huge turkey

[guanta]

So I just got a MES 30 for xmas.

And now I have been given the task of possible smoking a huge turkey. My father got it from a friend on a farm and it weighs honestly about 35lbs. This thing is huge!

Any chance I can smoke this? Would cutting it in half work?

 

[crpngdth2001]

Quite honestly, even two halves at 17.5 lbs each would not likely get you through the danger zone (140* in 4 hours). I would recommend against it.

 

[guanta]

So I'm still fairly new to this. What's the danger zone ? Not reaching 140 in 4 hours? Or the other way around?

 

[bertman]

I'm curious myself. Does that refer to smoke absorbtion?

 

[timberjet]

40 to 140 in 4 hours or less. This is so you don't get poisoned. You most definitely can do all that turkey in there but I would recommend parting it out into it's separate components. It may not all fit but at least you could freeze or heaven forbid roast the remainder in the oven. I am sure A site mod. will be along soon to post the link to the FDA guidlines in full detail for poultry and meat preperation in general. But the 40/140/4 is a good rule of thumb. You would also most likely want to brine that pterodactyl pretty well before smoking. Sounds like it might be a fairly old bird. Hope this helps. In the poultry section at the top in the sticky threads there is all the info you would need to explain what this all means. Also I would highly reccomend jeff's ecourse. It is worth it and explains the safety stuff pretty well.