Do you enjoy visions of your family sitting down to a delicious holiday meal? Do you also have nightmares of a burnt turkey as the centerpiece to your meal? To help avoid a disastrous holiday meal, you should choose the best turkey roasting pan. I recommend a stainless roasting pan. If you have the wrong roaster, you could end up with unevenly cooked meat, a pan so heavy you strain yourself lifting it out of the oven, and burnt gravy.
The size of a roasting pan is your first decision to make. Air circulation and wasted space within the pan should both be considered. Ideally, you want a pan that fits in your oven, of course, but that has about 2 inches between it and the oven walls so that air can flow well. In addition, you want your roast to fit snugly in the pan, with little wasted room around the edges. This can just cause the juices to spread thinly and burn during cooking.
The material of your roasting pan is important. You want your pan to be light, sturdy and to conduct heat well. Aluminum conducts heat well, but it reacts badly to the acids in lemons and tomatoes which can affect the taste of your food. Stainless steel in non-reactive and not too heavy or fragile, as stoneware can be. However, stainless steel is not a good conductor of heat. Therefore, I recommend a heavy stainless roasting pan layered with sheets of aluminum and/or copper.
Be sure to check that your stainless roaster can stand up to high temperatures from the burners on your stove and also the near-broiling temperatures required inside your oven. With roasting meat comes the desire to make gravy, and it is easiest to place your roaster on the stove top and go. In addition, you may need to brown the meat on the stove top before placing it in the over. Warping or buckling are symptoms of an inferior roasting pan placed on a stove top. In addition, these pans can heat differently in different areas of the pan and cause burning of your gravy.
Did you ever consider the handles on a pan? Easy to forget about, but essential when you are removing that heavy, hot pan from the oven. The best handles are strongly riveted to the pan and stand straight up from the pan so oven space is not wasted. Cheaper handles stick straight out from the pan or even worse, fold down. Try getting your potholder-covered hand through that handle easily. In addition, you should choose a rectangular pan with rounded corners that facilitate easy cleaning. The height of the sides of your pan should be 2.5 to 3 inches, which is the happy medium to allow air to circulate, yet won't allow hot juices to spill easily.
There are deals on pans that include handy extras. A rack is one. My favorite extra is heavy forks. Even if I only use my forks once a year to lift that heavy turkey out of the pan onto my serving platter, they were worth it. - 32406
The size of a roasting pan is your first decision to make. Air circulation and wasted space within the pan should both be considered. Ideally, you want a pan that fits in your oven, of course, but that has about 2 inches between it and the oven walls so that air can flow well. In addition, you want your roast to fit snugly in the pan, with little wasted room around the edges. This can just cause the juices to spread thinly and burn during cooking.
The material of your roasting pan is important. You want your pan to be light, sturdy and to conduct heat well. Aluminum conducts heat well, but it reacts badly to the acids in lemons and tomatoes which can affect the taste of your food. Stainless steel in non-reactive and not too heavy or fragile, as stoneware can be. However, stainless steel is not a good conductor of heat. Therefore, I recommend a heavy stainless roasting pan layered with sheets of aluminum and/or copper.
Be sure to check that your stainless roaster can stand up to high temperatures from the burners on your stove and also the near-broiling temperatures required inside your oven. With roasting meat comes the desire to make gravy, and it is easiest to place your roaster on the stove top and go. In addition, you may need to brown the meat on the stove top before placing it in the over. Warping or buckling are symptoms of an inferior roasting pan placed on a stove top. In addition, these pans can heat differently in different areas of the pan and cause burning of your gravy.
Did you ever consider the handles on a pan? Easy to forget about, but essential when you are removing that heavy, hot pan from the oven. The best handles are strongly riveted to the pan and stand straight up from the pan so oven space is not wasted. Cheaper handles stick straight out from the pan or even worse, fold down. Try getting your potholder-covered hand through that handle easily. In addition, you should choose a rectangular pan with rounded corners that facilitate easy cleaning. The height of the sides of your pan should be 2.5 to 3 inches, which is the happy medium to allow air to circulate, yet won't allow hot juices to spill easily.
There are deals on pans that include handy extras. A rack is one. My favorite extra is heavy forks. Even if I only use my forks once a year to lift that heavy turkey out of the pan onto my serving platter, they were worth it. - 32406
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