Frying a Turkey

Never even tried it.. someone please educate me!

It seems to be more of a get together than anything else to me. I've had them but they are not worth the effort and the oil costs more than the turkey.

Bill is right. Big mess too. Let somebody fry it for you, and ask that your turkey be fried last. It'll be tastier that way.

Don't have much of a choice here. Ol' lady says she wants me to fry a turkey.. I'll be frying a turkey. Whether I know what I'm doing or not

my son-in-law used to fry one every thanksgiving at our house (could be a heck of a mess, costly oil, have fire extinguisher handy), he switched to the oil-less fryer a couple years ago, much less mess, no oil, tasted about the same, just took a little longer to cook (I think). I believe it uses heat wave infrared technology...

Academy has them for about $100 ...

http://www.academy.com/shop/browse/outdoor-living/grills--smokers/fryers?affcode=42&cm_mmc=ps-_-NonBrand-_-Non-Brand%20-%20Outdoor%20Living%20%28Exact%29-_-Google&ploc=9028291

put it on a hanger and drop it in the peanut oil

I hear it works best if you drop them in frozen...

the oil will get plenty of use throughout the year, not worried about that. Plan on using my crawfish setup.. just wondering about the prep and other details.. injecting, seasoning, temps, any tips anyone might have.. not asking for your hunting spots here, just trying make the Mrs happy!

Inject with garlic butter... get the oil hot and cook.. you can stuff a duck in its rear too

We don't do it all the time but fried turkey is really good. It doesn't get the oil nearly as dirty as frying fish etc, so it is easy to reuse the oil. Inject with whatever you want season an rub with mustart and let come to room temp before frying.

put your turkey your going to cook in the pot you are going to use fill it to where you want it when hot with water then take tukey out and make a mental note or mark pot, that mark is how much oil to put in the pot. Dunk turkey slow, do it outside, you are likely to get a little splatter on the ground.

Thanks redchevy.. what do you season with?

I think DROP is the wrong word.

If you do fry, move out in the yard so you don't burn the house down.

I do a couple for thanksgiving and again at Christmas. my family loves them. I just buy the Tony Chacheres kits from academy. usually do one reg. and one spicy ( my own peppers and hot sauce and such) to the last one. usually like 2-2.5 mins/lb. and yeah, don't do it in the garage, we usually do it in the barn. also there are a million and one ways to flavor, rub, inject, marinate. as stated, I love to do it because its gets the guys all together BSing and beer drinking. best of luck.

I usually fry and smoke a couple every year for Thanksgiving and again for Christmas, plus a few here and there throughout the rest of the year. Injected and fried is my favorite, I crave that seasoned crispy skin.
Anyway, yes a little common sense goes a long way frying turkeys. Do it away from the house just in case. I inject with a Tony's marinade as well, I like to add a little cayenne to at least one. Rub liberally. You can cook anywhere from 350-400 degrees, I usually cook at 350 and go 3 minutes/lb and maybe a little extra to crisp it up a little more. Use a meat thermometer when you're getting close. Don't over fill your pot with oil, mentioned above is a good way to test how much oil to use. You can strain and re-use your oil many times if you want so it pays for itself. Just make sure the bird is dry when it goes in and put in in SLOW. I recommend gloves. I used to fry my turkeys with the neck side up, if you do the oil will shoot out the hole a little so be careful. A few years ago I started frying with the butt side up and that's how I cook them now, less splatter that way and no difference in the outcome. Let it rest before carving. Hmn...seasoned, juicy, crispy fried turkey.....now I want one.

skinnerback nailed what I recall when my SIL used to fry with oil ... oil at 350*, 3-3 1/2 minutes per pound, inject with Tony's injection marinade including legs & thighs ... be sure turkey is completely thawed, pat dry, rub with spices to your liking ... ya'll are making me hungry for fried turkey now

Couldn't get my mind off of fried turkey, so made a run to the store. I love the wings and legs so picked up a package of each, (just cooking for me).
Seasoned and ready to go.

In the pot.

Finished off nice and crispy. Pour on the hot sauce and get after it. They're like chicken wings, only bigger.

Since it's No Job November at the Casa de Skinner, guess I'll make two meals out of the wings. Will throw the drumsticks on the smoker another day, if I don't fry them too. Thanks for lookin'.

Mmm dang skinner that looks good

Thanks, was good. As soon as I finished my wing I fell asleep in my chair, woke up at 4 something this morning with a plate in my lap.

Man......

Thanks a bunch from a guy who just decided NOT to skip lunch. My mouth is watering.

Is that just tony's and black pepper?

I guess I'll have to do a few test runs like skinnerback here and try some different seasoning combos!

I just used Slap Ya Momma's. I normally use that or Tony's, they are my favorites on poultry.

if you have a Dickies close by, order a Cajun fried turkey for 59.99. You won't regret it.

sounds delicious, I may give it a try

Fried a bunch of em. Here is how I fry em.

I try not to fry any turkey over 14 pounds and 12 pounds is the perfect frying size. Put turkey in pot and fill with water. Mark water level 1/2 inch below where water level was. Why, because oil expands as it is heated. If the water level came closer than 4 inches from the top of the pot, you need a bigger pot or a smaller turkey. Biggest mistake folks make is too large a bird for the pot.

Remove bird and dry pot. Season bird anyway you like but we like to inject with Creole Butter. Chef Williams of Tony Chaterey will make a fine bird. I like to use Fiesta fajita seasoning all over the bird and inside cavity. Once injected, put into non scented trash bag and place in ice chest covered with ice or put in fridge. i like to let it sit overnight.

Next day, take out turkey and truss up with cotton butchers twine. Tie up legs and draw in wings and thighs close to bird. This will keep the skin from blowing out and will let the bird cook more uniformly.

Add oil to that marked line and bring temp of oil up to 360 degrees. Now take a quart sauce pan and dip into oil filling pan and set aside. This is to insure you don't have too much oil. If you need more you can add the hot oil back easily.

Once oil is 360, turn fire off!!! Lower bird slowly into pot. once bird is fully in pot, add the other oil if needed. Then turn fire back on as high as it will go. That bird is a large heat sink and your oil temp will drop to about 310 to 320 degrees. You do not want it to go below 300 as that will make a greasy bird. Start timing at 3.5 minutes per pound. So a 12 pound bird will take 42 minutes max. I would check it at 39 minutes. It's done when you get 160 degrees in middle of the breast. Once temp gets back up to 340 degrees start adjusting burner to keep that temp. I try to not go over 350 degrees as it can split the turkey skin or make it a dark color. You want the skin intact to keep in the juice.

Once you do a few birds you will get the process down and won't have to mess with the sauce pan as you will just know. Good luck and git ready for the finest bird you ever tasted!

well hell.. I bought a 22lb bird yesterday.. is that no good?

The issue is the size of the pot. It will fry up like any other if your pot is big enough. The standard turkey frying pots they sell everywhere won't hold a bird that size. If I was you, I'd smoke that big one and fry a smaller one.

Bout to do a test run with some wings!

The pot I bought said up to 30 lb turkey.. Bet you're right thou probly shouldn't try to stuff it in there. Guess I'll have to grab another one

If your pot says up to a 30 lb turkey you're good. Most pots are smaller. I wanna see pics of the wings

I do know you hang from a rope and lower in slowly . WARNING If your turkey is frozen it will flame up big time and possibly blow the heck out of your pot and can cause a huge fire !! NEVER DROP IN A FROZEN TURKEY !! Look it up on YouTube , you'll see what I mean.

Man they came out awesome!! Definitely ready to take on a whole bird this weekend! Did 'em in my fish fryer, worked pretty well! Probly don't need to inject wings but I wanted to see what the marinade tastes like with the seasoning. Did the drums in the Tony's original and the flappers with the extra spicy, both with black pepper and injected with jalapeno butter. Phenomenal.. fiance was blown away!

On a side note, if anyone is looking, Academy has the 30lb fryer kit (pot, stand, hook, thermometer, and burner) for $39.99 right now! Was gonna use my giant crawfish setup but for the same price I'd have to spend on the extra oil I bought a whole kit! I did try it, and the 22lb fits in the pot perfectly with plenty room to spare.

That looks AWESOME sir!. Good job on the cook.

I kinda wanted to make a post about fried pork ribs tonight, but I decided to give this pig to a family in need and is packaged and in the freezer now. I will post another later. If you've never fried pork ribs, (I prefer a pig under 150 lbs for this, under 100 lbs is best IMO ) you need to try it. Just trim them (separate ribs), season them like you did the turkey, and fry the same. Dust with a little seasoning as soon as they come out and they are something else. Give that a shot. I want turkey, again now.

I did get to thinkin about what else I could fry up like that. I got plenty of pork in the freezer I'm gonna have to try that next!

Most turkey fryin kits come with a 28 quart pot. These pots are narrower and taller than a standard 28 qt pot. This is so they will use less oil and maximize bird size that will fir the pot. If you have a 28 quart pot turkey fry pot, I would not attempt any bird over 14 pounds. There are much larger pots available that will handle a 22 pound bird but they take a whole lot more oil.

Most 28 qt turkey fry pots will use about 3 to 3.5 gallons of oil.

I would take it to the local BBQ house and pay them to fry it. Ask to be the last bird they fry and get the seasoning left behind.

Fried up my 22lb bird last sunday. Everything went without a hitch! DavidP you saved my a$$ with the tip about scooping out some hot oil before dropping the turkey. I marked it with water, pat dried, injected and seasoned all the day before, let it sit uncovered in the fridge for 24hrs. Poured the oil to my mark and heated to 375*. When I checked it, the oil was about 2" above the mark! Scooped out a full 2qt pot's worth and slowly dropped the bird, literally had zero extra room! Had a little splatter over the edge but nothing big. Had I not scooped some out I think It could've gone south in a hurry! Cranked the burner up to full blast, oil never got under 340*. @22 lbs I fried for 66 minutes trying to keep the oil at 350 the entire time. I pulled it and let it rest for about 10 minutes. At first I thought I'd pulled a Griswold, when I poked the skin on the leg it collapsed like there was nothing underneath. Fortunately it was all there, and D@MN was it good! We had 14 people over and they all loved it! White meat was just as juicy as the dark, the skin was super crispy and delicious! Will definitely be doing it again for christmas, maybe 2 smaller birds this time though. I want to experiment a little with the seasoning and injections. Even in my big pot, a 22lb bird was about as big as I'd wanna go. Thanks for all the help guys.. couldn't have turned out any better!




My yard buddies couldn't resist when they got a whiff



finished product

You don't think he will try to fry a deer next year do you?... I'm getting the heck out of here!

Please excuse ignorance .....but I cannot figure why fry a turkey. What to do afterward with all the oil needed ....now contaminated with grease from the bird. There's gotta be a lot of tiny dark flesh pieces left in the oil....that would have to be filtered out (a tedious process) if you plan on using the oil again. Seems just a lazy man's method to cook a turkey, while resulting in considerable wastage.

My thoughts:

fry some taters in the grease after the bird to clean oil, let cool, all the fall off stuff will settle to the bottom (kinda like water in a gas can), then pour the top 3/4+ of the oil off into the original container for the next go around. used to do that all the time after doing a big fish fry.

Once you try it.. If it's done right.. You won't want it any other way. I've sworn by my moms roasted turkey for 30 years now. All her meat comes out perfect. Can't beat fried though. After doing it you'll realize it's not just a lazy mans cop out. It's not an easy task by any means. Might not take as long, but why does that matter? As for the grease, i poured it through a grease filter back into the original container after cooking. No mess, took about 3 minutes.

That's like saying baked chicken wings are just as good as deep fried. Just no room in this good country for that kind of talk