Lessons learned this Thanksgiving

jhoward82

So in October I did a test turkey and all went well. Thanksgiving wouldn't be Thanksgiving without something going wrong though, right?

The first mistake I unknowingly made was waiting too long while the Egg got up to temp. (With the test turkey I put it on while the temp was rising after the starter cube burned off.) 

The second mistake I made I knew was iffy, but thought I might be okay. I am getting to the end of my bag of lump and it is down to a lot of smaller pieces. 

The thigh was up to 157 and I went to check on the egg. The temps were in the upper 30's, and by 12:30 the egg was in the shade so to keep it at 325 I had to give it a little more air than I did in October when it was warmer outside. The Egg had dipped down so I got a coat-hanger as a wiggle stick and got some ash knocked down and saw the glow of the charcoal. Temp started climbing so I figured I was good, and would check in 10 minutes to see how it was doing.

Well, that was the last gasp as 10 minutes later the turkey was still at 157, and the EGG was down to 300. I had to resort to pulling the grate off with the turkey on it, and lifting out the plate setter and drip pan. And lo and behold, I was pretty much out of charcoal! (Back to my mistakes, I burned more of the charcoal before getting the turkey on there, and the charcoal I was using was burning faster than the test run)

Thankfully I still had some charcoal in the bag. Tossing it on there, I also grabbed out kitchen torch to get the top going while the remaining couple of coals on the bottom got the bottom going. Within a few minutes the temp was climbing back up, the temp in the thigh started climbing back up, and we were only a little delayed in our meal time. (Okay, a lot more than we wanted, but again, what is Thanksgiving without the turkey having a problem of some sort?)

In the end the turkey came out well. I did herb butter under the skin, a couple of bastings with salted butter, and that was it. The breast was a bit drier than I would have liked, but moister than I expected when I pulled the turkey off. 

Foghorn

The end result looks great.  Strong work and thanks for sharing.

FearlessTheEggNoob

Personally, I could care less about presentation. When I do smoke my first turkey its going to be dismembered prior to going on the grill.

Breast No1 is done -- check.
Breast No2 is done -- check.
Leg No1 is done -- check.
Leg No2 is done -- eat.
Dog gets the wings and he's not picky.

Stoogie

I made a rookie mistake this Thanksgiving by not making sure I had enough lump on hand.  I thought I had enough lump left, but didn't bother to double check.  Come Thursday morning, I find that I'm near the bottom of my bag and panicked.  Went to the only grocery store open around here and they had a small bag of Cowboy lump, so I bought that.  Thankfully I didn't have to use it as I used every little last bit of what I had on hand.

Lesson learned:  Stock up on lump!

CANMAN1976

Spatchcocking would solve all these unevenly cooked turkey's I believe.
Your turkey looks great from here:)