Love where you live. Sign up for our newsletter

Ultimate Thanksgiving: Turkey Recipe Round-Up

by on Oct 27, 2010

It’s still early, but we wanted to get this one out there early to give serious Thanksgiving aficionados plan-ahead time. What follows is a swift stroll through the thicket of turkey techniques you’ll find on the Web. We’ll keep this post updated with new ones we find over the next month (send suggestions to [email protected] or leave them in the comments).

Oh, and be sure to check out all of our Ultimate Thanksgiving posts. Nothing will help make your menu and decor planning easier.

Updates:
Serious Eats does a buffalo fried whole turkey, and it looks awesome:
Buffalo fried turkey 

Historically Accurate:
It’s doubtful the first Thanksgiving included any turkey at all (wild ducks and lobster are more likely), but if it did, the Pilgrims probably would have cooked it over an open fire, or boiled it:

CNN's Turkey on a Spit from 1996.

Tried and True
This section’s for ‘missionary position’ turkeys. There are too many out there to list, but I’ll throw down a few I’ve either tried, or look particularly appealing:

Alton Brown's Roast Turkey Recipe

 

Grilled
Is grilling a turkey even unusual anymore? Not to me:

Grilled turkey

Smoked
Smoking is grilling at low temps (around 200 degrees), and can be a little dicey with a large bird (salmonella, etc.). Make sure you’re careful and get your feathered friend sufficiently hot before you eat him:

Deep Fried
Speaking of being careful, deep frying a turkey is a deliciously dangerous way to go. But haven’t people been doing it this way for ages? What could go wrong? LotsOfThings.  Stay outdoors, keep the kids away, and be smart:

A couple of black guys prepare a Thanksgiving dinner.

A man is looking outside to where a grill is on fire.

Asian-inspired
If it has noodles and “mein” in the title, I’m interested. Here are some recipes you try if you decide it’s really not OK to do your Thanksgiving dinner at LeAnn Chin (it isn’t?):

Mexican-ish
Ándale! Arriba! Silliness aside, the Aztecs actually first domesticated the turkey around 2000 years ago, and the bird was a regular part of their diet:

"Tempting Stuffed Turkey for Thanks giving and other Occasion"

Buried
Give thanks Polynesian-style with a pit-roasted bird. It’s simple: big pit in the ground, hot rocks at the bottom, fill with coals, dump in a foil-wrapped fowl:

Thanksgiving turkey recipes.

Bacon-Wrapped
Straight-up, this sounds pretty gross. But then, I’m not a huge fan of wrapping meats in other meats. To each his own, I guess:

A turkey meat is on the plate.

Turducken
Listen, there’s no reason to do something like this to a turkey, a duck, or a chicken (or, for that matter, to your family). Also, you shouldn’t eat things that have ‘turd’ in their name. But if you insist on a ridiculous holiday gimmick, here you go:

Gross turducken preparation
Yes, I purposefully chose a gross-looking picture so you’d be turned off of this method.

Spatchcock’d
Sounds bizzare, really just means ‘butterflied’, and seems to be a trending way of doing turkey this year:

Turkish chicken in silver foil.

Smoked Wings w/Dr. Pepper sauce

Yes, you are correct, this isn’t a section. It’s just in here because it includes Dr. Pepper in the sauce. Do I need a better reason?

Smoked Turkey Wings with Dr. Pepper BBQ Sauce

Smoked Wings with BBQ Dr. Pepper Sauce

Sous Vide

Vacuum-sealed food is super-slow-cooked in a water bath at low temperatures (140 degrees or so). In other words, fancy-schmancy turkey:

Sous vide turkey preparation

Miscellany

Soup, silly, and sans-meat:

Wow! You made it this far! Congrats! What are your favorite, craziest, tastiest turkey recipes? Comment-it-up below!

Leave a comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *