(NEXSTAR) – I didn’t expect to get emotional while speaking to a Butterball Turkey Talk-Line operator, yet here we are. And from the sound of it, I’m far from the first person to have this experience.
Nicole Johnson has been answering the phones at Butterball since 2001. In her time fielding calls from stressed out home cooks, a lot has changed. Butterball now has a website with a live chat feature. They also have a text line and handy video tutorials.
But some things haven’t changed at all. The most common questions the hotline gets are still about how and when to defrost a turkey. Johnson has heard all sorts of creative ways people try and do it. (Throw the bird in the Jacuzzi? Check. Electric blanket? Check. Bathed alongside twin toddlers? She’s heard that, too.)
“A lot of times they call and they know it’s not ‘safe and acceptable,’ but they’re just, I guess, wanting to share their new creative method,” Johnson, who is now director of the Butterball Talk-Line, says.
Johnson has helped college students who can’t make it home for the holiday but want to know how to make a turkey breast for one. She’s calmed many a first-time host, panicking they’ve messed up dinner beyond repair. She’s had people who call in every year reach out to let her know that a loved one has died and there will be one fewer place setting at the table this year.
“Some of our folks have been with us over 40 years,” Johnson says. “So a lot of times they’ll call and speak to that same person and that’s been part of their Thanksgiving tradition for years and years.”
Teachers will also call in from elementary school classrooms in the week leading up to the holiday. When Johnson answers the phone, she hears a chorus of children’s voices on speakerphone shouting “hello” in unison.
“I think those are adorable calls,” she recalls. “Those are definitely my favorite.”
It’s right about here that I realize I have goosebumps while listening to Johnson’s stories of the motley calls she has received over the years. I have never, not once, called the Butterball hotline for help. People in my generation are hardly willing to call a restaurant to ask if they’re accepting reservations. In the past – as embarrassed as I am to admit it – I’ve been more likely to turn to Reddit for advice than call a doctor.
And sure, you can Google how long to roast a 12-pound turkey. I haven’t tried it, but I’m sure ChatGPT also has some mediocre suggestions.
But now I don’t want to type it in to my computer. Why would I ask Siri or Alexa how to cook when I could have this woman with the warmest Midwestern accent answer my question instead?
While Butterball has tried to evolve to keep up with the high-tech times, Johnson says, “the phones are really the heart of the Talk-Line. There’s something about that human connection. It’s still my favorite way to interact with and talk to our holiday cooks.”
As the conversation goes on, I find myself confessing to her about the one time I started a small oven fire on Thanksgiving. (“I make mistakes all the time. We all do, we’re human,” she tells me.) She asks how I prepare my turkey. I tell her I do turkey quarters bathed in an exorbitant amount olive oil and duck fat (which once sloshed over the side of the roasting dish, hence the fire). She tells me about the frenetic energy of working at hotline headquarters starting at 6 a.m. on Thanksgiving Day. She talks about her kids and where they spend the holiday.
If it wasn’t obvious before, it’s obvious to me now. What you get from talking to Johnson isn’t just an answer to your cooking question.
“A lot of times, they call and they’re stressed or maybe they’re lonely. I think just hearing that voice, whether it’s to give them the correct cooking instructions or just to kind of lend a little bit of like an ear, just on Thanksgiving … it definitely is wonderful.”