Jane. low and slow is all there is to smoking a turkey. low and slow. lots of babysitting because you can't put all of the fuel in at once and walk away. you can use charcoal and add a bit of soaked woodchips to generate smoke. My son has made a "chip pan". a small bread pan that has slits cut into it and he packs it with wet chips and sets it above the coals. last night though our county was issues a stay at home order for 28 days. we are only to go out for essentials, the doctor and something else.shrug. I personally don't understand. those are the things I leave home for normally.. oyvey! no businesses are open past 10:00 pm. (so, lets condense the persons into an even smaller timeframe to shop?just how many people swarm a grocery store at midnight? like walmart hours... I go if its an emergency for the medicine they might have that I might need.) and at those hours it was never busy. as if that is the moment covid is going to infect a person. I saw a comment that covid is being spread more in the evenings at restaurants and bars so therefore they are not allowed to be open past 10 now. ... it only infects people in the evenings? I find that hard to believe that they are pinpointing infections to be happening in the 10-12:00 window. so, my Thanksgiving dinner that has dwindled to smaller and smaller in size is pretty much my children and us now. only one doesn't live here as it is,my mom and dad which we already see regularly. two brothers out of the 5 siblings I still have. maybe 13 peoples to feed but a carry out plate is not off the offering either. happy to feed them but not if they have an inkling of being sick or happy to just send them off with a plate.
For me, low and slow is 225-250f and mostly I like crispy skin so poultry I run at 325-350. Turkeys are not fatty compared to pork so the whole rendering thing is wasted, but we do like a higher temp bird so I shoot for 180f with a meat thermometer or a loose thigh joint. Timing is a thing, but the BGE is more like an oven so its steady charcoal heat makes things predictable. I burn down wood to charcoal so its more like what they call lump charcoal except with wood flavor. No way I want raw wood burning, its not a tough old pig. I am going to use this little Jaccard meat tenderizer gizmo and all its little poking blades. Then the cavity will get moist veggies like onions and such.
Things have changed very little in our town ! Just wear your mask when shopping and use the sanitizer and no problem ! Our life goes on pretty much normally ! With few restrictions !
