Housekeeping: Happy Turkey Day in the States

Tim Healey
by Tim Healey

Yeah, it’s that time of year again. Except this year, it won’t be normal.

Many of us are foregoing holiday gatherings outside our household, or still getting together but at much smaller gatherings. Some of us are driving, instead of flying.

As for me, my parents and I were on the fence. We could’ve limited the gathering to three people, they live within easy driving distance, I wouldn’t even have to stay the night on either end … and yet, we decided to play it super safe and not gather. So I’m doing my first-ever turkey and praying it works out. Leftovers for days!

Whatever you do, please stay safe. I hope that if you must gather outside your household, you keep the gatherings small and mask up as much as possible. No one wants Covid as an uninvited guest.

That’s all I’ll say on that matter, other than trust the CDC and health experts. As for TTAC, well, the usual turkey-day shut down commences this afternoon, with scattered posts, including some advertorial content that helps us pay the bills, likely over the long weekend.

Enjoy the food, football, and family, do what you can to avoid this nasty virus, and see you back here, hopefully hearty and healthy, come Monday.

[Image: Drazen Zigic/Shutterstock.com]

Tim Healey
Tim Healey

Tim Healey grew up around the auto-parts business and has always had a love for cars — his parents joke his first word was “‘Vette”. Despite this, he wanted to pursue a career in sports writing but he ended up falling semi-accidentally into the automotive-journalism industry, first at Consumer Guide Automotive and later at Web2Carz.com. He also worked as an industry analyst at Mintel Group and freelanced for About.com, CarFax, Vehix.com, High Gear Media, Torque News, FutureCar.com, Cars.com, among others, and of course Vertical Scope sites such as AutoGuide.com, Off-Road.com, and HybridCars.com. He’s an urbanite and as such, doesn’t need a daily driver, but if he had one, it would be compact, sporty, and have a manual transmission.

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 5 comments
  • Pig_Iron Pig_Iron on Nov 25, 2020

    Wishing everyone a wonderful Thanksgiving. ❤

  • ToolGuy ToolGuy on Nov 26, 2020

    Roasting a turkey is all about heat transfer. The Truth About Food Safety: The "165F" guideline is way oversimplified - the reality is time *and* temperature. See the chart here: https://tinyurl.com/y34a3wvu If you wait for the 'built-in' thermometer to pop, you're gonna have dry turkey. Look at your raw turkey the way a good engineer would look at it (not some slacker conformist engineer - lol). Now flip it over (breast down, legs slightly elevated) for most of the cooking time. [A piece of welding wire is ideal for holding it in place.] The fat will render down into the naturally-dryer breast meat. Then flip it over for the last ~40-60 minutes so the top browns, and serve it like normal people do (but you roasted it upside down, because physics). If you are focused on heat transfer, you realize it would be silly to stuff the body cavity of the turkey with actual "stuffing." But you do want to put some room-temperature flavorizing moisturizing goodness in there - celery tops, onion quarters, diced apple, citrus if you choose, herbed butter, salt and pepper. And rub herbed butter under the skin of the turkey.

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    • ToolGuy ToolGuy on Nov 27, 2020

      "Drier" not "dryer" (neither word applies to this year's bird as it was incredibly moist). A Bernzomatic TS7000 Trigger Start Torch Head with an appropriate container of C3H8 can be helpful in evening out the browning on the skin. Note that the TS7000 is pressure regulated for consistent performance when inverted, while the knob on the TS7000 lets you adjust the flame for detailed turkey browning work. Also note that the TS7000 can expose you to chemicals including lead, which is known to the State of California to cause cancer and birth defects or other reproductive harm. Finally, note that the TS7000 is no longer in production.

  • Tankinbeans Tankinbeans on Nov 26, 2020

    Happy Thanksgiving, y'all.

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