Turkey With Awesome All Over

My older brother and I always have the best ideas when we hang out. Since we're visiting him and his family in Texas for Thanksgiving, turkey cooking will be the target of our collective good-idea powers!

I'll let the pictures do most of the talking from here.

9lb, free-range

neck and tail out.

start of the first cut.

first cut complete.

second cut.

Spine removed.

"CPR" style breast bone CRUSH!

Wings tucked, kickin' back.

Fresh, cut to 6mm thickness.

Getting better.

lump-charcoal...

...on fire.

lump-stones...

...in foil.

Hot stones.

Cooking time.

One stone on top.

Oh, the aroma!

After about 2 hours.

Bacon off.

mmm...

I've only seen the rose color edges on meat that's been slow-cooked over charcoal. The results are always great as they were this time. 

So our final temperature reading showed that we had slightly overcooked it, but it was still more moist and juicy and flavorful than the typical oven cooked turkey. The butterflying helped to reduce the cook time by improving the ratio of surface area to volume. The bacon of course added great flavors, but also helped to baste the turkey and retain some moisture. The stones work to keep temperatures even and directly transfer heat into the bird. Finally, the spine, neck and tail were boiled to make stock that was then used in the stuffing recipe. 

Hope you enjoyed "reading" about it at least half as much as we did cooking and eating it. Did we ever!