Tackling Turkey, Once and for All

An exclusive article for Lenda Lines by Matt Goulding, my son and co-author of the "Eat This, Not That" series.

Every November the nations' newspapers and food magazines flood our homes with a torrent of overwhelming and often contradictory information claiming to have finally cracked the turkey code. One year the geniuses at Bon Appetit or the New York Times decree that plain turkey is dead, that pomegranate molasses and truffle butter are the secrets to great turkey, and the next year they claim nothing beats a traditional bird. It's enough to send currents of fear down the spines of home cooks the country over.

To help you cut through all the silly turkey chatter, I've come up with a four-step, no-fail plan to world-class turkey. Follow this blueprint and you're guaranteed to raise the bar at this year's feathered feast.

1.  Get busy brining. A brine is simply a salty water bath, often supplemented with other spices. By brining your bird overnight you ensure that the seasoning penetrates all the way to the bone and that your bird will emerge from the oven moister than ever. Combine one gallon of water with 1 cup of salt and ½ cup of light brown sugar and bring to a simmer until the salt and sugar dissolve. Cool completely, then submerge the turkey for at least 8 hours and up to 14. If the brining vessel doesn't fit in the fridge, ice it down consistently enough to keep the turkey very cold.

2. Cool your breasts. Sounds funny, but consider this: dry turkey occurs because legs need to cook to 175˚F and the breast to just 160˚F, so by the time the legs are done, the white meat tastes like rope. Chefs at top restaurants normally cook the two parts separately but this will deprive you of the glory of presenting the bronzed beast at the table. Instead, remove the turkey from the fridge and strap on two ice packs, one on top of each breast half, for 30 minutes before cooking. The ice will lower the internal temperature of the breasts, thus helping to mitigate the cooking time discrepancy. 

3. Go high and low. Start by roasting your turkey at 500˚F for 30 minutes until the skin begins to brown, then lower the temperature to 350˚F for the remaining cooking period (insert a thermometer into the thickest part of the breast and remove the second the mercury hits 160˚F). The two-temp approach ensures a balance of crispy mahogany skin and juicy meat.

4. Take a timeout. Three hours in an oven will set every last bit of moisture inside your bird in motion, and it takes at least 20 minutes for those juices to stop swirling and be reabsorbed back into your meat. If you carve the turkey before 20 minutes have passed, all those precious juices will end up on your cutting board, not on your fork.

The Western Wake Farmer's Market and four additional Triangle area farmers' markets invite you to their Tuesday, Nov. 23rd pre-Thanksgiving markets!  The hours for our local market located at Carpenter Village are 3:00-6:00 pm.  Hope to see you there!                                     

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