Just before Thanksgiving my girlfriend and I bought a turkey hoping that we would get the chance to have a Thanksgiving turkey. However we were lucky enough to get invited to TWO Thanksgiving dinners. Since then we have both been working non stop and haven’t had the time to cook our gobler. Finally this weekend we found time to cook our turkey!
Instead of just throwing the turkey in the oven, we decided to brine the turkey first! Brining a turkey involves making a brine (a flavoured salt solution), then immersing your turkey in it and then leaving it for a long time to absorb the brine. The goal of this is to add flavour and keep your turkey super moist.
Our brine was made from 8cups of vegetable broth, 8cups of water, 1/2cup of salt, rosemary, thyme, sage, black peppercorns, bay leaf and 1/2cup of sugar. We brought it to a rolling boil, then turned down the heat and let it simmer for 10 minutes and than you need to let it cool to room temperature.
This is me getting our turkey ready for the brine. We got an 8lb turkey, so we will have lots of leftovers. Once I had the turkey unwrapped I took out its heart and liver, moohahahaha!!! It just sounds so evil saying “I took out its heart and liver”.
Once the turkey was prepared we put it in a massive zip lock bag and filled up the bag with the brine.
Turkey in a bag! Yum!
Turkey in a bag filled with brine.
Getting ready to be put in the fridge.
Stuffed into our tiny fridge, in front of the beer and on top of the Chinese leftovers.
Tomorrow we will take the turkey out of its cold bath and throw it in a very hot oven! Check back tomorrow night to see how well the turkey worked out, as long as I haven’t overdosed on turkey and fallen asleep!
PS. I am currently watching Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations and they are in Ecuador. They have some kick ass looking street food there, Ottawa’s street food scene has a long way to go compared to Ecuador!
PPS. I thought I would include some pictures of what I ate today. I just like playing with my camera!
Breakfast (Egg, bacon and home made hash browns)
Supper (Chinese Food!!! Egg roll, General Tao’s Chicken, Moo Shu Vegetables, Shanghai Noodles – my favourite!!!, Sweet & Sour Chicken balls and pork fried rice!)
Adventures of an Ottawa Foodie 
Leave a Reply