About two weeks ago I was scrounging through my deep freezer and low and behold there it was..A Turkey I purchased back in Dec 2015. Thanksgiving is quickly approaching us so I had to cook this baby up.
It's worth mentioning that my daughter has been hounding me to make Turkey for the past 5 months or so. Her three favorite dishes I make are Meat-loaf, Turkey and Spaghetti. Every year during Thanksgiving I cook up two Turkeys and buy two more to make during the year. I might have to buy additional Turkeys to satisfy my daughters craving.
HERE WE GO......
First things first. Remove all the plastic wrap and reserve the innards for a stock or toss them in the garbage. You're gonna want to break down the Turkey into pieces. I always refer to the Chef-Steps Video on Turkey Butchering to demonstrate how to break down a Turkey the right way. As always I dry-brined my Turkey with a sprinkle of Kosher salt. The Turkey sat in the refrigerator for about 2 days.
Now on the the Sous-Vide process. After bagging up all the meat I had to come up with a temp that would work with the idea of me deep frying Sous-Vide Turkey. In the past I would SV the white meat at 140˚ƒ for 4 hours than Smoke, BBQ or Grill. Same with the dark meat but I would SV the dark meat at 150˚ƒ for 6 hours.
Finishing the Turkey is a snap when I Smoked/BBQ or Grilled the Turkey. I would run the Weber at 225-250˚ƒ and take the internal temp of the Turkey back up to 140-145˚ƒ (White meat) and 150-155˚ƒ (Dark Meat) which usually took about 90 minutes. This created perfect Turkey that was glazed and dark.
Taking everything into consideration I decided on the following. To save time and be more efficient I set the Sous-Vide at 155˚ƒ and cooked the dark meat for 4 hours then lowered it to 140˚ƒ (added cold water) and tossed in the white meat and cooked everything for another 4 hours. To recap: Dark Meat cooked for 4 hours at 155˚ƒ then additional 4 hours at 140˚ƒ. White meat cooked at 140˚ƒ for 4 hours total.
After the Turkey was Sous-Vide it was Cold Shocked (submerged in an Ice-Bath) and refrigerated for a few days.
Before I preceded to the next step I tossed all the bags in the sink and soaked them in warm tap water to bring them up to room temp. The Turkey pieces are big and if you were to fry them Ice-Cold.....well lets just say it's not a good idea.
Remove the Turkey from the vacuumed sealed bags and rinse them under cold water. Pat dry and if you want..... dry off the additional moisture with a small fan.
Before I continue I just have to praise the Better Breader Batter Bowl. If you plan on breading anything this makes your job easy and clean up is a snap. And the silver of course is you don't waste any flour. Toss in some flour give your food a shake and your done. Boom!!!!
I set the oil pretty hot (375˚ƒ) because the Turkey was already cooked through and I was only interested in getting them crunchy and brown.
Review- They came out great. I won't change anything accept maybe the flouring technique and or the spices. I will consider the following next time.
Finishing the Turkey is a snap when I Smoked/BBQ or Grilled the Turkey. I would run the Weber at 225-250˚ƒ and take the internal temp of the Turkey back up to 140-145˚ƒ (White meat) and 150-155˚ƒ (Dark Meat) which usually took about 90 minutes. This created perfect Turkey that was glazed and dark.
Taking everything into consideration I decided on the following. To save time and be more efficient I set the Sous-Vide at 155˚ƒ and cooked the dark meat for 4 hours then lowered it to 140˚ƒ (added cold water) and tossed in the white meat and cooked everything for another 4 hours. To recap: Dark Meat cooked for 4 hours at 155˚ƒ then additional 4 hours at 140˚ƒ. White meat cooked at 140˚ƒ for 4 hours total.
Before I preceded to the next step I tossed all the bags in the sink and soaked them in warm tap water to bring them up to room temp. The Turkey pieces are big and if you were to fry them Ice-Cold.....well lets just say it's not a good idea.
Remove the Turkey from the vacuumed sealed bags and rinse them under cold water. Pat dry and if you want..... dry off the additional moisture with a small fan.
Setup a breading station or do what I did and use the Breader Bowl. Place some flour in the bowl with some seasoning. The Ozark Seasoning is what I chose and I was not disappointed but you can use what ever you want. I also lightly sprinkled the Turkey pieces with the spice prior to flouring.
First time out I used a simple breading method. I dipped the Turkey in flour then in a liquid (I used half/half) and gave it another coating of flour. I set the pieces on a rack and used that little fan I described above to dry them further.
I set the oil pretty hot (375˚ƒ) because the Turkey was already cooked through and I was only interested in getting them crunchy and brown.
Review at the bottom of the pictures.
Review- They came out great. I won't change anything accept maybe the flouring technique and or the spices. I will consider the following next time.
- Maybe use the Ozark Seasoning for the dry-brine.
- Use the Serious eats approach for deep frying chicken.
