Turkey Size in Large BGE

bob.bud

BGE advertises that you can cook a 20lb bird in a LBGE; however, this assumes you have a platesetter legs up supporting your grate.

Anyone out there with an AR and oval stone cook an entire bird, if so, how large? How did you have it setup?

UPCamper

I have the AR and do a 18-20 lb bird no problem.  Could go bigger but haven't tried. 

RRP

no AR, but my largest was a 26.5 pounder! That was a big bird!

bob.bud

@UPCamper how was your rig setup? 

xiphoid007

I've spatchcocked a 16lber, but that was pushing. I do have the oval stone and the AR also.

FaceDance

@xiphoid007 Think you could go 18lb spatchcocked?

xiphoid007

Probably. U can always lop off the ends of the leg bones to gain a couple inches. You could also separate the legs to reorganize pieces for a better fit.

If you have the breast facing towards you and the bird is high, just make sure the thermometer isn't going to impale the bird. You may need to pull it and use a grid level thermometer.

Also, beware smoke. It is so easy to over smoke poultry. Maybe one big hunk of wood is more than enough. Quite honestly the charcoal will give you enough smoke for my family's taste.

Just for fun, throw a drip pan under with a quart of stock and veggies (carrots, celery, onion, garlic, some herbs) and make sure it's not directly on the stone. This will catch drippings for gravy. If you do add a little smoke, you have smoked gravy! This concentrates the smoke a lot, and my wife finds it too smokey, but it is good.

Sorry for the long answer, but I love grilling my turkey, I'm getting pumped!!

UPCamper

bob.bud said:

@UPCamper how was your rig setup? 

I can't really remember what I did last year.  Just kind of figure it out as I go, before I light the fire.

To the best of my knowledge, I filled the fire bowl, put the woo ring in it with the stone for in direct. Then put my cross brackets on somewhere and then the grate. I can't remember if I used the bottom rack or middle.  Only small issue became the thermometer probe was trying to stick the turkey.  So what I did was cut a wine cork in half-ish and stuck the probe through it on the outside so that it wasn't going as far into the dome.  That freed up some more space inside.  

Other thing in I did was cut the handles off of my roasting pan to get it to fit into the rig.

FaceDance

Thanks @xiphoid007 and @UPCamper

I will figure it out... Sounds like I've got some options/tricks to work with.