As we get ready to celebrate Christmas with family and friends, most of us will sit down to nicely cooked turkey with all the fix-ins.

For some new turkey chefs it can be nerve-racking performing the big cook in front of family and friends.

Chef Darren Nixon has a few tips on how to cook the perfect bird and the most important step might be before ever putting it in the oven.

"Give yourself lots of time to thaw out your bird, that's probably the very first most important advice," he says. "Without that you end up with the scenario where the clock's ticking down and the next morning you got to get that bird in the oven and its still a little bit frozen and then you're fighting with a frozen bird so give yourself an extra day, it takes quite a while of course the bigger the bird the longer it takes."

Nixon says after the bird is thawed and the stuffing is in, time is important after you've got your turkey that perfect golden brown and are almost ready to serve.

"Gotta give yourself lots of time and then you also need to consider rest you need that bird to rest a bit while you're making the gravy and doing all of that which helps even out the juices so also pretty important."

If you're needing a refresher or this holiday season or is your first turkey ever, Nixon gives some pointers on making everyone speechless at the dinner table... with a perfect turkey.

"It should be evenly browned and you get that from basting and that is where you take the juices out of the pan and pur it over top of there and you can do that on an half an hour basis you still want it to be juicy and plump so that would of course help as well with the basting as well as not over cooking."

Olson says when in doubt cooking the turkey should be 20 minutes a pound.