Brining My Thanksgiving Turkey (Cranberry, Apple & Sage)

Happy Thanksgiving:

I purchased a  11 1/2 # farm raised no hormones or antibiotics turkey for Thanksgiving from Locust Leaf Farm in Foster, Rhode Island. (want to learn more about where and how I got my turkey?  click here) The following blog post will detail how I brined the turkey.

First lest start by asking why brine a fresh farm raised turkey?  Well brining adds moisture and flavor to the turkey and helps to keep it from drying out. Not only will your turkey be moist and tender but you will also accent the natural flavor of the bird. Planning is the one the most important part of the brining process, brining to early could be disastrous, brining to late would be a waste of time. You will need to brine your turkey roughly one hour for every pound.  For my turkey I started brining my turkey 11 hours prior to the turkey making its way into the oven.

For the brine: (recipe a variation of Good Eats Roast Turkey)

• 1 cup kosher salt
• 1/2 cup light brown sugar
• 1/2 gallon chicken stock
• 1/2 gallon apple cider
• 1 tablespoon black peppercorns
• 1 bunch fresh sage
• 2 bag of fresh cranberries
• 1 gallon heavily iced water

Directions

Combine the chicken stock, salt, brown sugar, peppercorns, sage in a large stockpot over medium-high heat. Stir occasionally to dissolve solids and bring to a boil, add one bag of cranberries (they will pop like popcorn), boil for one minute.. Then remove the brine from the heat, cool to room temperature, and refrigerate.

Early on the day or the night before you'd like to eat:
Combine the brine, water and ice in the 5-gallon bucket. Place the thawed turkey (with innards removed) breast side down in brine. If necessary, weigh down the bird to ensure it is fully immersed, cover, and refrigerate or set in cool area for 8 to 16 hours, turning the bird once half way through brining.

Cooking
Preheat the oven to 500 degrees F. Remove the bird from brine and rinse inside and out with cold water. Discard the brine.
Stuff the turkey with the second bag of cranberries and truss the turkey.  Need help or don't know how to truss a turkey?  Click here  coat the skin liberally with canola oil.

Roast the turkey on lowest level of the oven at 500 degrees F for 30 minutes.

A 11 to 13 pound bird should require approximately 2  hours of roasting or until the thickest part of the leg reads 165 degrees on a meat thermometer.

Let the turkey rest, loosely covered with foil or a large mixing bowl for 15 minutes before carving.

Until I Blog Again:  Live Life, Eat Well and Be Safe

My Thanksgiving Turkey- from Locust Leaf Farm- Happy Thanksigiving

Happy Thanksgiving, in this post I would like to give thanks to the many small farmers who give chefs, cooks and foodies the chance to buy all natural farm raised meats and produce throughout Rhode Island and throughout the United States.

If you have followed my blog you will recognize the name Locust Leaf Farm, so far I have purchased a 1/4 cow from them, a side of lamb as well as eggs and other miscellaneous items.  Check out my original Locust Leaf post here

Today I purchased a Farm Raised Turkey for Thanksgiving from Locust Leaf Farm, the farm gets the birds in June when they are only a few weeks old and then raise them on the farm in very large open air coops.  While in the coops the turkeys are given unlimited all natural fresh food (including treats of vegetables and grasses) and water.  Thus the turkeys are able to walk, jog and play turkey games throughout the day. Unlike the mass produced turkey farm turkeys you buy in the supermarket (see below)

Locust Leaf Farm raised and sold 40 turkeys in 2010 and  this year they have already sold 50 birds before January 1st . Because of the consumer demand they decided to expand and raise 75 birds for this Thanksgiving.

Locust Leaf Farm processes their own birds right on the farm, and they also process for other local farmers.  They do this as a family, with the help of 2 other trusted individuals.  This year they are estimating that they will process between 400 and 500 birds the week leading up to the Sunday before Thanksgiving..

I purchased a 11.5# Turkey for $40.25 , the largest turkey they raised this year was a little bit over 28#.

The farm even raised a few heritage breed birds this year, the Blue Slate Tom Turkey. The heritage birds were hatched by the farmers daughters and  preschoolers.  A picture of the Blue Slate Turkey that was taken at the farm a is below:

This is unlike the mass produced turkeys you buy in the store: 

The Secrets Behind Mass Turkey Production
via the Business Pundit

Slate has an informative ditty about how turkey suppliers meet huge Thanksgiving demand, which amounts to roughly 46 million turkeys during a single week. Suppliers must plan a year ahead:
Market leader Butterball…has already begun the production cycle for next year’s holiday season. Eggs for breeder birds have been purchased from one of the world’s two major genetic suppliers, Hybrid and Nicholas. Those eggs will then be hatched and placed in turkey farms so that they can grow and become sexually mature during the winter. Come springtime, these birds will produce the eggs that are destined to become the turkeys we actually eat.
The eggs laid next spring will be incubated for 28 days and then, after they hatch, the resulting turkeys will spend about 10 to 18 weeks on a farm before they’re brought into the processing plant in late October and November. The birds are slaughtered, quickly chilled…then shipped out to retailers, usually all in the same day.

The article adds that turkeys need to be bred with human help:
The vast majority of turkeys sold in the United States…have been bred to produce as much white breast meat as possible, resulting in males so large and unwieldy that they can’t properly mount the females. Toms therefore have to be manually stimulated and “milked” for their semen, which is then inserted into a hen using a syringe.
And that, folks, explains how your roasted bird made it from farm to table. Not a pretty process!
Article printed from Business Pundit: http://www.businesspundit.com.

You choose what method you prefer, you already know mine, and for that I give thanks to all the small farmers

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Until I blog again- Live Life, Eat Well and Be Safe...gobble gobble gobble