Thankgiving Turkey - to brine or not to brine?

Anyone have suggestions on prepping and cooking turkey for thanksgiving. What would you suggest to use for stuffing on a turkey that’s not just the traditional bread crumbs? I find Turkey to be a dry meat and so it’s not my favorite food. I listened to the radio and Emeril Lagasse was on and he said brining creates a juicier bird.

Brining
This method is pretty common in the Northeast, and what you do is soak the turkey in a mixture of salt, sugar, water and seasonings for at least 4 hours and up to 24 hours. What this does is plump up the breast meat with a sort of moisture cushion, which keeps the bird moist during cooking and imparts a great flavor. Also brining speeds up the cooking time by about 30 minutes, since water conducts heat.

His recommendation can be found here:
http://emerils.com/holidays/prep.html

this thread covers part of it:

Turkey Brining
http://lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=5791

and you may want to look at the "Three Pound Chicken" thread for info on what salting does to meat.
http://lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=5856

and don't forget "How are you cooking your heritage turkey?"
http://lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=2084

I will brine. I also find that my turkey stays moist if I dip a cheesecloth in a butter/white wine mixture before roasting and lay it over the bird, and then baste the cheesecloth during cooking with the same mixture (except for the last half hour or so, when I remove it).

Good luck.

aschie30 wrote:I will brine. I also find that my turkey stays moist if I dip a cheesecloth in a butter/white wine mixture before roasting and lay it over the bird, and then baste the cheesecloth during cooking with the same mixture (except for the last half hour or so, when I remove it).

Good luck.

Ah, the Martha Stewart method. I have been cooking my turkeys that way for the past few years and have been very happy with the results.

stevez wrote:

aschie30 wrote:I will brine. I also find that my turkey stays moist if I dip a cheesecloth in a butter/white wine mixture before roasting and lay it over the bird, and then baste the cheesecloth during cooking with the same mixture (except for the last half hour or so, when I remove it).

Ah, the Martha Stewart method. I have been cooking my turkeys that way for the past few years and have been very happy with the results.

I like those methods, but I also like to stuff a compound butter under the skin over the breast ans under the skin for added flavor/juiciness.

stevez wrote:

Ah, the Martha Stewart method. I have been cooking my turkeys that way for the past few years and have been very happy with the results.

You found me out.

I prefer to brine, air dry, butterfly or quarter, and roast on a rack above a large pan of stuffing. Cook's Illustrated suggested this in one of their many "Best Turkey" articles.

The advantabe to quartering the turkey is you can take each section out when its done.

As I posted in one of those linked threads, I follow a simplified version of the Cook's Illustrated method which has the advantage of being so simple you don't actually have to have a recipe to refer to:

1) Brine. Okay, maybe you want a recipe for that part.

2) Microwave the stuffing before it goes in the cavity, to get it up to 140 or so.

3) First half of the cook, cook the turkey upside down. Flip it for the second half. The breasts will look like the car backed over them when you flip it, but don't worry, with at least another hour and a half in the oven to go they'll plump back up into Norman Rockwell painting-perfect golden brown turkeyness.

CI had some complicated method for a half hour on this side, a half hour on that side, a half hour forming a Maltese cross with the wings and legs, etc. Too much trouble, as Cathy would point out, too many times opening the oven. I find that a brined turkey, with pre-warmed stuffing inside, cooked breast side down part of the time will invariably make a wonderful juicy bird, even in the breast meat; any additional steps you take can only add tiny incremental improvements.

stevez wrote:

aschie30 wrote: I also find that my turkey stays moist if I dip a cheesecloth in a butter/white wine mixture before roasting and lay it over the bird, and then baste the cheesecloth during cooking

Ah, the Martha Stewart method. I have been cooking my turkeys that way for the past few years and have been very happy with the results.

Martha Stewart Schmartha Schmurert. That's what the Joy of Cooking has been saying since 1930 something.

Mike G wrote:First half of the cook, cook the turkey upside down. Flip it for the second half.

My method is to cook upside down in a V-shaped rack at 450 degrees for the first 45 minutes or so, then reduce the temperature, flip the bird and finish off as usual. Got that from a Williams Sonoma cookbook, and by golly, it works great. No need to brine a Butterball turkey, by the way; they're already so loaded up with liquids, I don't imagine it would make any appreciable difference to soak it further.

Mike G wrote:1) Brine. Okay, maybe you want a recipe for that part.

2) Microwave the stuffing before it goes in the cavity, to get it up to 140 or so.

I'm with you up to here.

Mike G wrote:3) First half of the cook, cook the turkey upside down. Flip it for the second half.

This still seems like too much work for me. I cook my turkey in parchment, an adaptation of a recipe of my grandmother's (she used brown paper grocery bags, but these are now made of recycled paper and full of chemicals, inks and even metals). The method allows high heat for part of the cooking process, speeding things up, and still results in brown skin and moist breast meat, without turning.


Edited to fix bizarre typo

But it satisfies my BBQ-making male's desire to do something. Your method, wrapping it up like a present, is too Martha-girly for me. Mine has a certain resemblance to putting the turkey up on blocks and rotating its tires.

We've been cutting out the backbone and laying it flat recently. It cooks in about 1/2 the time. My husband HATES brined things, he doesn't like that much salt. I just put a bunch of herbs and leeks and other yummy things underneath, and use probe thermometers in both the breast and thigh.

Mike G wrote:breasts will look like the car backed over them when you flip it, but don't worry, with at least another hour and a half in the oven to go they'll plump back up into Norman Rockwell painting-perfect golden brown turkeyness.

Thanks for the info. One of the reasons I never tried the breast-down method is because I thought that the breasts would come out looking exactly like that - run over by a truck. It was one of those things where I thought people sacrificed looks and presentation in favor of moistness and texture. The other reason why I've never tried that method is because I can imagine myself trying to flip the bird halfway through cooking and have it slip out of my hands and slide across the kitchen floor, where my dogs would make quick work of it.

Better than roasting it on a weber kettle grill, and dropping the turkey in the snow. Which happened to my dad many years ago.

If you're concerned about it I suggest buttering the top at that point to ensure browning, but in my experience, yeah, you'd never know the difference when it's done.

Flipping is not that hard with two people. One person sticks a big fork in each end and lifts it off the rack or pan. The other person has two wads of paper towels and rotates it on the forks. Realistically, it probably plops off the forks along the way or something, but as long as it lands sideways on the rack you can keep scooting it into position. Check the oil, change the air filter, and you're good to go.

My mother told me last night that she bought a pre-basted turkey and I am not necessarily familiar with what this means. She said that it means that it's injected with oil or something to that effect? Regardless, I was planning on brining, but now this totally throws me for a loop. Will it be too salty or just I just go ahead with the brine?
Thanks for all your suggestions

bern bern wrote:My mother told me last night that she bought a pre-basted turkey and I am not necessarily familiar with what this means. She said that it means that it's injected with oil or something to that effect? Regardless, I was planning on brining, but now this totally throws me for a loop. Will it be too salty or just I just go ahead with the brine?
Thanks for all your suggestions

Pre-basted means it's been injected with plenty of fluids ... I'd skip the brine. Throw some flavorful stuff into the cavity (onions, lemons, etc.) and stuff a compound butter under the skin over the breast (and thighs, if you can get that far into the skin), and roast it. Tenting it with foil for the first part of the roast helps the butter seep into the skin, then take off the foil and let the skin crisp and brown.

HI,

I have been brining turkey ever since Cooks Illustrated revived this technique. Every refinement they have suggested over the years, I have added.

In the LA Times, they had an article on dry brining a turkey for three days in a 2.5 gallon plastic bag. They tested and found you could begin the brining process with a frozen turkey. I usually buy a 20-pound plus turkey on Friday to allow brining on Tuesday or Wednesday. The bird then air dries overnight to enhance skin crispness. I have to admit, I don't always like dragging around a plastic container with turkey and brine weighing in at almost 40 pounds.

Cook's has advocated dry brines, too, but I haven't tried it. Reading through this article, I am inclined to give it a shot. I'm curious if anyone else tried the dry brine who had experience with wet. Which method do you favor? (Why?)

Your questions answered about the 'Judy Bird':
The dry-brining technique for preparing roast chicken named for chef Judy Rogers of San Francisco's Zuni Café in San Francisco can turn your Thanksgiving meal into something special.

A More Flavorful Dry-Brined Bird

Recipe: Dry Brined Turkey

Recipe: Sage and Bay Salt

Recipe: Smoky spiced salt with orange

Recipe: Rosemary-lemon salt

We're going to a pre-Thanksgiving dinner where the centerpiece will be a turkey made following this Cook's Illustrated's dry brine article. I've never tried this technique or even tasted its results, so I look forward to seeing how it comes out and will post the details here.

Khaopaat wrote:We're going to a pre-Thanksgiving dinner where the centerpiece will be a turkey made following this Cook's Illustrated's dry brine article. I've never tried the technique nor have I tasted its results, so I look forward to seeing how it comes out and will post the details here.

I look forward to your comments. The LA Times article diverted from CI by not salting under the skin. Of course, if you are beginning with a frozen bird, it would be impossible to accomplish.

Regards,

I am still deciding on the brine(it will have buttermilk) for the turkey I am doing on the smoker(not brining the traditional stuffed bird for the oven).

I am also still deciding between a turkey breast, and a small bird for the smoker as well. It all depends on the selection @ Ho-ka on Saturday.

Cathy2 wrote:They tested and found you could begin the brining process with a frozen turkey.

Why would you want to? Nearly all frozen turkeys have already been injected with a brine solution.

Cathy2 wrote: I'm curious if anyone else tried the dry brine who had experience with wet. Which method do you favor? (Why?)

"Dry-brining" is similar to kashering.

I have not found significant flavor or textural differences between frozen "pre-basted" (i.e. brine-injected) turkeys, pre-kashered frozen turkeys and fresh turkeys that I brined myself. (Note that I am talking about supermarket turkeys, not heirloom or specialty turkeys right from the farm.)

BTW, some turkey processors, including Butterball, have begun injecting even their fresh turkeys.

Hi,

I brine turkeys no matter what their past may be.

Regards,

Cathy2 wrote:I brine turkeys no matter what their past may be.

When I tried brining "pre-basted" turkeys, they didn't come out any better than when I didn't. There's only so much saltwater the cells can hold; eventually osmotic pressure equalizes the salt level. Since the object is to denature the protein strands, it doesn't really matter how they get that way.

Hi,

I found the wet brine roasted turkey was more forgiving of overheating than injected or non-brined.

My turkeys come out quite good, so maybe it is the cook and not brine! (A riff on: its the pitmaster and not the pit).

Regards,

I had a fair amount of both white and dark meat from the Cooks Illustrated-inspired dry-brined turkey, and I believe it confirmed my belief that traditional (wet) brining is where it's at.

Our friend said she followed the CI recipe to the letter, and she produced an excellent bird...however, I didn't find it to be any different than a very well-made non-brined bird. The meat was tender, but didn't have the "wow, so juicy and flavorful!" effect that a traditionally-brined bird has.

Incidentally, the big Whole Foods on Kingsbury had tons of fresh (non-frozen) turkeys in stock, with a sign specifying, among other things, that they had not been soaked, injected, or otherwise "enhanced" in any way, and were a very reasonable (if I recall correctly) $2.69/lb. They were just begging to be treated to a nice, briny soak.

Hi all,

I'm a little late into this discussion, but my experiences mirror LAZ. If I have a store bought turkey I skip the brining, most store bought turkeys have already been treated with a brine solution. But a fresh farm turkey can benefit from a brine. If you get a chance find a local farmer that sells his birds and give it a try.

dan

I picked up 2 turkeys from the local Farmer's Market today. I'm brining one in Dan Gill's buttermilk brine. Its in the fridge now for overnight, then a good seasoning on Wed and let the skin dry to crisp.

The other was salted per the instructions from the links provided by Cathy. I didn't get it in time to brine it for the 3 days so I'll cook it Saturday.

Both turkeys will be smoked.

Hello,

I'm doing Alton Brown's roast turkey recipe (http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alto ... index.html)
and I'm wondering if it's okay that I used low-sodium vegetable broth. Will this be salty enough for a good brine, or should I remake it with full-sodium broth?