Who Is Cooking For The Holidays? Whatchya Cooking?

For Thanksgiving (USA) turkey duty has fallen on me for the past several years.

I've tried all sorts of things from the "traditional" ways to upside down to deep frying, heck I actually fully de-boned the turkey and made a roll two years in a row. Yes, that is a LOT of work.

Where I've finally settled in is breaking the bird down and dry brining.

I butcher the bird basically into drumsticks, thighs, and boneless breasts. Those get dried thoroughly with paper towels and then generously sprinkled with a salt/brown sugar/(light) dried sage mix and placed on racks in sheets pans. Depending how well the thawing has gone this will be for 24-48hrs.

If possible, on the same day I do that, I roast up the carcass and wing tips with carrots, celery, and onions and then make a stock. Ready for gravy.

All the heavy lifting is done a day or two in advance.

The day of I roast the turkey pieces, adding the breasts in after the other parts have been going a while and then make the gravy with my turkey stock.

This method frees up a lot of oven room, produces juicy flavorful meat with crispy skin, allows you to pull pieces individually depending on doneness, allows for a great gravy, and simplifies carving.

The past few years we've been going to my mother in law's house and this also makes transporting the bird super easy.

After many, many years of varying degrees of success this is the method I'm fully committed to.

Besides, it let's you use a sharp knife to get things done.

 

The first year I did the de-boned and rolled turkey, there was a lot of grumbling about tradition and the pretty bird and all that. Then they ate it and that started to soften the blow. And my wife was quietly reminding people that they didn't have to make the bird. That quieted things further.

It took a couple years, and I think there's still some hold outs, but for the most part, folks are just happy with properly cooked bird.

I actually wish frozen turkey's were more readily available year-round. I buy whole chickens and break them down and would love to do that a few turkeys each year.

 

Best of luck.

 

Give the dry brine method a go sometime.

You can try it out on chicken for an idea. I'll usually spatchcock a chicken for that but works as well with any pieces. The turkey will have more flavor but it'll let ya know if you like it.

I dry brine stuff fairly often these days.

 

Also, I'll never turn down some braised short ribs!

 

@Insipid Moniker

Also, also...I didn't know what a pescatarian was until now. That's um, interesting...

 

Awesome. I gotta tell ya friend, I was a wet brine guy for a long time but no more. I'm all in on dry brining. I genuinely think it is superior. Give it a shot. Can use all the same ingredients.

 

Even if you just do a breast, I really think dry brining is awesome. While I haven't tried it, I'm sure it would work for smoking too. I've pretty much completely abandoned wet brines.

This is more or less how I attack it.

 

No doubt.

I meant getting the deer.

 

Yeah, small get together for us too.

 

Like I said, I started out practicing on chickens.