Cooking a Turkey

[arthur73]

Hi

Can anyone help?

Cooked a 10 pound turkey yesterday at 220F for 11 hours

Used a wet mop every hour

Breast (white) meat was fine but the Thigh and Drumsticks(dark) meat still had blood showing?

Any thoughts anyone?

Arthur Beverly

Scotland UK

[bryan]

Re: Cooking a Turkey

Can anyone help?

Cooked a 10 pound turkey yesterday at 220F for 11 hours

Arthur, 220 is great cooking temp. I would suggest that you cook using temperature instead of time. 165 breast and 175 leg are general temp's. Search "turkey" this forum and find more detail info and pic's.

[jdbower]

I generally do my poultry at a bit of a higher temperature, closer to 350. However, Cook_Shack is right, cooking to temperature is much more important than time. I also generally cook them indirect, but with a large bird if you find things cooking unevenly you may want to have your heat deflector offset a bit, this allows you to move it such that the thighs get more direct heat and can catch up with the breast. Alternatively you can remove the deflector for the last bit of the cook just before the breast is done.

[Conodo12]

Re: Cooking a Turkey

Hi

Can anyone help?

Cooked a 10 pound turkey yesterday at 220F for 11 hours

Used a wet mop every hour

Breast (white) meat was fine but the Thigh and Drumsticks(dark) meat still had blood showing?

Any thoughts anyone?

Arthur Beverly

Scotland UK

Arthur, cooking a turkey at 220F is a touch on the low side IMHO. I would take your temperature up about 10 degrees to 230F. Next, at 230F, you can typically count on a turkey being smoked, (cooked) at a rate of approximately 30 mins. per pound. In your case, that bird should have been cooked in about 5 hours! Here are a few tips:

1) Heat soak your KK. Bring the temp to 230F and do not start cooking until 230F is read on your TruTemp for at least 30 mins to 1 hour. Also, you should be smoking the turkey on an indirect heat.

2) Your turkey should be removed from the refrigerator about an hour before putting it on the KK just to help bring it up in temp. Don't worry about bacteria - just set it in a covered roast pan or dutch oven. Heck, I have taken mine out of the fridge, set it on a platter, then just let it sit in the Microwave or oven (neither turned on of course).

3) Place the turkey on the grates of the heat-soaked KK with indirect heat breast up. Close the lid.

4) Wait. Go get a pint with some friends. You do not need to be basting the bird every hour. Heck, I DO NOT baste at all.

5) Check your temp at the breast and thighs after the turkey, 10 pound in this case, has been in the closed KK for at least 3.5 hours. Now you can gauge approximately when it will be done. My sense is you will be eating a succulent and juicy turkey at about the 5 hour mark. Maybe a touch before, maybe a bit after depending on the turkey and the temp of the turkey when you placed it in the KK.

My only other variable would be to place the turkey in a pan then place the pan and turkey in the KK if you want to catch the drippings for gravy.

Try this method and let me know how it works for you. I can speak from experience that you will not be disappointed.

One more note - If you want turkey but are pressed just a bit for time, prepare your turkey by spatchcocking the bird.

[LarryR]

I too favor higher cooking temps for whole birds.

I ice the breast for about 40 min. while she sits on the counter. Keeps the breast temp down and allows the dark meat temp to come-up a bit promoting even cooking and the two types of meat arrive at "done" temperatures at the same time. I get perfectly done white and dark meat every time using this method.

[Syzygies]

I ice the breast for about 40 min. while she sits on the counter.

That's clever! Will adopt.

[LarryR]

That's clever! Will adopt.

I can't take credit for it I got it here MAD MAX TURKEY

[mguerra]

gobbler

Get a proper thermometer, a ThermaPen if you can afford it, and cook to a specific finish temp as Cook said. This is critical for safety, and flavor also. You should cook several turkeys trying both sub 300 and over 300 cooking temps. I like 300 to 350 for a turkey, but you can go in the mid to high 200's for more of a smoked effect, as has been said. If you keep opening your KK to baste, you are losing moisture and heat. Don't do it. I only check the temperature of the bird in the thigh joint and don't bother checking the breast. When the thigh is 180 plus, it's done! I have not tried icing the breast before, but will do it this year. Check out last years Thanksgiving and turkey posts for some good brining tips.

[arthur73]

Hi Guys

Thanks to all who replied and for your advice

I can feel an idea for a Christmas Present coming on ( a Thermapen you say!)

Thanks all

Regards

Arthur

[Jim Malter]

I brine the bird, butterfly and cook over direct heat, top grill at 350. I flip once onto the skin side.

jim

[primeats]

I will be re-visiting this topic in November, but the times and temps CAN be used on the KK. I have done it, and remember don't baste!

[Beeps]

I have such fond memories of cooking turkeys on my KK.

Here's the link to my first efforts, they turned out well! (need to do it again)

http://www.komodokamado.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3324

[Paswesley]

I agree with those members who have encouraged temperature, rather than time. I use a Redi-chek which serves me quite well. I have a very large home and have experienced none of the problems with dropped signal that others have complained about, even when I exceeded the recommended 100 foot distance between the transmitter and the receiver. On the other hand, I live in a low density sub-division, so there is probably no problem with radio frequency saturation in my area. Your results may not be as satisfactory as mine, depending on where you will be using the device.

To return to the topic, I have had great success with turkeys in my K. I have cooked three since I got Mable in July. The most recent one, a twenty pounder, took about 6 hours. I used a fresh bird and left on the counter under cover. The first probe reading I got was 70 degrees, which lessened the cooking time a bit. I heat soaked Mable to 325 and cooked the bird until the probe read 150 in the thigh, at which point I raised the temp to 355 and cooked until the probe read 175. I used a rack and had the bird on the main cooking grill. The reflected heat off the dome and the convection from the indirect method produced a beautiful bird, indeed. I only opened her once, to remove the foil from the wings at the time that I raised Mable to 355. I used some Alder wood for smoke, laying several chunks atop the fire basket when the bird was put on. Yummy!