The Best Turkey Basters Suck (in a Good Way)

In general, surprises are fun—but carving the Thanksgiving turkey has a tendency to be the bad kind of surprise. Yeah, you just spent 5 hours roasting an entire bird, and there’s basically a 50% chance it’s good and a 50% chance it’s dry and sucky—anyone’s guess! Best wishes! We’re here to help give you a fighting chance, because we found the best turkey baster to buy.

Why baste your turkey?

To keep it moist. Duh. Turkey loves drying out (especially the breasts), so robust basting is your best defense against tough meat that has to be drowned in gravy to be edible. According to this handy Epicurious video, you should take your turkey out of the oven, tilt the roasting pan, and drizzle the bird with pan drippings roughly every 30 minutes. That means if you’re cooking a 10 lb bird, you should baste it around 8 times over the course of its cook time. 

What we looked for in the best turkey baster

Okay, I know Epicurious said to take the roasting pan out of the oven every time you baste, but I know you’re going to cheat—only because I know I cheat, and that’s generally how human nature works. You’re going to pull the rack out of the oven just enough to get to the juices in the bottom of the pan, and that means you need a fast, efficient baster that sucks up a lot of liquid at once and that’s ergonomic so you don’t burn yourself. 

Here’s what I learned as I tested turkey basters: Bad basters have small rubber bulbs that don’t suck up liquid efficiently. You’re standing there with your arm in an oven—you want these to suck fast! The REALLY bad turkey basters (the $3 ones from the grocery store) have bulbs that get stuck in a smooshed position when you’re using them instead of bouncing back. I really hated that. Bad ones are leaky, too. Frankly, they’re all a little bit leaky, but some of them are much better than others.

I tested seven turkey basters—plastic basters, glass basters, and metal basters, budget basters and pricier ones, too—and found three to recommend. Here’s to juicy turkey!

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Best Accessible

GoodCook Touch Dripless Baster with Brush ($10.99)

Ralphs

Upsides: I don’t know if this is universally true, but GoodCook is the brand of cooking utensils my local grocery store carries, and I see that it’s also carried at Kroger-owned grocery stores in our area. Point is: GoodCook seems to be accessible, especially for people who waited till the last minute to get all their stuff for Thanksgiving dinner and don’t have time to order the very best turkey baster on our list. There’s a cheaper GoodCook baster (it costs $4 for a reason), but you should splurge on this one. It holds 40 ml of liquid and the bulb is very responsive. It’s also flat on top, so you can set this one on your stovetop without making a mess. It comes with a basting brush attachment, too, and a cleaning brush. 

Downsides: The cleaning brush is weird. It’s just a little silicone doodad that doesn’t get all the way down into the tip of the baster. Kinda pointless.

Credit Liv Averett / Ralphs

Rating:

7.5/10

Sporks

Best Three-in-One

Farberware 3-in-1 Plastic & Silicone Baster ($10.58)

Walmart

Upsides: This plastic baster has a BIG bulb with a flat top that you can set on the counter with your baster tip in the air for the sake of cleanliness. We really like this basting brush attachment, although we sort of wish it had an angled tip attachment, too. The opening is a little awkward when the silicone brush isn’t attached. The third attachment (of 3-in-1 fame) is an injector, which I didn’t experiment with. But hey, it’s there if you wanna squirt squirts into your turkey!

Downsides: This one is smaller than other basters (it holds 22 ml of liquid), so you’ll have to spend more time sucking and squirting (sorry). We do like that the bulb is nice and wide so you can press it on the sides or the top with ease.

Credit: Liv Averett / Walmart

Rating:

8.5/10

Sporks

Best of the Best

OXO Good Grips Angled Baster with Cleaning Brush ($16.99)

OXO

Upsides: The best turkey baster (almost) has it all. It has an angled tip AND an angled shaft. There’s a finger rest so you can easily use the rubber bulb like you use the plunger on a syringe, pressing it in on top rather than on the sides. It draws in a lot of liquid and drippage is minimal. You’re really gonna be able to work your way around a bird with this one (even a big bird). It has a 1.5 oz capacity and it fills up quickly. It also comes with a cleaning brush and the angled tip is removable for easy cleaning. 

Downside: The bulb doesn’t have a flat top so you can’t set it on the counter nozzle up. You’ll need a spoon rest for this one if you don’t want a puddle of turkey grease on your stovetop.

Credit: Liv Averett / OXO

Rating:

10/10

Sporks