Go to the mobile version of this Web site.

Login | Contact Us | Site Map | Paid archives | Electronic edition | Subscription Questions | Extras

Home › Living › Food

Recipe: Two-hour turkey

Published November 8, 2006 at midnight

Text size  

More Food

More stories »

When time is short, you can cook that turkey in record time.

Two-Hour Turkey

Serves 6 to 8

1 frozen turkey, 12 pounds, thawed, or 1 fresh turkey

1 to 2 tablespoons vegetable or olive oil

Coarse kosher salt

Coarse ground black pepper

1 cup fat-free chicken broth (optional, for drippings)

• In the days before cooking: Clean oven to prevent smoking of burned-on grease at high heat.

• Thirty minutes before cooking: Preheat oven to 475 degrees and use oven thermometer to check temperature.

• Remove and discard truss that holds turkey legs together. Pull or trim off and discard lumps of fat in neck and body cavity. Remove giblets from cavity and save for gravy, if desired.

• Rinse turkey inside and out. Pat dry with paper towels. Rub turkey skin all over generously with oil. Set bird breast down and sprinkle back with salt and pepper.

• Place an adjustable V-shaped rack in a 13-by-16-inch roasting pan (set rack sides so the bird is a minimum of 2 inches from pan bottom). Put turkey, breast up, on rack; sprinkle breast with salt and pepper. Fold wing tips under.

• Using aluminum foil, form caps over the tips of each drumstick. If wing tips extend beyond pan rim, fashion a foil collar underneath so drippings flow back into pan. Leave legs untied. Do not stuff or close body cavity.

• Insert the oven-safe meat thermometer near center of breast through thickest part of breast to bone. You will still need to check the thigh, breast and wing temperatures at the end. The USDA prefers placing thermometer in the thigh during roasting.

• Set pan on the lowest rack in a 475-degree oven (do not use convection heat.

• Roast, checking after 45 minutes. Once the temperature has reached 140 degrees, begin checking every 10 minutes, until thermometer reaches 165 degrees in thighs, wings and breasts. (Despite the same weight, birds will still vary in cooking time.)

• Halfway through roasting time, rotate pan in ovenfor even browning. If areas on turkey breast start to become browner than you like, lay a piece of foil over the dark spots.

• If there's any smoke, check pan and wings for drips into oven; adjust foil under wings, or slide roasting pan onto a larger, shallow-rimmed pan.

• Remove pan from oven, and loosely cover pan with foil to keep it warm. Let turkey rest 15 to 20 minutes.

• Use drippings from pan and the 1 cup fat-free chicken broth to make gravy if desired.

- Adapted from Safeway Two-Hour Turkey recipe (

Nutritional information per serving: 320 cal., 12 g fat (3 g sat.), 129 mg chol., 0 carb., 241 mg sodium, 0 fiber, 50 g pro.