I've seen lots of recipes that call for it, and I tend to ignore those recipes.
Here's a related tip: Do not, and I repeat DO NOT wrap the turkey entirely in aluminum foil.
Today I had a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner with friends. I lent my wonderful, slightly expensive (it cost me $75 about 25 years ago and is far and away the very best seventy five bucks I've ever spent) roasting pan with rack. I've used it many times over the past quarter century, and offered it to my friends because last year they used one of those aluminum pans -- and please, please, to all of you who use them, go out and buy a real pan -- and it was almost impossible to make the gravy, my assigned task.
Do I need to explain this? All of cooking is chemistry. An aluminum pan does not retain heat well, and so you tend to get a boiled turkey, not a properly roasted one.
Anyway, this year, my friends, who hadn't done much turkey roasting in a very long time other than last year, were happy once again to do the turkey and host several friends. (I made mashed potatoes, rolls, and did the gravy.) They, in their inexperience, wrapped the turkey in aluminum foil. Sigh. The aluminum foil flaked off, and I didn't fully appreciate that until, as I was making the gravy in that pan, kept on seeing more black things pop up. I tried tasting one, hoping it was burnt bits. Uh, oh. Aluminum foil. Luckily my friends had a strainer, so I kept on making the gravy, we strained it, no one consumed aluminum foil, and all was well.
I do want to reiterate that the money I spent on a good roasting pan with rack all those years ago was the very best money I have ever spent.
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