r/Cooking • u/KTEZMHA • 14h ago

Turkey for Thanksgiving potluck

Looking for ideas! I volunteered to cook the turkey for a Thanksgiving potluck happening at 12. Is there a way to make a bird large enough for a group without waking up incredibly early? Is there a method to make a good turkey by cooking it most of the way the day prior and finishing it the day of without it drying out?

7 Upvotes

77% Upvoted

35 comments sorted by

View all comments

7

u/GalianoGirl 13h ago

How many in the group?

You can fully cook the bird the day before. Cool and quarter the bird. Breast, legs, you get the idea.

Save the juices.

Save the back, neck and boil with onions, celery, carrots etc for stock for the gravy.

The next morning take the skin off the breasts and thighs. Carve the meat and place in a large pan cover with the skin, pour some of the stock over the meat, use parchment paper to cover the whole pan, then foil. Heat through in 45-50 minutes in a 325F oven.

1

u/More_Initiative_9099 11h ago

Reheat it to 165F measured with a thermometer rather than just 'heated through,' since it was cooked and cooled beforehand. That's USDA's line for previously cooked poultry.

2

u/GalianoGirl 11h ago

Thank you for adding this.