I have an 18lbs turkey and I was thinking of trying to brine it this time. However, what is the best thing to brine it in, if you don’t have a room in your fridge? I’ve seen people put it in one of those football kind of coolers, but does that keep it cold through out the whole time? So any tips about that would be great and recipes too. I also wanted to cook the turkey in a oven bag, do you think that would be a good idea?
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On Rachael Ray yesterday I saw them doing this! they brined the turkey in a cooler with chicken stock and let it sit.
To brine my turkey, I use either a small ice chest or one of those orange drink dispensers by Thermos…. what’s nice about either of those two is they can sit out on the counter and keep yoru turkey safely cool, and they both have spigots to drain off brining liquid when you’re reading to roast!
ROASTED BRINED TURKEY
1 (14 to 16 pound) young turkey, fresh or thawed
For the brine:
1 cup kosher salt
1/2 cup light brown sugar
1 gallon vegetable stock
1 tablespoon black peppercorns
1/2 tablespoon allspice berries
1/2 tablespoon candied ginger
1 gallon iced water
For the aromatics:
1 red apple, sliced
1/2 onion, sliced
1 cinnamon stick
1 cup water
4 sprigs rosemary
6 leaves sage
Canola oil
Combine all brine ingredients, except ice water, in a stockpot, and bring to a boil. Stir to dissolve solids, then remove from heat, cool to room temperature, and refrigerate until thoroughly chilled.
Early on the day of cooking, (or late the night before) combine the brine and ice water in a clean 5-gallon bucket. Place thawed turkey breast side down in brine, cover, and refrigerate or set in cool area (like a basement) for 6 hours. Turn turkey over once, half way through brining.
A few minutes before roasting, heat oven to 500 degrees. Combine the apple, onion, cinnamon stick, and cup of water in a microwave safe dish and microwave on high for 5 minutes.
Remove bird from brine and rinse inside and out with cold water. Discard brine.
Place bird on roasting rack inside wide, low pan and pat dry with paper towels. Add steeped aromatics to cavity along with rosemary and sage. Tuck back wings and coat whole bird liberally with canola (or other neutral) oil.
Roast on lowest level of the oven at 500 degrees F. for 30 minutes. Remove from oven and cover breast with double layer of aluminum foil, insert probe thermometer into thickest part of the breast and return to oven, reducing temperature to 350 degrees F. Set thermometer alarm (if available) to 161 degrees. A 14 to 16 pound bird should require a total of 2 to 2 1/2 hours of roasting. Let turkey rest, loosely covered for 15 minutes before carving.
–Alton Brown, Food Network
who would know better than Alton Brown
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/good-eats-roast-turkey-recipe/index.html
you could put it in a big ziploc bag with the brine, then put the bag in a cooler and add ice all around it and keep checking on it and add more ice as the ice melts. then let the turkey come back up to room temperature (i think) before you cook it.
i’m sure you could cook it in an oven bag, but i don’t know if you’d want to seeing as how i don’t think it could get a nice crispy skin that way? and i’m not sure that it would brown.
I saw the lady on "Cooking for Real" (food network) making a brine for turkey the other day. She said whatever you do, don’t skimp on the salt. She used apple cider, salt and some dried herbs (bayleaves and rosemary I think)
Any type of picnic cooler should work fine. The ones that have a drain plug on the side are even better. Once you add your ice to the brining liquid and submerge your turkey, it should stay cold enough for 8-16 hours as long as you keep the lid closed. (The recipe I have uses 5 pounds of ice)