Smoking a Turkey

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ronaldjallen

Newbie
Original poster
Aug 21, 2013
11
10
Locust Grove, VA
I have recently purchased a Digital Cajun Injector Electric Smoker and smoked my first turkey in many, many years this past Thanksgiving.  I set it at 225 for 7 hours and filled the a-maze-n pellet smoke tray and I inserted the temp probe and closed it up.  Temp outside was around 40/45 degrees.  I checked the inside temp several times and while the temp did fluctuate it held pretty close most of the time.  But after 6 1/2 hours the internal temp was only at 145.  I added an hour to the time and checked back an hour later and it was still at 145.  I finally gave up and brought it inside and put in oven and finished it off.  It had a great smoke flavor and turned out fine but I was disappointed that I had to bring it inside to finish.  My question is should I have raised the temp higher?  I read in one of the posts where someone recommended 140.  Any suggestions.
 
Birds do best at 300°+. There is nothing wrong with finishing the bird in the oven, many do it. " I read in one of the posts where someone recommended 140. " Recommended to do what? Cook it? Real bad idea! Hold it hot after it gets to 165°? Sure that will keep it safe until ready to serve. You don't say anything about the starting condition of the bird. Was it still a bit frozen? There will be a delay. Did you use a known tested accurate therm to measure the bird and smoker temp? You can't trust that the stock smoker therm is accurate. I set my MES at 275 and it runs closer to 300°, so if I want 275 I set the MES at 250°. Lots of variables...JJ
 
Did you take any Q-view . . .
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Sorry no Q-view....I planned to but when I started having problems getting up to temp I was just concerned with getting it done.  It did look great however.
 
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