Description
I kind of mixed the ingrediants from the different brines, cavity fillings and vegetable roasting rack from several different food tv recipes. This made the moisest turkey ever.
Ingredients
- Whole Turkey
- Olive Oil
- Kosher Salt
- Vegetable Stock
- Black Peppercorns
- Lemons
- Orange
- Yellow Onion
- Carrot
- Celery
- Rosemary Sprigs
- Sage Leaves
- Bay Leaves
- Thyme
- Ice Water
- Fresh Thyme Sprigs
- Carrots
- Celery Ribs
- Yellow Onions
Instructions
- Combine all brine ingredients, except ice water, in a stockpot, and bring to a boil
- Stir to dissolve solids, then remove from heat, cool to room temperature, and refrigerate until thoroughly chilled
- Early on the day of cooking, combine the brine and ice water in a clean 5-gallon bucket
- Place thawed turkey breast side down in brine, cover, and refrigerate or set in cool area for 6 hours
- Turn turkey over once, half way through brining
- A few minutes before roasting, heat oven to 500 degrees
- Remove bird from brine and rinse inside and out with cold water
- Discard brine
- Pat dry with paper towels
- Add rosemary, bay leaves, thyme, lemons and orange to the cavity
- Tuck back wings and coat whole bird liberally with olive oil
- Arrange the halved carrots, quartered onions and celery stalks on a half-sheet pan or baking sheet
- Position the turkey on top of the carrots and celery so that the turkey does not rest directly on the bottom of the pan
- Roast on lowest level of the oven at 500 degrees f
- For 30 minutes
- Remove from oven and cover breast with double layer of aluminum foil, insert probe thermometer into thickest part of the breast and return to oven, reducing temperature to 350 degrees f
- Set thermometer alarm to 161 degrees
- A 14 to 16 pound bird should require a total of 2 to 2 1 / 2 hours of roasting
- Let turkey rest, loosely covered for 15 minutes before carving