This was only my second year cooking a full thanksgiving dinner but I decided this year I was ready to step outside my Thanksgiving box. Brining is something that neither my nor my husband's family has done so I had to rely on tv and internet advice along with my instincts. But I gave it a try and I couldn't be happier that I did. Brining makes the turkey moist, juicy and flavorful. It also makes it cook a bit faster and my bird came out so beautifully browned that I can't help but think the brining made it prettier, too. So here are my brining tips:
1. Get a big bucket. I thought of using a stock pot, but mine wasn't quite big enough. It also would have been a hassle to have to clean before making mashed potatoes. My brilliant husband took a trip to the grocery store and asked around and ended up with a large food-safe bucket from the bakery that they get their frosting in. It had a cover and a handle and was just the right size. And it was free. I couldn't ask for more.
2. The whole point of brining is the salt. 2 cups of salt sounds really disgusting, but the salt helps the turkey retain water, keeping it moist and juicy. The recipe I used was 1/2 cup of salt per 6 cups of water. My large bucket with the turkey in it held about 24 ounces of water, so I used 2 cups of salt. One recipe I read suggested using kosher salt. I didn't want to deplete my kosher salt supply, so I used 1 cup of kosher and one cup of regular table salt. I'm sure it would have worked out fine either way.
3. Flavor the brine. While it seems that the salt is the only real necessity here, the brining time is obviously an opportunity to add some additional flavoring. I added 1 cup of sugar to balance the saltiness, generous amounts of the spices that I put in stuffing: Rosemary, Oregano, Sage, Ginger, Thyme and Pepper plus Celery salt and 3 bay leaves. I'm sure any spices you normally use on Thanksgiving would do the trick.
4. Brine away. The salt, sugar and whatever spices you are using in water on the stove. I found I needed a good sized pot to get this all to dissolve fully. Remove the neck and giblets from your thawed turkey, put him in the bucket and fill most of the way with cold water. Pour the salt mixture over the top and refrigerate at least overnight, up to 24 hours. Before you cook the turkey, rinse it thoroughly and dry it as you usually would.
5. Watch your turkey, it might cook a little faster than normal.
6. Don't stuff the turkey (with stuffing). For one, the stuffing would be reeeally salty. Even if you're into that, because the turkey cooks fast, you run the risk of not cooking the stuffing thoroughly. Gross. Instead, I stuffed my turkey with pieces of onion, apple, celery, spices and bay leaves which I kept and used later with the turkey carcass to make the broth for turkey soup. Yum.
7. If you use the drippings from the turkey to make your gravy, be careful. While the turkey doesn't come out salty, the drippings are very salty. Definitely don't add any salt to your gravy, use unsalted butter if you are making a roux, and if you want it even less salty, use primarily another source of flavor, such as water from boiling the neck and giblets, which have not been brined, so that you can add only the amount of drippings that you want for the saltiness that you desire. Side note - if you do end up making that turkey soup, you won't need to add any salt to that either. And it will be gooood.
8. Eat your delicious, juicy turkey dinner!
No comments:
Post a Comment