If you absolutely must get rid of bones and cartalige of the turkey, boil it down into bone broth and strain the remaining bits off to break down in the trash, or (if the bones are soft enough.) mash it down into a bone "brick" to crumble and throw outside safely where it won't hurt any animals that finds it.
@Annothername Exactly, I tend to freeze what leftovers I can in good sealed containers to last me year round. Bone broth usually lasts about three to four months in this household, especially the turkey bone broth.
@PaganMother all the roasted goodness! I have really focused on not wasting any food if I can avoid it. However I can use scraps I will, even freezing cherry tomatoes for sauces (icy marbles) etc. But it took a lot of years to figure out what works in our house.
@Annothername Yea, my favorite thing to do with left overs, especially from the fruit and vegetable dishes, is turning them into pies. You wouldn't believe how delicious a green bean casserole can be until you've had it as a pot pie. And you can always add scrap meat from the ham, or turkey, or even just chicken to give it some more nutrients.
@PaganMother oooh. I REALLY need to get better at pie dough and whatnot. And pastie dough! I had an amazing veggie (carrot broccoli onion) cream cheese and chicken pasty that I cannot forget but DO NOT have the touch baking.
@Annothername There's a couple channels I wanna recommend. Tasting History with Max Miller, and the Townsends. Babish Culinary Universe is also a really good one to tune into for baking and cooking recipes from around the world. Townsends are more reconstructionist focused on earlier american and other nationality dishes from the early 18th to 17th century and Tasting History is amazing for deep historical dives into the culinary evolution of various different dishes around the world.
@PaganMother thank you I'll definitely check them out and appreciate the recommendations!!
@PaganMother
How small is safe? I wouldn’t want to risk it. Internal splinters in a small critter can be deadly. Just trash them unless you’re going to put the bones through a blender.
@CJLavoie When it comes to boiling down the bones, I'm talking smooshable between your hands level of softness. The smaller bits can be dangerous yes, but straining them off should help reduce the threat to the wild if you compost or throw out the remains of the bone broth. I don't own a trash compactor unfortunately, but I do reuse everything I can until all that's left is the smallest bones that can't be reduced to harmless moosh.
@PaganMother Sounds like you’ve thought it through. I wonder if a dash of vinegar would help soften them more? Anyway, hope you had a wonderful holiday!
@CJLavoie Yep! It should yeah, if you hope to reserve the bone broth for future use, it might help keep the broth for longer as well though I would be careful about how much vinegar you add to it. Maybe a half cup to several cups of water and bones should help soften them up for easier disposal.
@CJLavoie And thank you, you too! My family lives pretty rural so we have to be mindful of the wild animals in our part of the country side.
@PaganMother Oh what a shame not to make soup or stock with it. I freeze the strained stock in quart portions. Every later soup / stew is amazing. Why buy a box of broth when you have the raw materials (if you have time of course; and I also add saved onion ends and carrot ends and peels and every tasty thing to simmer with them)