What to put in roasting pan with turkey

Want to serve a moist turkey with crispy golden skin this Thanksgiving? Our roast turkey recipe will give you the confidence you need for your turkey to come out perfectly--even if it's your first time.

With our perfect roast turkey recipe, you can rest assured that your turkey will turn out when the big day arrives. You'll also want to check out our recipes for popular giblet gravy and turkey stuffing.

• Why This Recipe Works
• Ingredients
• Turkey Cook Time
• How to Make
• How to Thaw
• The Brining Debate
• Stuffing
• Carving
• Recipe FAQs
• Serve
• Store
• Expert Tips
• Recipe
• Comments

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Why This Recipe Works

• Stuffed with Aromatics: Infuse a nice flavor into the meat when you stuff the cavity with aromatics. We used celery leaves, carrots, and quartered yellow onion.
• Dry Skin: Don't rinse the turkey, as it spreads harmful bacteria around your kitchen. Instead, pat it dry with paper towels and let it sit on the counter in a roasting pan for an hour to warm up to room temperature.
• Butter: Slather softened butter on the turkey's skin, (It will only stick if the skin is dry.) then season generously with salt and pepper.
• Roast: Use an oven thermometer and preheat the oven to 400°F then turn down the temperature to 350°F just before placing the turkey on the lower rack so it can cook in the center of the oven. Use a meat thermometer to check when it's done. The turkey breast should be 165°F and the thigh 175°F. (Factor in carry-over cooking, where the temperature will rise 10°F in 10 minutes.)
• Rest: Place the turkey on a grooved cutting board and tent with foil. Let it rest for 30 to 60 minutes so the juices can redistribute, making the meat more moist. Carve it in ½ inch slices so the meat doesn't dry out.

Ingredients

Our perfect roast turkey recipe takes basic pantry staples. Let's talk about the key ingredients.

• Aromatics: We used celery leaves, carrots, and yellow onions in the cavity of the bird.
• Dairy: We used butter all over the skin of the turkey, but you could also use duck fat or olive oil.
• Broth: We used low sodium chicken broth to help keep the meat moist while roasting and to make the giblet gravy.
• Spices: We used coarse kosher salt, black pepper, and table salt.
• Meat: We used a fully thawed, 14 pound turkey.

Turkey Cook Time

How long do you cook a turkey? Knowing the right amount of time it takes to cook a turkey for the holidays can be stressful. Erase the guess work with our Thanksgiving day turkey cook time guide. This guide is for an unstuffed turkey cooked at 350°F.

How to Make

Gather all the ingredients to make our perfect roast turkey. Measure out the spices and butter. Pour the chicken broth and cut up the aromatics: onions, carrots, and celery leaves.

1. Let the turkey sit to warm up to room temperature for an hour for a larger bird. This will allow for more even cooking and a more juicier roasted bird. While you are waiting, prep the roasting pan (affiliate) and place a rack inside. If you don't own a rack, make your own with three pieces of heavy duty foil crunched up to make a snake, then spiral it up. You can also try using root vegetables (carrots, onions, and potatoes).
2. To prep the bird, remove the plastic clamp from the legs and discard. Remove the neck and giblets and keep them for stock, giblet gravy, or stuffing. Don't rinse. Pat the inside and outside dry with paper towel. Allow the skin to dry out for the perfect roast turkey.

3. Center the turkey on the rack and in the roasting pan for the best air circulation. Make sure the breast side is up and the drumsticks are up. Rub kosher salt and black pepper in the inside of the cavity, then loosely stuff it with aromatics, fresh herbs (parsley, thyme, sage, rosemary, bay leaves), or quartered fruit (apples, lemons). It's a great way to help increase the flavor from the inside out.

4. Rub the skin all over with a fat (butter, olive oil, or duck fat), then liberally salt and pepper the skin.  Cover the cavity opening with a piece of crumpled foil.

5. Pour a liquid in the roasting pan to prevent the drippings from drying out.  We used low sodium chicken broth, but water or wine would also work.

6. If you want to truss the cavity, tuck in the tail, pull the skin together, and overlap it.  Secure the skin in place with kitchen twine, cotton thread, toothpicks, or a wooden skewer. (For ease, we skipped this step.)

If you want a pretty presentation when serving the whole roasted bird on a platter, truss the legs with kitchen twine.  You can choose to cross the legs or place them side by side.

Tuck the wings underneath. This prevents them from burning and helps the turkey sit flatter. For the photos below, instead of tucking the wings under the bird, we choose to secure the wings by tying them with kitchen twine.  This helps the wings stay out of the cooking liquid, allows the wings to nicely brown, and helps the bird keep a compact shape.

7. Preheat the oven to 400°F. Use an oven thermometer to find out the correct temperature. Just before putting the bird in the oven, lower the temperature to 350°F. Place the uncovered bird on a lower rack so the turkey is in the center of the oven with the drumsticks pointing toward the back.

After 1 ½ hours of cooking, take it out to baste it.  You can use the pan drippings, melted butter, olive oil, or melted duck fat.  We used a large metal spoon to baste it with the drippings, but you can also use a turkey baster, ladle, or a pastry brush. If you find the top of the breast or the tips of the wings are browning too fast, cover them loosely with foil.

8. Continue basting every 30 minutes until the meat is 165°F when it's temperature is taken with a meat thermometer.  For this 14 pound bird, it was basted it at the 90 minute mark, two hours, two and a half hours, three hours and three hour 20 minutes.

Each time we put it back into the oven, we would rotate the pan, so it the legs would face to the right then to the left.  We wouldn't recommend putting the legs facing forward as it would dry out the breast meat since it's hotter at the back of the oven.

It is done when the temperature is 165°F and the juices run clear when the meat is sliced.  Take the reading by placing the meat thermometer (affiliate) on the thickest part of the thigh, but not touching the bone.

It's vitally important that you check the temperature and not just go by eye; you can get sick if it isn't cooked properly.

9. Once it's cooked, let it rest for 30 minutes to 1 hour, tented with foil, on a grooved cutting board. This will let the juices redistribute throughout, making it more moist.  Also, when it's cooled, it is much easier to carve. While it is resting, make your giblet gravy or a quicker homemade gravy.

10. Before serving, remove the kitchen twine.  Place on a large platter and arrange the kale, lemon wedges, orange peel slices, cranberries and fresh sage leaves around the edges.

Our recipe is easy and foolproof.  The bird is slathered in butter, stuffed with aromatics, sprinkled with salt and pepper, and placed breast side up in a pan of chicken stock.  It's simple to do and gets wonderful reviews from hungry family members and friends.

How to Thaw

What is the safest and easiest way to thaw a turkey? The best way is to place the frozen turkey in it's original packaging on a tray breast side up. Allow for one day for every 4 pounds, so a 16 pound turkey will take 4 days to thaw. You can safely store a fully thawed turkey for another 1 or 2 days in the fridge before cooking it.

What is the best way to thaw a turkey quickly? Keep the turkey in it's original packaging and submerge it in ice water in the kitchen sink. Make sure you change the ice water every 30 minutes. This will keep the water ice cold and will ward off contaminating bacteria.

Can I thaw my turkey on the counter? It's never a good idea to thaw a turkey at room temperature (best in the fridge or ice water) because the turkey will thaw on the outside and the temperature of the bird will rise above 40°F, which will cause bacteria to multiply quickly and could make someone sick.

How do you know it's thawed? Use a probe thermometer, and test it at the breast and thighs. It should be fridge temperature which is 32°F to 40°F.

What if it isn't completely thawed? The good news is turkeys are safe to cook if they are still frozen or partially frozen. A partially frozen turkey will take 25% longer to cook and a mostly frozen turkey will take 50% longer.

The Brining Debate

What is better: unbrined, salt-water brined, or dry brined turkey? There are chefs in each camp, so pick what's best for you this holiday season.

Wet Brine: Some home cooks like to brine their turkey because it yields juicy, tender meat. It's best to brine an organic or wild turkey, as most store-bought turkeys have already been brined.

To do this, place your fully or partially thawed turkey in a brining bag or pot breast side down, then pour in the brine and refrigerate for 8 to 18 hours. Flip the bird half way through. When done, rinse with cold water for a few minutes in a clean sink. Pat dry with paper towels, then allow the bird to sit uncovered in the fridge for at least 8 hours to help dry the skin out.

Dry Brine: Other chefs boast that a dry brine will get crispier skin on a turkey and a richer, more concentrated flavor in the meat because the spice mixture is rubbed on top of and under the skin. This method is easier than a wet brine, cuts out the unnecessary added water, and the amount of salt can be more closely measured.

To use this method, start with a thawed or partially thawed turkey when you apply the dry rub under and on top of the skin. Next, place it uncovered on a tray in the fridge for 1 to 3 days. There is no need to rinse off the dry rub before cooking.

No Brine: Most grocery store turkeys, like Butterball turkeys, are already brined--meaning they are injected with a water and salt solution. For this recipe, we didn't brine the bird, and our taste testers agreed that the meat was juicy and skin was crisp.

Stuffing

Should you stuff the turkey or cook the stuffing separately? This is a topic of great debate. Historically, people liked to stuff a turkey because it yields a moister stuffing, a flavorful stuffing, and saves space in the oven. In more recent years, food scientists have proven that cooking the stuffing separately can protect you from food borne illness, allows you to adjust the moisture and flavor, and gets a crisp, golden-brown crust. For a flavorful stuffing, check out our bread stuffing recipe.

If you are a traditionalist and you want to stuff your turkey, follow these safety precautions. Start off by using cooked ingredients and put the stuffing in a fully thawed, unbrined turkey just before roasting. Avoid over stuffing by using ¾ cup per pound. All parts of the stuffing need to be cooked to 165°F, so check with a digital thermometer. Typically the turkey is done before the stuffing, so remove the stuffing and finish cooking it in a buttered casserole dish while the turkey is resting.

Carving

There is more than one way to carve a turkey, so you'll have to find a method that suits you best.  Watch this method from Culinary Institute of America, or do this popular way.

• Let it rest for 1 hour, tented with foil, or until you can touch it without burning your hands.
• Remove the legs.
• Remove the wishbone by cutting an upside down V in the flap of the neck cavity.
• Remove the breast meat and carve it ½ inch thick.
• Separate the drumsticks from the thigh.
• Debone and carve the thigh meat ½ inch thick.
• Remove the wings and separate the wing tip, wingette, and drumette.
• Keep the carcass (2 thigh bones, 2 wing bones, and 1 wish bone) for broth.

Recipe FAQs

What is the safest way to thaw a turkey?

The safest way to thaw is in the fridge.  A good rule to follow is to allow the meat to thaw 24 hours for every 4 pounds. This means if it is 14 pounds, it will take 3 ½ days for it to thaw.  Place the packaged bird on a baking tray, large platter, or small roasting pan and let it thaw in the fridge. See what the USDA says about thawing meat safely.

How can I have a crispy, golden brown skin?

Pat dry the inside cavity and outside skin with paper towel.
Allow the skin to dry out.  Let the bird's skin dry out by letting it sit on the counter to warm up to room temperature, or place it on a baking tray and let it sit in the fridge for 4 to 24 hours.
Apply a fat to the outer skin.  Butter, olive oil, and duck fat are all good options.
Baste the skin.  Use pan drippings, melted butter, olive oil, or melted duck fat.

What are some tips to have a moist, juicy roasted bird?

Roast two small ones instead of one large one.
Start with a room temperature bird.
Use a roasting rack.
Season the inside cavity and the skin.
Butter under the skin and on top of the skin.
Don't overcook.
Cover areas that are browning too quickly.
Let it rest, tented, for 30 minutes to 1 hour before carving.
Slice the breast and dark meat thicker, like ½ inch thick.

Should I truss the legs?

If you want your whole turkey to look it's best on the platter, trussing the legs is the way to go.  By trussing the legs, the bird will have a more compact shape and it won't spread out when roasting.
Use kitchen twine, unflavored dental floss, 100% cotton thread, or fishing line to tie the ends of the legs together.  Most chefs choose to cross the legs before tying, others place them side by side.
If you choose not to truss the legs, it will not affect the taste.  Chefs who choose not to say the leg meat cooks quicker as the air circulation is better.

Serve

Roasted turkey tastes amazing with some other traditional Thanksgiving and Christmas side dishes. To round out your holiday table, we suggest serving mashed potatoes, stuffing, giblet gravy, green beans, sweet potatoes, mac and cheese, corn casserole, cranberry relish, dinner rolls, salad and pies.

Store

• Leftovers: Place any meat in the fridge tightly covered for up to 4 days. Leftover turkey bones can be sealed in a freezer bag and stored in the freezer for up to one year.  Check out our recipes for stock and giblet gravy.
• Reheat: Place the leftover sliced meat in a pan with sides.  Add some moisture (roughly 1 cup of chicken stock) and some fat (1 tablespoon of butter) and cook at 350°F for 30 minutes.  This method does require patience, but will produce moist leftover meat.
• Freeze: Any leftover meat can be placed in a ziptop bag and frozen for up to 2 months.

Expert Tips

• Let it warm up to room temperature for 1 hour before roasting.
• Put the oven rack at the bottom.  It should roast in the center of the oven.
• Rub the patted dry cavity with kosher salt and stuff it with aromatics to flavor the meat from the inside out.
• Rub the skin all over with butter and kosher salt for crispy golden skin.
• Roast it with the drumsticks at the back of the oven for the first hour and a half.
• Baste it with pan juices or brush with melted butter.
• Tent the bird with foil and let it rest for 30 minutes to 1 hour before carving.  This will let the juices redistribute.

Other Side Dishes You'll Love

• 
  

  Sour Cream Mashed Potatoes

• 
  

  Grandma's Bread Stuffing Recipe

• 
  

  Chick-fil-A Mac and Cheese Recipe

• 
  

  Buttermilk Pie Recipe

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Recipe

Perfect Roast Turkey

Our perfect roast turkey is an easy recipe for beginners that want to cook a whole turkey in a roasting pan with a homemade rack for Thanksgiving.  It shows you what herbs are best for seasoning a bird so your unstuffed turkey comes out moist when cooked in your kitchen oven.

4.2 from 5 votes

Course: Dinner

Cuisine: American

Keyword: How to cook a turkey in the oven to be moist, leftover turkey recipes

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Cook Time: 3 hours 20 minutes

Total Time: 3 hours 40 minutes

Servings: 14 servings

Calories: 477kcal

Author: Brooke

Ingredients 0.5x1x2x

US ImperialMetric

For the Turkey

• ▢14 pound turkey, fully thawed
• ▢2 tablespoons salted butter, softened
• ▢⅛ teaspoon salt
• ▢⅛ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• ▢2 cups chicken broth

For the Aromatics

• ▢2 carrots, cut in 1 ½ chunks
• ▢1 onion, cut in quarters
• ▢handful of celery leaves

Equipment

• roasting pan

• turkey baster

• Aluminum foil

• meat thermometer

Instructions

Preparing

• Allow 4 days for it to defrost in the refrigerator for a 15 pound bird. (24 hours for every 5 pounds.) It's safe to allow one extra day for it to totally thaw.

• Take the thawed bird out of the fridge so it can warm up to room temperature.  This can take 1 hour.

• Remove packaging plus the plastic clamp from the legs and discard. Remove the neck, giblets (heart, liver, gizzard) and possibly a gravy bag from the body or neck cavity.  You can throw them out or keep them for giblet gravy or giblet stuffing.

• Skip the rinsing (unless you brined your turkey.) The FDA doesn't recommend rinsing because it could spread potentially harmful bacteria up to 3 feet around your kitchen from tiny droplets of water that splash off. Instead place it breast side up on a baking tray and pat the cavity and outside dry with paper towels. Allow the skin to dry out for crispier skin.

• If you don't have a roasting rack, make your own with foil.  Take a long sheet of aluminum foil and roll it up tightly from one of its long sides to make a snake.  Cut two more sheets of foil and wrap them tightly around the snake to make a firm rope.  The snake needs to be able to support a 14-pound turkey without flattening.  Shape the coil into a lowercase "e" shape and place in the roasting pan. Some other ideas are root vegetables (carrots, onions, and potatoes) or foil-covered paving bricks.

Preparing the Oven & Aromatics

• Lower the oven rack to the bottom, or second from the bottom.  This helps the turkey roast in the center of the oven. Place an oven proof thermometer inside the oven to get a more accurate reading. Preheat the oven to 400°F.

• Center the turkey on the rack and in the roasting pan for the best air circulation. Make sure the breast side is up and the drumsticks are up. Rub kosher salt and black pepper in the cavity before placing the aromatics (onion, carrots, and celery leaves) or fresh herbs (parsley, thyme, sage, rosemary, bay leaves) or quartered fruit (apples, lemons) inside the cavity.  The aromatics will flavor it from the inside, but will be thrown out after it's roasted.  Crumple up a piece of foil to cover the cavity opening or skip down to truss the cavity.

Last-Minute Touches

• Rub the skin all over with softened butter.  Make sure the skin is dry; otherwise the butter (oil or duck fat) won't stick. Generously sprinkle with kosher salt and black pepper to help add extra flavor.

• If you want to truss the cavity, tuck in the tail, pull the skin in place with the kitchen twine, cotton thread, toothpicks or a wooden skewer. (Optional. For ease, we skipped this step and used crumpled up foil to cover the opening.)

• Cross the legs and tie the drumstick ends tightly together. Tuck the wings under the body, for a more compact look, or if you prefer, bring the twine under the wings to lift them up higher so they can brown better.  Tie the twine in a knot at the neck opening.  This helps the wings stay out of the liquid, allows them to brown nicely and helps the turkey keep a compact shape.

• Pour 2 cups of chicken or vegetable stock into the roasting pan.

Roasting

• Place the bird uncovered in the oven with the drumsticks facing the back. Decrease the oven temperature to 350° F.

• Roast the turkey for 1 ½ hours.  Using a turkey baster, spoon or pastry brush, baste the drippings all over the turkey.  You can use the pan drippings, melted butter, olive oil, or melted duck fat. Do this at the 1 ½ hour mark and every 30 minutes afterward until it's done.  Each time it's basted, place the drumsticks facing the left one time, then the right the next time.  Don't put the breast facing the back of the oven, as it will dry out the meat.  (A 14-pound turkey would be basted a maximum of 5 times: 1 ½ hours, 2 hours, 2 ½ hours, 3 hours, and when it comes out of the oven.)  If the turkey is browning too quickly, cover loosely with foil.

• Roast the turkey for 13 minutes per pound.  A 14-pound turkey will take just over 3 hours.  Use a meat thermometer to check the temperature in the deepest part of the thigh away from any bones.  The temperature should read 165°F, and the juices should be clear when the thermometer is pulled out. Factor in the carry-over cooking where the internal temperature will increase roughly 10 degrees. Check food safety guidelines from the USDA for more info.

• Save the pan juices to make homemade giblet gravy.

Resting the Turkey

• Let the turkey rest, breast side up, on a large cutting board with grooves or on a tray with sides for 30-60 minutes.  Tent the turkey loosely with foil.  When it rests, the internal temperature of the thighs will continue to rise to 175°F - this is called carry-over cooking.  The resting time allows the juices to redistribute, so the turkey will be more moist.  Check the temperature again after 10 minutes. The turkey will release juices onto the cutting board during this resting time.

• Before serving, remove the kitchen twine. To make a pretty presentation, place the bird on a large platter and arrange with kale, lemon wedges, orange peel slices, cranberries and fresh sage leaves.

• Carve the turkey in this order: legs, wishbone, ½ inch breast meat, separate the drumsticks from the thighs, debone and carve the thigh meat, remove the wings and separate the wing tip, wingette and drumette.  Keep the carcass for turkey stock, bone broth, or turkey soup.

• Don't keep the cooked turkey at room temperature for more than 2 hours.  Refrigerate or freeze any leftovers. 

• Serve the turkey warm with gravy, stuffing, cranberry sauce, and other traditional Thanksgiving side dishes.

Notes

• Let it warm up to room temperature for 1 hour before roasting.
• Put the oven rack at the bottom.  It should roast in the center of the oven.
• Rub the patted dry cavity with kosher salt and stuff it with aromatics to flavor the meat from the inside out.
• Rub the skin all over with butter and kosher salt for crispy golden skin.
• Roast it with the drumsticks at the back of the oven for the first hour and a half.
• Baste it with pan juices or brush with melted butter.
• Tent the bird with foil and let it rest for 30 minutes to 1 hour before carving.  This will let the juices redistribute.

Nutrition

Calories: 477kcal (24%)Carbohydrates: 2g (1%)Protein: 70g (140%)Fat: 20g (31%)Saturated Fat: 6g (38%)Polyunsaturated Fat: 5gMonounsaturated Fat: 6gTrans Fat: 1gCholesterol: 237mg (79%)Sodium: 526mg (23%)Potassium: 768mg (22%)Fiber: 1g (4%)Sugar: 1g (1%)Vitamin A: 1688IU (34%)Vitamin C: 1mg (1%)Calcium: 42mg (4%)Iron: 3mg (17%)

Our roasted turkey recipe was originally published on September 7, 2017 and was updated on July 5, 2019 with refreshed photos and content. The post was republished on October 7, 2022 with resized images and refreshed content.

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