I’m thinking about brining a turkey a la Alton for our Thanksgiving meal on Thursday - it’s my family (me, husband, toddler child), along with both sets of parents.
I’ve looked at Alton’s recipe and it doesn’t seem too terribly bad, but obviously, I’ve never cooked an actual whole turkey before, so I’m a little nervous.
Advice? Do it? Don’t do it? Order takeout? 
If you feel comfortable cooking a turkey, brining it IMHO really adds nothing to the difficulty as long as you’ve got it planned ahead of time - space in the fridge, large enough pot or bucket, etc. It’s just an extra step, no actual skill involved.
PS - I don’t do frozen turkeys, but if you do - Cook’s Illustrated keeps hammering the point in e-mails to me that you want the whole thing defrosted by the day before, and if it’s a big turkey it may take WAY longer than you think. If you’re planning on frozen, read up on how long now. I’ve never done frozen but actually Cook’s suggests it, because like frozen veggies they’re uniformly flash frozen and are not prone to getting large ice crystals in them like “fresh” ones. Just another thing to confuse you with, is all.
Brining is easy! You’re just letting it soak in salt water; what’s so hard about that? Trust Alton.
Do it!
A little tip I learned from 20+ years of turkey roasting, the breast goes DOWN!
Yeah, it won’t look like the classic Tday bird, but it won’t be be dry breasted like the classic one either!
All the juices in the bird obey the law of gravity, why let them baste the backbone instead of the breast?
CMC +fnord!
The first time I cooked a turkey, I brined it. It turned out great. Now, I was only cooking turkey/stuffing/mashed potatoes etc because I love leftovers. I actually went to my parents’ house for the real meal, so I had no pressure.
But yeah, brining’s the easy part- it’s the rest of the cooking that’s a PITA.
I’ll second that it’s EZ. I brined when I cooked my very first Turkey, it was a snap. Just need a bucket, water, salt & assorted miscellanea. The weather is usually fridge-temp overnight by me, I just stick the bucket, covered, in the garage overnight, doing the ritual Turning of the Brine-Bird at some point (I forget the interval).
also, what crowmanyclouds said, cook the turkey upside-down if you’re feeling adventurous. Alternatively, a cooking bag makes it all pretty painless.
Brine! It’s easy, and it’s awesome!
Hmmph, I was going to reference the 27-page thread I started, asking what advice to give a friend cooking their first turkey, and how my spouse shanghaid me into cooking the bird myself, and I brined it.
But the board threads (at least mine) seem to cut off in 2005 now; this was probably around 2001 or 2. Frickin’ board (“fighting ignorance, until we forget and then fight it all over again”). I’m glad I printed that thread out and kept it; there was loads of good Turkey advice in there.
Cook’s Illustrated magazine - aka America’s Test Kitchen, the PBS TV show - recommends flipping the bird (snicker) halfway through roasting. For a 12-14 lb turkey, brine it, then roast upside down at 400F for 45 minutes, flip breast-side up, roast about 50-60 min longer until the breast is 165F and legs are 170-175F.
Trust Alton Brown. He will not lead you astray.
Really, cooking a turkey is not that hard. It just comes wrapped up with all the tradition and trimmings and the high expectations, and because it’s so big, people save it for special occasions. You can do it!
Some commercial Butterball-type turkeys are already brined, so read the labels. Brining one of these would be redundant.
Alton has never led me astray. His baked mac and cheese is always a winter favorite around here - it’s the dish I take to my in-laws :D.
I think I’m going to do it. I have the recipe copied and just need to make out my shopping list. I’m not going too crazy with the side dishes, and the in-laws are bringing some stuff while my mother’s making her pumpkin soup and bringing the pies and rolls, so I think I can handle it all.
Wish me luck!
[Alton Brown Blessing]May your turkey turn out golden brown and delicious.[/ABB]
Agreed - Cook’s Illustrated tested this and found that the “self-basting” turkeys get unacceptably salty if you brine them.
Are you sure you don’t want to stick around, so we can stress you out about the exactly right way to make gravy, and only heathens make it that other way? Huh?
If you’re going to talk about adding chopped hard-boiled eggs to gravy, I’m leaving, taking my five gallon bucket with me, and not coming back.
rushes off to check thawing turkey in fridge to make sure it’s not self-basting
Eggs? Really? ew.
Ditto koshered birds.
I would say it’s some Southern thing, but I’m in Florida, so I can’t really say that. Suffice to say he has given me permission to make his recipe without the eggs.