A Basic (and Basically Delicious) Thanksgiving Turkey Recipe

Although I worked in the kitchen at a catering company, I was a young and inexperienced cook the first time I ever roasted a turkey.  It was not even Thanksgiving, but I felt I really needed to learn how to cook a whole bird.  I was a vegetarian at that time, so I never had the occasion to cook meat or poultry at home.  I was a whiz with sauteed chicken breasts, since it appeared so often on our work menus, but every other type of meat or poultry was foreign and intimidating to me.  So I bought a small bird, turned the oven on, and went for it.  I fed my roasted turkey to a friend and when he approved, I told myself I now knew how to make a Thanksgiving turkey.

That is, until the rest of the world tried to knock me off-balance.  Simply turning on the oven and sticking a turkey in there was no longer good enough.  You had to have an oven bag.  Or you had to truss the bird.  Or you had to buy a giant deep fryer.  Or you had to soak it in brine for 3 days.  Or you had to drape the turkey in a shroud of cheesecloth.  Or you had to monkey with the temperature on the oven every fifteen minutes.

I bought into the mindset that someone else's methods MUST be superior to my own, so I tried a lot of them.  I've trussed, I've stuffed, and I've spatchcocked (partially de-boned the turkey before cooking).  I've used high heat and I've used low heat.  I've used fresh, organic birds and I've used mass-marketed frozen brands.

Most of those methods work just fine and produce a good turkey dinner, but sometimes these new ways of doing things are a real pain in the neck.  Because really, all that most people want is just a traditional turkey that is moist on the inside with a crispy skin on the outside.

So, I'll give you a recipe I've used and return to often... when I'm not experimenting with some dippy new method.  In this recipe, you are asked to baste the turkey every half hour, which does take some attention, but presumably you are going to be in or near to the kitchen anyway.  This extra step of basting is worth it in terms of moistness, flavor, and nicely-textured skin.  I'll make some notes that I think are helpful before I get into the heart of the matter.



BASIC THANKSGIVING TURKEY

Notes:
-I like a 10-14 pound turkey of the frozen variety.  Why frozen?  Why not fresh, local, and organic?  Because I know that even if an indecisive shopper before me traipsed around the store with the bird in her cart for 45 minutes before deciding she wants to serve ham this year and put it back in the meat department, it will still be safe and won't make anyone ill.  That warm 45-minute cart ride is more dangerous for a fresh bird...that kind of fresh and organic can give you dysentery.  Plus, I have had fresh birds that were downright gamey and unpleasant.  Make sure you thaw your bird for 3-4 days in the refrigerator.  A partially frozen bird will take forever to cook and will brown unevenly.
-Don't put your bread-based stuffing your into your raw bird and leave it while it cooks.  That's another food safety issue.  If you must stuff, do it in the last half hour of cooking.  Stuffing served on the side is just as delicious and a whole lot less risky.
-Use a sturdy roasting pan with 3-4" high sides.  You can use higher sides, but I like the hot air in the oven to circulate around my turkey.  You can use lower sides, but you'll have to cut down the amount of stock and you may have a slightly drier bird.  I like a pan with a rack, to make it easy to hoist it onto a carving platter, but that's totally optional.  Avoid those aluminum roasting pans.  They are so light and bendable, the weight of your turkey and fixings may just torque out of your oven mitts and onto the kitchen floor (your dog will love you, though).
-You can baste with an old-fashioned bulb baster (those gigantic eyedropper thingies), a big barbeque brush, or a giant spoon or small ladle.  Any one of those tools will get the job done nicely.
-I don't recommend starting your bird at an ultra-high temperature as many pros do...I think it makes the skin do wonky and uneven things.  Steady, medium heat gets the job done nicely.
-If your bird did not come with a pop-up thermometer, a meat thermometer is a very smart investment.  You want your poultry at 165-170 degrees.  Pink white meat is a real bummer. 

-1 turkey 10-14 pounds, fully thawed
-1/2 an apple, seeds removed
-1/2 an onion
-1 stick of butter, cut in half and well-softened
-salt and pepper
-4-6 cups of turkey stock (good chicken broth is fine, too---this is 1 to 1 1/2 boxes of stock)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  

Stick the apple and onion into the cavity of the bird.  You won't eat these, but they help keep the bird moist and flavorful. (You could also add some fresh herbs to the cavity like tarragon or sage, but this is optional)

Smear half a stick of butter all over the outside of the bird.  Season liberally with salt and pepper

Place bird in roasting pan and pour stock all around the outside. Crumble up the remaining butter and add the butter pieces to the stock.

Roast for approximately 4 hours, basting every 30 minutes or so.  If the turkey starts getting too dark (like you are worried the skin is going to burn), just loosely drape some foil over the top.  Remember ..."done" is 165-170 degrees

Happy Thanksgiving!
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