Turkey Times

It’s post christmas christmas time again and I’m thinking about Turkey cooking. I always roast meat using a meat thermometer because it takes all the guesswork out of a great roast. Even though the thermometer is a superior method for knowing doneness, you still need some idea of how long it will take — in order to avoid having your turkey finish cooking hours before your guests arrive!

I usually go on the internet to see what’s what. The other resource that’s been useful is a meat book that Mum has had for years. The problem is that these resources often disagree on cooking times. The book recommends much longer cooking times, even though modern turkey standards require higher internal temperatures.

The reason for this discrepancy has always puzzled me. Finally I have found a site that gives the reason. The National Turkey Federation explains the shorter times by saying that today’s turkeys are bred to increase the amount of white meat. Since white meat cooks faster, your turkey is done sooner.

That page also gives a table of times for preparing turkey at 325 °F.

I realize that several of our friends are using the high heat method with turkey flipping, for some reason I’m sticking with the 325 temperature. It’s always worked in the past! And for the record, the longer roasting times consistently produce juicy delicious birds at my Mum’s place; it seems that as long as it’s cooked, a different length of time in the oven isn’t that critical.

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› food     2006-12-28 11:21   ...0