How many pounds of bacon for a 12 pound turkey?

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WildFireEric

Senior Cook
Joined
Jun 18, 2007
Messages
292
Location
Sterling, VA
Have any of you come up with a formula for how much bacon to use to wrap a turkey? Should I just put a bunch of strips on it? cover the whole thing? put some in the cavity? use some in the cavity and not use any aromatics (eject the orange and lemon). Does using bacon mean I should squash my plans of using any glaze on it? I don't know if bacon would have a negative reaction with some of the typical stuff you'd use.

One thing I noticed is this bacon has more of an apple smoke smell when raw than it does after its cooked.

So, I'm planning on putting the turkey on my Weber OTS for a few hours at 350 or whatever with a few chunks of Apple like last year. But the bacon is the unknown variable this year. I don't know if it will contribute much smoke, block much smoke, add to the crispy turkey skin, not contribute. I plan on rubbing the turkey down with some olive oil before adding the bacon.

I lifted two pounds out to be safe, but not sure if that's enough. :shock:

Thanks in advance for any ideas.
 
Eric, I hate to be a stick in the mud..........but don't waste the bacon or ruin the turkey by wrapping it in bacon........have the bacon for breakfast and the turkey for dinner!
 
Fry the bacon and keep the drippings. Then soak cheese cloth in the drippings and then wrap the turkey and smoke away..or just inject the dripping into the turkey..... :D
 
I've never wrapped a turkey in bacon.

I've soaked cheesecloth in butter and laid that over the top of the bird to prevent over-browning during the cook and then remove it toward the end to get a nice even browning; but never bacon.
 
The Pickled Pig said:
You might get a better idea from the turbaconducken...

http://bacontoday.com/turbaconducken-turducken-wrapped-in-bacon/

Thanks Pickled Pig. Never heard of turbacon, but I can't guess that would be any worst than Oreobacon. I'll skip on an omlette idea that just hit me. I don't think Amy would go for a turbaconandeggs, unless I put some avocado in it.

Once again, thanks for all your suggestions. I'll let you know how it goes. Plan on brining/thawing out Wednesday night and putting it on the Weber around Noon Thursday.
 
all-raw-wrapped-assembled-front.jpg

Don't show this to JB.... :shock:
 
I concure with Larry & SS Don't wrap, Inject the breast's with Bacon grease
 
fry up the bacon with some home made biscuits and munch on it while you cook the turkey, but good luck either way
 
Well, I appreciate all your feedback.

After 3.5 days in the fridge, my 12 lb frozen Butterball was not quite thawed, so I dropped it in a stainless steel stock pot with cold tap water. After a few hours, it was thawed just enough to wiggle the neck out. I couldn't find the giblets, although I pulled all the plastic out. While researching a brine recipe and reading all the negative advice of brining this thing, the turkey finished thawing out.

I made a slightly modified Alton Brown Honey turkey brine recipe, with twice the honey and a tablespoon of as many spices that I could find. :shock: Even though this is an injected/self-basting bird, I figure by cutting the brine time in half (and the few hours of soaking in plain water), might result in a tasty bird with not too much added salt taste. We'll find out. :roll:

I'll take the bird out of the brine after 6 hours and let it dry for a few while I get the WSM up to a stable 350 degrees. Turkey top rack, drippings pan lower rack and sand in the water pan. I'll apply a pound of bacon to the breast and legs about halfway thru the cooking and put a few strips in the cavity along with the aromatics.

In case the gravy comes out a little salty, we can use unsalted butter and dilute the drippings if necessary. I'm not too worried. I think this should turn out. I'll post pictures later. Just have a turkey soaking in spicy honey-salt water right now.
 
; ; ;

Here's the pics so far. I decided to brine the the Butterball self-basting turkey, even though I don't have to. The reviews claim it is not very flavorful. I soaked the bird for a few hours in plain water and drained. Then I brined for 7 hours (1/2 the recommended brining time) with salt, several spices and sugar in an All-Clad stainless steel stock pot in the fridge. It took in about two cups of my brine. I stuffed a quartered onion, apple and some celery in the cavity along with poultry seasoning/brown sugar mixture on the skin and under the skin on the breast. After 90 minutes on the WSM at 300 degrees, I draped 1 pound of bacon on the turkey. I think it has about an hour to go. Amy is working on finishing the rest of the dinner so it will be ready in an hour or two. We have already hit the pumpkin pie after eating most of the stuffed eggs and celery sticks.
 
; ; ; ; ; ;


The end product was smokey and sweet. Not salty at all, which was a challenge since I brined a Butterball that was already injected with salt water. Since it took in two cups of the honey/salt/mixed spices brine in 7 hours, it tells me Butterball people did a crappy job :) The sweetness in the meat and drippings was probably a combo of the brown sugar on the skin, under the skin on the breast and honey brine. Very moist. Don't know if due to brine, bacon, aromatics in the cavity, or the chicken stock in the drippings pan that steamed. Cooked at 300 degrees for 3 hours until the breast hit 165. I used one cherry chunk, one apple chunk and a few handfuls of small apple tree twigs. Kingsford in a 1/2 Minion with a full chimney lit and dumped on top.

All in all a very fun, but slow smoke. We were tired for not getting to bed early the night before. I was up until almost 5am before hitting the rack for a few hours. Now that the chaos of Turbacon 08 is over, bring on Christmas 08. Yeehaww!!!! Black Friday starts in 2.5 hours. Will be in Leesburg Outlet stores!!!!!!
 
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