The Ultimate Smoked Turkey
Meathead
If you're looking for a little something different for your holiday turkey, still using traditional poultry flavors, this might just be your new recipe! It uses the Simon and Garfunkel rub we made just for this (and a lot of it!) -- parsley, sage, rosemary, thyme...and a bunch of other stuff. It just adds a little smoke flavor to the traditional roast bird, which I think is a welcome addition.
This recipe accomplishes a good stock base by adding all of the usual elements (and maybe a few unusual one) to a drip pan held under the bird. Just before it's done, you strain the liquid out and use that to make gravy while the skin on the bottom crisps up.
We did have a little problem with the dark meat not being quite done enough when the breast meat hit the right temperature. That is not usually a problem for me, but I generally spatchcock my whole birds these days and that helps even out the cooking. I ended up carving off the leg quarters and cooking them in the oven for a while, until they hit about 180.
We made the Simon and Garfunkel rub here: https://youtube.com/shorts/EXATu7WhJtE