Talking turkey…

I know there's the "food porn" thread, but have we done a turkey prep thread for those who celebrate?

Here's mine, ready to rumble:

Covered in an olive oil-soaked cheesecloth, in the oven at high heat to start.

The vintage electric carving knife inherited from my Mom will make an appearance later.

Happy let's be fat berkeleys day yall.  When is the appropriate time to start whining to the wife that I want food?

Thanksgiving makes me think we should all be a little more like boa constrictors. Very soon, we'll all be starving! A few hours after that, we'll be seated in front of four to six days of food. Seems we should be able to average things out better!

Kids can't be here until tomorrow so out Thanksgiving is Saturday, dropping a 15 pounder into brine now.

Bon Appetit' all. 

Here's ours, butchered and dry brined. Backbone, neck and winglets are roasting in the oven now for gravy base.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.

Margie

It's a funny looking turkey

Is it Thanksgiving without a pie?

The kid made a mac and cheese that requires a two-person lift and a cardiologist appointment...

I have a friend who raised some turkeys this year on his farm and he hooked me up with a couple.  This guy was 28¼ pounds making him the largest bird I've ever roasted.  He dispatched and processed back in late August, so the bird was frozen when he dropped it off last week.  After thawing in the fridge for a few days, it spent most of Tuesday in a cold water bath to finish the thawing process.  Wednesday afternoon I added the brine to his bag and this morning he got rinsed off and headed to the oven.  500 degrees for a half hour and then 350 for nearly 3 additional hours.  All the weight charts said that a bird of this size would take 5 hours to cook, but when I temped it at that almost-3½-hour mark, it was already to 167.  Other than being slightly overcooked, it was easily the most delicious turkey I've ever eaten.  And I'll be eating on it for quite a while!

Not huge fans of bird, so just smoked a small split breast this morning to serve with the ham

Funny looking turkey update:

Since our Thanksgivings are always small, all of our family is fairly far away. 

We either do just a Turkey breast with normal sides (although we've found a green bean casserole that uses fresh beans and no gloopy canned soup that is 10x better).

Or we just order a premade meal from a fancy restaurant that all we have to do is heat and throw away some aluminum pans.

Marjorie Suddard said:

..... neck and winglets are roasting in the oven now for gravy base.

Margie

That's brilliant, never thought of that!  Gives more control over the end result too.