Thanksgiving Recipes Reviewed - The Bird

I made almost everything for last week's Thanksgiving dinner from scratch, and I used almost all new recipes.  I figure that means I should sit down and think about those recipes - give them a good review.   
The whole idea of "cooking it all" started the week before Thanksgiving, when I was watching the Bobby Flay Throwdown with Ree Drummond Thanksgiving show.  It all looked so good.  They were making everything from scratch, with fresh ingredients, and everything looked delicious.  And I always prefer "from scratch" anyway, so that I can know exactly what's in the food I'm eating.   That's partly because I don't do gluten so I kinda need to know what's in it, and it's partly because I really do believe natural is better, and healthier.  And you can't have natural if you're buying processed stuff and don't really know what's in it...

ANY way... back to the recipes.  The one thing that seemed furthest from my "norm" for Thanksgiving dinner was the brine for my turkey.  I've never used a brine.  For anything.  I've never known anyone who has.  But I kept reading all sorts of rave reviews about how it could make all the difference in the world.  So...  I decided to go for the brine.

According to everything I read, the key to a good brined turkey was to use a fresh - not frozen - turkey.  So Tuesday after work I hightailed it over to Country Market and picked up a good lookin' fresh 15-pound bird. I'd decided to go with Ree Drummond's recipe for a brine.  I don't know why, exactly.  I suppose just because I really enjoy reading her blog, and because everything she made on the Throwdown episode looked amazing. 

I got up early Wednesday morning, and got to the business of brine.  I had to get it done super-duper early so it could cool, and I could get the bird, affectionately named "Bob" by the H.H., into his bath before I left for work.  I'll admit it was pretty simple to prepare, and it smelled darned good when it was heating up.

Once the brine was cooked and then cooled, I transferred it to a HUGE stock pot, and submerged Bob.  I put the lid on, heaved it all into the refrigerator (a couple gallons of brine over a 15-pound turkey in a huge stock pot is not exactly light), and forgot about it.  I didn't even think about Bob, or the brine, until 8:30 am on Thanksgiving day, when I thoroughly rinsed him and got him ready for the oven.

For roasting, I mostly stuck to the basics - put him in a roasting pan, tightly covered him with a foil tent, so forth and so on.  The one NOT so basic thing I tried this year was this - I covered the breast with a length of cheesecloth that had been soaked in butter, and at the end of the roasting time, I basted solely with butter.   

All-in-all, the turkey turned out to be quite good, in my own humble opinion.  Much moister than any turkey I've ever made before.  I'll definitely brine again. And baste with butter.  I guess it's true - everything really is better with butter.  ; )