Wampus - Thanks for all the info. Huge help! This Thanksgiving will be my first smoked turkey. Picked up the Turkey Cannon last week. The trussing with the cannon was also a question I had, so thanks for the answer and pics. I was wondering what your go-to liquid is for the cannon (do you mix some rub with the liquid)? I'm planning to brine and do an herb butter rub under the skin. Was considering injecting with melted butter as well. Is that overkill? Finally, curious what rub you used on the skin in the pics above. Was considering some Yard Bird. Thanks!
I used Simply Marvelous Pecan rub for that particular turkey in the photos above. Yard Bird will work great though.
I don't think brining and injecting butter is overkill at all. I do the same thing.
I ALWAYS brine. In the past few years, I've also injected melted butter into the bird. I ALSO use herb butter under and over the skin too. The results are fantastic.
If there's one thing that I'd say MAY be too much is to do the herb butter AND a BBQ rub. Personally, I'd go with one or the other.
Those photos above were from
THIS COOK THREAD that I put up (which apparently doesn't have the photos attached to it any more for some reason). While the results were fantastic, all I did was rub the bird with SM Pecan and put some apple juice with that same rub in the Cannon. I've also used a little beer mixed with AJ as well I think. Whatever seasoning I'm using on the bird, I'll just add some of that into the liquid that's in the cannon. Apple juice works well. I also rubbed the inside of the cavity well with the SM rub before loading on the cannon.
HERE is a turkey thread I put up about last year's Thanksgiving Turkey for our family that was outstanding. This has become my "go to" technique...just brine, butter injection, herb butter and cook it. If the turkey's too big to use the Cannon (usually anything larger than about 12 lbs won't work well on the Cannon), I'll just stuff the cavity with aromatics, truss it, rub it and smoke it.
Good luck!
