Fried Turkey How To

Let me start this off with an advisory. Apparently some people are finding their way to this one-sided discussion on poultry indulgence using the following terminology : "fried turducken." To these individuals, I have said it once, and I will say it again...you CANNOT fry a turducken. Nor can you fry a stuffed turkey, or a partially frozen turkey. Experiments such as these are part of the reason firemen dont get the day off on Thanksgiving.

As has been previously stated, you need 4 things for a successful turkey frying. A turkey fryer (no, your fry daddy is NOT big enough, i dont care how many chicken wings you can fit in there), a fresh turkey 10-17 pounds, propane in a tank, and enough peanut oil to make the state of Georgia proud. Peanut oil is recommended because of its high flash point.

Assemble the turkey fryer according to instructions, attach to the propane tank and check for leaks. You can check for leaks using dish soap. If the soap bubbles, dont light that cigarette. If you have a leak, follow instructions on tighening connections or contact the manufacturer. Unless you are a trained professional, do not attempt to rig something up to cover the leak. Your local fire department will thank you.

While assembling the fryer, figure out how much oil you will need to fry the turkey. Take the stock pot that will sit on the burner and place the turkey in it (not on the burner!). Place the turkey butt down, neck up since this is how it will sit on the frying rack. Fill the pot with water until it is 1 or 2 inches above the top of the turkey. Remove the turkey and mark the level of the water. This is how much oil you will want to use.

Pour out the water and dry the pot completely. Now take a roll of paper towels and begin to dry the turkey. I recommend using a fresh turkey because you do not have to worry about whether or not it is completely thawed. The turkey must be completely dry and thawed before it hits hot oil. Think about what happens when you flick a drop of water into a pan heating oil on the stove. Now imagine what happens when a 15 pound block of ice hits 35 pounds of 350 degree oil.

After you dry the turkey completely, shoot that beast up. Most turkey fryers will come with a syringe for pumping the bird full of the flavorful marinade of your choice. You can also puchase prefilled syringes. We used a homemade marinade that consisted of dry white wine, lemon juice, cayanne pepper, chilli powder, and garlic salt. Make sure to inject whatever you use into both breasts, the legs and the wings. I would also recommend covering the skin in a dry rub. Cajun blackening spice works nicely. We didnt do that and it gives the skin substantially more flavor.

Sit the turkey on the frying rack ( a metal plate looking thing with with holes in it and a giant paper clip sticking up out of it), and let it marinade. In the meantime, take the completely water free stock pot and fill it with oil to the level you determined earlier. Place it on the burner and follow the directions your fryer came with. These will generally involve sticking the world's longest candy thermometer into the oil, place the lid ajar, and turn the gas on. Monitor the temperaute vigilantly. The oil needs to reach 350 degrees farenheight. Raise the temperature up to 340 somewhat quickly, but let the oil heat up the last 10 degrees more gradually to prevent overheating. Oil is flammable. Flaming oil that hits your propane tank equals a trip to the burn ward at your hospital and an honnerable mention in this year's Darwin Awards. The heating period may take around 45 minutes to an hour. It can take longer so settle down and stop being so impatient.

Once the oil has reached 350 degrees, its time to cook the bird. If the oil is not hot enough your cooking time will be slower and the skin will not seize properly, resulting in greast meat. If the oil is too hot you will die. Slowly, gently, and carefully lower the bird on its fry rack into the oil using the coat hanger provided in the fryer kit. Make sure this is sturdy enough to handle the weight ahead of time.

Once the bird is in, the hot oil fills the cavity and surrounds the bird, resulting in even and highly efficient cooking. This is the reason that you cannot fry a turducken or a stuffed turkey-there is nowhere for the oil to flow through resulting in a charred mess as the skin cooks to a crisp and the inside remains pink and bacteria prone. The average recommendation for cooking time is 3 minutes per pound plus 5 minutes. So for a 15 pound turkey you would cook it for 50 minutes. Again, linger round the fryer keeping a close watch on the oil to maintain temperature. At the appropriate time, slowly remove the turkey and let it sit for at least 30 minutes to seal in the juices and finish cooking. Stick a meat thermometer in to make sure it reaches 165 degrees in the thickest part of the breast. Carry over cooking will generally be sufficient to raise the internal temperature the last few degrees.

And the winner is......

...drum roll please.....

My blood has finally started flowing freely again and thus I can muster enough energy to type. After a less than protracted debate with dinner guests, I have decided to break up the battle into two categories:

1) "Moistness":
now there really must be a better word than moist to describe meat. Moist is an appropriate describing word for two things: cake and panties. But it shall have to do since it was the word most oft used by those eating the birds. Anyhow, the winner in this category is the fried turkey. The hot oil (heated to 350 degrees and watched like a weeping Mary in a South American convent) causes the skin to seize and lock in the juices without taking in much oil. The result is perfectly cooked, tender and subtly flavored turkey. Delicious.

2) Flavor:
The hands down winner in this category was turducken. The explosion of the cajun flavors provided from the stuffing bathed gently in duck fat is a combination that is damn near impossible to beat. Note that use of the word "flavor" is not necessarily indicitive of liking the creation, just that it had a lot more of it.

The reason for these two categories was that this is how everyone responded when asked which bird they preferred. Everyone except for Denise refused to truly commit to delcaring one or the other a superior thanksgiving treat. In her infinitely honest wisdom she declared, "I'm glad I can say that I tried turducken. Its a good conversation piece. But I dont ever need to eat that again"