Saturday, December 09, 2006

Ladies and gentlemen...

I give you the great experiment.

"She's supposed to have trans-warp drive."
"Aye, and if me grandmother had wheels she'd be a wagon."
"Come come Mr. Scott, young minds, new ideas."

Actually no, it's really this.

This will be my first attempt at cooking poultry in the oven. 44 servings of food. I am going to have a TON of leftovers.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well, insofar, as cooking tasks go, roasting a bird is really pretty easy. The only tricky part will be to ensure that it is fully cooked as the bird-inside a bird-inside a bird factor will slow down the cooking time pretty significantly. You'll also want to give yourself enough time to let the bird(s) rest for at least 10-15 minutes, tented under aluminum foil, once it comes out of the oven. And it will need a coating of melted butter or other fat on the outside before you pop it in to roast so the skin crisps up a bit.

Nick said...

Yeah, after two days of thawing it's going to cook for 4 and a half hours at 325 degrees. At what point in the cooking process do I need to coat the bird? continuously? At the beginning? Middle? A quick roast at the end?

Wacky Neighbor said...

It must be a moon, it's way too big to be a space station.

Nick said...

Are you kidding, the Empire couldn't build a Turducken that big!

(Welcome back WN!)

Anonymous said...

Coating of melted butter goes on at the beginning. Just melt a stick of butter and drizzle it over until it's mostly covered. You can do it once and leave it alone. If the bird is pre-seasoned, you'll probably want to try to get unsalted butter, so it isn't too salty. I've seen some recipes for thawed frozen birds that suggest cooking them for four hours with the pan covered in foil and then uncovering it for the final hour.

Just give yourself some extra time with it and make sure you have a meat thermometer. If it gets done early, it can sit for up to an hour under a foil tent and still be warm enough for serving, but I have found that poultry will often take longer than the directions would imply.

Nick said...

Yeah, this thing is going to take two days to thaw AND about four hours to cook per the directions. I'm figuring for 5. Which means I'll be putting the bird in at noon on Saturday. Can I let it defrost in the fridge for an extra 6 hours and be ok?

Anonymous said...

yes, as long as the bird stays nice and cool in the fridge, it should be fine in its thawed state--at least for a full day and most likely longer than that.

Wacky Neighbor said...

I admit, I'm a tad disappointed. I mean, I've heard of a turducken before. I was hoping for something like an ostremuturduckenail.

Nick said...

Well, I'm sorry. I'll have to try harder next time.