We want to spend a lot more time in our RV during the holidays, but always wondered how we were going to cook the big traditional holiday meal. Well, the bbq and campfire smokers and grillers inspired us to try something new: smoking a whole turkey on the Weber Kettle Grill.
This is a super fun way to cook a turkey, and even though we have never tried it before, it came out BOMB! Like all smoking, there is quite a bit of preparation involved. But once everything is cooking, there isn’t really a whole lot to do, so we still categorize this as an easy camping meal!
We got up pretty early and started getting the turkey prepared. We washed it down with cold water and got all of the giblets out. Then we patted it dry and got the skin separated from the bird. Next up, we got the seasonings ready. We were shooting for traditional flavors, so we mixed up some sage, thyme, rosemary, kosher salt, garlic sales, and some garlic cloves into about a cup or so of softened butter. Then we put a nice layer between the meat and the skin so it could baste as it smoked. We also hit the outside of the turkey with olive oil and rubbed the outside down with the same mixture.
While we let that marinate for a minute, we went outside to get the Weber going. You don’t need a whole lot of fancy equipment for this one. We had some Cowboy hardwood charcoal, a smoker box, some hickory wood chips, the Weber chimney starter, and a digital meat thermometer. And of course, the Weber kettle grill.
We used a modified version of the snake method because we were expecting roughly 30 minutes per pound, so roughly 8 hours for our 16lb bird. We went ahead and got the fire started and then threw the turkey on. 250 seemed to be about the right temp to cook on according to several recipes. Took a bit more work to keep it up that high vs. 225, where we normally do our briskets, and I was chasing it around for the first few hours until I got it stable around 250.
From there, it was really easy. We left it cooking for just 7 hours instead of 8 because the internal thermometer popped out. The white meat was just a tad drier than I had hoped (but still not bad at all). I think next time, I will budget for about 25 minutes per pound, so I probably should have pulled it off about 6.5 hours in instead of 7. Still, it came out really good and I know I can do it even better next time.
Highly recommend you give this a shot. The smokey turkey is really good and a nice change of pace, and doing it on the Weber is a lot of fun for the whole family to get involved and just hang out by the BBQ. Especially for campers because those RV ovens are small. With some experience doing it this way, you can be the star of the campground and have all kinds of happy campers.
Always nice to challenge yourself and do something new. Especially when everything comes out so good! Added on a few lbs., made some fun memories cooking with the love of my life, and have another awesome recipe to roll out at all of our holiday events, and THAT’S #WhyWeWork! See you on the next adventure!
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