Hopefully the bulk your holiday memories are good ones. While most of mine skew happy, perhaps my most memorable Thanksgiving experience is from Thanksgiving, 1982. It was the one time that the extended family opted to go out rather than have a home-cooked throwdown that was typical for us, and I ended up walking away from it (or, more accurately, crawling, as in to the loo, and repeatedly) with a bit of salmonella.
Several people who dined at this otherwise known to be good (by central Maine standards) establishment were afflicted, and it made the local news. But neither the notoriety nor having company made me feel a whit better at the time.
So in the spirit of supporting the making of happy memories for this Thanksgiving that steer clear of recreating my experience, we’d like to pass along some tips and pointers about safe turkey thawing.
Since this post is brought to you by the bacterium salmonella, a few introductory words are in order about this family of more than 2,000 similar forms of bacteria. Two varieties, Salmonella Enteritidis and Salmonella Typhimurium, are the most common and account by themselves for about half of the cases of sickness. These bacteria live in the digestive tracts of people and animals, and are passed through contact with human and animal wastes and unsafe meat handling and processing. Salmonella is described by the United States Department of Agriculture (UDSA) as the most common cause of food borne illness, and extreme cases brought about by salmonella poisoning sicken more than one million and claim 500 lives annually.
Fortunately, some very simple procedures and safeguards will help you keep this decidedly unwelcome visitor at bay.
You have three safe options for thawing your bird (details on each may be found here courtesy of the FDA): in the refrigerator, in a cold water bath and in the microwave oven.
For the first two, you will want to plan ahead: Refrigerator defrosting takes the most time at one to three days for a small bird. If you’ve got a gargantuan and glacial gobbler, you’ll probably want to use the next method, as a 20 pound bird can take up to 6 days to defrost in the refrigerator.
A cold water bath is a faster option. The USDA rule of thumb is a half hour of submersion per pound, so the large 20 pound bird will be adequately thawed in about 10 to 12 hours. Regardless of bird size, you will want to place your turkey in a sealed leak-proof bag, make sure the container you use is large enough for the entire turkey to be submerged, and you will want to replace your thawing bath water every half hour.
So, with the benefit of three days notice, you can plan ahead to get your bird ready for your guests. And be on the lookout for some thoughts on safe stuffing over the next couple days.
Photo courtesy of TheKosher via Wikimedia Commons
