My two teenage daughters are responsible for planning and preparing our Thanksgiving dinner and are wanting to know what spices/herbs are OK to use on our turkey.

**They are REQUIRED to prepare it so that it is safe for their furry brothers & sisters

I know most everyone here shares their Thanksgiving feast with their gliders also so how do you prepare yours?

Thanks for giving us some ideas!

Honestly, when I did our "early" Thanksgiving last weekend, I just used a little poultry spice mix on the skin, as well as salt and pepper. I'm not sure, but I believe it was probably Rosemary and Thyme mix. Of course, I was bad and basted the skin with a little butter at the end. However, the fuzz butts got breast meat, no skin...they were just fine. Not how I'd feed them all the time, but they sure loved it last Saturday night! They got some cranberries, butternut squash, broccoli, turkey...we didn't share the pumpkin pie with Molly and the crew, though! :-)

No pumpkin pie??? I'm telling them!

It's not Thanksgiving without the pumpkin pie!!!!!!!!!

Those poor mistreated babies.......

Most spices and herbs are harmless. The exceptions are garlic, onion, chive, catnip (which most of us don't eat anyway), and salt. There's some evidence that pepper will cause cancer in lab rats, so with these tiny ones we should avoid it as well. I can't find any real research to back up that claim, but I've not spent a lot of time looking. Season your turkey with rosemary, sage, thyme and oregano (or common poultry seasoning) and it'll be fine -- and delicious!