Odd eats: Cthuken

Students enrolled in an online culinary course may find the Cthuken either appealing or appalling. The octopus-stuffed turkey baked with crab legs is truly a sight to see, but might not be the best dish to serve at the dinner table this holiday season.

A unique Christmas dinner
A picture of this unique surf and turf collaboration was tweeted by Damana Madden on Dec. 16 and has since gone viral across multiple social media networks. Gothamist reporters dug a little deeper and discovered that the creation was conceived almost two years ago by Texan Rusty Eulberg. Eulberg and his wife crafted this startling dish after wanting to make something different for Christmas dinner.

“[We] wanted to do something unique for Christmas dinner with friends of ours. Jenny is a big fan of Cthulhu so we went and bought some crab legs and some octopus and bacon and cooked them all separate and slapped them together on a plate, and that was it. The next year I made a Cthicken; the same thing using squid instead of octopus and a chicken,”
Eulberg said in an interview given to Gothamist.

Homage to H.P. Lovecraft
The dish’s name is a reference to the H.P Lovecraft monster, Cthulhu. Lovecraft describes Cthulhu as hundreds of feet tall, with a giant head full of innumerable tentacle-like feelers. Cthulhu’s body was also described as having human-like arms with thick black wings on its back.

At first glance, the seafood and poultry monstrosity does not look the least bit edible, and Eulberg admitted that his friends’ initial reactions were less than enthusiastic. However, he explained to them that each part of the dish was cooked and seasoned separately and then put together afterward. His friends overcame their fears and tried the Cthuken and were pleasantly surprised with the combination of flavors.