between us Turkey folks,
Speaker 4: tell me about what it means to be the director
Speaker 4: of the Butterball Turkey talk Line.
Speaker 3: Well, thanks for asking. The talk line itself started in
Speaker 3: nineteen eighty one, so forty four years, the talk line's
Speaker 3: been up and going. I joined the talk line in
Speaker 3: two thousand and one and back then twenty plus years ago.
Speaker 3: To join the talk line, it was a little bit
Speaker 3: different of an interview process. We didn't have to advertise
Speaker 3: for it. It was a word of mouth referral. So one
Speaker 3: of my graduate instructors at the time, she also worked
Speaker 3: on the talk line and thought you'd be a verat fit.
Speaker 3: It's a seasonal position. You know, you're empathetic, you have
Speaker 3: a great food background. Let me give you the referral.
Speaker 3: So she did and I joined back in two thousand
Speaker 3: and one. It's an amazing job. It is seasonal for
Speaker 3: our team. We have over fifty men and women answering
Speaker 3: consumers questions. You know, there's many ways to reach us.
Speaker 3: But I'm year round leading the team in the in
Speaker 3: the director position. So I truly love my job.
Speaker 1: It's mainly people calling in to get instructions about how
Speaker 1: to prep their turkeys and what kind of turkey to buy,
Speaker 1: and you got it, got twenty coming over. How many
Speaker 1: should how big a turkey should I have? Should I
Speaker 1: have multiples? And then what do I do with this thing?
Speaker 1: This suction thing in how do I work? So you're
Speaker 1: doing all the basic stuff right and telling people how
Speaker 1: to have a better Thanksgiving experience, right, Okay.
Speaker 3: Do get a lot of questions like that?
Speaker 1: Yes, we do, because I don't know either. I mean,
Speaker 1: let me ask you this. Do people carve with a
Speaker 1: carving knife more to the because we have those electric knives? Yes,
Speaker 1: so it's more carving knives now, not so much the
Speaker 1: electric saws that you saw the turkey up with.
Speaker 3: I think it's I think it's personal preference, and I
Speaker 3: think it's family tradition. I'm nearing my fifties and my
Speaker 3: dad because I work every Thanksgiving, my folks will host
Speaker 3: my four little butterballs, my four kiddos, and they always
Speaker 3: kind of tease my dad a little bit because he
Speaker 3: comes down with this. He takes it out once a year.
Speaker 3: And yeah, you're right, it's at electric carver and that's
Speaker 3: his personal preference, right, kind of family tradition. He's always done.
Speaker 1: It that way.
Speaker 3: But a lot of folks will ask for instructions, you know,
Speaker 3: to carve their turkey with with the knife. We have
Speaker 3: a couple tips and tricks for that. So you're right,
Speaker 3: we get questions. You know, how should I go about carving?
Speaker 3: Should I stuff my turkey? Should I not stuff it?
Speaker 3: And that's where we really like tell people, how did
Speaker 3: what's your family tradition? Right? How did how did you
Speaker 3: grow up? Because we have advice for quite a bit,
Speaker 3: quite a bit of waste.
Speaker 1: I would like to make a turkey statement. Yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: on the side, and I will always advocate for stuffing
Speaker 1: the turkey. The quality and the flavor.
Speaker 3: It's phenomenal. So did you grow up like that?
Speaker 1: My mom was a turkey stuffer? Ditto likewise, I mean
Speaker 1: she didn't mester, she didn't play. Yeah, yeah, she's and
Speaker 1: it was delicious.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And it's amazing how much stuffing she could pack in there.
Speaker 1: It's like it just kept coming out, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. I let's start with the basics. How do you, Nicole?
Speaker 1: How do you choose a turkey?
Speaker 3: Well, it depends on if I am looking to fall
Speaker 3: my frozen turkey. You know that's our number one question
Speaker 3: here at the Butterball Turkey Talk Line. How do I
Speaker 3: thaw my turkey?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 3: And so you want to remember it takes twenty four
Speaker 3: hours for every four pounds of turkey meat to thaw
Speaker 3: on your fridge. So if you do the math, if
Speaker 3: you have a twenty four pound turkey, that's a good
Speaker 3: six days to thaw on the fridge. You can also
Speaker 3: use a cold water back method, So if I want
Speaker 3: to thaw the turkey, I'll use that method. But you know,
Speaker 3: I'm working some pretty long hours right now, so I
Speaker 3: may choose something that doesn't require thawing. We have some
Speaker 3: turkeys that are they're just that they're just cooked and frozen.
Speaker 3: It's about convenience, which is, you know, oftentimes what I
Speaker 3: need with my four kiddos. Maybe I want to do
Speaker 3: a turkey breath, Maybe I want to do ground turkey.
Speaker 3: Kind of just depends on what, you know, what my
Speaker 3: work schedule looks like, but they're all good options.
Speaker 1: How do people figure out what sized turkey they need?
Speaker 1: Is there a like a poundage for per person or
Speaker 1: per two people? How does what's what's the metric there?
Speaker 3: Yeah, we usually tell folks a pounds and a half
Speaker 3: to two pounds per person, So you know, your family
Speaker 3: of five or six, you're looking ten to twelve pounds turkey.
Speaker 3: If you want to have leftovers, definitely go more towards
Speaker 3: that two pound range and you can store your leftovers
Speaker 3: in the refrigerator for three days and then in the
Speaker 3: freezer for up to three months.
Speaker 1: I don't know if there's a better lunch the next day,
Speaker 1: the next to two days, because it's that weekend, right,
Speaker 1: because if Thanksgiving falls on Thursday or Friday, right now,
Speaker 1: you got all weekend to watch football? Yes, just and
Speaker 1: just grind on on turkey sandwiches with stuffing. Yes, there's
Speaker 1: there's no better lunches.
Speaker 3: Turkey nachos, what yes? What? Yes? And my kids love
Speaker 3: that because they can just add their own toppings, right.
Speaker 3: Kids want to do that, They kind of want to
Speaker 3: make it their own. Those are delicious, right. So, if
Speaker 3: you guys have shreded turkey leftover, throw it in a
Speaker 3: plastic baggie and try it. It's pretty good.
Speaker 1: Let check it out. What's the best way to tell
Speaker 1: if the turkey is done ready to go?
Speaker 3: The safest way we're all about food safety year at
Speaker 3: the top, is to use a meat thermometer to check
Speaker 3: for done.
Speaker 2: This.
Speaker 3: You don't want to overcook the turkey, but you definitely
Speaker 3: don't want to undercook it either, Right, So it's going
Speaker 3: to register one seventy in the thigh and one seventy
Speaker 3: in the breast for best eating quality. But for folks
Speaker 3: like us who like the stuff and carry on our
Speaker 3: mom's tradition, you can take that meat thermometer, insert it
Speaker 3: right in the center of the stuffing, and when it
Speaker 3: registers one sixty five, your turkey's done.
Speaker 1: Huh fantastic?
Speaker 2: All right?
Speaker 1: So what is the number one turkey mistake people will
Speaker 1: make every Thanksgiving?
Speaker 3: Well, As a working mom and having four kids and
Speaker 3: a lot of different schedules, I think people need to plan.
Speaker 3: You know, ideally, I'm a little bit of a paper
Speaker 3: and pen girl myself. But regardless if it's paper and
Speaker 3: pen or you know, you keep your list on your phone,
Speaker 3: try to plan in advance. Right, even though I have
Speaker 3: cooked a lot of turkeys, I will go ahead and
Speaker 3: list out everything that I'll need in advance. I'm also
Speaker 3: all about convenience too, so I may opt for a
Speaker 3: throwaway disposable pan saves it a little bit of a
Speaker 3: cleanup saves with a lot of the cleanup, Or if
Speaker 3: you want to use an oven cooking bag, we can
Speaker 3: give you instructions for that. It's more of a moistic method.
Speaker 3: It's it's tender, juicy, delicious and all of the mass
Speaker 3: is contained right in that in that bag. A lot
Speaker 3: of folks will want to put their own stamp, I
Speaker 3: guess on there, you know, Thanksgiving turkey. So they're very
Speaker 3: grateful when they call and we have instructions. Yet we
Speaker 3: have the traditional oven, that tried and true method, but
Speaker 3: maybe they want to try outdoor grill. You know, we're
Speaker 3: here in Chicago, so it's weather permitting on Thanksgiving. Deep
Speaker 3: frying that's been popular since for years. It's been very popular.
Speaker 3: There's some safety, there's some safety things you want to remember,
Speaker 3: but it's a delicious turkey.
Speaker 1: Deep deep frying a turkey is its actually a good method.
Speaker 3: It's delicious, really, it really is. Have you ever prepared? Okay,
Speaker 3: So just from a food safety perspective, you do want
Speaker 3: to keep in mind that, you know, you want to
Speaker 3: have the right oil of choice because of that higher
Speaker 3: smoke point that you need. Peanut oil is a great
Speaker 3: option you want, you know, you want to remind people
Speaker 3: to do it outside and their their fryer outside. Make
Speaker 3: sure that turkey is fully thawed, right. We don't want
Speaker 3: those ice crystals to to you know, spatter on that
Speaker 3: hot oil. That's that's where you could have, you know,
Speaker 3: an issue. But it's delicious.
Speaker 1: It's very good.
Speaker 3: Usual, your fourteen pound turkey or less is the most
Speaker 3: ideal size for that fryer. It's delicious.
Speaker 1: So what's the largest turkey you can get?
Speaker 3: Well, we do get a lot of phone calls usually
Speaker 3: twenty six to twenty eight pounds. That's a that's a
Speaker 3: pretty large sized turkey. It's it's yeah, it's a it's
Speaker 3: a good sized turkey. But if you're looking for a
Speaker 3: lot of yield of meat, what you can go ahead
Speaker 3: and do is purchase purchase two smaller turkeys. You can
Speaker 3: even cook them side by side in the oven as
Speaker 3: long as they fit side by side. And we can
Speaker 3: give you instructions on that too. So some people might
Speaker 3: do that, or maybe they just want some more white meat,
Speaker 3: so we can tell them to get a bone in
Speaker 3: or a boneless breast. That's a great option.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 1: Let's say somebody overcooks their turkey. Is there any way
Speaker 1: to save it?
Speaker 3: Well, we're always thankful that if we get that phone call.
Speaker 3: Really it's not a food safety issue, right, you haven't
Speaker 3: undercooked it. Because we do have some of those conversations
Speaker 3: if you overcook it. You know, you may just want
Speaker 3: to use a we may talk through some gravy recipes
Speaker 3: it up, right, Yeah, and maybe what not to do
Speaker 3: next time. Right. We just kind of walked through it
Speaker 3: a little bit.
Speaker 1: Try to help them as best we can, right, make
Speaker 1: them feel good. There's a little bit of helpe there
Speaker 1: with the grid. Yes, So what's the wildest or most
Speaker 1: humorous call that you've ever taken, like something like a
Speaker 1: screaming emergency or something or yes.
Speaker 3: And some of our callers, some of our team rather
Speaker 3: they have ten years of almost forty years almost you know,
Speaker 3: the entire existence of the talk line itself, and we
Speaker 3: get those repeat callers who call and want to speak
Speaker 3: to those specific individuals every year. And sometimes it's you know,
Speaker 3: for turkey advice, or sometimes it's the creative ways. You know,
Speaker 3: we'll hear the people will fall and we've heard electric blanket.
Speaker 3: We've heard you know, countertop thawing, which is not ideal.
Speaker 3: But those are some of the really nice calls that
Speaker 3: we get. Sometimes people call for for the turkey advice,
Speaker 3: but a lot of times some folks are lonely on
Speaker 3: Thanksgiving week too, so there's something to be said about
Speaker 3: And I just got done saying this to one of
Speaker 3: my colleagues. There's something to be said about that human
Speaker 3: connection and what we offer here at the talk line.
Speaker 3: When we talk to our cooks on the phone. You
Speaker 3: can get our information, yes, on email, chat, text, and
Speaker 3: social media, and that's all great. You know, my kids
Speaker 3: love making text. That's very cool. But the phones, you know,
Speaker 3: they're really the hard of the talk line. We all
Speaker 3: work on Thanksgiving Day, we dedicate our Thanksgiving Day. We're
Speaker 3: doing eight, nine, maybe even ten hour shifts here on Thanksgiving. Yes,
Speaker 3: we're super busy. You know that there's always a way
Speaker 3: to reach us. So we have a callback feature. You
Speaker 3: can enter your phone number and we'll call you back
Speaker 3: when it's your place in line, which is kind of nice.
Speaker 3: But then when we do call them back, they are
Speaker 3: so grateful oftentimes kind of surprise. I think that you know,
Speaker 3: we'll here, you're a real person on the other line,
Speaker 3: You're not.
Speaker 2: Just a you know.
Speaker 3: So yeah, and it feels pretty dark good to have
Speaker 3: that kind of job, right and and and hear that
Speaker 3: from from callers over the day.
Speaker 1: Have you noticed any kind of regional differences in the
Speaker 1: kind of questions people ask like person from New York
Speaker 1: or person from the Midwest or South Dakota or Montana.
Speaker 1: They also get a different kind of question somebody from
Speaker 1: Florida or whatever.
Speaker 3: I don't know if I necessarily notice like a regional difference,
Speaker 3: but you were mentioning earlier. If we get phone calls
Speaker 3: where people are kind of kind of in a panic, right,
Speaker 3: and those are the real cute ones. We'll be on
Speaker 3: speakerphone right out of the gate. And a lot of times,
Speaker 3: maybe it's you know, two siblings kind of bickering back
Speaker 3: and forth and and and they're calling us because we're
Speaker 3: going to determine, you know, one way or another, and
Speaker 3: like our word is is goal to them, which also
Speaker 3: feels very impowers. Maybe it's a husband and wife and
Speaker 3: they're kind of going back and forth a little bit.
Speaker 3: We get over Thanksgiving break, before the kiddos get out
Speaker 3: of school, we get a lot of classrooms that we'll
Speaker 3: call and you hear the teacher okay, okay, she's on
Speaker 3: and and and we're talking to like a classroom full
Speaker 3: of kids. And I love those calls. I probably because
Speaker 3: I have, you know, four kiddos of my own, but
Speaker 3: those are really cute, very cute calls with all the
Speaker 3: with the classrooms.
Speaker 1: All right, so you watched, uh the show the Thanksgiving
Speaker 1: episode deep Fried Korean Thanksgiving for thanks for Thanksgiving dinners
Speaker 1: one day? Yes, one days? How did we do? What?
Speaker 1: What's the verdict on each Turkey?
Speaker 3: Well? I thought it was pretty cute that you had
Speaker 3: to toss the roles to her after the fact because
Speaker 3: she's thinking right that she that that was very cute.
Speaker 3: But it was very cute. And I thought much like
Speaker 3: them accommodating four different you know, gatherings or Thanksgivings. I
Speaker 3: feel like that's kind of what we do here at
Speaker 3: the talk line, kind of what you guys represent in
Speaker 3: your show, right, just trying to make everybody really as
Speaker 3: happy and just kind of give them as memorable. I
Speaker 3: think of a Thanksgiving as we can.
Speaker 1: Would you you wouldn't recommend people eating four different Thanksgiving dinners?
Speaker 1: I mean, I mean, that's that's a lot.
Speaker 3: It is a holiday. You probably wouldn't do it every day.
Speaker 3: But if you can do it, why not?
Speaker 1: Wow?
Speaker 2: Why not?
Speaker 1: I like your attitude?
Speaker 2: All right?
Speaker 1: All right? If Butterball Turkey talk Line existed in the
Speaker 1: Gilmore Girls universe, which character do you think you would
Speaker 1: call you most often.
Speaker 3: Well, I have three boys and one daughter, and I
Speaker 3: watch that show and I see the bonding that that
Speaker 3: that the two of them have, and it instantly makes
Speaker 3: me think of my daughter.
Speaker 1: She's fifteen.
Speaker 3: She's an absolute sweetheart, but she's smart as a whip
Speaker 3: and she's stay on my toes right. So I think
Speaker 3: that I definitely relate to the show because of the bonding.
Speaker 1: Of the two of them.
Speaker 3: You know, it's such a wholesome show too, which I love.
Speaker 3: But it's fast paced too, and I love that, and
Speaker 3: my household is fast paced with my kiddos, And I thought,
Speaker 3: there it is so that I have. Yeah, that's a
Speaker 3: good that's my answer for that.
Speaker 1: You know, you know who I think it would be.
Speaker 1: I think it would be Kirk. I think Kirk. I
Speaker 1: think Kirk would call you and you would say something
Speaker 1: like do you have a fire extinguisher in the house?
Speaker 1: You know that kind of a thing.
Speaker 3: But I would stay calm, But I would stay calm.
Speaker 1: Calm, rightly. I think Kirk would be calling you on
Speaker 1: on the on the half hour. Nicole Johnson, it was
Speaker 1: been a delight, good luck, just Thanksgiving, and keep doing
Speaker 1: what you do. Helping out people who don't have a
Speaker 1: clue what to do with the turkey, uh, and some
Speaker 1: that do and just need a little assistance.
Speaker 3: All the best, Thank you, thank you very much.
Speaker 1: You got it. And and she's listen, everybody, give Nicole
Speaker 1: a call. Okay, she can help you out. She knows
Speaker 1: her she knows when it comes to turkey and parenting.
Speaker 1: She knows her stuff, all right, so she can. She's
Speaker 1: kind of like a turkey therapist, a little bit right
Speaker 1: turkey social worker, kind of kind of a deal. She
Speaker 1: can make your day better, all right. And best fans
Speaker 1: on the planet, Thanks for all your downloads and cards
Speaker 1: and letters. Keeping coming please, we really really do appreciate it.
Speaker 1: And remember where you lead, we will follow. Stay safe everybody.
Speaker 2: Everybody, and don't forget.
Speaker 1: Follow us on Instagram at I Am all In podcast
Speaker 1: and email us at Gilmore at iHeartRadio dot com.