The History of John Madden and the Turducken — and How You Can Buy the Triple-Meat Dish Now

It's hard to think about John Madden without thinking about the turducken.

The iconic culinary wonder — made up of a deboned chicken, stuffed inside a deboned duck, stuffed inside a deboned turkey — was a staple of the late broadcaster and NFL legend, who died on Tuesday at the age of 85.

He was first introduced to the triple-meat masterpiece 25 years ago, when Louisiana chef Glenn Mistich presented him with one at the Rams-Saints game on Dec. 1, 1996.

Mistich, 59, opened his eatery Gourmet Butcher Block in 1994, where he sold turkdukens among 25 other food items on his menu. One of his customers was longtime New Orleans radio personality Bob Delgiorno, a friend of Madden's who thought the sportscaster needed to try the dish when he was in town.

"Bob got in touch and we went to Superdome," Mistich recalled to USA Today. "Madden grabbed a piece of it with his hands and fell in love with it."

Madden sure did. "It smelled so good, so I just started grabbing it, pulling it apart and eating it," he said in Fox's All Madden documentary, which aired on Christmas Day. "I didn't have any plates or silverware or anything."

"You should have seen John's face," DelGiorno told ESPN this November, recounting how Madden gleamed over the "delicious" smell and peppered Mistich with questions about the turducken. "He was in love."

Madden had a history with meat, of course. Beginning in 1989, he started presenting the best player for each year's Thanksgiving game with a Turkey Leg Award. Texas barbecue owner Joe Pat Fieseler even famously made Madden a six-legged turkey, so the broadcaster could share turkey legs with more and more players.

But the turducken was next level for Madden and next thing Mistich knew, Madden was boasting about his turducken on air, exposing 10 million people across the country to the concept of the Frankenstein-like creation. He even showed it to the cameras, breaking it down like he would a football game.

"Here's my turducken," he said, according to ESPN. "It's turkey — you got the turkey on the outside. Then you stuff the turkey with the duck, then you stuff the duck with the chicken. 'Tur' for turkey. 'Duck' for duck. And '-en' for chicken. Then you just mix it all up. I've been eating it all day."

"You can't beat that," Madden added. "That's good eating."

Louisiana natives knew about the turducken before Madden, the dish appearing on menus across the state for years leading up to that — but its origins are disputed.

Cajun chef Paul Prudhomme, who died in 2015, claimed he invented it in the 1960s while working on a restaurant buffet line in Wyoming carving meats, the Times-Picayune reported in 1994. He later dubbed his dish "the turducken," patenting its name and recipe in 1986.

But Junior and Sammy Hebert claim otherwise. The Louisiana brothers and co-founders of Hebert's Specialty Meats have said they first made it in 1985, when a local farmer and customer came into the store and asked them to merge the three fowls together.

That's where Mistich mastered the art of making it. As ESPN reported, he got a job there in the 1990s thanks to his now-wife Leah, sister of Junior and Sammy. He learned how to make a turducken there, which at the time was just a cult favorite dish. Breaking off on his own is where he perfected his process and recipe, meticulously deboning each bird (over a two day process) and sewing each of them together with a layer of sausage stuffing and cornbread dressing to separate.

When Madden got his (literal) hands on Mistich's turducken, he couldn't stop singing its praises. His love for the turkducken didn't just push it into the national consciousness, it also changed Mistich's business forever.

Prior to that, Mistich was selling about 250 turduckens a year. "We were doing 6,000 turduckens the following year, just because of John Madden," Mistich said in the All Madden doc. "When John Madden speaks, people listen."

Madden's love for the turkducken never dimmed. The broadcaster continued to mention it in all of his Thanksgiving day broadcasts year after year until his retirement in 2009, often demonstrating the proper way to eat it.

"A lot of people don't know this but you have to slice it down the middle, and then you slice it across," the Hall of Famer said while calling into a 2002 Thanksgiving Day game. "It's really five different things, it's a chicken, a duck, a turkey, and two kinds of dressing!"

He made Mistich's turducken the official "All Madden team" food just two weeks after first tasting it, shouting it out at the Super Bowl and everything.

Throughout most of his mentions, Madden would call out Mistich and his Gourmet Butcher Block business by name.

Mistich sells the "All-Madden Turducken" online via Goldbelly. Priced at $149, the 17-lb. creation comes frozen and feeds 30 or so people.

"I'm very grateful," Mistich said to USA Today. "I can't say enough about what he's done for our business. He's definitely put it on a national level. Turducken is even in the dictionary now."

The chef sent Madden one every year, for Thanksgiving and Christmas.

"I think about John a lot, and I always get emotional. I quit school in the 10th grade, and here I am today," Mistich reflected to ESPN, thinking back on his success. "John changed my life. The least I can do is send him a turducken every year."

The only thing he was never able to do is really tell Madden how thankful he was for his support. Every time he did, Mistich told ESPN, Madden always waved him off, simply telling him, "You make an unbelievable product."

"You can't beat a good turducken," Madden himself said in the All Madden documentary, in what is his final public word on the now immortal dish.

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Madden died "unexpectedly" on Tuesday morning, according to a statement from the National Football League. He is survived by his wife, Virginia, and their two adult sons, Michael and Joseph.

He's since been mourned by sports legends across the industry, and by Mistich — who wrote a touching message on Facebook on Wednesday to the man who made him famous.

"Our hearts are saddened by the passing of our dear friend, John Madden," Mistich said. "Along with his passion and knowledge of football, John had a passion for food. The few times I was blessed to spend with Coach we didn't talk football, it was all about food."

He continued: "Our prayers go out to Mrs. Virginia, Mike, Joe, and their families. John Madden will be forever missed!"