Dr. Elaine Love’s first Thanksgiving cooking on her own was not unlike many other turkey cooking novices’.

“My first turkey I left the bag inside and I had the nerve to serve it to my mother,” Love said. “And she was not happy.”

Love cried and vowed never to do that again – and she hasn’t. In fact some would call her a queen of turkey-cooking logistics. She is assistant principal at Nelsen Middle School and has cooked 17 or more turkeys in one day for the past 15 years.

Love launches into the culinary endeavor every Thanksgiving and Christmas, using the home economics ovens at Nelsen, that’s use has been donated. Her efforts are to support Tabernacle Missionary Baptist Church’s homeless feeding program.

This year marks her 500th turkey.

“I do it because I feel like it’s in my heart to give back and help in the community,” Love said.

Originally from Brooklyn, N.Y., she grew up in a poor family, taking her grandmother to her appointments, the food bank and helping her out in the kitchen. She was a great student, she said, but sometimes had to miss school to take care of her family.

“So, I said, ‘Boy when I get to be old,’ I said, ‘I’m going to help people’ and I just pray that they never have to go through what I had to go through all my years growing up,” Love said.

With a heart for community service, Love started feeding the homeless 20 years ago when she was a school counselor in the Tacoma School District.

Now, every third Saturday, as Tabernacle’s nutritionist, she prepares healthy food for the homeless that come to the church. But, for the Thanksgiving and Christmas feast she needs more space, which is why she employs the help of her colleagues at Nelsen.

What does it take to make 17 turkeys in one day?

Love gets to the school at 6 a.m., the turkeys have been thawing overnight from when her husband dropped them off. She and a co-worker clean and season each turkey, being careful to remove the bags of gizzards. The turkeys are put into the oven with just minutes to spare before the school bell rings announcing the start of classes. At noon, Love checks on the birds, taking the aluminum foil off so they can brown. She comes back at 1:30 p.m. to turn off the oven and by 2:30 p.m. when classes are over, they’re done.

Next comes the messy part – draining the pans and de-boning the turkeys into pans of dark and white meat.

“And tomorrow morning these pans will feed 300 homeless people downtown,” Love said.

All the turkeys have been donated by members of Tabernacle for the feeding. To show thanks to the school for the use of the ovens, 15 turkeys have been donated in addition to the 17. These turkeys will be given to students at Nelsen who’s families are in need.

Sylvia Christensen, a Nelsen sixth-grade science teacher and former teacher Mark Ellen Kidd helped Love prepare the Thanksgiving turkeys on Nov. 19.

Christensen said it wasn’t a big deal to get up that morning and help or de-bone in the afternoon.

“I was raised with the attitude that serving our fellow man is serving our God – that was my parents teaching,” she said. “So for me this is, you know, my church, another church it doesn’t matter, we’re all doing the same thing.”

Love completed her charity work for this Thanksgiving on Saturday (Nov. 20) by feeding 200 hungry people in the church basement and making 250 “to-go” plates for the hungry.

“I am thankful to all the organizations such as the University of Phoenix and people who donate to our cause which is the haves helping the have nots,” said Love.

The University of Phoenix donated canned food items to the church from their own food drive.

Love will be back in the kitchen in December to do it all again for Tabernacle’s Christmas dinner for the homeless.