Try My Pink Turkey! You'll Never Be The Same.

[Chuckwagon]

I just have to share my knockout Brine-Cured-Smoked Turkey with good folks like you! Its called "Lone Peak Turkey".

Brining is so simple your mother-in-law could do it! Do you like smoked turkey but hate a dried-out texture? If you like to smoke your meleagris gallopavo (wild) or meleagris ocellata (domestic), you will love it brine-cured in a solution of dextrose, 7-Up, salt, and sodium nitrite. What 7-Up (lemon-lime soft drink) does to the turkey is unbelievable! If you are only able to get “Sprite” soft drink, that’s ok too! And even fully cooked, the meat is served pink! This is undoubtedly the solution (no pun intended) for the problem of dry turkey. When smoked and roasted no higher than 170° F. (77°C.), I guarantee this gobbler will be the best flavored and textured, (and the pinkest), bird you’ve ever prepared or you may hunt me down and smack me with its carcass. Following 48 hours curing, use a thermometer and cook it only to 165° F. (74°C.) allowing for 5 degrees carryover effect. Careful now, just another ten degrees hotter and it becomes toast, so watch your thermometer.

Hey, this is just too easy! If you are not able to actually smoke the turkey, you may wish to add 2 teaspoons liquid smoke to the brine. Thaw the bird and remove all the innards. Weigh the turkey and stitch pump (inject) it with brine equaling ten percent of the turkey’s weight. Next, drop kick the danged thing into the remainder of the brine for 48 hours at 38° F. (21°C.). A convenient container to use is a clean camping cooler. (It is insulated and has a nice lid and drain). Here’s enough brine for several turkeys. Five-gallon formula:

Lone Peak Smoked & Cured “Pink” Turkey
The Brine:
Four gallons ice water
One-gallon 7-Up soft drink
2 teaspoons liquid smoke
4 cups powdered dextrose
2-1/2 cups kosher salt
2 cups Prague Powder #1 (sodium nitrite)

Remember to stitch pump (inject) a twenty-pound turkey in several places with 2 pounds of brine - (that’s 10 % of the bird’s weight), or pump a ten-pound turkey with 1 pound of brine (10 % of the bird’s weight). Next, immerse it in just enough brine to cover it. To keep the brine cool, add a sealed plastic bag full of ice cubes to the cooler. Remove the bag after 24 hours and add another one full of ice cubes.

After 48 hours, rinse the turkey and soak it in fresh, cold water a couple of hours, changing the water once at the end of an hour. Finally, lightly waterhorse the bird and hang it up to dry for at least an hour. The surface must be dry to the touch for it to take on any smoke. Now smoke-cook the turkey in your smoker using some nice alder, cherry, apple, or hickory. Forty-five minutes of heavy smudge is plenty. Too much smoke will cause the meat to taste bitter. Remember to use moistened wood chips or sawdust and keep a “flow” of smoke going using the draft and the vent to keep the meat from becoming bitter. It is important not to burn the wood - you only want to cause it to smolder. If you’ve added liquid smoke to the brine and are using your kitchen oven, bake the turkey at 350° F. but only until the meat registers 165°F. (Many people start the oven at 450° F, then lower it to 325 after forty five minutes - makes a nice crust). Remove it from the oven and let the “carry over effect” finish cooking it. If you’d really like to knock the socks off your guests, brush the bird with rendered bacon drippings just before serving it.

Most people overcook turkey. Be aware that the white meat cooks more quickly than the dark. The breast will register 170° F. before the thighs do, so be careful. Also be aware that spices and rubs will not penetrate a bird’s skin and fat. Rub your favorite spices and herbs on the flesh between the skin and the fat layer before cooking it. After people taste your turkey, rave reviews may be printed in your local newspaper with reference to your supernatural cooking skills. Local service organizations may erect a monument in your town’s square honoring your charcuterie ability. Even Granny, although grinding her teeth, will most probably compliment you for your smoked-cured, turkey recipe. This stuff is absolutely delicious! The flesh tastes something like two-year cured ham. Try some maple extract in the brine to present a mystifying flavor. Most of all, enjoy what you’re doing!
Best Wishes, Chuckwagon

[saucisson]

Nice recipe chuck, I'll certainly try it I've brined in salt and fizzy lemonade overnight before but not used cure, sounds great.

Dave

[Big Guy]

2 cups of cure? seems like a bit of overkill!

[RodinBangkok]

2 cups of cure? seems like a bit of overkill!

I'd suggest running the percentages on this formula before using anywhere that much cure.

[saucisson]

I hadn't spotted that no wonder it's pink...

Was that a typo chuck?

Dave

[wheels]

By my reckoning it's well within the amounts allowed in the US (and also complies with the stricter EU rules), so it's fine.

Don't forget you've got 5 Gallons of liquid there.

Phil

[saucisson]

Doh!! thanks Phil.

Dave

[Chuckwagon]

Thanks guys,
I've recalculated and rechecked everything. I even called the USDA-MID. The recipe is fine - just a lot of it. Our ranch crew eats a lot of food and we make big batches of everything. You wouldn't believe me if I told you what we use to mix the salad dressing in!

Believe it or not, in 1920 the US government allowed the addition of 10 lbs. of nitrate to 100 gallons of water. (Today seven pounds are allowed). A cured product could contain no more than 200 parts nitrite per million. It may seem like a lot, yet the same restrictions remain in effect today.

Just as a curiosity, do you know how much nitrite is lethal? Taken straight, merely 1/3 teaspoon! Nitrate is a little safer... it takes just over a full teaspoon to make you a permanent resident of the boneyard.

One must remember that the seemingly large amount of Prague Powder #1 in the brine, does its work in forty eight hours then, unlike the cure in sausages, most of it goes down the drain. I've made this pink turkey recipe for years and the buzzards have yet to start circling overhead.
Best wishes, Chuckwagon

[saucisson]

One must remember that the seemingly large amount of Prague Powder #1 in the brine, does its work in forty eight hours then, unlike the cure in sausages, most of it goes down the drain.

I think we (or should I say I ) panicked a bit before realising that

Dave