King of Turkey Land

As a CSA that I organized for work comes to a close the last drop off was a HUGE turkey. Gobble gobble time a few months past the holidays but I was determined to cook that bird. I have never roasted any type of bird, not even a chicken, so this was a new challenge to take on and put behind me so I can be prepared for when turkey day responsibilities fall to me.
 I was a wuss at taking out the inner stuff (I believe a neck and liver) Stu was my knight in shining armor and helped me to rinse and clean the bird before brining. If not for him I would have had to face the bird innards and a fear and I am just not ready to tackle yet. Maybe the next turkey time I will win my bravery badge for fully cleaning the bird.
The farmer was saying something about rubbing salt before cooking so figured this was the way to go. So to the computer I turned and after a bit of googling I found that the easiest thing to do was rub salt on the bird and leave it in the fridge overnight for the crystals to soak in. And surprisingly it worked! All the salt was soaked up by the next day leaving a "brined" bird ready for the oven.
Next I moved onto the spices taking meyer lemons, (lemon that is mix with an orange) rosemary, garlic and stuffed all that goodness up into the birds belly. A good smear of butter all over the bird like suntan lotion at the beach and we were ready for cooking.
 Then the bird went into the roasting pan to officially meet it's hot end in the oven. I used a one-time-use tin that Stu and I found at Target opting to not buy a big roasting pan because I don't think that a 15lb turkey will be in our future anytime soon.
Basting happened every 45 minutes and I had to wrap the top in a bit of tin foil to keep the bird from getting overdone. Wow did that turkey look and smell good! Done to perfection I took it out of the oven to sit while looking up youtube videos on how to carve a turkey.
After it cooled down a bit I went at the bird with a large serrated knife and took the meat off the bones like a professional chef. Loulou as at my feet hoping for bits to drop, which being a newbie at carving happened quite often.

After all the meat was off and the kitchen cleaned I sat down to watch TV, eat turkey, and feed niblets to my dog. Feeling full and accomplished I dozed off into a tryptophan induced slumber. What a great Sunday afternoon.