Juicy Roast Turkey With Sage

An elegant roast turkey that my family used for thanksgiving and turned out great! Works well with stuffed or unstuffed turkey. This is DEFINITELY hands on cooking, and requires the chef to get a little friendly with the turkey. Can be adapted to just a turkey breast easily, just use less cooking time and less butter and spices.

• Ready In: 45 mins
• Yields: 1 delicious roast turkey

Ingredients

• 1  whole turkey
• 3⁄4 cup  room temperature butter
• 1⁄2 cup sage
•  salt
•  pepper

Directions

1. Prep the ingredients before touching the turkey. Be sure that whatever you use, you can use only for this purpose, so you can wash the utensils immediately after use, to prevent contamination.
2. Cut sage into strips.
3. In a small bowl, mix sage with butter and a little salt and pepper.
4. Remove giblets from turkey, and rinse inside cavity and out.
5. Fold wings under underneath the turkey.
6. I find it easier to place in a roasting pan with rack to do the next few steps.
7. Here is where it starts to get a little personal: reach under skin on breast, at the neck end, and loosen skin on top all the way down the turkey, towards tail end.
8. Take a hunk of the butter mixture and place underneath the skin.
9. Repeat until butter is spread throughout turkey. YOU DO NOT HAVE TO USE ALL OF THE BUTTER. Size of turkeys vary greatly and depending on your bird you may use less. So far I have not had to use more.
10. Once butter is placed under skin, from the outside (hand not under skin) press butter down to spread out all across the breast.
11. If stuffing, stuff turkey now.
12. Cook until the temperature of the bird is 170F and the juices run clear.
13. Let rest for 20 minutes before carving.
14. For more elegant presentation, leave sage leaves whole and place under the skin face down in a decorative pattern.