Monday, December 1, 2014

HOW TO OVEN ROAST A TURKEY IN ONE HOUR


Several of you commented, and a few even emailed us directly, and asked:  
"How did you cook a turkey in 1 hour?"  "Was that a typo?"

Nope, we really do cook our turkey in one hour...

We've posted this before but for those new to the blog, we're definitely happy to share it again.  It all starts with this thing here.  It's a "Beer Can Turkey Rack" (they are bigger than the regular beer can chicken holders).  We don't use beer (though I said we should try that sometime), we just use it as the method to hold the bird upright in the oven.  










We take a large sheet pan and cover it with heavy duty foil.  We take the giblets and neck out of the turkey and place it on the beer can rack.  Next, we rub olive oil all over and under and season it with some seasoning we call our farmhouse blend (really just whatever you like, salt, pepper, garlic powder, etc).  Heat the oven to 450 degrees.








Oh, I almost forgot, we do make sure the flap of skin is down over the neck opening so that it holds the moisture in.  This lets the heat go up under and into the turkey but not really escape out of the top.  As you can see, one hour later and it's nice and golden!  Friends have commented that it almost looks like a fried turkey.  

Here is a shot of the bird while it is cooking in the oven.  We take out all the racks except one and put that one on the lowest setting so that the baking sheet is on an oven rack, just at the lowest spot.  We've found that for our oven, a 14 lb bird is just about the biggest we can get.  

One hour roasted turkey
This wouldn't work (and we've tried) if you just put it in a pan, breast side up (or down) and did the same high temperature.  All you would end up with is overdone on the top and underdone on the bottom.  Plus you'd get a turkey that's two toned.

What happens with this method is that the super hot heat is able to reach all around the turkey at the same time so that it sears the skin and seals in the juices.  When we slice it, it's just as moist as can be.  In only one hour!  We start checking it about 40 minutes in.  We like the skin crispy and golden so we get that at about 1 hour, but you might like the results a bit sooner than that.  Just check the temp with a thermometer.  When we put it on a tray to carve it, it just looks beautiful, like a classic roasted turkey.

Hope that helps!



11 comments:

  1. Beer Can Turkey Rack....I gotta get me one of those. Thanks for posting about this.

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  2. and i roast mine on a rack at 325 degrees for hours. all kinds of ways to roast the bird!

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  3. That is one beautiful turkey! What a great idea - I've got to get one of these.

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  4. huh...that is certainly something new. I will have to try that. It looks wonderful!

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  5. So delicious looking! I will have to try this on the next turkey I bake. What a time saver!

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  6. Does it spatter the oven? I cheated and bought a fully cooked turkey this year -- but then it took 2 hours to reheat it.

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  7. Did you use the can of beer too? Looks yummy. M

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  8. BTW, I just got this post. Here is the date: Sent: Tue 12/02/14 5:33 AM. Don't understand why I get your posts a day later. M

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  9. I receive them a day later also.

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  10. My favorite way is to roast a half of a turkey. So there is no inside to the turkey. We eat roast turkey all the time. But I don't do the Thanksgiving turkey. That is for someone else.

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  11. hi. home economist on pbs said best ratio of meat to bone is 12 to 14 lb. bird preferably a hen turkey.

    p.s. is second man the strong silent type or is he too busy in the kitchen to blog? just nosey.
    deb h.

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