Grilled Thanksgiving Camping Turkey Recipe With Instructions How To Cook Turkey While Camping! (2024)

5 from 6 votes

Course: Dinner Camping Recipes

Cuisine: American

Prep Time: 15 minutes minutes

Cook Time: 2 hours hours

Total Time: 2 hours hours 15 minutes minutes

Author: Kim Hanna

Butter Blend

• 4 tablespoons butter softened
• 4 cloves garlic minced
• 1 tablespoon cayenne pepper
• 1 tablespoon black pepper
• 1 tablespoon kosher salt
• 1 teaspoon thyme
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano

The Turkey

• 8 pound turkey remove the legs and wings and store them for another use. NOTE: If you need a bigger turkey (to feed more people), just make sure it will fit inside the cooking vessel you are using.

Aromatics

• 1 large onion quartered
• 1 orange quartered
• 1 lemon quartered

Gravy Without Drippings

• 1 stick unsalted butter
• 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 (32 oz) carton chicken stock
• Salt and black pepper to taste

Turkey

• Mix the butter blend in a small bowl.

• Butter the bird and flavor the cavity. Clean the turkey then gently lift the skin around the cavity and spread the seasoned butter under the skin but be careful not to tear the skin … it needs to hold in all that butter while the bird is cooking. Take any remaining butter and spread it inside the cavity. Then add the aromatics inside the cavity.

• Cook it. Pre-heat your grill or oven to 350 degrees and cook according to package instructions for the size of your turkey (approximately 15 minutes per pound).

• Get your charcoal going, enough to do a ring of coals around the grill’s kettle drum for indirect heating. Don’t place coals in the center of the charcoal grate.

• Fill the water pan with water to keep the turkey moist. See our Simple DIY Modifications For A Weber Smokey Joe Smoker Conversion post for more information and photos. https://www.campingforfoodies.com/simple-diy-modifications-for-a-weber-smokey-joe-smoker-conversion/

• Place the turkey onto the cooking grate (located above the water pan grate). Situate the turkey upright so the aromatics stay in the cavity and in the center of the grate to avoid direct heat.

• Now for the toughest part: maintaining a constant 350 degree temperature inside the grill. You’ll have to open or close the grill vents to raise and lower the temperature. This is where science comes in to play. Just remember this … It’s all about the oxygen … starve the fire by closing the vents and the fire burns out. Feed the fire by opening the vents to add more oxygen.

• You’ll want to cook the bird according to the weight so check the directions on the package for specifics (approximately 15 minutes per pound). Our experience has found that the smaller the grill, the faster the bird cooks (even when maintaining the appropriate internal grill temperature.)

• Ambient conditions impact cooking times so use a quick-read thermometer to check the progress. Like all good campers, be flexible! Your turkey may be done sooner or later than you anticipate so just be ready either way. Recommended doneness is 160 degrees for internal breast temperature.

• Serve it. Carve your turkey and serve it up with all of your sides. This is one of the recipes we make when we are camping on Thanksgiving. See our entire menu on our Traditional Thanksgiving Dinner At The Campsite post

Gravy Without Drippings

• Place a medium saucepan or cast iron skillet over medium heat.

• Add butter to pan.

• Once butter is melted, add flour a little at a time using a whisk to incorporate with the butter.

• Continue stirring with the whisk to remove the raw flour taste, about one minute.

• Slowly add the chicken stock to the pan, whisking continuously.

• Continue cooking and whisking until the gravy reaches the consistency you like. The longer it cooks, the thicker it will become. This should take about 5-10 minutes.

• Remove the pan from heat and season with salt and pepper, to taste.

Camp Cooking Tip: We decided to use a turkey with the legs and wings removed because we were using our little modified Smokey Joe to cook the turkey while camping on this particular trip. The legs and wings cook faster than the rest of the turkey … in a regular oven you can easily slide out the oven rack and cover the legs and wings with foil midway through the cooking process so they don’t burn before the rest of the turkey is finished cooking. In this situation, it was not going to be that easy to maneuver the turkey during the cooking process so we just opted to cook the cavity part of the turkey rather than the entire bird.

Using a Smokey Mountain Cooker has advantages over cooking your Thanksgiving turkey in our DIY Smokey Joe modification. The biggest benefit is ACCESS! The body of our DIY modification is a piece of stainless steel that is fastened with nuts and bolts. The Smokey Mountain Cooker actually has a rust-resistant aluminum door that allows you to easily add more coals as well as providing access to the food and drip grate. Another cool thing is the cooker is not only available in a 14-inch standard Smokey Joe size … it also comes in 18-inch and 22-inch models which means you can cook larger turkeys or other pieces of meat!