Last year, I hosted Thanksgiving (see previous blog post--sorry I don't have the link. I'm not sure how to link that up). This year, I hosted Thanksgiving again. On Thursday, we went to David's side again and then hosted for my family on Friday. I should've read my previous blog post sooner than the day before because I did not remember how early to buy the supplies. I decided to buy them on Monday, the week of Thanksgiving, because I thought that might get me the best deals. Instead, I got the same deals I would've had the same week, lots of empty shelves, more stress, and less choices. Because of this, I got one of the very last turkeys. I wanted the biggest one since it was on sale and I can use the leftover meat in the future (freezer) so I found a neglected 24 pound turkey. Before checking with my previous post, I thought last year's was close to 20 pounds. Turns out, it was 15.
I started thawing my turkey in the fridge on Monday night. Turkeys take FOREVER to thaw so I knew it wouldn't thaw in time for Friday's meal around 2pm. I read that you can soak the (wrapped) turkey in cold water (such as in a sink), changing the water every 30 minutes. It takes a minimum of 30 minutes to thaw one pound. We started the soaking treatment at 3am on Friday (my wonderful husband took the first shift) and we needed the turkey in the oven by 9am, according to the package recommendations of cook time. At 9am, the turkey was still a little frozen on the inside (the downside to the soaking method is that you have to keep the turkey in the packaging but then there's no way to know if the inside is thawed or not) so I thought it would take longer than the 5-6 hours the package said for this weight.
Due to poor planning on my part, the turkey didn't end up in the oven until 9:45am. I did the same method as last year. I started it at 475 for the first 30 minutes, then turned it back down to 325 for the rest of the cook time, covering with foil when darkening too much. It was cooked except for the very bottom of the turkey as of 1:20pm. Then I let it rest until everything else was finished cooking (about 40 minutes). I was able to cut the cook time! For the very bottom that was uncooked, heating it in the microwave will get it up to temp without overcooking the rest of the turkey.
Now, I should also mention that this turkey caused a lot of stress on my part. The night before, I discovered that none of my pans were big enough to hold my turkey. I ended up using a disposable roasting pan that *just* fit the turkey but this needs to be supported on the bottom so the turkey doesn't break through. I found my biggest, no edge cookie sheet and it wasn't big enough to hold the entire pan (but enough of the pan that it worked). I had to take my second oven rack out and lower the first rack all the way to the bottom. Even with all this, I could still barely fit my turkey (and its pans) in the oven. At the end of all of this, I bent my cookie sheet (I'm not even sure it's still usable) and I bent my oven rack slightly!
Lesson learned: never buy a turkey that big again!
(Everything else went just fine and we had more than enough food. Once the turkey was done, this was a less stressed day. Plus, I had lots of help from my mom. I don't think I could ever manage hosting a traditional Thanksgiving without her help.)
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