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Cooking Thanksgiving Turkey a Few Days Ahead of Time


dcbc

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I've been "permitted" to smoke a turkey on the Sunday before Thanksgiving.  My plan is to smoke it on the WSM, let it rest, vacuum seal it, refrigerate it, transport to Houston, reheat with a sous vide on Thanksgiving morning, carve, and serve for lunch.

Anyone see any problems with this plan?  I have the food saver pleated bags that should fit a whole turkey with no problem.  What temperature do I reheat it to before carving?

 

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Reheat time and temp, the integrity of the plastic seal in transport and keeping it cold but not waterlogging it on the ride down. 

250 for the reheat and as long as it takes, maybe foil and butter it up some if it has started to get tight

double bag and maybe even duct tape on the seams. 

Big ass cooler and lots of cooler packs or maybe packed with a raggedy old blanket or news paper on top of it and packs then more packs. If you are toting down some frozen other stuff using them as cooling packs would work too. Thinking out loud. 

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5 minutes ago, elfenix said:

 

foil and butter in sous vide?

If he's going to bag it that's redundant. 

Kinda defeats the purpose of smoking it doesn't it? I'll run the risk of drying out the breasts trying to get the skin crisp again, hence butter. Seen injections too. 

I'm not much of culinary player. Boiling it in a bag, even fancy named, is not a favorite. 

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5 hours ago, elfenix said:

 

foil and butter in sous vide?

I think I meant stick some butter in the bag with it and let it melt over it during the reheat.

Guessing that taking it to 150  to reheat is a good gameplan.

5 hours ago, gsoda3 said:

save yourself the trouble and just order a deep fried one from popeyes.

Line's too long since the return of the sammich.

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I have smoked several with varying results.  My best method so far has been to inject liberally with Tony Chachere butter mixture and spatchcock on BGE.  Last year, all the ham was left and not a single bite of turkey remained.  

I will do my practice turkey next week.  New grill and unfamiliar with its cooking tendencies. .  

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5 hours ago, dcbc said:

Line's too long since the return of the sammich.

you can call in the order and then pick it up on thanksgiving day.  takes a couple hours in the oven to warm up.  it's really good.  totally worth it if you'd rather not mess with it all.

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2 hours ago, gsoda3 said:

you can call in the order and then pick it up on thanksgiving day.  takes a couple hours in the oven to warm up.  it's really good.  totally worth it if you'd rather not mess with it all.

Appreciate it, but I kind of want to mess with it.  First time in my mom's 80 years that she's handed over the bird to me.  Power play.

 

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  • 3 weeks later...
14 minutes ago, immamac said:

not spatchcocking a turkey is a mistake for a smoke. There's 0 chance that it cooks evenly. Also smoking Sunday to reheat Thursday is a horrible mistake. Expect a horrible textured bird.

Oh, Captain, you have had since November 3 to reply.  Waiting until this point is not helpful at all.  I'm already in the traffic pattern.

That said, I have had fantastic, unspatchcocked Turkeys in the past.  And I had even temps when I took it off today. 

As for the reheat, we shall see.  I'll be honest when I update this thread though.

Edited by dcbc
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