My wife has four imperatives for turkey: gravy that’s not smoky, stuffing in the bird for drippings, the turkey is "done", including good skin, and no spatchcocking for the holiday dinner. This recipe gets it done.
Then there’s Meathead’s comprehensive guide, from which I’ve taken a bunch of ideas since 2016: https://amazingribs.com/tested-recip...-recipe-easily
Good to check whether your setup will fit ahead of time. The one I find
best involves platesetter, a low-sided roasting pan you can fit into the
egg, and the grid.
Smoke level is up to you. This also works in an oven.
This year’s (2013) went more or less like this:
21 lb free-range turkey
Prep (brining is optional):
Double-recipe of "Basic Meat Brine" or "Apple-brined turkey" from the Big
Green Egg recipe book (http://www.nakedwhiz.com/WiseOneRecipes.pdf. Really, just use your brine of choice.
Brine for about 24 hours (seems right from my experience). We use a huge
stainless pot for this, but you can use a large food grade plastic bag
that you set in some kind of container.
Remove from brine, pat dry, let sit in fridge uncovered for another 24
hours (seems to help the skin crisp up).
*** Note: as of 11/17, switched to dry brine, about 3 days. See AmazingRibs.com or seriouseats.com Thanksgiving/turkey articles: sprinkle with specified amount of salt, leave on a rack uncovered in fridge for 3 days.
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Cook day:
This year the whole process from laying the fire through making gravy took
5-1/2 hours (21lb turkey), and I was moving slowly. Smaller turkey will take less time.
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Prep including the fire was about an hour and a half at a leisurely pace:
(optional) I prepare a "dry" stuffing - no liquid in it initially.
Generally, it's ground pork or sausage, good sized cubes of bread and
herbs, mixed together in a big pot and cooked in butter until it mixes up
well. This then goes into the oven covered at 325 while the turkey is
cooking outside. More later. I didn't count stuffing making into the
5-1/2 hours. Takes me an hour or so to put it together.
Put the giblets in a stock pot and simmer slowly before starting the
fire. Parsley, sage, thyme, bay leaf, a little salt, and pepper - the
usual drill. Some people think the liver makes the gravy bitter - I use
it. A package of turkey wings is also a good starter for the stock. Brown them first.
Simultaneous with building fire:
Salt and pepper inside of turkey. Toss in a halved lemon and halved onion
with skin on, and a bundle of herbs, if you like (remove all before
stuffing).
20 minutes to a half-hour before starting to cook put a plastic bag with
ice cubes on breast. This helps equalize breast and dark meat cooking. [NOTE: optional if you don’t truss the legs].
Slather outside with oil, or better, butter. [Note, I now think that just putting oil under the skin is better for crispiness. Butter is good (and tastier) for the outside skin - you’ve dehydrated it sufficiently with 3 days in the fridge dry brining].
Make pouches between the skin and the meat, especially the breast, and rub some oil between them. This is really important for the skin (see pic above). Don't put anything moist in there!
Butter a piece or two of bread on both sides, put in the roasting pan, and
lay the bird breast down on it. This prevents ripping the skin.
If you did rip the skin, put some cheesecloth over the section where bare
meat is exposed, and slather well with melted butter. Remove the
cheesecloth a half hour or so before the end of final cooking.
Fire:
Make sure the firebox is clean. Load charcoal up to the middle of the
fire ring. Let it burn for a while to get past the white smoke phase. Put
plate setter on, legs up before getting up to initial temp of 400. Just
before putting in the bird, add a few sticks of apple or similar wood
(amount depends on how smokey you want it - 3 1" thick by 3"-4" long
sticks was subtlely smokey). Again, smoke level is up to you or in my case, the Missus!
Initial cook (1-1/2 hours):
Put the grid over the plate setter, put the roasting pan on top of it.
Check to make sure the thermometer won't break the skin when you close the
top. If your egg is like mine, it's probably hotter towards the back, so
put the legs facing towards the hinge.
Close the top and throttle the egg down to 325. Total cook for this part
is 1-1/2 hours. You can melt some butter with herbs in it (eg thyme,
sage, etc) and baste every 20 minutes or so. Once the butter is gone, the
pan drippings are good for it. TBH, I rarely baste anymore.
Cook stuffing covered in oven about an hour at 325 while this is going on.
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Stuffing and turning (~40 minutes at a leisurely pace):
Take turkey off and bring inside, but leave egg going. Remove stuffing
from oven, but leave oven going.
Let it cool enough so you can work with it.
Remove the pieces of bread from the pan. Stuff the bird. Lay it breast
up in the pan.
You'll probably have more stuffing than needed for the bird. Add some
white wine to moisten it a bit or some of the pan drippings (wine turns
out less greasy and you don't have to defat the drippings now). Put it in the oven uncovered for about an hour.
Final cook (this time it was 1:50; it can take as little as an hour for
smaller birds)
Put the bird back in as before, with legs towards the back. Shut the top
and have a beer or something. I started checking
doneness with an instant thermometor at about 1:25. Shoot for 170 at the
thigh (or the loose drumstick method) and 160 at the breast. 160 at the breast will get you there if you don’t truss the legs (thanks Meathead)!
Pull the bird and let it cool while you make the gravy. Loosely tent - the temp will go up at least 5 degrees.
About a half hour for cool down and gravy (but nothing else is ever ready,
so it's usually longer - no harm).
Typical pan gravy. Skim off the fat, add flour (first) and white wine to
drippings, maybe some shallots, the cut-up giblets and stock from
earlier. Simmer to desired consistency.
That's it. I've done variations on this for years now. Always comes up
excellent.
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