Q: What is The cooking tempurature and time for a Twenty three and A half pound turkey that is stuffed? Should the stuffing be cooked before being placed in the bird or no ? Thank you and Happy Holidays
Taylor Patterson
Crete

A: We generally favor cooking the stuffing outside the bird (and renaming it dressing) and instead cutting up aromatic fruits, vegetable and herbs to place in the cavity of the turkey. That way you are free to use higher cooking temperatures and therefore shorter cooking times without the danger of food-bourne illness. Stuffing the bird, however, is a perfectly good choice. Simply stuff the raw, uncooked stuffing into the bird and roast at 325 F for 20-25 minutes per pound, in your case 6-9 hours. When you are nearing an internal temperature (of the stuffing) of 160 F and 170 F in the thickest part of the thigh, then increase your oven temp to 350 F and uncover the turkey to brown the it off. Be aware that it will continue cooking a bit after you pull it out of the oven, so if you feel you can achieve both desired temps simultaneously, it’s okay to pull it out of the oven just a bit before achieving the desired temps. The idea is to keep the breast meat from becoming dry. Just be sure to monitor it with your instant-read thermometer to confirm 160 F and 170 F respectively

Chef Adam, San Francisco, CA