Beeps Posted November 4, 2009 Report Share Posted November 4, 2009 Thanksgiving Dry run - I'm hosting Thanksgiving for my family this year. There's going to be 30 people here. I wanted to see if I could grill the turkey. I bought a small test bird for the first pass (15 lbs). Recipe: Brine 1 Turkey in any manner you choose. I have tended to shy away from heavy salt Remove from brine pat dry and let air dry in refrigerator for 24 hours. Air drying I've found produces extremely crispy skin and worth the time and effort. I doesn't stink up your fridge by doing this if you've cleaned the bird well. After dried, breast side down remove the backbone, flip and bust the chest bone with a knife. Herb Paste: 4 Parts Thyme Leaves 2 Parts Sage leaves 1 Part Rosemary Leaves 1 Part shallot chopped (or 1/2 small onion) 1 Part lemon zest 1 Part dijon mustard For each part, 2-3 garlic cloves Put all above in processor and drizzle olive oil in to make the emulsion. Rub this all over the cavity between the skin of the breasts, legs and wings, then rub the remaining all over the outside of the bird. The starting dome temp was 400 deg F and I left it there for one hour, then shut off the vents. Let sit for 40 more minutes at 350 and it was done, 160 deg F internal temp. I put hickory chips in 2 times at start and when I closed the vents. Pretty easy and it cooked fast. Here's the results from this morning, I'm really surprised how fast it was done: First peek of daylight. This is at 1.5 hours, I took it off 10 mins later. Carved up: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Syzygies Posted November 4, 2009 Report Share Posted November 4, 2009 Looks beautiful... So what's your brine recipe? I've seen 1/2 cup sea salt per gallon water called a "light brine". This is what I always use (with 1/4 cup sugar), and I haven't found birds get too salty, even overnight. People also use 1 cup/gallon, but for me that's too much. A possible shortcut to air drying is to use a hair dryer. I've done this with other birds, e.g. before deep-frying a duck for Thai cooking. (For another cooking application, Dennis likes to use an old hair dryer as a very directed fan after lighting charcoal.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DennisLinkletter Posted November 4, 2009 Report Share Posted November 4, 2009 Looks great.. Looks great.. I gotta cook some birds.. been a while. That shot has gotta go up on the new KK website that's going up soon.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LarryR Posted November 4, 2009 Report Share Posted November 4, 2009 Nice looking bird! I'm doing one this weekend in my Jack Daniels and Maple Syrup Brine. She's going "down" tomorrow. Here's some good info on Brining Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beeps Posted November 5, 2009 Author Report Share Posted November 5, 2009 So what's your brine recipe? I've seen 1/2 cup sea salt per gallon water called a "light brine". This is what I always use (with 1/4 cup sugar), and I haven't found birds get too salty, even overnight. People also use 1 cup/gallon, but for me that's too much. A possible shortcut to air drying is to use a hair dryer. I've done this with other birds, e.g. before deep-frying a duck for Thai cooking. (For another cooking application, Dennis likes to use an old hair dryer as a very directed fan after lighting charcoal.) That could be it, I was using 1 cup per gallon. I like the sugar idea too! I think my wife would freak out if she saw me using a hair dryer on a bird haha. Thanks for the link LarryR, that's a great resource about brining and how to better do that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Syzygies Posted November 5, 2009 Report Share Posted November 5, 2009 Here's some good info on Brining I appreciate seeing the link, but I'm a bit reminded of Consumer Reports trying to claim that premium audio cables were a fraud, when I could detect actual volume differences (never mind fidelity) between the cheapest cables and the most cost effective good cables. Laurie and I can't stand commercial salt, we're convinced that's part of the reason commercial hot sauces taste so chemical and harsh. And expensive? Buy sea salt in bulk at one of those hippie bin stores (ours is called Harvest House) with homeopathetic remedies in front. It's probably cheaper than commercial salt at a supermarket. In any case, we like a light brine and can taste the difference over no brine. If we're imagining this, please don't pinch us. We're enjoying the dream. My favorite source for brining is Paul Bertolli's Cooking by Hand. He describes how to compute the salt for a target salinity, taking into account the brine water and the water in the meat. For a house-cured ham, this is essential. (Our target salinity is 2.5%, making for a rather light ham.) For a quick bird brine, just use lots more brine than bird, and the calculation becomes insignificant. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amphoran Posted November 5, 2009 Report Share Posted November 5, 2009 Great looking bird, Beeps! Was that about a ten-pounder? Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sanny Posted November 5, 2009 Report Share Posted November 5, 2009 Re: Thanksgiving Dry Run Great looking bird, Beeps! Was that about a ten-pounder? Mike ...I bought a small test bird for the first pass (15 lbs).... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amphoran Posted November 5, 2009 Report Share Posted November 5, 2009 BLUSH! That last bit was off the screen to right..... My one issue with this forum software is that sometimes lines don't wrap properly. Thanks for pointing that out, Sanny! Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sanny Posted November 5, 2009 Report Share Posted November 5, 2009 BLUSH!... Thanks for pointing that out, Sanny! Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Conodo12 Posted November 10, 2009 Report Share Posted November 10, 2009 I'd say that was a successful test run!! Nice job!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tucker Posted November 13, 2009 Report Share Posted November 13, 2009 Grilled bird WOW..... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
primeats Posted November 15, 2009 Report Share Posted November 15, 2009 Really nice looking birds. I need to change the font on my Macbook, thought the subject title was about dry rum,naturally I was intrigued. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yeehaaa Posted November 20, 2009 Report Share Posted November 20, 2009 Thanksgiving dry run Beeps, Nice looking bird! Makes me hungry.... I'm a little puzzled about the brining. 4 hours for a 15# turkey seems a bit shy. I brine a 20# bird for 24 to 30 hours and it seems just right. I use a brine that is 1 gal. water + 1 cup Kosher salt + 1/2 cup sugar + spices. Also, rinse the bird thoroughly before putting it back in the fridge to rest. (Resting is good...I practice it a lot) Someone on this forum a while back mentioned the book "Charcuterie" by Ruhlman & Polcyn. I looked the book up and had to buy one. The basic brine recipe I use is from this book: - 2# chicken = 4 to 6 hours brine time - 3-4# chicken = 8 to12 hours - 10-15# turkey = 24 hours Happy Q-ing! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beeps Posted November 24, 2009 Author Report Share Posted November 24, 2009 Thanks for the kind replies! Thanksgiving is a couple days away! My plan from what I've learned with everyone's kind comments are: 2 15 lb turkeys, in brine for 12-16 hours with 1/2 cup of sugar and salt based on feedback here and research. I think I didn't let it go long enough with the dry run bird. I will dry them in the fridge for 24 hours. The herb paste recipe is amazing, I have done it with a chicken as well and the results are incredible. I plan to heat soak my cooker before I put them on (it's cold here recently), and plan to allow 3 hours of cooking time so probably putting them on at 2pm for serving at 530 with 30 mins of resting before carving. The thing I'm not sure about is I will have to double stack the birds with the top 2 grills, so the bottom one may get soaked with the drippings of the top bird? Not sure if that will just make the bottom bird totally awesome or fail. I may be able to get both on the same level of grill. We'll see! Edit: I noticed in my excitement of the original post I butchered Drunk_J's format so I'll edit to conform. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LarryR Posted November 24, 2009 Report Share Posted November 24, 2009 Beeps, why not put the bird on the top in a roasting pan? This way you protect the bird on the bottom and capture all the drippings for some gravy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amphoran Posted November 25, 2009 Report Share Posted November 25, 2009 herb paste question Beeps, There are a couple of ways to parse the herb paste recipe. It states: "...for each part, use 2-3 cloves garlic..." So as stated there are 10 parts of herbs and other ingredients, so do you really mean to use 20-30 garlic cloves, or am I mis-interpreting something here? I further assume that a "part" in this case might be a loose handful. Is that close? I'm hoping to do this Thursday, it looked SOOOOOOO scrumptious! Thanks, Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beeps Posted November 25, 2009 Author Report Share Posted November 25, 2009 LarryR, I'm not sure why I didn't think of that. I'm going to dig around to see if I can't find a pan, that's a very simple solution. Mike: I think the original post can be way better, thanks for the feedback. I'll update my post. Where part = Tablespoon so: 4 Tbs Thyme Leaves 2 Tbs Sage leaves 1 Tbs Rosemary Leaves 1 Tbs shallot chopped (or 1/2 small onion) 1 Tbs lemon zest 1 Tbs dijon mustard For the above, 2-3 gloves of garlic. If doubling the recipe, 4-6 cloves of garlic to taste. Depending on your bird size you may need to make more, which is what I had to do, so that's why I put it into parts. I think that backfired on me and certainly hurt the clarity of my post. I got the recipe from Cooks Illustrated where I could not link the actual recipe as I subscribe but they do not allow links to recipes outside their forums. Maybe I can copy and paste but I'm not sure I'm breaking rules. I'll email them. It's fun stuff I just dumped my birds into the brine!! Pics inc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amphoran Posted November 25, 2009 Report Share Posted November 25, 2009 Beeps, Thanks much! That clarifies everything. My 16-pounder is halfway through brining as I type. Cheers, Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beeps Posted December 1, 2009 Author Report Share Posted December 1, 2009 I only had the chance to take 2 pictures in the fray: Here's when I cracked the lid about 30 mins in to check temps. I was afraid I was going to need to double stack the birds, but 2 15 lbs fit with no problem: Leggy goodness, meat was about the same as before, moist and tender: Thanks for all the help. I hope everyone had a wonderful day. I think next I will try pizzas! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
