<p>My new appetizer: Grilled Kiebasa and am also doing some mild and some spicy italian sausages with a sharp horseradish dip. slice these and add a cube of a granny smith apple on a toothpick and serve with a strong horseradish mustard dip.</p>
<p>A Buffulato with cherry tomotoes with supreme vinegar and oil (the finishing kind) to put on garlic crostinis. I am try to give this group some real food as they often fill up on appetizers and do not eat the meal–thus the salad is now an appetizer.</p>
<p>I’m trying a smoked turkey this year. My local sausage maker sells smoked turkeys. I just have to steam it in the oven for a couple of hours, and it’s done. Supposedly. We’ll see.</p>
<p>So … our oven broke last night, in keeping with a long-established family tradition of Thanksgiving snafus. Right now we’re preheating one of those portable roaster ovens to see if it might bake a pecan pie. </p>
<p>Fortunately, I can take the turkey into work, where there’s an oven. And we know the roaster oven will heat the sides, because that’s what we bought it to do. I would say, “Really, universe?” but I know other people have worse Thanksgiving Day issues. Hope they get the power on for everyone the storm left in the dark. </p>
<p>I’ve been thinking of Wis75, who needed Thanksgiving restaurant suggestions for Seattle. The weather has been horrible! I’m sorry Wis75 hasn’t had a chance to see any blue sky. Of course most of the rest of the nation hasn’t been much better!</p>
<p>Thank you all for sharing tips and recopes! For best turkey grilling directions, Reluctant Gourmet has step by step instructions that I swear lead to the most amazing turkey I’ve ever cooked in my almost two decades of hosting thanksgiving dinners. </p>
<p>I had a little accident with my turkey that may have led to the set turkey I have ever made . I brined it and as I was attempting to put it into my refrigerator , I dropped it…thankfully, the turkey never hit the ground but I lost 2/3 of the brining solution. I still managed to brine it overnight, but decided to make a compound butter and put it under the skin. I am not sure if it was the fresh turkey, the combination brine / butter or what, but everyone said it was the best one Ive ever made , and I have never had one turn out dry</p>
<p>Did a quickie this T-day. Just ground up the celery, onions, the night before and sauteed with spices. the next day, made a stuffing, stuffed the bird with package of stuffing and some chestnuts, and stuck it in the oven for an hour at 325. Then covered loosely. Veggie mix of little green beans, canned Green Giant Niblets and baby carrots with a bit of honey to sweeten. made a sweet potato casserole ahead of time that I just stuck in there and plain baked potatoes. Due to unexpected guests, added a whole deli ham soaked in tangerine slices and juice. Added cranberry from the can and a small but pretty green mixed salad, and Pillsbury giant croissants fresh from the oven and Mrs Smith’s pumpkin pie. Lots of sparkling water, and cider. A nice bottle of red wine a guest brought along with some great chocolates to add to the dinner and some cordial, again brought by guests. Best turkey I ever made, and I even was able to scrape up a home made gravy from it that was delicious to make up for all the quickie packaged shortcuts this year.</p>
<p>Also the least expensive. Got turkey for nothing, and had a lot of the other things at hand. My brother bought some last minute things for me, so the net cost came to very little.</p>
<p>We had a scaled down traditional Thanksgiving dinner at home this year, which was really something of an accomplishment. Everything tasted great except for the wine. I think I chose the wrong year or something, lol.</p>
<p>I’d like to share something I tried that was new to me this year. I read about starting the turkey on it’s belly and flipping it part way through the cooking process and decided to give it a try–outstanding results! The idea is that some of the fat and juices (that normally end up in the bottom of your roasting pan) moisten the breast meat. I put my onions, celery, etc in the cavity (I always think this is such an invasion of privacy but perhaps the bird is oblivious?!) as usual but put the turkey on its breast in the rack. Roasted it for 1.5 hours–it was a big 22# turkey–and flipped it to finish the roasting time with the breast up. I bought a new pair of rubber gloves and scrubbed them thoroughly so they were nice and clean…just put one hand in each of the cavities and quickly flipped it. Don’t believe I could’ve done it with utensils–required the use of hands.</p>
<p>The result was one of the most moist turkeys I’ve every made. It was a fresh bird which I don’t always get organized enough to order, etc. Fresh birds are more moist than frozen ones but this one was SO yummy!</p>
<p>@frazzled, what did you end up doing with the turkey? At my lake house, we have one oven and one of those portable roasters, so I always did the turkey in the roaster and the trimmings in the oven.</p>
<p>This year, since we had to move Thanksgiving to our main home for the water issue, I have double ovens, so I cooked the turkey in the oven, and did a smaller smoked turkey in the roaster. I felt like the big turkey was a little on the dry side, but thanks to MIL, we had ample gravy, so everyone seemed happy with it. I’ve never heard of putting the bird on the grill until this thread; that sounds really interesting.</p>
<p>A surprise this year was that I made traditional stuffing inside the bird-I threw in onions, celery, and chopped an apple that just happened to be sitting on the counter, and everyone LOVED it. MIL makes her traditional cornbread stuffing like most East Texans prefer, and I figured I’d just put my stuffing aside, but this year, hers was barely touched. </p>
<p>For all you turkey on the grill folks, would this work with one of those Big Green Eggs? We don’t have a traditional charcoal grill.</p>
<p>Nrdsb, I have a gas grill (I know, anathema to Texans! ), and that’s what I used to grill mine. Idad makes his bird on a charcoal grill. I bet the Green Egg should work just as well if not better! </p>
<p>I love hearing about everyone’s successes . My 16 y.o. D barely ate any of Thanksgiving dinner this year. I couldn’t decide if she truly didn’t like it or was just pretending she was too cool for Thanksgiving :-S. Next year I am going to see if I can get her involved with the planning a bit more. I did the Alton Brown turkey this year and it was great -but took longer to cook than usual. I am going to refer back to this thread for some Christmas meal ideas as well. </p>
), and that’s what I used to grill mine. Idad makes his bird on a charcoal grill. I bet the Green Egg should work just as well if not better! </p>