ROAST TURKEY

Let's get Roasting!

Remove the bird from brine and rinse inside and out with cold water. Discard the brine.
Place the bird on a v-shaped roasting rack, breast-side down and pat dry with paper towels,use a shallow roasting pan (If you use a deep roasting pan, you wind up steaming the meat). 

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Thoroughly rinse the turkey, and discard the brine mixture.
2. Brush the turkey with 1/2 the melted butter. Place breast side down on a roasting rack in a shallow roasting pan. Stuff the turkey cavity with 1 onion, 1/2 the carrots, 1/2 the celery, 1 sprig of thyme, and the bay leaf. Scatter the remaining vegetables and thyme around the bottom of the roasting pan, and cover with the chicken broth
3. Roast uncovered 3 1/2 to 4 hours in the preheated oven, until the internal temperature of the thigh reaches 180 degrees F (185 degrees C). Carefully turn the turkey breast side up about 2/3 through the roasting time, and brush with the remaining butter. Allow the bird to stand about 30 minutes before carving.

To prevent the meat from drying out, loosely cover with a thick sheet of aluminum foil, butter on the inside to prevent sticking. The last hour or so, remove the foil and turn the turkey to brown the breast.

Baste, baste, baste.

Don't rely on the little plastic thermometer in some turkeys to pop out. If you wait for it, the turkey will overcook. Instead stick an instant read thermometer several inches down through the skin between the thigh and the breast so the tip ends up about an inch above the joint. The turkey is ready when the thermometer reads 180 degrees F. If you are not prepared to use a meat thermometer to measure the internal temperature of the turkey and the stuffing in the bird, that is okay but the stuffing should be cooked outside the turkey," I always cook my stuffing outside of the turkey".

Let the cooked turkey "rest" after it have been removed from the oven. While the turkey cooks, the juices are forced away from the heat to the middle of the turkey. Cover loosely with the aluminum foil and let rest for 20 to 30 minutes after it is removed from the oven. This allows the juices to redistribute throughout the turkey. A moist turkey is easier to carve.

If you need your oven to reheat or cook side dishes, it's better to serve the turkey at room temperature with hot gravy than to reheat it. Reheating dries out the meat. The interior of a large turkey will stay quite hot for at least an hour.