It is just the 4 of us for Thanksgiving this year. With temperatures being in the 60s, I decided to smoke a turkey breast for our thanksgiving turkey. Along with mashed potatoes, homemade cranberry sauce, dinner rolls and pumpkin pie, it's been a really great Turkey Day.
So, for those of you who have a smoker, here's what I did to smoke a turkey breast, which turned out to be one of the best tasting turkeys I've ever eaten.
I bought a 6 lb turkey breast, which is just about right in terms of leftovers for sandwiches. Last night, I made the following brine, which I found at my favorite smoker cooking website. Smoker-cooking.com has all the tips and techniques needed to make great smoked food. I used the techniques found on that website for the last 2 smoked meals I've made, and both have been great.
Here's the brine;
Ingredients:
| 1 gallon 1 cup 1/4 cup 1 Tbs 1 Tbs 1 Tbs 1/2 Tbs 1/2 Tbs 1/2 Tsp 1/2 Tsp 1/2 Tsp | water Morton kosher salt white sugar onion powder garlic powder paprika white pepper powdered ginger mustard powder powdered sage nutmeg |
I boiled the water, then added the sugar and salt. Once the sugar and salt was dissolved, I added the remaining ingredients. After the brine had cooled to room temperature, I put the turkey breast in and refrigerated for 9 hours.
After 9 hours, I removed the turkey from the brine and washed the brine off. I then let the turkey "rest" in the refrigerator for 3 hours.
Next, I dusted the cavity of the turkey with the following rub (dry ingredients only).
| 1/8 cup 1 Tbs 1/2 Tbs 1 Tsp 1 Tsp 1 Tsp 1/2 Tsp 1/4 Tsp | vegetable oil onion powder paprika garlic powder kosher salt white pepper powdered ginger powdered sage |
After dusting the cavity, I added the vegetable oil and put the wet rub all over the outside of the turkey.
Now, on to the smoker. Again, I only had hickory wood, but I like hickory flavor, so no big deal there. I got the smoker to 250ish degrees and held it there. I cooked the turkey at that temperature for a little over 5 hours (gotta get that white meat to 160-165). I added 2 handfuls of hickory chips every hour for the first 3 hours (the chips had been soaked in water since last night). I also basted with butter 3 times over the 5 hours.
After 5 hours, I pulled the turkey breast off the smoker and wrapped it in foil for 20 minutes to let the juices settle throughout the meat. I then carved and served.
The turkey was really moist and very flavorful. I liked it better than the Alton Brown Roast Turkey I made at Christmas last year, but my wife said that while this one was really good, she liked the Alton Brown Roast Turkey better. So, I guess I have 2 turkey recipes to roll with in the future.
No comments:
Post a Comment