Box Turkey

We’re in the car with a friend, headed for an afternoon matinee of HellBoy.

“I’m so tired of having to go to so many grocery stores to get everything I need,” our friend says. (I’ll call him Sam — he threatened to do me bodily harm if I identified him.) “Yesterday, I had to go to Brookshire’s to get my lunch turkey, and to the Super WalMart to get my box turkey.”

“I’m sorry,” I say. “Your box turkey?”

“Yeah,” Sam says. “Box turkey. It’s America’s favorite turkey, but they don’t carry it as Brookshire’s.”

I try to imagine box turkey. I come up with an image of poultry jerky — the sort of thing that has to soak in hot water in order to reconstitute itself. “Wait. What’s the difference between lunch turkey … and box turkey?”

Sam adopts a posture and tone not unlike that of a college lecturer. “Lunch turkey is eaten at lunch. Box turkey, I eat at breakfast.”

I pause. “And why can’t you eat lunch turkey for breakfast?”

“Lunch turkey is crusted with black pepper,” Sam says. “That’s just too much flavor first thing in the morning, so I have it for lunch. Box turkey is plain — it’s just pure, unadulterated turkey. I like it in omlettes, so I use it for breakfast.”

I shake my head. “So this box turkey … is it a specific kind of product?”

“Lunch turkey comes from the deli,” Sam explains, speaking very slowly and clearly so that even I can understand. “Box turkey comes in a box.” He raises his arms and fashions his hands into cups, making himself into a human scale. He tilts to the left. “Lunch turkey.” He tilts right. “Box turkey.”

“No, no — I mean … is it, like, freeze-dried turkey?”

“Some people,” Sam says, “might say box turkey comes in a package.”

I confess I’m a little disappointed to learn that box turkey is just pre-packaged deli turkey in a cardboard shell.