- May 7, 2008
- 157
- 10
I swear I have to re-learn brining every time I do it and I never fully understand it.
For Thanksgiving I brined 2 turkeys, both 12 pounders, and both following Jeff's smoked maple turkey recipe.
I smoked one, and fried the other one. They were both probably the best turkeys I've ever done.
I did brine then a little longer than suggested though. I think I went 36 or 48 hours.
I don't believe it's possible to have a turkey too most or too flavorful, so I might be different than most in that regard.
So for Christmas I'm doing 2 more, 1 fried and 1 smoked.
I decided to somewhat follow that recipe for smoked maple turkey again, but with a few minor changes.
I do my brining in 5 gallon buckets. And following his directions last time made it really hard to keep the turkeys submerged in the solution. It'd probably work better in a bag, but my buckets are so much easier I decided to make it work.
So I put 1.5 gallons of water in the bucket, 1 cup of kosher salt, 1 cup of dark brown sugar, and 3 tablespoons of Jeff's rub. I mixed that real good so it was all dissolved, then I put a 12 pound turkey in, and put a small mixing bowl in top of it to hold it down in the solution. I then dumped a 10 pound bag of ice in the bucket to keep it cold and put the lid on it. I then took the bucket and sat it in a cooler, and dumped 3 bags of ice in the cooler. Then I put the cooler on my patio table outside. After that, I did all of it again, 1 to be smoked and 1 fried.
I'm going to cook them on Christmas Eve, so they'll be in the brine for about 55 or so hours.
Do you guys think I need more salt or sugar? I'm still not totally understanding the relationship of salt to sugar to water that makes brine work.
For Thanksgiving I brined 2 turkeys, both 12 pounders, and both following Jeff's smoked maple turkey recipe.
I smoked one, and fried the other one. They were both probably the best turkeys I've ever done.
I did brine then a little longer than suggested though. I think I went 36 or 48 hours.
I don't believe it's possible to have a turkey too most or too flavorful, so I might be different than most in that regard.
So for Christmas I'm doing 2 more, 1 fried and 1 smoked.
I decided to somewhat follow that recipe for smoked maple turkey again, but with a few minor changes.
I do my brining in 5 gallon buckets. And following his directions last time made it really hard to keep the turkeys submerged in the solution. It'd probably work better in a bag, but my buckets are so much easier I decided to make it work.
So I put 1.5 gallons of water in the bucket, 1 cup of kosher salt, 1 cup of dark brown sugar, and 3 tablespoons of Jeff's rub. I mixed that real good so it was all dissolved, then I put a 12 pound turkey in, and put a small mixing bowl in top of it to hold it down in the solution. I then dumped a 10 pound bag of ice in the bucket to keep it cold and put the lid on it. I then took the bucket and sat it in a cooler, and dumped 3 bags of ice in the cooler. Then I put the cooler on my patio table outside. After that, I did all of it again, 1 to be smoked and 1 fried.
I'm going to cook them on Christmas Eve, so they'll be in the brine for about 55 or so hours.
Do you guys think I need more salt or sugar? I'm still not totally understanding the relationship of salt to sugar to water that makes brine work.