For an extremely juicy turkey this Thanksgiving, try a simple Turkey Brine made up of just 7 ingredients. This recipe has been our family’s favorite for almost 10 years! Let us show you how to brine a large bird with minimal clean up.
I don’t share savory recipes on the blog often if you’ve been following along for a bit. But Thanksgiving is our favorite holiday, and I just want to share with you all of our family recipes we make every single year. And I can attest that Ryan’s Turkey Brine hasn’t let us down for the last 10 Thanksgivings we have hosted.
The brining process requires the turkey to sit in the brine for a day soaking up all the salt, water and flavor, yielding an extremely juicy bird once roasted. No more dry turkey, you’ll be fighting over even the breast pieces, that’s a promise!
What you’ll need to make the brine
This turkey brine is extremely simple, but it has it all: sweet, salty, gingery, peppery, garlicky. You might be wondering where the sage and rosemary, and other aromatics are. Don’t worry, those will come into the picture later when we roast the turkey.
For the stock, you can use either vegetable stock, chicken stock or turkey stock. We have used all of these individually or a combination in our brine before. It’s great if you can get turkey stock, which I have seen at Sprouts during the holiday season, but it’s not super common and can sell out fast.
Simply combine all the ingredients in a large stock pot, bring it to a boil, then let it cool to room temperature and refrigerate before brining.
How to Brine a Turkey
The amount of brine this recipe makes will be enough for a bird anywhere from 10 lbs to 16 lbs. If you are making something much smaller, you can cut the brine ingredients down proportionally.
If you’re brining a smaller bird or just a breast portion for a smaller Thanksgiving dinner, feel free to brine it directly in the pot, if it is large enough, and keep it in the fridge. But if you’re brining a large turkey like we usually do, you’ll need:
- A cooler or ice chest large enough to hold all the brining liquid and your bird.
- A turkey brining bag – you can skip this if you want to add the brine and bird directly into the cooler. However, this bag will help with cleaning up afterward, you can dump the brine and throw the bag away without having to wash the ice chest.
The bird we have in these photos is about 10 lbs+, which is on the smaller side. But we still don’t have a pot large enough for it, so the brining bag and ice chest method works well here.
- Pour the brine into the brining bag placed inside the insulated cooler.
- Add your turkey breast side down.
- Add water.
- Add ice to cover the turkey completely.
Let this sit for 16 to 24 hours, flip the bird half way through and check to make sure there is always solid ice in the brine to keep the bird cold. If you see the ice is starting to melt away, add more as necessary.
Cook’s Tips
- For a smaller portion of turkey or for brining a whole chicken instead, you can use the same recipe but cut the ingredients by half.
- If brining a smaller bird or smaller portion in general, I recommend brining in a large pot and keeping it in the refrigerator so you don’t need to keep checking to make sure there is always ice in the brine.
- When keeping the brine and bird outside in an insulated cooler, make sure you check occasionally to ensure there is always enough ice to keep the turkey cold for general food safety.
- You do not need to rinse the turkey after brining. It won’t be too salty unless you didn’t add enough water and ice during the brining process.
- We have brined both frozen and fresh turkey before and the results were the same. As I understand, some frozen turkeys have been injected with a salt solution which could make it too salty but we haven’t encountered this issue in the past 10 years.
- The recipe calls for up to 24 hours of brining but we have also done it up to 3 days before, so you could certainly brine it longer if you wish. We didn’t experience the bird being too salty or the meat breaking down with longer brine time.
- But you could also just remove the turkey from the brine and keep it refrigerated if you’re not roasting it right away.
- Thawing a frozen turkey will take a long time so make sure you give yourself 3 – 4 days before brining day to thaw it.
- Some fresh turkeys are actually flash frozen, so make sure you order them well ahead of time and not on the day you plan to brine, or you’ll be brining a half frozen bird.
- For the record, we have brined a half frozen turkey before due to the exact reason above and it was fine, but we don’t recommend it, just because you want to be sure it is not frozen anymore when you roast it or it will cook unevenly.
Storage
The brine should be kept in the refrigerator before use, only leave it at room temperature until it is cool enough to be refrigerated. The brine is just a stock with flavoring so it will last pretty much indefinitely in the fridge if not used. But do not save used brine.
More recipes for Thanksgiving dinner
- Ryan’s Thanksgiving Roast Turkey
- Easy Turkey Gravy
- Easy Thanksgiving Dressing
- Creamed Corn au Gratin
- Sweet Potato Rolls
- Homemade Cranberry Sauce
- Spiced Apple Cider
- Thanksgiving Pie Recipes
- More ideas for Thanksgiving dinner
📖 Recipe card
Turkey Brine
Equipment
- Cooler or Ice Chest (5 gallon or larger)
- Turkey Brining Bag (optional)
Ingredients
- 1 turkey (up to 16 lbs)
- 1 cup Kosher Salt
- ½ cup light brown sugar
- 1 gallon stock (vegetable, chicken or turkey)
- 1 tablespoon whole black peppercorns
- 1 tablespoon whole allspice berries
- 2 tablespoons chopped candied ginger
- 20 crushed garlic cloves
- 1 gallon cold water
- 8 cup ice (plus more as needed)
Instructions
3 – 4 days before roasting
- Begin thawing the turkey in the refrigerator or a cooler and kept at 38 degrees.
- Combine kosher salt, light brown sugar, stock, black peppercorns, allspice berries, candied ginger, and garlic in a large stock pot and cook over medium high heat. Stir occasionally to dissolve solids and bring to boil. Remove from heat, allow to cool to room temperature, and refrigerate.
1 day before roasting
- Early in the morning of the day before cooking day, pour brine into a brining bag placed inside an insulated 5-gallon bucket or ice chest.
- Place the turkey, neck and the giblets bag in the brine, breast side down. Pour in the water and add ice to cover the turkey entirely. Let sit for 16-24 hours. Flip halfway through brining.
- Check occasionally to make sure there is a sufficient amount of ice to keep the bird cold the whole time. If necessary, add more ice to the brining bag to ensure the turkey stays at below 40 degrees.
Roasting day
- When you’re ready to cook. Take the bird out of the brine and place it on a roasting rack in your roasting pan about an hour before cooking. Allow the bird to come closer to room temperature and pat dry with paper towels. Discard the brine.
Notes
- Thawing a frozen turkey will take a long time so make sure you give yourself 3 – 4 days before brining day to thaw it.
- The water and ice is used to both dilute the brine so it is not too salty and to keep the turkey cold while brining, especially if you’re not able to keep the brining container in the fridge. We usually cook a large turkey, 10 lb +, and never have enough fridge space to brine it in the refrigerator.
- The brining bag is optional but since we started using it a few years back, it’s been a life saver in terms of cleaning up afterward.
Looking forward to this brine this year. There’s some great ingredients I never would have thought to add to my brine.