How to Get Juicy Turkey Meat Every Time

It’s almost time to start thinking about the Christmas dinner and making it as delicious as possible, but unless your turkey is in the hands of someone who knows what they’re doing, there’s a risk of your turkey being dry and disappointing. However, you don’t need to be a professional chef to ensure your turkey ticks the ‘moist’ box this Christmas, you just need to follow a few tips.

What Makes a Turkey Dry?

Turkey can become dry after cooking for many reasons. It could be overcooked, the oven temperature could have been too high, if the turkey was frozen the cells could be damaged, and much more. Here are our top tips for preventing dry turkey this Christmas.

Season Appropriately

Seasoning isn’t just about what you rub on the outside, it’s also about what you put on the inside. Garlic, onion, lemon, thyme, and rosemary are all classic, aromatic flavours that can help your turkey keep its moisture.

You can also add favoured butter on top and underneath the skin of the turkey for a super intense flavour that helps the turkey maintain the juiciness that everyone looks for.

Brine

Brining involves soaking the turkey in a salty water with aromatics like bay leaves, peppercorns, and garlic for a couple of days before cooking. This method of wet brining is one of the best paths to a juicy meat.

However, for a more flavourful brine, you can dry brine as an alternative. Dry brining involves rubbing the turkey with seasoned salt and left to marinate for a couple of days.

Wrap it Up

Wrapping up your turkey in tin foil can help keep the juices in during cooking. Loosely cover your turkey and then remove it 30-40 minutes before taking it out of the oven to crisp up the skin. This will ensure the skin to dries up and will allow the juices to flow around the tin that you can make into a delicious Christmas gravy.

Let is Rest

Finally, you need to make sure you allow enough time to let your turkey rest. When the meat cooks, the muscle fibres tighten and the water inside the meat is pushed towards the surface. This means if you carve the meat immediately after removing it from the oven, the juice will pour out and you will be left with dry meat. Resting allows the water to redistribute back into the meat, leaving you with a juicy, tender meat.

It’s recommended to leave the turkey to rest for around 30 to 40 minutes, but for larger birds, you could leave it up to an hour. If you’re in the process of planning the times for your Christmas dinner, you should include this in your timings!

Looking for the Juiciest Christmas Turkey?

At John Howe, we run a large, free-range turkey farm where our turkeys have a vast space to run and play. Their environment and feed are natural and closely replicates their natural habitat making for a content turkey. And we always say, a happy bird is a tasty bird!

If you’re looking for a quality Christmas turkey that doesn’t disappoint on flavour, browse our range now.