How to: Bake a Turkey (with tips for little ovens!)

I know a lot of us make do with glorified toaster ovens for all our baking. While it has its challenges, most of us manage quite well and turn out some amazing stuff once we figure out the quirks. Large turkeys can be a challenge for anyone though! We solve this by frying our turkey, but that doesn't work for all of you. So here is a guest post from my friend Tracey about how she has successfully navigated baking a flavorful, moist turkey in a mini China oven! Hope these step by step instructions help whether your oven is mini or not! 

How to: Cook a Whole Turkey (even in a China oven!)

This is my aunt and uncle's recipe. It is what they do every Thanksgiving. It is simple and even worked in my China oven! They key is to watch the temperature inside the oven and not get a turkey too big. Mine was 11 pounds.

Thaw the turkey in the fridge for 1 day for every 4lbs. If it is still frozen the day you are ready to cook, you can speed things up by thawing in cold water. 

Prep the turkey and pan:

You don't want the turkey to sit directly on the bottom of the pan and cook in it's own juices.  Make a little "ledge" of carrots, onions, celery or whatever you have.  I used 2 foil pans for extra strength and higher sides so the juices didn't spill out. (I don't have a roasting pan.)

Make sure you take out any giblets/stuff that might be stuffed in the turkey!!!

Rinse the turkey and pat dry.

Tie the legs together with bakers twine or even dental floss. (Much more polite that way.)  If you have the ends of celery left over stick them in the cavity of the turkey for flavoring.  You can stick in extra carrots and onions too!

Make a seasoned butter.  We use thyme, sage & basil. About 1/4 cup of butter, 1/2 teaspoon each salt & pepper.  Maybe 1/4 teaspoon each of sage, rosemary, basil or whatever you have.

Spread the seasoned butter between the skin & the turkey (gross)!

Rub a little extra butter or  oil on top of the skin.  Season with salt, pepper & a tiny bit of poultry seasoning.

Try to tuck the wings under the bird so they don't brown too much. If you can't get them to tuck under just cover the wings sooner. 

Bake the turkey:

I put an oven thermometer in my oven to monitor the heat. I went off the internal heat, not what I had the temperature dial set at. 

Bake at 400 on lowest rack in oven, uncovered for the first 15 minutes. (I set my oven as high as it would go. It dropped 50 degrees as soon as the turkey went in.) 

Reduce heat and cook at 350 for roughly 13-15 minutes per pound.  Once the turkey has browned to your preference, cover with foil. My 11 pound turkey was done in 2.5 hours.

The key is to not overcook it!!  My uncle suggests you take it out when an internal thermometer reads 150.  The turkey will continue to cook after you take it out. My uncle is a better cook than I but I would wait until it hits 160 to be on the safe side. (FYI, if you don't have an internal thermometer you should get one!)  Poultry is done at 180.  Cover the turkey with foil and let it rest for 45 minutes.

When taking out the turkey it was really heavy and full of juice and my pans suddenly felt very flimsy! My husband held a cookie sheet and I pulled the turkey and pan out onto it to provide more support.

One turkey I took out at 160F and covered with foil for an hour - it turned out great.

One turkey I took out and it was already 180F - I didn't wrap in foil and it also was still moist!