This past Thanksgiving we did something new… We grilled our turkey and it turned out delicious!

We purchased a Pit Boss Pellet Grill earlier this year and love it. So, we decided to cook a whole turkey on it for Thanksgiving. Not only was it great, turning out moist and tasty, but it took less time than in the oven. We will definitely continue to use our Pit Boss to cook our turkeys.

Pit Boss Grill

We chose the Pit Boss Pro Series 1100 Wood Pellet Grill because of the size. With a big family the bigger the better. Going with the bigger size did cost more, but in the long run, it saves us time and money.

The way it saves us time is that we can cook larger amounts at a single time instead of cooking smaller amounts multiple times. Since we are cooking a single time we use fewer pellets which in turn saves money.

Most people are familiar with charcoal and gas grills but are unfamiliar with pellet grills. I had heard of them but wasn’t sure about getting one until one of our family friends told Kaycee about theirs.

We have had multiple grills and smokers over the years including; gas grills, charcoal grill, gas upright smoker, charcoal offset smokers, and electric smoker. So far I have found that I like this pellet smoker the easiest to use and clean, and to top it off cooks great tasting food.

We have even cooked baked beans and mac-n-cheese in it and will be baking a pie in it soon. I’ll let you know how it turns out.

Pellets

So, as the name of the grill implies, we have to use pellets. Pellets are made by compressing sawdust and other materials. There are multiple flavors and manufacturers of pellets.

We use the Pit Boss brand pellets which we have bought at Lowes and/or Walmart. So far we have been pleased with the flavor and smells given by the pellets we have used. The pellet flavors we have used are:

• Hickory
• Apple
• Charcoal
• Competition Blend
  • Hickory
  • Maple
  • Apple

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We usually mix the Hickory and Apple flavors together in a 5-Gallon bucket to mix and store unused pellets. The pellets need to be kept dry.

For the turkey, we had the Charcoal pellets loaded in the hopper and topped it off with the mix of Hickory/Apple pellets.

Size of Turkey

Since we have such a large family, to begin with, we cook the biggest possible turkey we can for the holidays. Two turkeys were cooked this year for our festivities, but the one we grilled was a little over twenty pounds.

Brining

We always brine any and all of our poultry, no matter how it’s going to be cooked, because it just makes it so much juicier and moist.

Brining is soaking the poultry in a bath of saltwater which helps the turkey absorb the moisture. It also seasons the turkey very well so we are careful about adding extra salt.

In our brine, we use a mixture of salt and sugar. For every 8 cups of hot water, we dissolve 1 cup of sugar and a 1/2 cup of salt. We repeat this as many times as we need to until the turkey is fully submerged in the brine.

We have a huge 32-quart bucket that we use to do this job. It has a lid and so once we are done, we add ice to it, seal it up and let it sit.

As a general rule, we brine our turkey for 18-24 hours depending on how much time we have. For this particular turkey, it was 24 hours. We always calculate what time we intend to start preparing the turkey and start the brining process accordingly.

Preparation

When the turkey is pulled out of the brine, it needs to be rinsed thoroughly because you don’t want to taste the brine in the final product. Sam is the one who normally does this job and so he pulls the turkey out and places it in the strainer in the sink. He puts a plate, upside down, under the strainer so as he rinses the turkey, dirty sink water won’t touch the bird.

After the rinsing is done, he pats the turkey dry and makes sure the turkey is cleaned out. Kaycee has baked the packet of gravy before and it ruins the turkey. That’s definitely one mistake we try not to repeat.

He mixes a compound butter using two sticks of butter and a variety of spices like sage, garlic, and onion powder. He has a special talent for seasoning things and just mixes this and that until it tastes good.

He loosens the skin from the bird, but keeps it intact without tearing it, and begins to rub the butter all over the meat until the whole bird is covered in butter. He puts the leftover compound butter in the cavities of the turkey.

Sam moved the turkey to the roasting pan and put it breast side down. We do this so all the juices run over the white meat of the turkey as it cooks. Next time we will cover the roaster pan with aluminum foil and use the rack for easier cleanup.

Cleaning

After the turkey has been prepared and put into the roaster pan, the cleaning and sanitizing of the kitchen begins. Kaycee always plans to prepare the turkey first so that nothing else is out at the time. The turkey reigns supreme in the kitchen while it is being prepared.

Kaycee gives everything in the kitchen that has been touched by the turkey a bath in soap, hot water, and bleach.

Cooking

We pre-heated out Pit Boss grill to 350°F by following the manufacturer’s instructions. We also made sure our pellet hopper was full. We had charcoal loaded already so we topped it off with our mixture of hickory and apple.

Once the grill was at cooking temperature, 350°F, we put the roaster pan on the grill. Since this was our first attempt to cook a turkey, we positioned it on the “hot” end of the grill. The firepit (heat source) on our grill is in the middle, but there are three distinct temperature areas. It is the coolest by the hopper and then to the hottest by the smokestack.

We would normally place our thermometer probes in the turkey prior to placing it in the grill like we do when we cook it in the oven. We didn’t this time because we planned to turn it every hour and check the temp with our instant-read thermometer. Once we got closer to the final temperature, which is 165° in the breast meat, we would insert our blue toothed enabled temperature probes. One in the dark meat and one in the breast meat.

It normally takes about 4 hours to cook the turkey in the oven. So, we figured it would take at least that long or longer since it was cold that day at 38°F. Boy, were we wrong.

We were surprised when we went out to check the turkey after the first hour. The temperature was already over 100°F. So, we turned the turkey around 180° and put the probes in.

An hour and a half later I was alerted that the turkey had reached 165°F in the breast meat. The dark meat’s temperature was around 180°F which is where it usually lands when the breast meat reaches its temperature.

Using hot pads, I took the probes out and moved the roasting pan to the kitchen and placed it on the stovetop. I then covered the turkey with aluminum foil loosely to let it rest. We usually let it rest for at least 30 minutes prior to carving. but since it only took a total of 2 hours and 30 minutes to cook, we had extra time to let it rest.

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Thermometers

A couple of years ago we started to use temperature instead of time to cook our turkeys. Every year we would do the recommended cooking time and use the cooking bags to try to achieve a tasty and moist turkey. The taste wasn’t the hard part the moistness was.

Since we have switched to using thermometer probes it seems that our turkeys have always come out moist. We usually use our iDevices Kitchen Thermometer which is linked by Bluetooth. I have it linked to my phone and iPad so I have an option of which one I want to use.

It is pretty easy to use. You use the menus to pick what kind of food and then what temperature you would like to set it to. It will give you a heads up when you are getting close to the preset temperature.

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As mentioned earlier we used our instant-read thermometer to do a quick check of the temperature. This has been a great investment in all of our cooking especially when we cook steaks or chicken.

Flavor

The flavor of the turkey was amazing! It tasted of sage and garlic while being seasoned perfectly. There was light smoky taste but still had the flavor a roasted holiday turkey.

Turkey Stuffing

Now, there was one thing missing and that was stuffing the turkey. A couple of years ago we stopped stuffing our turkey and instead, started baking the stuffing in a bundt pan because it makes more crispy edges. That’s just how we like it!

Mix your favorite stuffing. Spray the bundt pan with non-stick cooking spray. Bake at 400 degrees for 40-45 minutes, or until done. Let it cool. Invert it onto a plate and hope it comes out all in one piece. Then slice it up and serve.

I hope this helps you take that leap to try something different. My family enjoyed the turkey and it is nice to be able to smell that turkey cooking out on the deck. As an added bonus, we had extra space in the oven to cook everything else in a timely manner.