Turkey: Botched spatchcock and cooking time question
The butcher indeed spatchcocked my turkey, but it appears he just split the backbone in half. Should I try to remove the halves?
Also, the bird is about 16lbs. I planned on roasting in a convection oven, and The Food Lab recommends a 450 oven (without temp reduction). At what temp should I be roasting this bird, and for how long? I also have two additional legs (thigh/drum) and wings to roast on a separate rack. What cooking time am I looking at for those parts?
TIA!!
Recommended by Food52
3 Comments
We're doing a high-heat roasted turkey too, Barbara Kafka's version. She calls for two hours for a fifteen lb bird, so I'd start checking your spatchcooked bird after an hour or so to make sure progress is about what it seems. https://food52.com/recipes/38997-barbara-kafka-s-simple-roast-turkey
Wings will probably take 30 minutes, legs 45. My rule of thumb is check early and often :) Just wait for the juices to run clear!
The cooking time (I put it in at 400 convection roast) ended up being basically how Olivia put it (although, unfortunately, I saw her response when I went to bed last night! I didn't check back again for answers in the afternoon because things got so busy, so I'd decided to put my bird in at 2:30 for a 5:15 carve time, thinking I'd let it rest for a good 45mins). When the bird was almost up to temp at about a half hour, I panicked! I shut the oven, cooled the bird down, and restarted things at a lower temp later on, about 4:30. The turkey came out great, with crisp skin and moist meat all around.
So, you really can blast a turkey in less than an hour!