How to Brine Your Turkey With Cranberry Juice This Year

How to Brine your Turkey with Cranberry Juice This Year

Cranberry Brined Smoked Turkey

First things first. The first thing that you must do in preparing for this recipe is to find a good turkey. I cannot recommend enough the use of a fresh, minimally processed bird with no solution added. Sometimes these are hard to find, but so worth the trouble to search one down. Perhaps the yellow pages could be your friend in this endeavor.

For one of my turkeys, I used a pre-frozen turkey with 8% solution as a worse case scenario. I have to make sure that this recipe is great even in a less than perfect turkey.

What size of turkey you purchase is up to you, and based on how many folks you will need to feed. Turkeys will usually feed 1 person per raw pound. i.e. a 12 pound bird will feed 12 people, so purchase accordingly. I do recommend buying 2 smaller birds rather than 1 large bird if you are feeding more than 12 people. I'm already hungry!!

Brining the Turkey

As the name implies, I'm going to brine the turkey this year with cranberry juice. Not water, with a little cranberry juice in it, but with straight cranberry juice. Well I say cranberry juice, the pure stuff is hard to find, and most bottles marked as cranberry juice 100% juice is usually part cranberry, part apple, part grape, etc..

I opted to use the cranberry-pomegranate mixture by Ocean Spray with no sugar added. The cranberry-pomegranate juice was very cranberryish with a lot of tang which is what you would expect, and I was hoping above hope that the flavor would show up in the end result.

You may be asking? Why cranberry juice? Well I love trying new things and it just came to me in a moment of great illumination really.

Cranberry and turkey just go together, so why not?

Place your turkey in a food safe container large enough to hold the size of turkey that you purchased, and make the brine below:

4 64-oz bottles of Cranberry-Pomegranate juice (Ocean Spray brand)

2 cups of kosher salt or sea salt.

Mix the brine a gallon at a time (2 bottles + 1 cup of kosher salt or sea salt) and pour it over the turkey until the bird is completely submerged.

I was fortunate to find a small 9 lb. bird, and it fit into a 2-1/2 gallon zip-loc bag for brining. Once the brine is covering the bird, place the bird in the fridge for 8-10 hours, or overnight.

What if you don't have room in the fridge?

Great question! You can, in a pinch, place the turkey in an ice chest with a tight fitting lid. Make enough brine to cover the bird, throw in about 8-10 lbs of ice and close the lid. If you keep the lid closed securely, it should stay cold enough all night. I do recommend that you drop a digital probe meat thermometer in the water to monitor the temperature, and make sure that it stays below 39 degrees for safety purposes.

Won't the ice dillute the brine?

Yes, just a little, but while I could get scientific about it, and add more salt to compensate, I never do, and it always comes out great. "If it's not broke then don't fix it" is the motto I use with that.

Adding some extra flavor.

When the brining process is complete, rinse the bird really well under cold water to remove any excess salt on the surface of the meat. Try not to laugh when you realize that the cranberry juice has turned the bird completely pink.

If the bird is 10 lbs or less, Place it in a 2-1/2 gallon zip-loc bag, and pour about 1/4 cup of vegetable, or canola oil over the turkey then about 1/2 cup of your favorite rib rub.

Close the bag and shake, or roll it around to completely coat the turkey with the oil and rub mixture. This allows the rub to get all over the outside of the meat as well as up under the skin and creates some really tasty eating for later.

If your bird is larger than 10 lbs then it may not fit into the zip-loc bag. No problem, just brush the oil onto the bird, then apply the rub by hand, making sure to get the spices up under the skin wherever possible.

Super Tenderizing the Turkey

Once the bird is out of the smoker, and you have time, consider wrapping it in foil, and allowing it to sit untouched for about 30-60 minutes. During this time the turkey will maintain temperature, and will tenderize for melt in your mouth goodness. This step is not a necessity, but well worth the time required.

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3. http://www.bukisa.com/articles/392064_ways-to-tell-if-a-relationship-is-unhealthy

If you have any suggestions, or comments to this article, myself, and my readers would love to hear from you. It is our desire for you, and your family to have a lovely holiday season. Use the comment section below. It is our hope that you continue to walk with God, as I promise that God is already walking with you. Thank you for your time today, and God bless. Also if you are looking for unique, one of a kind hand made gifts please visit our shop at http://lakewhitneywoodshop.weebly.com You can contact me in my shop at tomcmoore@amerion.com Happy Holidays!!