I have been asked by a few of my co-workers to smoke them a turkey for the upcoming holidays. I normally do these on
my WSM, but at the most I can only get 2 on the 18.5 WSM. I know my Grid Iron will hold more than that and I wanted
to see how it would do as far as smoke flavor goes.
I picked up a 14.75 (package weight) turkey the other day and defrosted it in my refrigerator most of the week. I am using
the Simon and Garfunkel rub from Amazing Ribs. Here it is coated with the rub and getting ready for my injection. I did not
brine since it said enhanced on the label. Injected it with some melted butter and now waiting for the Grid Iron to heat up.
It is ready for the smoker. I covered the breast area with cheese cloth soaked in butter while it was going through the smoke mode.
I picked this up from a post on Pelletheads. It is supposed to keep the breast from cooking too fast, so we will see.
Put onto the Grid Iron at 180 and at P5. I originally started in Smoke mode for the first half hour but the temp was too low and kept
flashing because it was below 150 (dropped to 140 and was holding there). I am definitely going to like that for jerky, etc. I believe
I am getting more smoke at P5 and 180 then I was with the same setting on Smoke.
After 3 hours I removed the cheese cloth then put the turkey in a pan with a little water and upped the temp to 225 at P4. Once it hits
140 internal will up the temp again to 350 to finish.
6 hours total and the turkey is done. The real dark areas are from the Simon and Garfunkel rub under the skin. I believe I used a tad
too much!
I will adjust the next time.
After resting about 30 minutes, the turkey was sliced. I know I need to work on my turkey carving skills, but the samples I tested
while carving said “let’s eat”!
Plated with some scalloped potatoes and steamed broccoli.
Turkey was very tender and juicy. Next one I do I will use less of that rub as it tends to be overpowering. It was almost a disaster
as I was going by my Maverick ET732 food probes (one in each breast). They were reading about 20 degrees less than what my
Thermopen showed. So the breast were cooked to 170 and the legs and thighs were about 178. I need to recalibrate my Maverick
probes again before my next cook.
Thanks for looking!
