Britons lamenting their Christmas turkey – or, indeed, the Christmas turkey of another – for being too dry and bland is a regular occurrence each year.

So the sheer scale with which the birds are consumed every Christmas is somewhat surprising.

We buy around ten million turkeys each festive period, buttering and basting them until their skin is crisp and golden, their bones ready for soup.

Despite figures that suggest great swathes of diners (48 per cent, to be precise) would opt instead for some other meat, be it beef or duck or pork, turkey is the unquestionable centrepiece. The majority of UK households sit down to the fowl on December 25 (76 per cent).

Even families who splash out on goose may too have a turkey crown on the table. And ham, studded with cloves and dripping in sweetness, is a mere accompaniment.

The democratisation of the turkey is a fairly recent occurrence: it wasn’t until the 1950s that they became widely available and not considered a luxury. But the birds go back a way further.

Turkeys were first brought to Britain in the 1520s (from Mexico, via Levantine traders, hence the name ‘turkey’), and first listed as goods for sale in 1521.

“The earliest written record of turkeys is attributed to Archbishop Thomas Cramner in 1541,” food historian Sam Bilton tells i. “He wanted to curb gluttony in the higher clergy by only allowing one bird to be served per dish (due to their size these ‘greater fowls’ were able to provide more meat therefore negating the need to have more than one)”.

Before then, for the rich, a boar’s head might have featured. Or a pheasant. Maybe even a swan or peacock. For a king? All of them, probably.

The popular belief is that King Henry VIII was the first to sit down and tuck into turkey on Christmas Day. By 1573, farmer Thomas Tusser noted that the birds had started being dished up as Yuletide fare across the land, though goose and capon (a castrated rooster) were still the primary choice.

Food historian Angela Clutton tells me: “Turkeys may have been part of the festive feasting for Tudor royals and the wealthy at that time, most likely in one of the meat-tastic pies. But turkey would not have commonly been the centrepiece roast in the way we think of it now.”

Skip to the early 1600s and the meat is no longer consigned to Christmas, nor is it quite so exclusive. In 1615, turkey has a role in Gervase Markham’s book The English Housewife, and The London Poulters’ Guild records show that by the end of the century company clerks were given them as a Christmas present.

Victorian times

Two centuries on, turkeys were still quite exclusive. During Queen Victoria’s reign, the birds were more expensive than alternatives.

In the North of England, most people with money to spare would buy a hefty hunk of beef; in the South, goose was favoured. Poorer families would make do with rabbit…

But it is during the Victorian era that turkeys began to be popularised. In Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, published in 1843, Scrooge sends Bob Cratchit a massive turkey to replace his goose.

“Turkey really became more popular at Christmas through the Victorian era,” Clutton tells i. “Turkey was still expensive for most people, but were (are) able to serve more people than a goose can, so became popular for larger families or for Christmas entertaining.”

Clutton adds that transportation made a difference, too. Mrs Beeton wrote about turkeys being ‘driven’ to London from Norfolk for the Christmas trade: “Quite a way, so they’d have had little leather ‘boots’ on their feet,” Clutton says.

Soon after, with the arrival of the railways, turkey really took off. A combination of literary might, increased production and refrigeration made lower budget eating possible. Crucially, turkeys became accessible, and therefore much cheaper.

Still, in the 1930s, our beloved turkey would’ve cost most of us a week’s wages. Today? Most people only need to work about two hours, and turkey appears a now unshakable tradition. Come on, even if you’re a poultry saboteur, you’ve probably at some point grabbed a Pret turkey feast on the train down to your in-laws.

A quick fix to ensure your turkey isn’t dry: brine it the day before, take the breast out (still on the verge of blushing pink) before the legs (it’s a leg-heavy bird), baste properly with butter, and cover with tin foil.