A Meditation on Solitary Feasting: Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Embrace the Turkey Leg Confit

Being a modest inquiry into the traditions of harvest gratitude, the scattering of tribes, and the particular dignity of dining alone on Thanksgiving with a 40 dollar piece of poultry prepared by professionals

By Michael Kelman Portney

I. A Brief History of the Kelman Thanksgiving Generosity

My grandfather, Zollie Kelman, had a tradition that would have pleased both Charles Dickens and the Tammany Hall political machine in equal measure: he gave away turkeys every Thanksgiving.

Not metaphorically. Not as some quaint memory embellished over time. Actual turkeys. Distributed to families in Great Falls, Montana, who presumably needed them.

I cannot verify the exact number, nor can I confirm with certainty their provenance. Perhaps they were procured from local farms. Perhaps from grocery establishments. They were definitely not his turkeys; that I am sure of. My grandfather's brief foray into agricultural enterprise appears to have been confined exclusively to the bovine variety, and turkeys, whatever their other qualities, are decidedly not cows.

But the records, if they exist, have not survived into my possession. What remains are the stories; turkeys handed out like campaign literature, except the turkeys were real, required refrigeration, and could not be folded into coat pockets.

It was the kind of gesture that builds legend in small communities. People remember who fed them. They remember who showed up at Thanksgiving with something useful, rather than with vague promises and a handshake that felt like gripping wet newspaper.

I grew up hearing these stories. I absorbed them. And I told myself, one day, when circumstances allowed, I would continue this tradition.

That day has not yet arrived, as adequate funding needed to procure said turkeys

II. The Current Disposition of the Kelman Portney Diaspora

This Thanksgiving, the family will scatter according to the following arrangements:

The Kelmans will remain in Montana, where they have always been. Montana holds them the way gravity holds objects to the Earth, silently, invisibly, and without offering alternative suggestions.

The Arizona Portneys from Texas will gather in Arizona. I assume there will be turkey if Abby doesn't defraud it on its way to the oven. I have not been invited to verify the assumption.

The California Portneys will remain in California, presumably continuing whatever activities Californians undertake on Thanksgiving, which I imagine involves organic vegetables and a discussion of whether stuffing is problematic.

I will be in Oregon. Alone. At a table set for one. Eating a 40 dollar turkey leg that has been confited in duck fat and accompanied by foie gras.

III. On the Laurelhurst Market Steak: A Lesson in the Economics of Proper Sourcing

Approximately eighteen months ago, my mother visited Oregon.

Relations were still cordial at that time, or at least cordial enough to justify the purchase of groceries. She went to Laurelhurst Market, an establishment in Portland known for its butchery and for taking the preparation of meat very seriously, as if each cut were a small theological question requiring resolution.

She bought me a steak. I put it in the freezer. I forgot about it.

Months later, after circumstances had deteriorated in ways that need not be catalogued here, I rediscovered the steak like a frozen holy grail made of meat. I cooked it using methods I believed to be competent. I ate it at my kitchen table, alone, on an evening that offered no particular significance beyond the fact that I was hungry.

It was the best steak I had ever consumed.

Not because of my cooking, which was adequate at best. Not because of ambiance, which was nonexistent. But because Laurelhurst Market understands something fundamental about meat: that if you source it properly, age it correctly, and butcher it with respect, the result requires very little assistance from the person holding the fork.

I returned to Laurelhurst Market some weeks later, intent on purchasing another steak of similar quality.

The price was 40 dollars.

I paid it.

Because supporting local farms and proper animal husbandry is not a luxury; it is a responsibility. And if that responsibility occasionally manifests as a single expensive steak consumed alone on a Tuesday evening, so be it.

I remembered that they offered other items, items designed for holidays, for people who wanted something better than the standard grocery store turkey but who were not hosting gatherings large enough to justify a full bird.

I remembered the turkey leg confit.

This Thursday, I will return and pay 40 dollars I don't have again.

Not because I must. But because some things are worth what they cost.

IV. An Interlude Upon My Illustrious Collegiate Career: Or, A Thoroughly Excessive Examination of My Tenure as President of Alpha Gamma Rho, During Which I Acquired an Unseemly Amount of Knowledge Regarding Agricultural Economics and the Proper Treatment of Livestock

It seems appropriate, at this juncture in our discourse, to acknowledge that my willingness to remit forty American dollars for a single portion of properly sourced poultry did not materialize ex nihilo from the metaphysical void, nor did it spring forth fully formed like Athena leaping from the cranium of Zeus clutching a spear and a pamphlet about sustainable agriculture.

No.

This peculiar fiscal philosophy was cultivated—dare I say husbanded—during my undergraduate tenure at Stephen F. Austin State University, where I pursued a baccalaureate degree in the mercantile sciences whilst simultaneously serving as the duly elected President of the Beta Chi chapter of Alpha Gamma Rho, a venerable fraternal organization founded in 1904 for the express purpose of ensuring that young men studying agriculture might band together in brotherhood rather than suffer the indignities of being mocked by their more urbane classmates who had never personally witnessed the birth of livestock and considered the word heifer to be vaguely scandalous.

Alpha Gamma Rho, hereafter referred to as AGR for brevity and because repeatedly writing out the full Hellenic appellation makes one feel as if one is drafting correspondence to a particularly formal Grecian philosophy symposium, was established at The Ohio State University by four agriculturally minded scholars who possessed the rather revolutionary notion that farm boys attending university should perhaps organize themselves into a mutual aid society rather than face the vicissitudes of campus life alone and unsupported, like medieval peasants wandering into a metropolitan cathedral and wondering why everyone is speaking Latin.

The organization's founding principles, as I recall from various ceremonies conducted with a solemnity usually reserved for the installation of Supreme Court justices or the blessing of naval vessels, involved something about brotherhood, leadership, and service to the agricultural community, concepts which, when translated from fraternal ritual into practical application, meant: We shall assist one another in comprehending soil composition, animal husbandry, agrarian economics, and the operational characteristics of John Deere equipment, whilst occasionally engaging in philanthropic endeavors that may or may not involve the exhibition of livestock at county fairs.

My elevation to the presidency of this august body was achieved through the traditional democratic processes, which is to say: a combination of parliamentary procedure, impassioned speeches about the future of agriculture, and a general consensus among my brothers that I possessed sufficient organizational competence to ensure that our chapter would not accidentally violate university regulations or, worse, disappoint the alumni.

The role of President carried with it considerable responsibilities, including but not limited to:

Presiding over weekly chapter meetings with a gavel and a Roberts Rules of Order that had been annotated by generations of previous officers until it resembled a Talmudic text.

Maintaining cordial relations with the university administration, who viewed Greek organizations with the same cautious optimism one might reserve for a pet rattlesnake that has thus far proven docile.

Coordinating philanthropic activities that demonstrated our commitment to agricultural education and community service Ensuring that our members understood that Alpha Gamma Rho was not, despite popular misconception, merely a social club for individuals who enjoyed operating heavy machinery, but was rather a professional agricultural fraternity dedicated to the advancement of agrarian enterprise and the cultivation of future leaders in the field

Explaining to bemused sorority members why our fraternity house smelled faintly of livestock feed and why several of our members kept discussing commodity futures prices with the intensity usually reserved for athletic competitions

During my tenure in this leadership capacity, I was exposed to individuals who could discourse with extraordinary erudition upon subjects as diverse and arcane as:

The optimal nitrogen to phosphorus to potassium ratios required for maximizing legume yields in various soil pH conditions

The comparative advantages of Angus cattle versus Hereford cattle in terms of feed conversion efficiency, marbling characteristics, and dispositional temperament, a debate conducted with the theological fervor typically observed at ecumenical councils where matters of eternal salvation hang in the balance

The historical evolution of American agricultural policy from the Morrill Land Grant Acts through the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1933 and into the contemporary labyrinth of farm subsidy programs that somehow manage to be simultaneously Byzantine in complexity and essential to the functioning of rural economies

Why one should never, under any circumstances, place one's trust in a man who cannot back a trailer in a straight line, as this deficiency indicates a fundamental lack of spatial reasoning that likely extends to other areas of judgment

These were not theoretical dilettantes engaged in abstract speculation from the comfortable remove of ivory tower academia. These were practical men, and several eminently practical women, the organization having evolved beyond its initial all male composition to embrace the revolutionary concept that women might also possess valuable knowledge about agriculture, who understood that farming is not merely the growing of vegetables for consumption by urban populations who have never experienced the particular olfactory intensity of a hog operation on a humid August morning.

They knew, with an empirical certainty born of direct experience, where their food originated because many of them had personally raised it from infancy, provided it veterinary care when necessary, slaughtered it with appropriate techniques that minimized suffering, butchered it according to established methodologies, and consumed it, thereby completing the entire cycle from birth to dinner plate with a directness and honesty that would induce profound psychological distress in the modern metropolitan consumer who prefers their meat to arrive prepackaged in styrofoam containers that offer no hint of the animal's previous existence as a sentient creature with opinions about weather patterns.

I learned, during those formative years of higher education and fraternal leadership, that supporting local farms is not a trendy affectation adopted by coastal elites who wish to signal their environmental consciousness whilst driving vehicles that consume petroleum with aristocratic abandon. It is, rather, a fundamental acknowledgment that the people who grow our food deserve compensation commensurate with their labor, that animals raised properly produce superior meat, and that understanding agricultural economics is essential to comprehending how civilization manages to feed itself without devolving into Malthusian catastrophe.

This education, acquired through a combination of rigorous coursework in the Nelson Rusche College of Business and extracurricular participation in Alpha Gamma Rho's various symposia on agrarian enterprise, instilled in me an appreciation for the entire supply chain, from soil microbiology to consumer purchasing decisions, that would later inform my willingness to pay 40 dollars for a steak sourced from cattle that had been permitted to live in accordance with their bovine nature rather than confined to conditions that resemble a particularly unpleasant episode of a dystopian novel.

When I purchase meat from Laurelhurst Market, I am not engaging in conspicuous consumption designed to impress dinner guests, as I have no dinner guests. I am participating in an economic system that rewards farmers who refuse to treat agriculture as if it were widget manufacturing, and I am honoring the education I received from brothers who understood that food is not an abstraction but the direct result of someone's labor on someone's land, and that if we wish for that labor to continue, we must be willing to compensate it appropriately.

This, I believe, is what they intended to teach us at Alpha Gamma Rho, though it was often obscured by discussions of tractor specifications and debates about whether deer hunting constitutes a legitimate agricultural practice. It does not, but the debates were spirited.

V. What Is a Turkey Leg Confit, and Why Does It Cost 40 Dollars?

For those unfamiliar with the term, confit is a French method of preservation in which meat is salted, then slowly cooked in its own fat, or in the case of turkey, cooked in duck fat because turkeys do not produce sufficient fat to confit themselves, and this oversight must be corrected by other birds.

The result is meat that: Falls from the bone with minimal coercion Retains moisture in a manner that defies the usual Thanksgiving turkey experience Tastes like someone cared very much about whether you enjoyed it

The foie gras accompaniment exists, I assume, because someone at Laurelhurst Market decided that if you're already spending 40 dollars on a single turkey leg, you might as well commit fully to the decadence and add the liver of a force fed duck.

I respect this logic.

If one is dining alone on Thanksgiving, one should either do it with dignity or not do it at all.

VI. On Family Farms, Food Sourcing, and the Quiet Radicalism of Knowing Where Your Dinner Lived

There is a movement, currently fashionable among people who can afford to care, that insists we should know where our food comes from.

This is not new.

My grandfather understood the principle, even if I cannot verify the exact supply chain of his Thanksgiving turkeys. He obtained them from somewhere; farm, store, wholesaler, I cannot say, and distributed them to families who needed them. The turkeys were not from heritage breeds raised on pasture by families practicing regenerative agriculture. They were turkeys. They came from wherever turkeys came from in mid century Montana.

But the principle was sound: food is not magic. It is labor, land, and logistics. Someone raised it. Someone killed it. Someone transported it. And at the end of this chain of custody, someone ate it, or gave it away, or put it in a freezer and forgot about it for nine months.

My grandfather's own agricultural endeavors, I should note, were brief and confined to cattle. His expertise lay elsewhere: in business, in community, in the particular skill of knowing when generosity builds more value than it costs.

Laurelhurst Market sources its meat from farms that allow the animals to live in conditions that approximate dignity. The cows eat grass. The pigs root in dirt. The turkeys, one assumes, had a reasonable turkey existence before their transformation into confit.

This costs more.

It costs more because raising animals well requires space, time, and a willingness to accept that not every process can be optimized for maximum efficiency. Some things must be done slowly, or they are not worth doing.

I cannot give away turkeys like my grandfather did.

But I can, on one Thursday in November, purchase a single turkey leg that was raised properly, prepared with care, and sold by people who treat butchery as a craft rather than a transaction.

This is not generosity.

It is not community.

But it is respect, for the bird, for the farmer, for the tradition of eating well even when eating alone.

And it is, in its small way, a continuation of what I learned during my agricultural education: that supporting the people who grow our food is not charity but necessity, and that paying what things actually cost is the only way to ensure they continue to exist.

VII. The Ritual of the Solitary Feast

There is a particular kind of dignity in setting a table for one on Thanksgiving.

It requires acknowledging several uncomfortable truths:

That family is not always present That tradition adapts to circumstance That eating alone is not the same as eating poorly That a 40 dollar turkey leg is a choice, not a necessity, and that choice has meaning

I will set my table as if someone important were arriving. I will use a real plate, not paper. I will sit down, rather than eating over the sink like a monk who has given up on ceremony.

And I will eat my turkey leg confit slowly, with attention, the way one eats when the meal is the entire event rather than the background to conversation.

This is what remains of my grandfather's tradition.

Not the distribution of turkeys to neighbors. Not the gathering of extended family around tables large enough to accommodate chaos.

But the understanding that food, prepared well and consumed with intention, is a form of gratitude, even if the only person being thanked is the duck who contributed its fat to the cause.

VIII. What My Grandfather Would Say

If Zollie Kelman could observe this scene, his grandson, alone in Oregon, preparing to consume a single expensive turkey leg purchased from a boutique butcher shop, I imagine the conversation would proceed as follows:

Zollie: You bought one turkey leg?

Me: Yes.

Zollie: For 40 dollars?

Me: Correct.

Zollie: And you're eating it alone?

Me: That appears to be the situation.

Zollie: I used to give away whole turkeys. To families.

Me: I'm aware.

Zollie: And you're sitting here with one leg.

Me: It's a very good leg. From a local farm. Raised properly.

Zollie: (long pause) You paid 40 dollars to support local agriculture?

Me: Yes.

Zollie: (longer pause) Well. At least you're doing it right.

And that, I believe, would be the end of the conversation.

IX. Conclusion: On Feasting, Solitude, and the Tradition That Remains

Thanksgiving has always been about gratitude performed through food.

The turkey is the symbol. The gathering is the method. The gratitude is the point.

But when the gathering is not possible, or not advisable, or simply not happening, the turkey remains.

And if the turkey must be consumed alone, it should at least be a turkey that lived well, was butchered properly, and was prepared by people who understand that food is not fuel but ceremony.

My grandfather gave away turkeys because he had the means to do so and because generosity builds communities.

I purchase one expensive turkey leg and eat it alone because I do not yet have the means for the former, but I can still honor the principle: that good food, properly sourced, is worth what it costs, and that supporting the people who raise it is not luxury but responsibility.

The tradition adapts.

The ritual continues.

And on Thursday evening, when the Kelmans are in Montana and the Portneys are scattered across the western states, I will sit at my table in Oregon and eat my 40 dollar turkey leg with the quiet dignity of a man who knows exactly where his dinner came from, exactly why it costs what it costs, and exactly why that price is worth paying.

Happy Thanksgiving.