How To Dry Brine and Roast A Turkey

The secret to a juicy, well-seasoned and beautifully bronzed bird? A dry brine! It’s so simple. Find step-by-step instructions below for dry brining and roasting your holiday turkey!

Let’s get straight to it!

This simple method for dry brining calls for salt alone — 1 teaspoon of kosher salt per pound — as opposed to salt and sugar or salt, sugar, and additional spices. And the roasted method is similarly simple: brush the bird with melted butter, season lightly with salt and pepper; then roast until done.

This method consistently produces a juicy and delicious turkey with a crisp, burnished skin!

What You Need for Brining the Turkey:

• kosher salt (I prefer Diamond Crystal brand)
• A giant plastic turkey bag or a parchment bag (though I prefer the plastic bag for the protection it offers).

In short you’ll: Set your turkey in the bag and sprinkle it evenly with the salt. For the small 12-pound turkeys I’ve been buying this is about 1/4 cup. Close the bag, then transfer it to the fridge for 48 hours.

What You Need for Roasting the Turkey:

• roasting pan with a rack
• brush
• butter, salt, and pepper
• white wine
• instant-read thermometer: This one is reasonably priced and very accurate: Javelin Ultra Fast Digital Thermometer

In short: On Thanksgiving morning, pat the turkey dry, set it on a rack in a roasting pan, brush it with butter, season all over with salt (lightly), and pepper; then transfer the pan to the oven. You start the cooking at a higher temperature, then lower after 30 minutes. Consistently, my 12 lb. birds are done in under 2 hours.

Find the process outlined in more details below 🦃🦃🦃🦃🦃

How to Brine a Turkey, Step by Step

For the past three years for Thanksgiving, I’ve bought organic turkeys in the 12-14 lb range from Whole Foods, and they’ve been so, so tasty. They are frozen, and I’d recommend removing it from the freezer and transferring it to the fridge 1 week before Thanksgiving. This will give it ample time to thaw before you plan on brining it.

Open the bag and remove the giblets:

Place the liver in a bag and cook or freeze. Save the other giblets for making turkey stock or freeze.

Place the turkey in a large bag: I actually prefer the large plastic turkey bags for this, but a parchment bag works fine, too:

Calculate how much salt you’ll need per pound: for a 12-lb bird, that’s roughly 1/4 cup. Sprinkle the salt over the bird: on all sides inside and out:

Wrap it up; then transfer it to the fridge for 48 hours:

On Thanksgiving morning or whatever morning you plan on roasting, remove the bird from the fridge a few hours before you plan on roasting.

Transfer the turkey to a rack in a large roasting pan and pat dry. Let sit at room temperature until you plan on roasting:

Melt some butter…

Then brush the butter all over the turkey:

Season with salt and pepper:

Transfer to the oven @450ºF for 30 minutes; then add 1 cup of water and 1 cup of white wine.

Lower the temperature to 350ºF and continue roasting until the turkey is done. (See the recipe box for help calculating how much time you’ll need.) My 12-lb birds consistently cook in less than 1 hour. Often it’s more like 1 hour 40 minutes.

An instant-read thermometer should register 160ºF:

Let the turkey rest for at least 30 minutes, but ideally more like an hour before carving and serving:

Such juicy meat!

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Bye for now! Good luck! Gobble Gobble!