Fried Turkey

[bleachboy]

Not getting anything on that link.

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Me either.

I am frying turkey(s) this year, though. Probably two 10-12 pounders. I'm not gonna let that vat of oil go to waste, though. I'm also planning onion rings, corn fritters, and fried fish (last).

[MsMelkor]

Is this what you're referring to?

My dad fries a turkey every year. He's Captain Safety so I'm confident all necessary precautions (and then some) will be taken.

[Mayhaw Man]

If you have a little time to kill, you might find the story of my first turkey fry entertaining. And lest you judge me character completely from this tale of stupidity and wrongheadedness, I have now gotten pretty good at it-although I prefer a smoked one over fried.

The wrong way to fry a turkey-Part 1

The Wrong Way to Fry a Turkey-Part 2

Edited to say that there are some helpful (seriously) safety tips at the end, which I came to the hard way. They might save you some trouble.

[fifi]

Is this what you're referring to?

My dad fries a turkey every year. He's Captain Safety so I'm confident all necessary precautions (and then some) will be taken.

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YES!!! Many thanks. I couldn't get any sort of link to work.

[jocelyng]

I don't know if I said this before, but we don't put rub on our turkeys. Mucks up the oil. We brine and then inject.

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What type of injection liquid do you use? Also no one seems to be talking about a gravy. I know my dad will want one. Any suggestions given that I won't have pan drippings?

Many thanks.

Jocelyn (this is my first post. hope I did it right.)

[fifi]

Welcome to eGullet, jocelyng!

As to injection stuff, when we bother to do it, it is usually a butter mixture with spices. You can usually find premade injection concoctions at the store. You don't want a water based anything. I am not sure what would happen but the thought of dunking a turkey with pockets of water into hot oil just doesn't sound like a good idea.

If someone insists on gravy, I buy some turkey wings or other parts, brown them in the oven and make gravy from that.

[jocelyng]

Thanks much. I'll probably skip injecting the first time around. I was supposed to make a test one for lunch today, but I got freaked out by the warnings about the fuel. My husband is going to help me on Thursday!

Jocelyn

[Roejimmy]

i would suggest you folks try to do a turkey "galantine" which is basically

a totally "deboned but still in one piece" bird biggest advantage is that you

loose most of the "volume" and it therefor is easier to handle while frying

and gain a nice flavor transfusion from the stuffing to the meat, last not

least you cant fuckup the carving since it cuts like a big sausage...

02:02 PM]

Have to disagree with the deep fried galantine idea...

The beauty of deep frying the turkey is that as the oil circulates in and around the bird, it cooks quite quickly. A large hunk of galantine will actually take longer to cook than the bird itself -

Last year we (in addition to our turkey) deep fried a bone in pork roast, figuring the cracklins etc... would be awesome, which they were, but it took closser to 8-10 minutes per pound since the heat had to penetrate from the outside only, with a whole turkey, it heats from the outside in and the cavity out.

[Roejimmy]

This may be a silly question but what if you are planning to fry a turkey for Thanksgiving and it starts raining?

We have found that covering the fryer does NOT inhibit cooking at all. Of course, with 12 gallons of hot oil, neither do a few pesky raindrops...

HOWEVER

If you deep fry outdoors - highly recommended

and you deep fry on a flat hard surface - also highly recommended

and that surface is a driveway - pay attention here...

those little bits of oil that fly up and land on and around the area of the fryer will interact with the rain, becoming very slick, and if dad pulls into the driveway at his customary speed expecting to stop in front of the garage door...

you get the idea.

Nobody was hurt but boy, did I laugh my ass off...

[Roejimmy]

One thing I might add, however, is that my success with the turkey has inspired me to attempt same technique vis a vis chicken, duck, whole catfish or even steak.

Deep fried duck is fantastic -

we marinate the duck overnight in soy, and then add orange juice for a full day on top of that. Dry the duck, fry the duck, and we serve it as an hors d'oeuvres...

[shacke]

Bumping up this great thread here as I am hoping to fry a turkey this year for the first time.

I am shopping for fryers and it appears to me that the electric models now available seem "safer" (relatively speaking) than the propane models. The popular masterbuilt model actually says its for indoor use only. Huh?

Has anyone had experience with electric models or perhaps have any words of wisdom in purchasing a fryer in general? There's aluminum v steel, propane v electric - is nothing ever simple?

Evan

[Soup]

Have deep fried a turkey only once. Friend had a fryer and I brought the peanut oil. He did the clean up.

What do you do with all that oil? Yes you can deep fry everything in your fridge but your still left with all that oil???

[winesonoma]

Have deep fried a turkey only once.  Friend had a fryer and I brought the peanut oil.  He did the clean up.

What do you do with all that oil?  Yes you can deep fry everything in your fridge but your still left with all that oil???

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Filter and save or use it for bio diesel.

[steakas]

Does anyone have any thoughts on this recipe http://www.eatturkey.com/recipe/recipe.cgi/2/11293? Any other good recipes out there?

THANKS!!!

[fifi]

Bumping up this great thread here as I am hoping to fry a turkey this year for the first time.

I am shopping for fryers and it appears to me that the electric models now available seem "safer" (relatively speaking) than the propane models.  The popular masterbuilt model actually says its for indoor use only.  Huh? 

Has anyone had experience with electric models or perhaps have any words of wisdom in purchasing a fryer in general?  There's aluminum v steel, propane v electric - is nothing ever simple?

Evan

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I don't have any experience with electric fryers. I would check the BTUs and see if they compare to a propane burner. And, I don't see any reason to spring for a SS pot unless you have other uses for it that would make the expense sensible. Aluminum works fine for frying turkeys and boiling shrimp and crawfish.

Does anyone have any thoughts on this recipe http://www.eatturkey.com/recipe/recipe.cgi/2/11293?  Any other good recipes out there?

THANKS!!!

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I saw two things in the recipe that I question.

The first is that the injection material contains water (vinegar and sherry) and I avoid that. It sounds like they are counting on the overnight sojourn to cause the injected liquid to be absorbed into the meat. What you need to avoid are pockets of water based material in the turkey anywhere. Can you spell steam explosion? That is why most injection marinades for frying turkey are butter or oil based.

The second one is that they didn't pay enough attention to establishing the oil level properly. Read on that up-thread. Oil spilling over from displacement by the turkey and foaming of the oil is the most dangerous part of the operation. Establishing a safe oil level is crucial and the recipe only "mentions" foaming.

[shacke]

OK. So I took the plunge and bought the countertop electric model. Their instructions have you heat the oil to 400, submerge the turkey in the oil and cook it 3 min per pound plus 5 minutes on the back end. This plan cooks it to an FDA advised 180 degrees and I know what THAT means .

I was thinking perhaps I would preheat the oil to a higher heat (385 or so) to allow the temperature to drop to about 360 when the bird is placed in the fryer. I read on the thread that will take about 35-45 minutes? Is there a per lb estimate? What is the final turkey temp with this method? Also, is a fried breast at 180 as nasty as a roasted breast at 180? Presumably it would not be as dry coming from a fryer.

Thanks for your help

Evan

[fifi]

In the first place, 400 is much too hot for the oil. You are probably beyond the smoke point of most oils. What are they thinking? We go by time, not internal temperature. I would have to read back up-thread but I am thinking that we shoot for a cooking temperature of about 350 and about 3 minutes per pound. I may be wrong so go read. That works out to about 45 minutes for a 12 pound bird as I remember. I have never used one of the electrics so I don't have any idea if they have enough power (BTUs) to recover temperature quickly. But we have started prewarming the birds in an oven and get very little temperature drop when we put the bird into 365 degree oil. Being somewhat warm and dry, we also avoid excessive foaming as well.

The breast is always juicy. Fried turkey is nothing like roasted. If it was, I wouldn't eat it.

[shacke]

In the first place, 400 is much too hot for the oil. You are probably beyond the smoke point of most oils. What are they thinking? We go by time, not internal temperature. I would have to read back up-thread but I am thinking that we shoot for a cooking temperature of about 350 and about 3 minutes per pound. I may be wrong so go read. That works out to about 45 minutes for a 12 pound bird as I remember. I have never used one of the electrics so I don't have any idea if they have enough power (BTUs) to recover temperature quickly. But we have started prewarming the birds in an oven and get very little temperature drop when we put the bird into 365 degree oil. Being somewhat warm and dry, we also avoid excessive foaming as well.

The breast is always juicy. Fried turkey is nothing like roasted. If it was, I wouldn't eat it.

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Thanks for the reply Fifi. I have to check on the BTUs but it may be some element of trial and error. I can't imagine it has same BTU rating as propane but that's just a guess. Prewarming is an interesting idea assuming that my oven is free. What time/temp do you use for that?

Evan

[fifi]

. . . . .

Thanks for the reply Fifi.  I have to check on the BTUs but it may be some element of trial and error.  I can't imagine it has same BTU rating as propane but that's just a guess.  Prewarming is an interesting idea assuming that my oven is free.  What time/temp do you use for that?

Evan

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Geez. I don't remember. It was probably somewhere around 250 or so. I am really guessing here. We were just trying to take the chill off, not get any cooking going. All of the birds had been thoroughly thawed and patted dry. A turkey would come out of the warming oven and into the pot. Another would go from the fridge to the oven and so on so they maybe spent 30 to 40 minutes in the oven. We fried 12 turkeys that day.

[shacke]

I can't imagine that brining would not help a fried turkey as it helps most everything else. It is a heritage turkey and the only concern I guess is masking some of the flavor although my brining solution is only salt water.

Any thoughts are appreciated.

Evan

Moderator's note: This topic has been merged.

[Jmahl]

Please, please don't fry it. Its a crime against nature. Use Martha Steward's turkey 101 = what I call T-shirt turkey -- you won't be sorry.

Happy turkey --

[fiftydollars]

Never mind… I thought this thread was about brining a friend.

[winesonoma]

I can't imagine that brining would not help a fried turkey as it helps most everything else.  It is a heritage turkey and the only concern I guess is masking some of the flavor although my brining solution is only salt water.

Any thoughts are appreciated.

Evan

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You like 4th of July and explosions. Water of any kind anywhere and hot oil do not ever mix. I would not brine, but I would make sure it's totally dry all over in and out.

[fifi]

We brine turkeys before frying them. Yes, as with any turkey for frying, you have to dry it well. We do that in a warm oven for about 30 - 45 minutes. (This also gets the temperature up a bit so the oil temp doesn't fall as much.) Brining doesn't really increase the water content of the bird significantly. It is an osmotic process.

I will say that we notice a difference. We usually have a couple that we have brined and others that friends bring over that haven't been.

[shacke]

We brine turkeys before frying them. Yes, as with any turkey for frying, you have to dry it well. We do that in a warm oven for about 30 - 45 minutes. (This also gets the temperature up a bit so the oil temp doesn't fall as much.) Brining doesn't really increase the water content of the bird significantly. It is an osmotic process.

I will say that we notice a difference. We usually have a couple that we have brined and others that friends bring over that haven't been.

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Thanks again Fifi. I will brine it. I will probably fridge dry and then oven dry it before the fryer.

Evan