ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
A Thanksgiving prank has been giving some parents heartburn. It took off on Twitter with the hashtag #microwaveturkeychallenge. Jaxsen Sweum is a student at Whitworth University in Spokane, Wash. Following instructions, he texted his dad this message, which he read to us over the phone...
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JAXSEN SWEUM: How long do you microwave a 25-pound turkey?
AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:
His dad, Rich Sweum, took the bait and read us his reply.
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RICH SWEUM: You don't microwave a turkey. Are you drinking?
CORNISH: The two Sweums read us their text exchange from there.
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J SWEUM: Come on, Dad. That's insulting. How long do you microwave it for, though? All I have is a microwave.
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R SWEUM: You don't microwave a turkey. People will die of food poisoning because it won't cook in all the places.
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J SWEUM: OK, so should I cook it longer then?
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R SWEUM: Jaxsen, you're pushing my buttons. I have high blood pressure. Do you want to give me a stroke?
SHAPIRO: Eventually the son revealed that this was all a joke.
CORNISH: Other parental responses include, yuck, and, I really didn't prepare you for life...
SHAPIRO: (Laughter).
CORNISH: ...And how can you be so smart and so stupid? Zak Stahl, a junior at (laughter) American University in Washington, D.C., pulled the prank on his mom in Chicago.
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ZAK STAHL: Hey, Mom. So we're having Friendsgiving this Friday. So how long should we microwave the turkey for? The turkey's 23 pounds.
SHAPIRO: But Stahl's mom is not just any mom.
JANICE STAHL: Butterball Turkey. Can I help you?
SHAPIRO: Yes. She works at the famous turkey cooking advice hotline. She's used to some pretty basic questions about turkey cooking, and in this case, she had the last laugh.
J STAHL: I think people are somewhat surprised that you can actually microwave a turkey, but you can. It has to be 12 pounds or less. And it tastes actually really good. It's not the prettiest turkey at the end of the day, but taste-wise, you wouldn't know the difference.
CORNISH: Stahl says the prank question actually pales in comparison to some of the real questions she gets.
J STAHL: We had a woman a couple of years ago whose little boy - she left the turkey on the counter. She was about to stuff it. Her little boy was playing with, like, little, you know, Matchbox cars. And he parked the cars in the cavity of the turkey. And she didn't see this happen. And she just threw the stuffing in the turkey, put it in the oven.
She calls us about three hours later when the turkey was done. As she spooning out the stuffing, there's Matchbox cars coming out. And she wants to know, can we eat this? (Laughter).
SHAPIRO: (Laughter) Stahl's advice was throw out the stuffing, but the rest of the turkey should be fine. And our advice, if you are going to stuff your turkey with Matchbox cars, don't microwave it. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.