How Do You Deep Fry a Turkey?

and precision. You need to plan your turkey fry several days in advance for reasons of both safety and flavor. And even if you're never planning on doing this, perhaps because like me, you injure yourself pan frying food. Hopefully you'll find the process as fascinating as I do. But okay, before you even start thinking about frying, get all the equipment you could possibly need together, including a fire extinguisher

safe for use on oil fires because you never know. Also, you'll need a few aluminum roasting pans, kitchen towels, tongs, and both a meat thermometer and an oil thermometer. Plus make sure you have a hook to lower and lift the turkey into and out of the oil. This is not a hands on kind of project. Also, be sure that you have a safe spot for frying, a flat

and fireproof surface, not your wooden deck. Please and plan to have someone stay with the turkey the entire time it's in the fryer, and decide how you will discard the used oil ahead of time. You can save it for reusing, or throw it away in a disposable container once it's cooled, or check with your local government. Lots of cities and municipalities have disposal or even recycling programs for cooking oil. Just don't pour it down any of your drains. Once you're all prepped, you can proceed to

step one, choosing your turkey. You're going to want to opt for a smaller turkey. You want a bird that's about a quarter to a third of the size of your fryar's pot. That will leave plenty of room for the oil to completely surround the bird once you submerge it. Attend to twelve pound turkey that's about four and a half to five and a half kilos is a good size for most outdoor fryers. Make a note of the turkey's weight. A plan to fry the turkey for three

to three and a half minutes per pound. Step one B. After you get your bird home and before you do anything else, put it in your fryer pot and fill the pot with water just to the point that it covers the bird. Remove the turkey, and then mark the water level. That's the level to which you'll want to add oil when it comes time for frying. Okay, Step

two thaw and brine the turkey. Dumping a frozen bird in hot oil can cause an explosion, so be sure to allow enough time to completely thaw out your turkey. It's easiest to thaw in the fridge over the course of a few days. You can even keep it in its original packaging and just PLoP it in one of those roasting pans to catch the juices. But for how long you want to allow? Twenty four hours of thawing time per every five pounds or two kilos of turkey weight.

If you're working with the aforementioned ten to twelve pound turkey that'll fit most outdoor fryers, that means you're looking at about two full days or forty eight fifty eight hours to be precise. During the final eighteen to twenty four hours of thawing, or once it's totally thought if you like, it's time to start wet brining your turkey, because when you fry a turkey, you won't be able to stuff the cavity with aromatics like you can when you roast one, and any rubs or fresh herbs on

or under the skin would wash away or burn. But brining gives you an opportunity to flavor the meat before cooking it and to tenderize it. There are lots of recipes for brine's on the internet, but the basic is one and a half cups of salt and a cup of sugar dissolved in a gallon of water. For our metric friends, that's about three hundred and sixty million liters of salt and two hundred forty million laters of sugar in about three point seven liters of water. You can

also add herbs or spices. Check out a few recipes and see what sounds good. Once made, refrigerate the brine until it's forty degrees are in height that's four degrees celsius or colder. Then place the turkey in a brining bag or large pot. Pour the brine in and seal or cover brine for eighteen to twenty four hours in the fridge. What's happening during this step is that, through the power of osmosis, the meat absorbs some of the

liquid and the salt d nature's proteins in it. Proteins are these big, folded up messes of molecules like necklaces that have somehow merged while sitting in your jewelry box, or like a string after your cat or child has gotten to it. Salt relaxes some proteins, making muscle fibers less tough, and letting water, molecules and anything else that's

in the water move in and hang out. But then, because you want the effects of the brine without that extra moisture, we come to step three, drying the turkey. After your bird is brined for eighteen twenty four hours, you want to let it dry out. This step takes an entire day, but it helps create a crisp skin by preventing the skin from seaming during the fry. So clear a shelf in your fridge and place a drying rack in or over a large shallow roasting pan. Remove

the turkey from the brine, Discard the brine. Pat the turkey dry and place the turkey on top of the rack and let it drip dry in the fridge uncovered for twenty four hours. Then step three it's time to fry. Remove the turkey from the fridge, place it in a clean aluminum pan, and let it sit at room temperature four thirty to sixty minutes. This will help the turkey cook faster and more evenly. Meanwhile, set up your fryer according to the manufacturers instructions. Add your oil just to

the fill line that you marked previously. Peanut oil, corn oil, canola cotton seeds, saff flower, soybean, and sunflower oil are all good options. Follow the instructions for bringing the oil up to the proper frying temperature, which is three hundred and fifty degrees fahrenheit or one seventy six degrees celsius. Using your hook, very slowly submerge the turkey into the hot oil about a quarter of the bird of time,

and wait one to two minutes between each move. Lowering the turkey slowly allows the oil to better maintain the proper frying temperature. Remember, the cool bird will lower the oil's temperature, so you want to give the oil time to heat back up to the optical temp. If you submerge the turkey too fast, the temperature of the oil may drop below frying temperature, and then you'll just be boiling the turkey and oil frying seals in the juices.

Boiling releases them. Fry the turkey for about three to three and a half minutes per pound until the internal temperature is a hundred and sixty degrees fahrenheit or seventy one degrees celsius. The U s d A instructs as to cook poultry two hundred and sixty five degrees fahrenheit or seventy three celsius. But when you take your turkey out one sixty degrees, it will continue to cook from the residual heat, a phenomenon that chefs sometimes call carry

over cooking. If you leave your turkey in the oil all the way until it reaches one sixty five, it will continue cooking and reach a final temp above that, maybe a hundred and seventy degrees fair in height or seventy six degrees celsius, and the turkey will be dry. When you do remove the turkey from the fryar with your hook transfer it to a clean aluminum roasting pan to allow it to drain. The moments after your turkey comes out of the fryar are a good opportunity to

add extra flavor. A lot of cooks like to sprinkle a dry rub on the bird at this point. Finally, step four rest both you and the turkey. This is perhaps the most important step for a juicy turkey. Once the turkey is done, loosely cover it with foil and let it rest for at least thirty minutes before you carve it. Basically, you want to allow the meat of the turkey to cool down. As it cooks, the muscle

fibers in meat firm up, pushing juices outward. By resting the turkey or a steak for that matter, you're letting those fibers relax and allowing juices inside to redistribute. If you carve it too early, the juices will flow out and your turkey again will be dry. Once you've let the turkey rest, harve as usual and enjoy your feast. Today's episode was written by Shawn Chattis and produced by Tyler Clang. Brain Stuff is production of iHeart Radio's How

Stuff Works. For more in this and lots of other tasty topics. Visit our home planet, how stuff Works dot com, and for more podcasts from My heart Radio, visit i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,