How to Cook the Perfect Turkey

Wash your hands and get to it!
Rinse the fresh or completely thawed turkey thouroughly- run some water through both ends. Make sure you've removed the neck- up front - and the giblets and heart, in a little white bag, out the back. Do with them as you please: the neck's ok for soup stock- put a some water on the stove in a large pan, throw the neck in and let it boil...add more water throughout the day, salt and pepper, season creatively, toss in all the cool veggies you can think of. The giblets you can sautee for dressing, toss into broth on the stove, feed them to the neighborhood cat, throw them away.

Get your roasting pan ready- I reccomend the good foil ones you can get for a buck or two at any local market. Put a quarter cup of water in the bottom of the pan and a bit of vegetable oil. Put the turkey in the pan- good old traditional breast up, or go if you cooked a number of turkeys, or are just feeling a bit risque, put the thing in breast down- the thought is with the breast down, they never need basting and remain moist. Pour more vegetable oil over turkey and rub it all over the bird, inside and out, getting your hands completely messy.

This is a great time to turn your oven on to 375 degrees for preheat. Drip oil across the kitchen floor while also leaving an amazing smudge on oven... eveyone will know YOU cooked the turkey. Let the oven heat up.

Now comes the real fun. How do you want your turkey to taste? I'm famous for my jalapeno turkey- it's quick, easy and mouth watering! But you can use anything, or nothing in your turkey. Cook the dressing in a pan- everything goes faster that way.

Traditional Turkey: salt and pepper the oiled bird, make an aluminum tent that folds long ways with the pan, creases longways down the length of the turkey and stands an inch or so above the bird- crimp it with your fingers on to the side of the pan and you're ready to put the bird in the oven.

WARNING: those aluminum pans that are so handy have a tendency to rip on the bottom sliding in and out of an oven rack, making a HUGE mess as the bird cooks- just belive me. Either place it carefully onto the rack or BETTER put it on a cookie sheet and slide the whole thing into the oven. Check it occasionally after a couple of hours. You can go to Butterball's site where they have a cool little calculator that tells you exactly how long to cook your bird... or just read the wrapping the bird came in. It's done when the legs wiggle freely. If you tied the legs up behind it's breast- it probably says something about you as a person.

Me, I fill and cover the bird with peppers- sliced wide open jalapenos and every other kind of pepper I can find at the store. Stick an orange or two in there - block the openings with fresh apples - put green onions or anything else you like around the bird. Claim that thing!

The last hour- spoon juice over the top- or buy one of those fancy basters and squirt the thing... enjoy yourself. I've cooked dozens and dozens of turkeys... now days I stick it in the oven before I go to bed and pull it out when I wake up. Piece of cake- perfection. You can pull the foil off the bird for the last 30 minutes to give it a cool brown look.

Have Fun!

This year marks the 20th Anniversary of Central Community's, Free, Community Wide Thanksgiving Dinner- if you'll be alone or without on Thanksgiving... don't be... please join us for a day of great food, fun and one more wonderful reason to give thanks. You're invited. And I'm cooking at least one of the turkeys!