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November 27, 2002, 8:30 a.m. Fried-Turkey Advocate What we can learn from Rich Lowry’s failure. By Chris McEvoy EDITOR'S NOTE: NRO’s Chris McEvoy offered some fried-turkey advice post-Thanksgiving last year, in response to some suspect cookery on the part of NR editor Rich Lowry. We flash back to this piece in hopes of fending off other such deep-fried failures.

he position of deep-fried-turkey advocate is not one to be taken lightly. You carry with you much responsibility, as not only the finished cuisine but the operation of dropping a trussed bird in a vat of boiling oil remain foreign to most people. Advocation can begin with describing the result: "This is the best bird you will ever have. The outer skin is crisp, the meat is succulent. Yes, the white meat, too. And, it's a rapid, invigorating process. Four worrisome hours in the kitchen are reduced to 45 thrilling minutes in the yard. You will not be disappointed."

Yet, our very own Rich Lowry was.

At an NRO editorial meeting a few weeks back, Rich asked enthusiastically if I'd be frying a bird again this year. No, I said, we'd be traveling to dinner. But I did rise to this call to advocacy. It was only a year earlier that I had described for Rich this new direction in holiday cooking. Rich was hooked then, and this year I encouraged him to join the friers.

"You should do it," I said, "It's not too late. It's never too late!"

On the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, Rich called from his cell. He was going for it — but only tentatively, and what might be termed disturbingly by true fry-heads. Rich was under the impression that he could deep-fry a bird stovetop, dropping select turkey sections in a smaller-than-standard pot of vegetable oil. I was appropriately scared for Rich and his family. This is an outside activity, I reminded him. And everything about it is large. Large pot, large burner, large attitude.

Rich was feeling it now, feeling large. He began a full inquisition. His tone was reporterly, and a touch demanding. With only 36 hours until Turkey Day, he was on the clock.

"Can I still buy the equipment?"

"Yes. This is an increasingly popular sport. Try Price Club, Costco."

"Is there anything to the recipe?"

"Absolutely. The bird is massaged in Cajun spices — paprika, pepper, and so on. You also need a cooking syringe. You inject the bird with a marinade."

"Where can I get exact instructions?"

"Hold on. . . . Okay, type 'deep fried turkey recipe' into Google. A hundred recipes will pop up."

"I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna do it."

"Go, man, go."

"Really, I'm gonna do it."

"Fly, man, fly."

Rich Lowry is, among many great things, a bona-fide turkey lover. How sad then was his face, on the Monday following Thanksgiving, when he said his deep-fried turkey was a failure. And how sad, too, was mine — the face of a failed advocate. Or was it?

Rich stood over my desk, describing his finished product: a black globoid of a thing, unworthy of plating. Then he revealed, piece-by-piece, how he went about the high-holy task of turkey frying. Relief filled me; Rich had bastardized the process. For shame.

There are a thousand and more nuances to the art of cooking, yet it has only three general parts: planning, preparation, and execution. Rich stumbled in each of these departments, and hence his meal was a disaster. Here's the report card.

Planning. Rich set out thinking large in this category. He bought the multi-gallon, stainless-steel oil basin and external rocket burner. He even purchased the more expensive peanut oil (high burning point, lends a good flavor) over the more ordinary lard or vegetable oil. But then, unthinkably, Rich went small. Rather than purchase the whole bird, he went for the mere breast. One can, I guess, fry anything. But this is the equivalent of skiing on a toothbrush. More, the theory of turkey frying is one of encasement, or entrapment. The whole, well-prepped bird (like many meats in their whole state) asks its juices to implode, rather than explode. It's a glorious cooking process that cannot be matched in any of the pre-separated parts. More on this below.

Preparation. As stated earlier, there is a dry rub and an injected marinade involved in the Cajun fried turkey. The rub can include paprika, red and black pepper, herbs, and salt, and it seems that Rich used something close to this. The baste can be concocted from beer, wine, cider, Worcestershire, seasoning, and any combination thereof. I admit to not prying too hard into what Rich used for his marinade. He found it "difficult to inject into the bird." His syringe "backed up." Simply, the final injection-marinade must be a non-viscous substance that will not "back up." The marinade should also be shot into the breast, thighs, back, wings, and drumsticks — impossible if one is breast-dependent. More, the bird can be injected and refrigerated a day in advance. This is the succulence insurance that Rich did not purchase.

Execution. Rich dropped his meager breast into the peanut oil. The oil temperature plummeted, never regaining its 350 degrees. The pot burbled. The breast deflated, blackening to the color of death along the way. Obviously, Rich had a temperature problem. When you drop something of lower temperature into something of higher temperature, the opposing elements will trade molecular speed with each other. The idea is to maintain an acceptable trade-off. If the submergible is too cold, it will pull too much heat from the oil. If the oil is at the suggested temperature, it will drop, every time. Question is, can you get it back? A good external burner can — so I question if Rich got his money-worth in btu's. Also, it's standard to ratchet the oil temperature higher than recommended at the start, letting it fall to the target zone when the bird drops in.

Rich had, truth be told, done some critical things right. He seems to have bought the correct equipment, for one. And his use of peanut oil was unexpected (there is a gourmet in this man). But mostly, Rich had gone for it — which this fried-turkey advocate still heartily recommends to all those in search of a better bird. Pluck it, stick it, fry it, eat it, love it. It's never too late.

A TURKEY REFERRAL:
As mentioned above, a quick Google search will turn up hundreds of fried turkey recipes, as well as outlets that sell quality outdoor frying rigs. Emeril Lagasse has a very representative Cajun-creole recipe, using smaller, quicker-cooking birds (8-10 lbs.). But as long as you play within the rules, you can be as experimental with this process as you want.