Deep Fried Turkey Goodness

Like every other food obsessed American, I often prepare for Thanksgiving, my favorite holiday, by watching the Food Network and most importantly their Thanksgiving Specials. For the last few years I've been toying with the idea of a deep fried turkey. I mean who doesn't like fried food? In the past, turkey has always taken a backseat to the sides served at dinner. We made a turkey because it was expected not necessarily because of the way it taste. Over the years, my mother and I have tried every "trick" in the book to try to make this large heavy breasted bird succulent and juicy. We've brined, injected, massaged, basted, tented and in the end just prayed that the white meat would be juicy and the dark meat cooked. Eventually after years of tweaking our technique, we found that brining and rubbing butter on the bird was the best we could do to prevent it from going dry in the oven.

This year, out of the blue, two weeks before Thanksgiving, my mother informs me that she wants to deep fry the turkey. I was delighted and honestly a little scared. I saw the deep fried turkey special by Alton Brown and watched as they lit a fryer contraption on fire when they plunged the bird into the fat. As soon as the words, "Deep Fried Turkey" came out of my mother's mouth I kept seeing images from that turkey inferno in my head.

Despite my fear, we went ahead and purchased the fryer from Lowes Hardware and hoped for the best. As you can see from the picture it turned out well. We brined the turkey overnight as usual and instead of roasting it for hours it only took about 50 minutes in the fat and out came a golden crispy juicy bird. It was by far the tastiest and juiciest turkey we've ever made. Deep Fried Turkey is awesome! Happy Thanksgiving!