Turkey Time

Connie and I are absolutely in the minority on Black Friday.  We don't even attempt to go to the grocery store.  Neither of us has the shopping gene.  And, we particularly don't have the crowded shopping gene.  My favorite trips to the store involve a list and a plan and a no lines.  Well, unless there's a rack of cookbooks.  Then, you'll find me browsing.  But, you knew that :-)

On Thanksgiving, we were lucky to be able to go to my brother and sister-in-laws.  Talk about extended family.  My niece and nephew, my mom, my sister-in-law's sister and folks.  My niece's husband and stepdaughter and his grandparents. Plus, my sister-in-law's cousin and his wife and their daughter and her mom and brother.  Nineteen of us total.  We are indeed thankful to be part of such a wonderful family! 

While the turkeys were on sale, I bought one so we'd have leftovers.  The day after Thanksgiving is when we roast our own turkey.  Last year, I pretty much followed Alton Brown's recipe.  This year I combined his, what a friend told me about Pam Anderson's, my brother's and my own.  Actually, my intent wasn't to even blog about the turkey since I'd blogged about Alton's recipe last year.  But, this turkey was the best yet so more than anything I want to get the instructions written down before I forget a bit of them. 

Kate's Turkey with Thanks to Alton et al

Ingredients:

for the brine:
1 gallon vegetable stock (we just add Penzey's stock base to the other ingredients when we heat them)
1 c kosher salt
1/2 c packed brown sugar
1 T black peppercorns
1 T allspice berries
1 T candied ginger
1 lemon, thinly sliced


for the aromatics and base:
1 red apple, quartered
1 onion, quartered
2 large sprigs rosemary
2 large sprigs sage
8 ribs celery
8 whole carrots

for the baste:
16 oz can jellied cranberry sauce
4 oz can orange juice concentrate
1 c red wine
1 stick butter

Directions:

The night before you're going to roast the turkey, it's time to brine it.  Put the brine ingredients in a medium saucepan.  Cover with water. 

Simmer until the salt has pretty much dissolved.  I've found it never dissolves totally.  Remove from the heat and cool to room temperature.  Add the brine ingredients to a large stockpot and fill it halfway with water.  Add the thawed turkey breast side down then add water to assure the turkey is fully submerged. 

Allow the turkey to soak in the brine for 8-16 hours.

Preheat your oven to 500.  Prepare the roasting pan.  Lay the carrots and celery in the bottom of the pan - two ribs of celery then two carrots... 

Remove the turkey from the brine and rinse it well with cool water.  Place the turkey breast side down on the carrots and celery.  Stuff the onion, apple, sage and rosemary in the cavity.  Rub the turkey with butter or canola oil.  Place the roasting pan in the oven.  Roast the turkey for 30 minutes then reduce the heat to 350.  If the skin gets too dark, you can cover it with foil.  Roast another two hours breast side down. 

When you put the turkey in the oven, start your basting sauce.  Put all of the ingredients in a heavy saucepan and stir to combine as the butter and cranberry sauce melt.  Baste the turkey once or twice while it's cooking skin-side down.

After two and a half hours, flip the turkey breast side up.  (nb:  we've found a pair of oven mitts works wonderfully for this.)  Baste it well.  Roast for another hour and a half to two hours, basting regularly.  Again, if the skin gets too dark, you can tent it with foil.

Alton's recipe calls for removing the turkey from the oven when it reaches 161 degrees.  Mine hit 175 at four hours - which is when I checked it... 

Allow the turkey to rest for 15-20 minutes while you make the gravy.  Use some of the drippings with the fat to start the gravy the skim the fat from more drippings to add to the gravy.  I also add about 1/2- 1 cup of water. 

We found that the carrots used as a base and the onions stuffed in the turkey made for some fantastic eating.  We didn't try the apple or celery. 

 adapted from Alton Brown, Pam Anderson and John Marvel

Brined Turkey Breast

Since my sister-in-law's family and mine joined forces for the holidays, we've had turkey sandwiches for Christmas Eve.  This year, I changed it up and had turkey manhattans as an option.  The non-baker actually made a couple of loaves of buttermilk bread for the base of the manhattans.  You'll get to read about the bread later.  It was fantastic!!  The mashed potatoes were simply russets - cut up and cooked then smashed with low-fat Philly and a bit of 2% milk. Because the peels have so much good stuff in them, I didn't even peel the potatoes.  The gravy, well, I totally cheated and bought some of the jars at the grocery.  The turkey, though, was a production.  And, what a successful production.

Last time I made a whole turkey and combined two recipes for the brine.  This time, I used Alton Brown's brine recipe (one of the two I used on Thanksgiving) but I totally made up my rubs.  This is the most moist turkey I've ever had.  I'd planned on slicing it then putting it into some broth to warm it up for the turkey manhattans.  It didn't need broth at all.  We actually cooked the turkey breasts on Thursday the 23rd.  Sunday the 26th we were still eating leftovers and the meat was still moist as all get out.  We're looking forward to a couple more days of leftovers!

Brined Turkey Breast

Ingredients:
For the brine:
1 cup kosher salt
1/2 c dark brown sugar
1 gallon vegetable stock
1 T black peppercorns
1 1/2 t allspice berries
1 1/2 t candied ginger

For the under skin paste:
1 large onion, sliced
2 t rosemary
1/2 c apple cider
1/2 c white wine

For the on the skin rub:
1/2 c olive oil
1 t crushed rosemary
2 T dark brown sugar
1 T finely chopped garlic

Directions:
To make the brine:
Because I brined the turkey at the office, I did it a bit differently.  I put a couple of cups of water in a saucepan, then added the other ingredients - including a couple of large dollops of vegetable base.  Once the salt and vegetable base had dissolved, I poured everything into a thermos and took the brine base, turkey breasts and big stockpot into the office.  Once there, I unwrapped the thawed turkeys (they take 2-3 days to thaw in the fridge) and rinsed them then plopped them into the stockpot.  I poured the brine base over them then filled the stockpot with cold water to cover.  I left the turkeys in the brine for almost 12 hours.  Then, I took them home and finished up.  I did not rinse them after pouring the brine off.

To make the under the skin paste:
Slice the onion and saute it until very soft in a small amount of olive oil.  Once it's started to soften, pour in the cider and the white wine.  Add the rosemary. 

When the liquid has almost totally evaporated, add the garlic.  When all you have is a bit of syrup, remove the pan from the heat. 

Allow the mixture to cool a bit then puree it in the blender or food processor. 

Rub it under the skin. 

It'll be lumpy as all get out.  That's ok!

To make the on the skin rub:
Mix all the ingredients

and rub thoroughly into the turkey skin. 

Put the turkey back in the stockpot and refrigerate it overnight.

To roast the turkey:
Preheat the oven to 500.  Remember it's easier to rearrange the racks while they're cool...the voice of experience speaking here!  Put the turkey on a roasting rack and roast it for 30 minutes at 500.  Then, if you have one, put a remote thermometer in the thickest part of the breast, tent the turkey with foil and put it back in the oven at 350.  For a 14-16 lb bird it should require another 90-120 minutes.  Once the turkey reaches 161, remove it from the oven and tent it with foil.  Allow it to rest for 30 minutes.  Before carving, remove the skin and toss it.   

adapted from Alton Brown's turkey recipe on FoodTV.