Hallelujah! Moist Turkey!

Praise the Lord for a successful Thanksgiving Community Group meal and fellowship!  We had a blast last night hanging out and eating each other's food!  I am happy to report that my Turkey and dressing turned out wonderfully :-)  I was very pleased with the flavor and moistness of the Herb Buttered Turkey and I think that the dressing that I made from my grandmother's recipe turned out wonderfully!

So, as promised, here is the recipe that I concocted for the turkey.  I combined several recipes, and I'm sure that some of these things can probably be omitted to simplify the recipe, but it worked this way-so I'll probably take this one as gospel!  It's pretty long, but here is step by step what I did.

Herb Buttered and Brined Turkey

(Leave 2 ½ hours for prep and cooking time on day of roasting)

Brine Ingredients:

2 ¼ cups Chicken Broth

3 cups Water

1 bottle Soy Sauce (15 oz)

1 cup Lemon Juice

4 Garlic Cloves minced and mashed (to get the juices)

2 tsp Ginger (powdered)

1 ½ tsp Pepper

Herb Butter Ingredients:

¾ cup Butter, softened (or put refrigerated butter in microwave for 8 seconds and mash)

1 ½ tsp Poultry Seasoning

2 Tbsp Garlic Herb Dressing Mix (Good Seasons-found with the salad dressing dry mixes)

            This will be around 1 ½ packets

1 ½ tsp Garlic – minced and mashed

Herb Rub Ingredients:  (I only used about ½ of this recipe)

1 Tbsp Sage (powdered)

½ tsp Salt

1 tsp Garlic Powder

1 tsp Celery Seed

1 tsp dried Parsley Flakes

1 tsp Pepper

½ tsp Paprika

¼ tsp Ground Mustard powder

1/8 tsp ground Allspice

Misc. Ingredients:

10lb Turkey (10 servings)

Extra stick of butter-maybe ¼ a stick to use for added color on outside of bird

6-8 Celery Stalks for veggie rack underneath turkey

3-4 Carrots peeled for veggie rack underneath turkey

2 Onions - 1 very roughly chopped for underneath turkey, 1 quarted for cavities

2 Packs of Poultry Herb Bouquets (in the refrigerated herbs department in plastic containers-includes fresh Sage, Rosemary, and Thyme) – one for each cavity

1 Lemon – thickly sliced for inside turkey cavities

2 cans Chicken Broth for inside oven bag (28 oz total)

1 Reynolds Oven bag (turkey size)

1 Oven proof thermometer

1 Roasting pan that is at least 2 ½-3 inches deep

Instructions in order of preparation:

Thaw turkey for 3 days in refrigerator.

(These next steps can be done up to a day in advance)

Mix all ingredients for Herb Rub and store in a baggie.  Mix all ingredients for Herb Butter and refrigerate if making the day before.  10 seconds in the microwave can soften it up right before you use it.  Clean and cut ends off of celery stalks and store in large baggie.  Peel carrots and store with celery.

Clean, rinse, and pat dry Turkey, making sure to remove all packets in both cavities of the bird.  Combine all Brine ingredients in a pot large enough to put the turkey in and cover.  Reserve 1 cup of brine to be added right before cooking-Refrigerate until needed.  Put turkey into pot breast down (liquid should cover at least half, if not ¾ of the turkey), cover, and refrigerate overnight. Turn several times if possible-but at least once.  Mine stayed in the brine for a total of 18 hours.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Drain and discard brine.  Rinse turkey and pat dry (don’t worry, you won’t wash away the flavor!).  Prep all ingredients to put into and on the turkey: Roughly chop 1 onion. Quarter 1 onion. Remove herb bouquets from package and dice a little bit of one for fresh herbs (1/4 tsp looks good under the skin).  Thickly slice lemon. 

Place turkey in a shallow pan to work with before putting in roasting pan.  Place hand under skin of turkey and move around to make room for herb butter.  (I used powder free latex gloves...cause it’s yucky).  After softening Herb Butter, rub all over turkey, in every crease and as far under the skin as you can get your hand.  I did the bottom first and finished with the top.  The butter doesn’t seem to stick very well, but do the best you can and use all of it.  Sprinkle with a salt and pepper mix to taste.  Sprinkle Herb Rub mixture on top side of bird and slightly rub into the skin.  Put some in the large cavity.  Push the fresh herbs that you chopped underneath the skin over the breast.  Stuff the large cavity with 3 pieces of the quartered onion, 1 herb bouquet, 3 lemon slices.  Put remaining lemon slices, onion, and herb bouquet into the smaller cavity. 

Prepare oven bag as directed in the included directions.  (1 Tbsp flour into bag and shake).  Put into roasting pan, making sure all of the bag is inside the pan.  Place celery stalks, carrots and roughly chopped onions into the bottom of the bag to create a rack underneath the turkey.  This will keep the turkey from sitting directly in too much of the juice.  Pour the cup of brine that was set aside the day before into the bag.  Add 2 cans  of chicken stock to bag.  Lightly salt and pepper veggie rack to taste.  Place Turkey into the bag and close bag with included bag tie, trying not to let too much of the bag touch the turkey skin.  Cut 6 half inch slits in the top of the bag to release steam while cooking.  Insert the oven proof thermometer through one of the bag slits and into the thickest part of the breast just above the thigh.  Make sure that you position the bird in the oven so that you can read the thermometer through the oven window instead of opening the door to check.  There is no need to open the oven until cooking it completed-no basting needed! 

Cook for 1 hour and 35 minutes – making sure to watch the thermometer towards the end of time.  The temperature goal is between 170 and 180 degrees.  When the turkey reaches appropriate temperature, remove and let sit in the bag for 15 minutes.  During this time, you can remove enough juice from the bottom of the pan with a turkey baster through the slits for the gravy.  This way you can go ahead and make your gravy for the turkey.  (Butterball includes gravy packet in a cavity—use 1 ¾ cups drippings and gravy packet-boil in pot, then cook and stir for 5-10 minutes.)  Turn oven up to 500 degrees.  Cut the top of the oven bag off rub the extra ¼ stick of butter into the top of the turkey. Put turkey back into oven for browning for around 10 minutes.  (This is what I did, but you might try 450 degrees for 15 minutes to get a darker color??).  Remove turkey from oven and put cover over it to keep it warm while resting for at least 20-30 minutes before carving.

Yummy!