It was the fall of 2019, and I was in my parents’ new living room, discussing Thanksgiving plans after a massive cross-country move that left half of my family back in Texas.

We didn’t even know who would be where on the big weekend; it was looking like it would be just me and my parents. So we started debating how to cut down on our usually massive menu — and whether it was even worth making our traditional pot of post-Thanksgiving gumbo for so few people.

But we missed home and the Texas-style barbecue we’d left behind. Smoked turkey, we mused, would make a much better gumbo. And honestly, is it even Thanksgiving without gumbo?

We no longer had a smoker, but we already knew where to turn. For years, a family friend had been ordering their bird from Greenberg Smoked Turkey, in Tyler, Texas. We preordered the turkey that same day.

Six years later, I’m still ordering a Greenberg Smoked Turkey as my Thanksgiving centerpiece, and I’m still making it into gumbo.

And, really, I’m using other celebrations as an excuse to order it, too. Greenberg ships its turkeys year-round (it smokes a whopping 2,500 turkeys daily), and they’re available in a range of sizes. So there’s no need to relegate succulent, smoky, herby meat to just one day out of the year.

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Abigail Bailey/NYT Wirecutter

We scheduled our Greenberg turkey to arrive the week before Thanksgiving, just in case something went horribly wrong and we had to buy our usual grocery-store bird at the last minute. It arrived on our doorstep precisely when we wanted it to, still a little frozen in its box.

We put it in the fridge immediately — but we made the mistake of taking it out of the plastic bag first.

Have you ever stuck your head straight in a smoker? Or stood directly over smoldering coals? That’s kind of what unwrapping a Greenberg turkey is like: a full-frontal assault of smoke washing over you like breaking surf. It was strong. It made everything else in the fridge taste like smoke. It was our first indication that we were in for a damn good turkey.

We dutifully waited until Thanksgiving morning to take the turkey out of the fridge and let it come up to room temperature. Greenberg’s instructions specify to *not *heat up the turkey, lest it dry out the carefully smoked meat. This threw us a little. Turkey that wasn’t warm out of the oven didn’t feel like Thanksgiving, in a way.

Turns out, we didn’t need to worry. It was perfectly delicious at room temperature. It was tender and juicy — dare I say succulent — with a powerful kick of bacon-y hickory smoke, the verdancy of a fresh herb rub (which you can see speckled between the skin and the meat), and the warmth of black pepper.

We devoured that first turkey, and we haven’t looked back since.

There are other bonuses of opting for a mail-order bird, like the staggering amount of time, energy, and oven space that ordering a turkey frees up. Serving it at room temperature meant the normal space-hog of a bird wasn’t dominating the oven, and that made cooking sides easy (even without my uncle’s extra oven down the street). And after a few years, we’ve learned some tricks, like carving a plate of meat and sticking it in the oven after all of the sides are done cooking. As the oven cools, the turkey gently warms without drying out.


A Greenberg Smoked Turkey that had been mailed to my grandmother’s house, Thanksgiving 2023. Over the years, we’ve shipped birds to multiple locations, depending on who’s hosting. Abigail Bailey/NYT Wirecutter

This family history has left me obsessed with smoked turkey — so much so that I practically begged my kitchen-team colleagues to help me taste a slew of turkeys from across the country. (Stay tuned for a full guide to smoked turkeys next year!)

In our first of many rounds, we tried three different smoked turkeys, with their brands concealed. Half of the panelists, including me, were enamored with the Greenberg turkey’s flavor. And all of the panelists enjoyed its texture, finding the meat firm yet tender, and never mushy.

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That said, half of the panelists also found the smoke too intense, with some saying it was sooty and acrid, totally blowing out their palettes. This is a valid critique. If you’re not used to the intensity of Texas-style smoked barbecue, it can be overwhelming. Plus, even after we wrapped the turkey in plastic, it totally smoked out our test fridge (and, really, the whole kitchen).

Newcomers to smoked meats might be more geared toward the subtle smoke of the Willie Bird Smoked Whole Turkey. While the tasting panelists who loved this bird acknowledged that it could use a smidge more smoke flavor, on the whole they found it to be well balanced, with nice salinity and hints of garlic and black peppercorn.

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Willie Bird uses maple — a lighter, more delicate wood than hickory — to smoke its birds, and the smoke lends a subtle sweetness. The breast meat was a bit drier than that of the Greenberg turkey, but it was still more tender than your average bird.

For someone who’s looking for a more traditional Thanksgiving turkey — one that will still go well with your most classic side dishes, and one that looks a little more plump and Norman Rockwellian — the Willie Bird is a great choice.


The Willie Bird Smoked Whole Turkey, brand-concealed for our taste test. Abigail Bailey/NYT Wirecutter

The irony of buying a mail-order turkey to save time and effort on Thanksgiving only to turn around and spend hours working across three days to make gumbo is not lost on us. But it’s so good that we’ve been left with little choice. It’s just as much of a tradition as the holiday itself.

My family shows love through food, I think. It’s my mom helping me chop vegetables the day before. It’s my dad babysitting the roux until it’s a deep chocolate brown, so I can take a break from cooking. It’s my sister keeping me company, yapping while I stir for hours.

And it’s my brother, staying up late with me to make the stock out of the carcass on Thanksgiving night, and carefully, maybe haphazardly, straining off the stock into way too many bowls because we didn’t (and still don’t) have one that’s big enough.

On Friday morning, we pull everything together: the roux, the trinity (onions, celery, and bell peppers), the turkey stock, and finally the andouille sausage and leftover smoked turkey meat. Over the years we’ve had a revolving door of guests join us for Thanksgiving. They always stay a day longer for the gumbo, and they always say it’s the best gumbo they’ve ever had. I like to think the smoked turkey is what makes the difference.

*This article was edited by Marilyn Ong and Maxine Builder. *