PREPARING A SAFE TURKEY
O. Peter Snyder, Jr., Ph.D.
Hospitality Institute of Technology and Management
 

It is well known that raw turkey and other poultry are highly contaminated with pathogens such as Campylobacter spp. (80-90%), Salmonella spp. (15%), Escherichia coli O157:H7 (5%), and Clostridium perfringens (40%), which survives the cooking process, etc. There is no effective government program to get poultry growers to control these hazards.

The government has left it up to you, the cook, to be the hazard controller. You must handle poultry safely and destroy the pathogens in order to avoid making your family and guests ill with diarrhea, vomiting, fever, etc. 
The following is a step-by-step process for assuring that you control the hazards and that the poultry that you serve will be safe.
 

1. Purchasing the turkey or chicken.

Frozen chicken or turkey will have slightly fewer pathogens, because freezing does reduce the number of pathogens on the bird, but it does not kill all of them. However, the turkey must then be thawed, which is a critical control point, because the contaminated drip can get all over the kitchen. If you buy fresh poultry or a thawed turkey, be very sure that none of the juice drips on any other foods that you purchase.
 

2. Thawing.

The USDA and FDA say that poultry should be thawed in the refrigerator. In today's cold refrigerator, this may take 4 days, and the highly contaminated juice from the bird can easily contaminate other foods in the refrigerator. Poultry should always be thawed on the bottom shelf so that there are minimal chances of cross-contamination.
Even better, poultry can be safely thawed on the counter. A 12-lb. turkey will take approximately 12 hours to thaw. Put it in a big pan on the counter and let it thaw overnight. As long as the temperature is less than about 50ºF, and the time is less than 24 hours, cooking easily controls the bacterial hazards. You can also thaw in the sink in flowing water. It is safe, but your kitchen, again, becomes contaminated with bacteria. 

When you believe that it is thawed, make absolutely sure. To do this, probe it in the middle to check for any ice. Many foodborne illnesses associated with turkey cooking are due to the fact that the bird is not totally thawed. When it is put in the oven, the middle, frozen part never cooks thoroughly, and pathogens survive. 

In summary, the critical step in thawing turkey is to make sure that the center is thawed and that you minimize getting any juice on kitchen surfaces.
 

3. Stuffing.

It is better not to stuff the turkey, but rather, to cook the stuffing in a separate pan. Just put some herbs and spices in the cavity of the bird. They give plenty of flavor. If you wish to stuff the turkey, however, remember, it is more difficult to heat the middle of the bird thoroughly, and it will take a longer time to cook. It is critical that you destroy the bacteria that are on the inside cavity of the bird.
If you want to stuff the bird the day before it is cooked, make the stuffing with cold water and cold ingredients so that the stuffing is about 50F when you stuff the turkey. If the temperature is less than 50F when you stuff the bird, the Staphylococcus aureus from your hands will not form toxins, and cooking will make the turkey safe. You may use cooked giblets, etc. in the stuffing, but cool them first.

 

4. Washing the poultry.

Do not wash poultry. When you wash poultry, the pathogens contaminate the sink, the faucet, other parts of the kitchen, your hands, etc. Washing poultry greatly increases the risk of foodborne illness from cross-contamination. The critical step is to get the turkey in the oven and kill the pathogenic bacteria as soon as possible. 
If you must wash the turkey, it is critically important that, when you are finished washing, you use soap and a lot of water to wash the sink thoroughly. It is not necessary, but you may wish to sanitize the sink by using 1 cup vinegar per 4 cups water. After the vinegar solution is on the surface, let it sit for 5 minutes to kill the bacteria. Chemical sanitizers are not recommended, because they are toxic and introduce small risks. 

 

5. Cooking the thawed turkey.

Put the turkey in the oven at 325F. Preferably, it is not stuffed. Put a thermometer into the breast of the turkey. Do not use a traditional, dial-type thermometer. The thermometer to use is the "old-fashioned" glass thermometer, because its tip measures the temperature, and that is what is important for accuracy. The dial thermometers measure temperature along the entire length of the 3-inch stem, which means that your measurement is only an average temperature over the 3 inches, and is very inaccurate.
If you have stuffed the turkey, you must cook the stuffed bird until the stuffing is above 150F. This assures a 10,000,000-to-1 kill of Salmonella. At this point, the breast will probably be 165F, which is very safe, and the thigh will be about 185F, which is necessary to make this muscle tissue soft. 

The critical temperature and time for cooking the turkey to assure safety is 150F for 1 minute for every part of the turkey. Above 150F, it is a quality issue.

Pan roasting, covered, is the preferred method, because the bird steams, which cooks it rather quickly and very thoroughly. Then, in the last 45 minutes, uncover the pan and let the turkey brown in the oven. This is a much more assured way to achieve a proper kill of the vegetative bacteria as opposed to cooking the bird uncovered. 

An oven-cooking bag works the same way as a roasting pan and is easier to clean up.
 

6. Cooking the turkey from the frozen state.

A very safe practice is to cook the turkey from the frozen state. Use the same oven temperature, 325F. Take off the plastic wrap. Cook it in the roasting pan, covered. After about 1 1/2 hours in the oven, the bird will be thawed. It will be hot on the outside, so use rubber gloves to handle the bird. You need to remove the giblets, neck, etc. Then, put the turkey back in the pan, cover, and roast as for a thawed turkey. The end temperature is the same, 150F for 1 minute.
 

7. Hot holding after cooking.

It is much better to get the turkey done a little early and hold it hot, than to be late and try to get it done by turning up the oven. You cannot rush the cooking. Plan so that the turkey is done 30 to 60 minutes before you want to serve. If the oven is available, simply turn the control to 140ºF hot hold.  You may want to open the oven and cool it for 10 minutes. Otherwise, the turkey will continue to cook. 
Alternatively, you can put the turkey on the platter, which will let it cool to 150F, cover with some foil, and return it to the oven. Keep the thermometer in the bird. If the temperature of the bird stays above 130F, there is absolutely no risk, and you could hold the turkey for 24 hours, if you wanted. 

You can also hold the turkey in the covered cooking pan on the counter, perhaps with a couple of heavy towels draped over it to keep the heat in. Again, if you keep the temperature of the bird above 130F, there is no pathogen growth.
 

8. After cooking.

Take the turkey out of the oven with clean utensils. Put it on a platter for service. Now is the time that your hands must be scrupulously clean. Before you start to carve the turkey, you must wash your hands thoroughly to remove any raw food bacteria that have contaminated your hands. Using clean, sanitized utensils, carve the turkey off of the bone. Now it is ready to serve. If there is stuffing, serve it with the turkey.
 

9. Enjoying your guests.

You have about 2 hours of time between removing the turkey from the oven and taking it back to the kitchen after the meal is finished to put the turkey leftovers into the refrigerator. One organism, Clostridium perfringens, does survive the cooking process. It has a "lag" of about 2 hours before it begins to multiply. When it does begin to multiply, it does so once every 15 minutes. Hence, it is critically important to begin to finish carving the rest of the bird in preparation for storage in the refrigerator. The turkey must also be cooled to 45F in less than 15 hours to control bacterial growth. This means, do not package your turkey leftovers over 2 inches thick. If you are careless about this, you could cause a foodborne illness. Slice the turkey into desired portions, preferably for 1 or 2 people. Freeze any portions that will not be eaten within 24 hours. 
 

10. Using the turkey meat. 

If you have followed the above steps after the turkey was cooked and served, and it was stored promptly in the refrigerator, reheating is not a critical control point for safety, and you can eat the leftover turkey in any way that you wish.
If you have "abused" the turkey, and it sat out for many hours, reheating will not guarantee the safety of your leftover turkey. Even if it tastes fine, you can become very ill with vomiting and diarrhea; illness-causing microorganisms do not normally cause food to smell or taste bad.

 

to HITM home page