Turkey in the brine since 8:30 this morning. Spent rest of the day at niece’s home visiting with family.
Currently cubed sweet potatoes boiling for the wife to assemble the sweet potato casserole in the morning, and I’m making cranberry orange sauce from Chef Jean-Pierre recipe.
In the morning I’ll spatchcock the bird, season it with Meat Church Honey Hog and onto the Traeger with pecan shell pellets. Hopefully in the morning hectic rush I will remember to take a few photos.
Oh, sweet potato Casserole. My wife and daughter do this. Daughter peels a cuts. Nancy puts in pan and sprinkles brown sugar and maple syrup, then in the oven.
Roughneck lit at 0800, just threw the prime rib on at 0900 and hit my first snag. My Pulse wasn't showing on my Fireboard or app... luckily because I was running 2 cookers I decided to grab a second pulse. That one is working. I think one of the chargers might be dead, though it doesn't make sense. Both pulses charged overnight and showing fully charged, but the new one that's working shows 80% charge. Threw the old pulse on the new charger and if that doesn't work come turkey time I'll just use wired probes and contact Fireboard tomorrow.
Only thing I'm debating is I want my bacon wrapped poppers done as my guests arrive but I'm cooking the prime rib at 225-250 and the plan was turkey on the MAK going 0-375.
I might throw poppers on with the prime rib then finish on the MAK I suppose.
I'm just starting this morning--it's just three of us and we aren't doing much aside from some meat and a couple of sides. We'll have leftovers for a couple of days.
But I'm trying to decipher recipes for a boneless, skinless turkey breast vs. "turkey breast." As in, the recipes never say if it's one half of the full breast, or the entire breast netted together like a loaf. (I won't call it "turkey loaf" since that brings to mind something made with processed meat, wrapped in plastic, and has explosive side-effects an hour or two past dinner.) That's my only unanswered question. I used to do the full netted turkey breast and it was around four hours. So I'm guessing if I do the two halves separately, it'll be more like 2 to 2½ hours. I'm just trying to plan everything out time-wise right now. I've done them at 250-275 in the past with good results.
Dressing with gluten-free bread may be the first thing I tackle, then pie. Aside from smashing potatoes, making gravy, steaming veggies, and roasting a couple of squashes, that's about it. I have to drive 10 hours starting at 7am tomorrow so I'm thankful this will be an easy day.
skinless? Then sub 250 and 3-4 hours is probably right. Skin on, even if you go low and slow on the front end you'll be cranking things up toward the end (unless you intend for the skin to be trash then stick with above) and I would guess 2-2.5 hours. Worst case, it finishes early, wrap it and cambro until eating time, if it was skin on you'll have to remove that and fan fry or a quick blast on an oven rack as wrapping will sog it up.
Everything was on schedule and moving forward swimmingly. I got the turkey breast on the smoker right on schedule, set the program, and hit start. The fan started right up. I could hear pellets dropping into the firebox. It was time to kick back, relax, wait half an hour and check temps just to make sure everything is copacetic. Hmmm, ten minutes in I notice there is no smoke coming out the exhaust. I check the temp. It hasn't changed. I assume we have a bad igniter. Turkey goes into the oven and the day moves on. So today, I am thankful I have a working oven.
Spatchcocked and dry brined turkey is in the oven. My wife has completed prep on green bean casserole and dressing so those will go in oven when turkey comes out.
Yesterday we used Chef John's recipe for make-ahead turkey broth to make gravy with. Went a little heavy on the wing pieces in this batch but the broth is beautiful and I hope the gravy is too.
Pit Barrel Cooker
Weber Master-Touch
Blackstone Omnivore 4 Burner Griddle
Thermoworks: Signals, Billows, Thermopens, Thermopops, Nodes, bunch of silicone stuff, and more!
OnlyFire Rotisserie w/ Basket attachment for the Weber
Vortex for the Weber
Both of Meathead's books!
Way too many BBQ related accessories, tools, and doo-dads!
Pit Barrel Cooker
Weber Master-Touch
Blackstone Omnivore 4 Burner Griddle
Thermoworks: Signals, Billows, Thermopens, Thermopops, Nodes, bunch of silicone stuff, and more!
OnlyFire Rotisserie w/ Basket attachment for the Weber
Vortex for the Weber
Both of Meathead's books!
Way too many BBQ related accessories, tools, and doo-dads!
Absolutely the most tender turkey I have ever cooked. Smoked it per Meatheads method of injecting butter after the breast has been on the smoker for 30 minutes. Only a simple light salt, garlic and pepper coating. Perfect taste, just enough smoke. I didn't even gravy my slices, they were perfect just as sliced. I smoked at 250 not 225 and the 3lb 6oz breast took 3 hours, wrapped at 140. About 45 minutes longer than estimated. Altitude here plays havoc on your cooks, so first time through with something new is always a learning experience. I pulled it at 155, only a quick rest as we were running very late.
Long day. No time to post any in progress pics. Just got home from nieces house. Smoked turkey a big hit, nothing left but wings and bones for stock to make gumbo. My niece’s roasted turkey - lots of leftovers even after evening second round of eating (was third round for some folks).
But I'm trying to decipher recipes for a boneless, skinless turkey breast vs. "turkey breast." As in, the recipes never say if it's one half of the full breast, or the entire breast netted together like a loaf. ....... I used to do the full netted turkey breast and it was around four hours. So I'm guessing if I do the two halves separately, it'll be more like 2 to 2½ hours.
Good guess. 2¼ hours was the magic amount of time for a half breast. Smoked half, froze the other half to have in a few weeks. At 115°F I wrapped it in foil, then finished to around 163°F. Came out perfect, with a lot of juice in the foil. I don't think we've ever had one so moist before. 👍 The only downside was that our local market included the rib meat and another loose piece of turkey meat in the bundle, so I had to tie up the breast with butcher's twine. Just a minor inconvenience.
I found a simple dressing recipe on the Bon Appétit site, cut the recipe in half, made it with gluten-free bread, and it got raves. No leftovers!
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