Smoking a pre-brined turkey?

I just had a turkey dropped on my doorstep, with a "12% solution of salt, sugar" and other things.

Can I use this for smoking, or is my only option dropping it at a food pantry and starting from scratch?

Any way to sort of de-brine it and put my flavors back in? At the very least I can stuff the cavity with citrus, onions and other aromatics.

I always brine my turkey so while you might not like the prebrined flavor, you can certainly still smoke it. i dont know what would happen if you tried to brine it again to add your flavor, but I seem to recall something in McGee that the osmosis may not be too effective if the meat has already absorbed salt. On the other hand, I dont think it could hurt it as long as your brine isnt too salty.

-Will

That's a fine bird for smoking - just don't brine it a 2nd time (too salty).... smoking is a great technique for your average "off the truck" bird. Go in through the neck, seperate the skin from the breast and rub some butter and a good BBQ rub directly on the breast meat. Get some rub in that cavity too. Not only does the butter add flavor/fat/moisture, but seperating the skin from the breast meat & will help it crisp up a bit. Also, don't go low n slow on that bird. Low n slow is great to break down fat & connective tissue, of which a turkey has none (except for the small amount of fat on the skin, which renders very quickly and doesn't need low n slow). Even better, spatchcok that sucker... if you're ok with not having that Norman Rockwell table setting.

I've smoked about 50 turkeys each year for our guests at Rub, and tried the Howard Kauffman birds, amish birds, etc. ..... for roasting, those superior birds are the bees knees... for smoking, the doorstep bird you have is great... #mytwocents

Jared

Thanks. I hadn't thought about putting rub under the skin -- I figured the salty rub on the outside would help draw out moisture for making it crisp. But hey, anything to boost the boring flavor of turkey. I'll just have to go lighter on the rub than I would on ribs, which I like very spicy.

I've done this once before (I forget what kind of turkey), so yes, I know that this is more of a smoke-roast.

12% solution is not optimal but can still be tasty. Don't brine again, no need for additional salt, just go simple. Oil the bird inside and out with veg oil and rub the bird with a flavorful no salt added rub. Off the top of my head I'd go 5-spice or a mix of guajillo/pasilla/ancho/chile de arbol/dried orange peel toasted in a pan and ground in a spice/coffee grinder. Just two suggestions, the world is your oyster.

I like to take out the backbone, crack the joint between leg/thigh and tie the legs pointing up. This preserves the Norman Rockwell appearance while allowing heat/smoke to get in the cavity and with the leg/thigh joint dis-articulated and protecting the breast the bird cooks more evenly.

This is explained in detail in Low & Slow 2, though picture below should give you the basic idea.

Hi JoelF, I have smoked salt-solution turkeys before and can echo the gentlemen above; they turn out great. I parted mine out into a 6-piece cut (legs, thighs and breasts), used a low-salt spice rub under the skins, and then smoked everything skin-side down, 250F temperature, apple wood smoke. I put the breasts in the smoker when the dark meat hits internal temp of about 100F, and aimed to finish white meat at 150F, dark meat at 170F. Then I did a quick oven broil to crisp the skin before serving.

GWiv, thanks for showing that spatchcock-trussing trick. Seems like you get the advantages of piecemeal cooking with a nice presentation too. I'm going to try that with a chicken soon.

I don't mean to highjack this thread, but I cook my turkey on the grill and it looks and tastes great, but the skin always comes out rubbery, not crispy. I'm not up for taking the bird and loading it in the oven, so is there anything else I can do to get a crispy skin? I'm cooking this in a regular weber, with coals to the side.

I have read several articles about using baking powder to create crisp fowl skin. Here is an excellent article about it from someone who I like.

http://www.seriouseats.com/2016/10/how- ... owder.html

Mine came out very nice -- everyone loved it.
Because my mother-in-law wanted the giblets and neck for making stuffing and gravy, I pulled them out on Tuesday evening, and put rub on the bird then (forgetting to oil it, I sprayed with cooking spray later). I was planning to spatchcock it, and should have given her the backbone then, but I didn't cut it out until Thursday morning, when I also put some butter under the skin of the breast. My rub was just a smidge of salt (hoping to dry the skin a bit), coriander, paprika, thyme, a little chimayo chile powder, black pepper and a little cumin.

I didn't have the time to do low-and-slow (sorry Gary), and went with advice from the Virtual Weber Bullet site and used (mostly) briquettes to get a hotter fire. Even so, I couldn't get my 18" WSM over 250 even with the vents wide open (could be too much charcoal dust blocking airflow, it was the bottom of the bag). It was going rather slow, so I after 2.5 hours, I put it in a 350 convec oven for 45 minutes. That crisped up the skin nicely, and got it all to temp. Wood was half pecan, half cherry.

Joel,

I think you might have gotten higher temps using lump rather than briquettes. Lump tends to burn hotter (but faster).

I've done this in my Weber Smokey Mountain without the water pan. It essentially roasts - direct heat, but on the top grill - with smoke. Everyone thought it was the best turkey they had ever had. I took out the back and used that for gravy, and cut it through the breast bone to make two halves that fit better onto the surface. The skin was not rubbery, and it cooked in much less time than a whole turkey in the oven would have.

JoelF wrote: Even so, I couldn't get my 18" WSM over 250 even with the vents wide open (could be too much charcoal dust blocking airflow, it was the bottom of the bag).

Setting the lid slightly askew, roughly an inch or so, will usually increase airflow and drive up temps. Be careful though, as once temps rise it's difficult to get them back down. I've had dome temps well over 400* using this technique and briquette charcoal. Once I get close to my target temp I'll tighten the lid back up, but still leaving a bit of a gap with the lid.

FWIW,
Dave