TAMPA – More than 1,500 people across Tampa Bay will sit down for a warm Thanksgiving meal thanks to Feeding Tampa Bay. The chefs and volunteers have been hard at work since before sunrise.
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The backstory:
FOX 13’s Kellie Cowan spent the morning with their chefs to see how the feast comes together and to gather a few turkey tips viewers can use at home.
What they’re saying:
Chef Daniel Graves, head chef at Feeding Tampa Bay, says the holiday is their biggest cooking day of the year.
“We’ve been preparing for this for about four or five days now. And we cook about 12 to 1,400 pounds of turkey, it’s about 140 to 150 birds,” Graves said.
Graves says volunteers play a crucial role.
“It’s all hands on deck obviously, the utilization of our volunteers is key to what we do and our staff, so we’ve been working long days, but it’s worth it because we get to give our food-insecure families a nice home-cooked meal and serve them with dignity and respect, which is really what we’re all about.”
The organization also distributed 10,000 turkeys, ingredients for sides and pies to Bay Area families so they could cook their own meals at home.
Turkey tips:
Chef Graves shared a simple approach to carving:
“There’s only six cuts you should make. The first two should be between the thighs and all you wanna do is push down. When you push down, the joint comes out, and then it’s a nice easy cut to get your thigh and your drummy,” Graves said. “Then use your body weight and your blade and guide your knife along the breastbone, almost like you would fillet a fish. The breast will come off nice and clean.”
For cooking, Graves recommends pulling the bird from the oven earlier than many expect.
“The other tip I would give is to let your turkey cook to about 155 to 160 degrees and then take it out and let it carry over to 170 outside of the oven, because remember if you cook your bird to 170 and then take it out and let it carry over, it’s going to go to another 10 to 15 degrees and that’s how you end up with dry turkey.”
Graves adds that pop-up timers are not dependable.
“I wouldn’t rely on the poppers. They’re unreliable, and you can get a thermometer anywhere,” Graves said.
The Source: Information for this story was gathered by FOX 13’s Kellie Cowan from interviews with Chef Daniel Graves of Feeding Tampa Bay.