Turkey Tips for Convection Oven

Rules of thumb for cooking turkey in my convection oven. Yours may be different.

Thawing a Frozen Turkey

• Remove the turkey from the freezer
• Put it in the refrigerator.
• Temperature in a working refrigerator should be in the 30's F
• Allow time for thawing = 5 hours per pound
• Remove turkey from refrigerator and let set at room temperature (about 70 degrees) for at least 2 hours before cooking.
• NOTE: You can remove it from the package, remove the neck and giblets and season at any time but be sure to cover the turkey if this is done before the 2 hours is complete.

Cooking times below assume the turkey is completely thawed, dried, seasoned, etc.

Home Convection Oven

• calculate total cooking time = 9 minutes per pound
• preheat to 400 degrees F - first 20 minutes
• reduce to 350 degrees F - cook for the rest of time you calculated
• measure internal temperature with instant read thermometer
• remove when it reaches 155 degrees F measured at the center of the meat masses (breast, thigh)
• let set for 20 minutes
• during that time, sometime, the internal temperature will rise 10 degrees F reaching the USDA suggested temperature of 165 degrees F for safe cooking of poultry.
• if you doubt it has reached this safe temperature, measure it while setting OR don't remove it until it reaches 165 degrees F.

WARNING: This is a "recipe" and does not suggest you should avoid generally suggest safety rules for dealing with poultry. Don't let it get warm for too long. Don't undercook it and eat it. I suggest you Google "poultry cooking safety tips" for more indepth info on the subject.