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A Cooks Guide to Cooking With Onions
Onions, subtle or strong have played a key role in
culinary history. Here is a guide to cooking with onions.
Yellow storage onions:
Probably the most familiar of all onions, you see em all the time at your local grocery store, sold in red net...
Cooking With Fresh Herbs
Herbs are fun and easy to grow. When harvested they make even the simplest meal seem like a gourmet delight. By using herbs in your cooking you can easily change the flavors of your recipes in many different ways, according to which herbs you...
Grilling Tuna Steak For A Simple Gourmet Meal
Looking for a delicious and simple way to grill up that fresh
tuna steak that you just caught or bought from the local seafood
market? Grilled tuna steak is a delightful and exciting entree
for any special meal. There are various methods to spice...
May's Featured Holidays and Recipes
There are three great days in the month of May that I would like to talk about...Cinco de Mayo, Mother's Day, and Memorial Day. I will share a brief history and include a couple of delectable recipes. Happy May! ...
Water Ionizers: Their Many Benefits
You are able to, at this point, make the most of one of the most important and abundant natural resources of our planet – Water. Our bodies are comprised of about 70% water, and our brain is composed of about 80% water. A large portion of our body's...
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One Bird the President Didn’t Pardon
Talking turkey
The talk around town in November was mostly politics, but after the election, people started talking turkey.
The thought of using a self basting or kosher turkey did not appeal to me, I’ve never liked taking too many short cuts, I find it ruins the fun. But I had heard a lot of talk about brining and how it cut cooking time down and made the turkey universally moist.
I did a bit of research, reading magazines and online articles and finally I got the basic formula: one cup of salt per one gallon of water. Salt and water seemed pretty boring so I researched further. Recipes for brine were a dime a dozen, some made sense while others were downright bizarre. Finally, I decided I wanted my brine to give my turkey a little more than a salt bath and came up with my own recipe based on that one cup – one gallon ratio
I started out with a half gallon of water in a large pot. I added two cups of salt and one cup of brown sugar. I brought it to a boil and kept it on just long enough to dissolve the salt and sugar. Next, I dropped in some peppercorns, a couple of bay leaves, and some thyme.
Finding a container big enough to hold a fourteen pound turkey and enough brine to cover it wasn’t much of a task. I just so happened to have a five-gallon bucket that I used for home brewing.
I poured the slightly cooled liquid into the bucket, topped it off with another
half gallon of water, and added a couple trays of ice cubes to hasten cooling. I then added one gallon of apple cider and one cup apple cider vinegar. I placed my turkey into the liquid, completely covered and let it brine away in the fridge for eighteen hours.
The Big Day
On Thanksgiving morning I preheated my oven, pulled the bird out of its salt soaked slumber, rinsed it off, and patted it dry. I stuffed the bird with stuffing that I had pre-cooked that morning and found a suitable roasting pan. Twenty minutes per pound was what I had heard for roasting a brined turkey and I factored in an additional twenty minutes for the stuffing.
I roasted the foil-covered turkey at 400F for the first three and a half hours, basting it every half hour. In its last hour, I removed the foil, turned the heat down to 375F degrees and brushed a honey mustard glaze on it. I let it rest about thirty minutes so that the juices could settle and then it was carving time.
My first reaction was “Wow it slices like butter!” The reaction of my dinner guests said it all—this turkey was different from its grainy, bone dry predecessors—this bird had taste! Safe to say I’m sold on brining.
Paul Rinehart is the founder of Online Cooking.
About the Author
Paul Rinehart is the founder on Online Cooking
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