There's a built-in gas grill here in the backyard. It works great for burgers, etc., but it could use a little maintenance, so every now and then during the past week I have been cleaning and rebuilding it. It's over 10 years old, but things age well in the desert so even though it has been outside all that time it still operational.
During the course of taking it apart, I found a spit assembly in the base. That hasn't been used for at least 5 years. Will it work now?
I cleaned the crud off of it and plugged it in. A cranky sound came out of the black box. We're in business. We need a test. Earlier this week I bought a $5 turkey from Wal-mart. A 12-pound loss leader. It wasn't a Butterball, (They were more like $11), but I reasoned that a turkey chick doesn't know if it is going to grow up to be a Butterball or not, so I went for the less expensive bird. It has been thawing all week.
It is now 12:30 Mountain Time here in Tucson. I have never grilled a turkey in my life, but I am prepared to put my $5 at risk. You can be the judge as to how I do today.
I have gotten this far. I pulled the giblets and gizzard out of the turkey, along with the gravy bag, thereby avoiding an ordinary neophyte error that ends up on America's Funniest Videos and such. I read on the internet that you have to heat the bird indirectly. I don't have a pan, so I made an aluminum and stone pan to help redirect the heat and catch the drippings. Then I took a picture of it. (See photo, below)
The bird got a shower in the sink. We'll call her Doris. Then I took the sharpened end of the spit and placed it in Doris' backside, then through an onion Steve left behind in the fridge, and then out through her neck. Time to truss it up to keep in balanced. There is a weight on the spit that can be adjusted to balance the load, but it is important to tied down the legs and wings to keep them from flopping around.
There is no string in this house.
I looked everywhere, even on packages. I considered using the shoelaces from Steve's old sneakers, but thought better of it. A ha! Dental floss. We're good to go.
So I will smear some oil all over Doris, tie her up, adjust the fire and load the spit. I will let you know how this goes. Stay tuned.
