Carve a Turkey - Temperature & Carry-Over Resting Time

Daniel Traster: I am Daniel Traster and I am showing you how to carve a turkey. In this step when our turkey has come out of the oven and hit our final 165 degree temperature we are going to just cover it with some aluminium foil. The foil is going to help to retain some of that temperature as the turkey rests. Most turkeys come with a built in pop-up plastic thermometer, you are welcome to rely on those; these are very reliable. However, a lot of professional chefs use an Instant Read Thermometer. An Instant Read Thermometer works at the tip and you insert the probe so the tip is in the thickest part of the meat. If you are reading the breast, that's the thickest part of the breast; in the thigh its the thickest part of the thigh.

You don't want to touch bone with the tip. The temperature you are looking for is a minimum of 165 degrees. However, you can pull it out a few minutes earlier and then put your foil on your bird and that will allow it to carry-over. It will transmit some of the temperature from the outside, some of that heat conducted towards the center so it's all nice and evenly warm and allow the juices to distribute. This takes about 20 minutes but it will give you much moisture bird.

So those are some tips on carry-over cooking, time, temperature, and resting. Next we are going to show you how to carve dark meat.