Roasted Apple Butter Turkey with Turkey Bacon Scalloped Potatoes
September 30, 2017 By Kacey 10 Comments
Canadian Thanksgiving is just around the corner! Turkey is our star, and people want originality 🙂 This roasted apple butter turkey is the crispiest turkey you will ever have, and the most moist! Feel free to pair it along with my turkey bacon scalloped potatoes! #CdnTradition
This is a sponsored post. I was fortunate enough to receive monetary compensation and/or products from Canadian Turkey. Though compensation was received, all opinions are my own and I would not recommend a product that I did not enjoy.
It is Thanksgiving season and you know what that means!
I feel Thanksgiving isn’t the same without turkey on the table 🙂
Nowadays people are more familiar with their turkey cuts. Ground turkey has taken off, however, turkey legs, half-breasts, thighs, etc. make for great holiday meals. Some people have large families, others are small and simple, and Canadian Turkey can help you out this holiday season no matter what your lifestyle!
For our Thanksgiving, I like changing things up. This roasted apple butter turkey pairs perfectly with turkey bacon scalloped potatoes! Turkey all around!
Originally I was going to cook the apple butter with the turkey, but I have found my new turkey methods really yield a moist and tasty dinner.
How do I manage this?!
Well, brining is essential I believe. What a difference it makes. My husband says he can 100% taste and see the difference. And really, brining is not hard at all! To think I was afraid at one point 😉 Honestly though, you can throw in whatever you like flavour-wise, but as long as you have a good balance of salt and water, you are golden!
Secondly, after the brining stage, I like to pat my turkey dry and allow it to sit, uncovered, in my refrigerator overnight. This allows the turkey skin to dry out, and when we go to cook it, it results in the crispiest skin ever! Seriously, no butter, no oil, nothing. I put my turkey into the oven dry. And it comes out anything but dry!
With these two techniques you are always rewarded with the perfect roasted turkey. If brining, DO NOT salt your turkey before cooking it. The brine adds so much saltiness and if you season your turkey more, you are going to over-salt. I know everyone says salt, salt, salt, but in this case, DO NOT!
This roasted apple butter turkey uses my homemade apple butter (made in the slow cooker!) You can have the apple butter cooking all day and ready to serve alongside your turkey. Or, if you are like me and like to plan ahead, feel free to make the apple butter in advance! Then you can choose if you want to serve it cold, warm, or hot!
Alongside this roasted apple butter turkey I went with turkey bacon scalloped potatoes. No party is complete without scalloped potatoes, especially if they utilize turkey bacon!
Ohhh, turkey bacon, how awesome you are! This is a newer ingredient for me (I have worked with it before, but never as much as recently.) However, what a fantastic substitution to pork bacon. The brand I work with is not greasy at all, meaning you get some nice crispy bacon without all that fattiness. Though, bacon grease is great for cooking up homefries in 🙂
Better yet, my daughter LOVES turkey bacon and requests it over regular bacon now! Win! So it just made sense to make turkey bacon scalloped potatoes alongside our roasted apple butter turkey 🙂 Canadian apples with Canadian turkey 🙂
Looking to make your Thanksgiving easy and enjoyable this year? Remember these little facts!
- Brine your turkey! This takes 8 hours or more so plan ahead.
- Remove turkey from brine, pat dry, and allow to dry out in the fridge overnight.
- Save time on Thanksgiving day by prepping what you can the night before! Hint hint, apple butter!
- The slow cooker is your friend for side dishes to keep the oven free for your turkey!
- Meat thermometer is your friend: I use one to ensure I don’t overcook my meat.
- Not enough people for a whole turkey? Consider turkey breast (rolled or stuffed,) or even half-breasts (like my slow cooker lemon-dill turkey breast.)
- Still feeling overwhelmed? Canadian Turkey has all the how-to’s when it comes to whole turkeys! You can even start a new tradition and use turkey parts (legs, wings, etc.) in place of a whole turkey (meaning faster cook time and less worry!)
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Apple Cider-Glazed Roasted Turkey with Herbed Butter
Apple Cider-Glazed Roasted Turkey with Herbed Butter is a delicious and easy turkey to make for the holiday season!
Thanksgiving 2016 is going to be one for the books.
First of all, my parental units are visiting from Kansas. The fact that Mr. B and I don’t have to travel over a holiday is a dream come true. I have some fun plans in store for the parents, like riding our bikes to Union Station for a cocktail, visiting the Natural Science Museum, attempting a turkey trot, and testing out our new backyard fire pit.
Besides not having to travel, this will be our first official Thanksgiving dinner in our home. I can’t tell you how excited, or how adult I feel about cooking a feast for my parents as they have done so for my brothers and I over the past thirty years. It feels like a natural transition and one that I fully embrace.
And with transition comes new tradition. As a food blogger, I am always looking for ways to improve my kitchen skills, whether through new cooking methods or new ingredients. Well, this Thanksgiving I am bringing my A game with the ultimate, must-have, heirloom turkey from Diestel Family Turkey Ranch.
You may be thinking, what’s an heirloom turkey, Lauren? I asked the same question when the folks at Diestel Family Turkey Ranch approached me about trying one of their gourmet turkeys. But in order to understand what an heirloom turkey is, you have to get to know the Diestel family and their farming practices.
The Diestel Turkey Ranch is a family-run, sustainable ranch, operating since 1949. The Diestel family prides themselves on raising the highest-quality turkeys. With plenty of room to roam or as they say “walk the flock”, Diestel turkeys get lots of fresh air, and are provided the best environment in which to live. Another important fact: they give their birds time to naturally grow so they don’t have to use antibiotics. Just think, the average industry turkey is raised in three months compared to six months on the Diestel farm. Also, all Diestel turkeys are fed a 100% vegetarian diet, which means no hormones enhancers. Just clean, honest good food!
The Diestel family raises many varieties of turkeys: – original turkey, petite turkey (for those easy weeknight meals), organic turkey, and of course, heirloom turkey! The best way I can describe an organic heirloom turkey is similar to an heirloom tomato. These turkeys are from old lines of turkeys dating back to the 1920’s, which means you are tasting a bird that your great-grandmother would have eaten! Diestel’s Organic American Heirloom Collection of old-fashioned turkeys are a mix of Auburn, Black and American Bronze turkeys.
And let me tell you, great-grandma knew her stuff, because after I made this Apple Cider-Glazed Roasted Turkey with Herbed Butter using an heirloom turkey, my life has forever changed. The turkey itself tasted less sugary and clean. The meat was juicy (yes, basting the turkey with apple cider helps), but to tell you the truth, this turkey could have run a marathon without hydrating. The meat is that damn tender.
Anyway, the recipe I provided for you today isn’t fussy. I believe a Thanksgiving turkey recipe should be straight and to the point. And with the heirloom turkey already giving us a flavor head start, I didn’t want to try and out shine the star. With that, I slathered the turkey with a simple herbed butter, stuffed the cavity with an autumn delight, and roasted it perfectly for 2 1/2 hours. I know that you will fall madly in love with this recipe and Diestel turkeys.
If you are looking to purchase a Diestel turkey over the holidays, you can buy one on their online store here! Or, you can find a holiday turkey at select independent, natural, and upscale food stores across the country. And in case you need a turkey fix year round, check out their deli slices, chorizo & turkey sausage online as well.
Oh, and if you make a Diestel turkey over the holiday season, make sure to let them know via Facebook or Twitter! The family loves hearing from folks. And to make your holiday season even better, if you purchase a turkey using the promo code CLIMBING12, you’ll get a $12 discount off your very own turkey!
Cheers to holiday season!
***Diestel Family Turkey Ranch provided me with a product for the purpose of this post, as well as compensation for my time. As always, all opinions expressed in this post are 100% my own.***
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Maple Brined Ancho-Scallion Rolled Boneless Turkey Breast with Apple-Butter Pecan Stuffing
Damn, I thought Thanksgiving was the 29th because Thanksgiving is usually the last Thursday in November. Oh, boy, this is the trick of the trick or treat for real; the ultimate “Ha ha…you better get your ass in gear!” moment. I think Superstorm Sandy left me a little off-kilter, but I’ll get to that later.
You see, for this month’s Daring Cook’s challenge, which is all about brining meat and/or vegetables, then roasting them, which I’m late to as usual, I decided to brine a whole turkey breast, then layer it with more flavors, like a compound butter rub, then stuff, roll, and tie it up for a lovely, delicious Thanksgiving treat for those who don’t want to roast a whole turkey.
Audax of Audax Artifax was our November 2012 Daring Cooks’ host. Audax has brought us into the world of brining and roasting, where we brined meat and vegetables and roasted them afterwards for a delicious meal!
I didn’t have a bowl or bag big enough to fit the turkey and brine, see on right, so I ended up using a huge pot..left.
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Well, well, well, this is dinner Friday night, the 16th, and in less than one week..we will have turkey again; a whole 20 lb turkey. Because of this turkey breast, I would love to just roast some chickens and be done with it.
“Why did you buy such small turkeys?”, They might ask.
Okay, no one in my family is that dumb.
There is no way I can break tradition here, so more turkey it is. Yippee.
I wasn’t able to pound the breast down as flat as it needed to be to make it easier to roll, so next time I will remove the skin first (in one piece), then butterfly each breast and pound it as flat as I can, wrapping it back up in the skin once it’s stuffed and rolled.
I love to brine meat, from chicken to pork, and I most always brine turkeys. The well-seasoned juicy factor from brining is incredible, and I can’t think of another method that can give you meat this juicy, unless Thomas Keller is in your kitchen. (Ha ha! I just read the Thomas Keller/Juicy Meat blurb again and realized how it sounds!)
This turkey breast is so loaded with flavor that I don’t know how I can match it, and I wish I could make it again for Thanksgiving. First you’ve got the salty and sweet maple brown sugar brine with bay leaves, garlic and peppercorns, seasoning it to perfection. Then you have a garlic-scallion-ancho pepper butter rub beneath and on top of the skin. The stuffing is the crème de la crème with apples, buttered and toasted pecans, and of course, the usual sauté of onions, herbs and whatever else you want to add to your ‘custom’ mirepoix. It’s not always celery, carrots and onions IF you don’t want it to be.
So what are ancho peppers? Ancho peppers are dried poblano peppers, and they taste like spicy raisins but impart such a lovely, slightly spicy/smoky undertone to dishes. You can find them in plastic packages in many supermarkets.
Now get ready to gasp. I nixed celery in my stuffing.
I almost always nix celery in stuffing, or just add a small amount.
I like celery raw and crisp just to eat out of hand, but I don’t flip over it cooked (or chopped in salads). I don’t think it adds much to dishes flavor-wise when cooked, except chicken soup..and that’s only because I’m superstitious and believe it’s part of the secret penicillin that makes you feel better.
With all that said, tied up, smothered with ancho butter, and roasted, this turkey breast is a picnic on the palate (did I really just type that?) and as juicy as a warm peach right off the tree (did I really type that too?) so all you really need is a side of rice or mashed potatoes and a vegetable.
Of course you can add as many sides as you want, and we all have our traditions and favorites. I cannot have a Thanksgiving without candied sweets (yams/sweet potatoes) with toasted marshmallows, and cannot even fathom the thought of them not being part of the meal!
As for the stuffing for this rolled turkey breast aka turkey roll, there will be extra stuffing after you roll it, but use any stuffing you like for this roast! I’m just giving you the recipe for mine because I think it’s perfect for this rolled turkey breast, even though I saturated it with chicken stock so the breast would be easier to roll; another reason why I should have kept pounding it down flatter!
Just to let you know, I’ve never wimped out on a good meat pounding, but this time my arm really hurt, so I wimped out. Ha, ha, a good meat pounding. I just can’t stop with the unintended innuendos today!
Who says ugly can’t be delicious? I’ve had ‘beautiful’ that’s flavorless or tastes like pond scum, or how I imagine pond scum would taste.
OK, here’s another GASP moment. Once again, this turkey breast is so juicy due to brining, it doesn’t need gravy, the holy grail of Thanksgiving. But, you could make a pan gravy out of the drippings with some butter, flour, white wine and/or stock, because I’m sure at least one person might protest. In fact, several did here, so I made it. They only poured it over the mashed potatoes because, like I mentioned, this turkey doesn’t need it. It’s simply tradition..like my candied sweets/yams with marshmallows.
I know I say this a lot, but I’m going to say it again and I can’t say it enough. This is one of the best stuffed turkey breasts I’ve ever had. You know when something tastes so good that no matter how full you are, you keep eating it? This is one of those.
Finally, I’m extremely disappointed that it turned out so ugly. Sloppy rolling on my part, plus, again, I should have pounded the whole breast a lot flatter before stuffing and rolling; like a MEGA lot – like super flat, as it’s supposed to be. Regardless, I’m sure yours will be pounded sufficiently and look a lot more beautiful than mine!
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