I've already posted the perfect way to cook turkey, if it's good enough for Heston, it's perfect!
Gob wrote:
ROAST TURKEYServes 6, with leftovers
Prepare: 20 minutes, plus brining
Cook: 3–4 hours (40mins/kg), plus resting
Ingredients
4–4.5kg free-range turkey
800g salt
200g unsalted butter, at
room temperature
3 onions, sliced
2 carrots, sliced
3 leeks, sliced (white and pale
green parts only)
50ml dry white wine
15g rosemary
15g thyme
Method
1. Chop the wing tips off the turkey and reserve for the gravy.
2. Brine the turkey on Christmas Eve by mixing the salt and 10 litres of water in a clean container and stirring until the salt has dissolved. Submerge the turkey in the brine, cover with a lid or foil and leave in a cool place for at least nine hours or overnight.
Remove the bird from the brine and submerge it in cold water for one hour, changing the water at 15-minute intervals. Dry the turkey well with kitchen paper.
3. Preheat the oven to 210c, fan oven 200c, gas mark 6. With clean hands, work the skin away from the flesh of the bird and rub 100g of butter between the skin and the flesh, being careful not to tear the skin. Rub any remaining butter over the skin of the bird. Season with salt and black pepper.
Set the bird on top of the onions, carrots and leeks in a roasting tin; add the wine and cook in the oven for 30 minutes to colour the skin.
4. Melt the remaining 100g butter in a pan and add the rosemary and thyme.
5. Reduce the oven temperature to 130c, fan oven 120c, gas mark ½. Baste the turkey with the herb butter and cook until the thickest part around the neck or thigh reaches 70c (you’ll need a probe thermometer). Continue basting every 45 minutes (when the butter gets used up, use the cooking juices in the roasting tin to baste). This should take three to three-and-a-half hours, depending on the size of the turkey and the type of oven.
It is important to check that the turkey is cooked by cutting into the thickest part (between the breast and thigh) to be sure that none of the meat is pink, and the juices run clear.
6. Remove the turkey from the oven and allow to rest for at least 30 minutes before carving. Reserve the pan juices and vegetables for making the gravy.
Per serving 560kcals/8g carbs/6g sugars/38g fat/20g saturated fat/2.6g salt
Mind you, the fact that you have to prepare it on Xmas eve may bugger up the whole thanksgiving idea!
“If you trust in yourself, and believe in your dreams, and follow your star. . . you'll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren't so lazy.”
I don't care for brined turkey, although I know many who do.
“I ask no favor for my sex. All I ask of our brethren is that they take their feet off our necks.” ~ Ruth Bader Ginsburg, paraphrasing Sarah Moore Grimké
We did not brine ours this year, and it turned out delicious and moist just the same. In addition to the bird roasted in the oven, we also hickory-smoked a smaller one in the charcoal grill/smoker out back. That was spectacular. But my favorite dish was the Acutal Awesome Real Cranberry Business.
(Okay, the cornbread-and-sausage stuffing was pretty damn good, too.)
Starting the turkey upside down is a good way to keep it moist. I like brining, or not. I've had fried turkey a few times, it was delish but I wouldn't want to deal with the mess myself.
I miss my grandmother's sausage and oyster dressing/stuffing. That was a true New England delicacy!
For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
~ Carl Sagan
bigskygal wrote:
I miss my grandmother's sausage and oyster dressing/stuffing.
Mixing oysters with your sausages could make them hard to bend!
“If you trust in yourself, and believe in your dreams, and follow your star. . . you'll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren't so lazy.”
Guinevere wrote:I cannot imagine a turkey that large. I think we've cooked ones in the upper 20s, but never the upper 30s.
I did a 10-pounder on Sunday, after I returned from my travels. It was a fresh, organic, free-range bird, and while it tasted good, it wasn't all that tender or very juicy. Maybe it was too small. It definitely didn't seem young. My uncle's 25 pounder -- frozen and cheap (I think he paid about 40 cents/pound) was far more succulent.
Under 15lbs seems to be about where it's time to consider a turkey breast...a 10lb turkey just doesn't have that much meat on it. I have never had a turkey that small come out well.
