tips for your turkey

[miss meg]

Anyone want to post tips on how they prepare their bird? I just did a separate post on brining.

The other thing that we do now is cooking at an extremely low temp (live 200 degrees) for an extended period of time. Dh has perfected this technique with roaster chickens over the past year, and we're eager to try it on the turkey this year. He'll let a chicken sit in the oven at that temp for 3 hours, then bump it up to 375 for 30 minutes to toast the skin nicely. It's beautiful, and the most moist poultry ever tasted.

[KariLynn]

I've cooked turkeys by slow roasting (like Meg's), fast roasting (400 degree oven), cook-in-bag roasting, BBQ roasting, and stand alone turkey roaster roasting. Only way I've never tried is deep-frying. It's too expensive to buy the equipment.

The easiest method is either the cook in bag or stand alone roaster, but what I've realized is that the key to any method is brining the bird. If you brine your turkey, it will turn out great regardless, and I've found that a fresh bird invariably tastes better than a frozen turkey.

[Warpedmom2000]

Found the entire recipe...Here is the link

1 (14 to 16 pound) frozen young turkey
For the brine:
1 cup kosher salt
1/2 cup light brown sugar
1 gallon vegetable stock
1 tablespoon black peppercorns
1/2 tablespoon allspice berries
1/2 tablespoon candied ginger
1 gallon iced water
For the aromatics:
1 red apple, sliced
1/2 onion, sliced
1 cinnamon stick
1 cup water
4 sprigs rosemary
6 leaves sage
Canola oil

Combine all brine ingredients, except ice water, in a stockpot, and bring to a boil. Stir to dissolve solids, then remove from heat, cool to room temperature, and refrigerate until thoroughly chilled.
Early on the day of cooking, (or late the night before) combine the brine and ice water in a clean 5-gallon bucket. Place thawed turkey breast side down in brine, cover, and refrigerate or set in cool area (like a basement) for 6 hours. Turn turkey over once, half way through brining.
A few minutes before roasting, heat oven to 500 degrees. Combine the apple, onion, cinnamon stick, and cup of water in a microwave safe dish and microwave on high for 5 minutes.
Remove bird from brine and rinse inside and out with cold water. Discard brine.

Place bird on roasting rack inside wide, low pan and pat dry with paper towels. Add steeped aromatics to cavity along with rosemary and sage. Tuck back wings and coat whole bird liberally with canola (or other neutral) oil.
Roast on lowest level of the oven at 500 degrees F. for 30 minutes. Remove from oven and cover breast with double layer of aluminum foil, insert probe thermometer into thickest part of the breast and return to oven, reducing temperature to 350 degrees F. Set thermometer alarm (if available) to 161 degrees. A 14 to 16 pound bird should require a total of 2 to 2 1/2 hours of roasting. Let turkey rest, loosely covered for 15 minutes before carving.