Sunday 31 March 2013

Easter Turkey on the Big Green Egg


Sorry I didn't write on the blog for a while I was deployed with the Navy. On another note let's get BBQing! Well I decided to BBQ and smoke my turkey this year on my BBQ. I started by buying a good quality Butter Ball Turkey at my local grocery store. I then left it unthaw in the refrigerator for two days. I then decided to brine my turkey overnight for 12 hours. I used the following recipe for my brine:

Ingredients

·       3 cups salt
·       3 cups brown sugar
·       3 gallon cold water

Direction

In a large clean cooler poor in the water and stir in the ingredients till they are well dissolved. No place a couple large bags of ice in the brine to keep it cool and submerge your turkey in the brine for twelve hours and place the cooler in cool place.

Now comes the fun part. Take your turkey out of the brine and give it a quick rinse under a cold tap. Then you want to pat your turkey dry with some paper towel.

I placed my turkey in a foil pan inside a v-rack. Its now time to inject the turkey. I used the following recipe for my injection:

Ingredients

1 1/2 cup melted butter
1/2 cup chicken broth
2 tsp of garlic powder
1 tsp of Bone Sukin' Sauce Seasoning & Rub
1/2 tsp Dizzy Pig Jamaican Firewalk

Direction

Stir the melted butter and chicken broth mixing in the spices till they are well dissolved on low heat in a small pot. Now let it cool just a little bit.





You now want to inject your turkey with this injection solution with a injection every square inch or so of the bird! Now let your bird sit for about 20 minutes.

Picture from www.fredsmusicandbbq.com/


Its now time to season the turkey with spices. I covered my turkey with a generous amount of Tasty Licks Savory Poultry seasoning and herbs. I also added some parsley to my turkey and a dash of Bone Sukin' Sauce Seasoning & Rub. Ensure that the inside cavity is coated with rub as well.


I also stuffed my turkey with some onions for added moisture and flavor  I also filled my pan with chicken broth to create some flavor moisture while my turkey smoke and cook.

Its finally time to start cooking. I pre-warmed my Big Green Egg to 230 degrees Fahrenheit and added a few pieces of Cherry wood chunk to the hot coals.



I then placed my plate setter with legs up with my grill sitting on top to smoke and cook this bird indirect.




Now place the bird and pan on top of grill and let it smoke for about 1.5 hour at 230 degrees Fahrenheit.



Now you want to increase the heat of the BBQ to 425 degrees Fahrenheit and cook the Turkey till the internal temperature reaches 165 degrees Fahrenheit. Also don't forget to baste the bird every 20 minutes with the juices in the pan. It took my turkey approximately 2 hours at this temp to be ready. If you turkey is starting to brown to much you can tent it with foil to protect it from burning.



When done tent the turkey in foil for 30 minutes to let the juices settle in the meat!




Enjoy and Bon Appétit! and Happy Easter!