Can I bake other foods in the same oven while my turkey is cooking?!

Question: Can I bake other foods in the same oven while my turkey is cooking?
I'm hosting Easter lunch this year and making a turkey for the first time. I also plan on making some things that will need to be baked that day such as a hashbrown casserole, rolls, and peach cobbler. Would it be okay to cook these things in the same oven? Will I even have room with a turkey being in there (it's a pretty standard size oven)?


Yes, you can, if your oven is big enough. Pull out all the pans you'll be using and do a trial run with them in a cold oven to make sure they fit. If they don't, make the rolls ad peach cobbler ahead of time. The turkey usually needs to rest before you carve it, so you can pop the rolls back in for a few minutes to warm them up. I assume you'll be serving the cobbler as dessert, so you can to the same thing...leave the oven on during dinner and then stick the cobbler back in the oven before you start clearing the table so it has time to warm up before everyone's ready for dessert.

Even if you are just doing the potatoes and turkey at the same time, check the temperatures to make sure the are the same. If they're not, you need to adjust the length of time you cook them. For example, if the turkey is cooking at 325 and the recipe for the potatoes, says to cook at 400, you'll probably want to add a good 20-30 minutes to to the total cooking time for the potatoes.

Also, remember that the more things you have in the oven, the less efficient your oven becomes. Even if the turkey and potatoes call for the same temperature, the oven will be cooler with 2 items pulling the heat than if it were just the one. Make sure you accommodate for that time as well.

My final suggestion is to buy or borrow a toaster oven. I bought one the first time I hosted Thanksgiving and it was a life saver. Because it's so much smaller than a regular oven it cooks faster. I baked the green bean casserole in that and just the turkey in the oven. My husband cooked the ham on the grill and I did everything else on the stove top.

Yes, it the temperature those other items you want to bake are supposed to be baked close to the temperature you are baking your turkey. Also, please take note that the more items you have in the oven then the lower the temperature of the oven will drop. So you'll need to turn the oven temperature setting up slightly when you put more items in to bake, maybe about 25 degrees or so. And remember to turn it back down once you remove those items.

Generally once the Turkey is done and resting everything else can be finished up quickly. If you bake on more than one rack one rack will probably be too close to the heating element. Do you have a crock-pot? You could do the hash brown casserole in that.

Make whatever you can in advance. The cobbler can be reheated, as can the casserole. The rolls can be baked after the turkey is out of the oven and is resting before carving.

cook ahead and reheat you will unlikely have room in oven for turkey and other items at the same time. Place roaster in oven cold and check the space.

if ur oven is big


Food's Q&A Resources