brining frozen Turkey?

[fxsales1959]

I brine whole chickens pretty often. I have never brined a frozen (thawed)turkey. I cook my turkey in a bag and have been doing so for about 40 years, so I'm not changing now.
I was perusing the interwebs looking for a brine variation for turkey. I was reading on the fine red-head pioneer woman's site and she highly suggested not brining frozen turkey ( only fresh)
reason being that most frozen turkey already has some sort of sodium based solution added during processing. Sounded legit to me. what say ye? I have never F'd up a turkey in all these years, but always looking for a leg(or thigh) up.
Happy Thanksgiving y'all.
john

 

[Kevin DeShazo]

So we brine thawed frozen turkey, been doing it for years.

When we get a turkey, we look for the lowest sodium amount there is, funny thing is, its usually the store brand turkey at 7% sodium solution, vs most others are at 15%.

We also reduce the salt amount by a little bit, instead of say a cup, maybe 3/4 cup salt.

Orange, black tea and bourbon brine will be in the making tonite, brine tonite and tomorrow, in the smoker on Thurs morn

 

[thirdeye]

What is the information on the wrapper? There is a huge variable in the types of injections.

 

[fxsales1959]

What is the information on the wrapper? There is a huge variable in the types of injections.

butterball: 8% water salt and spices according to label.

 

[Kevin DeShazo]

Butterball, not the best option for brining, has all the butter under the skin, just mho

 

[rc4u]

at our wallmart they sell honeysuckel and only 3% solution

 

[thirdeye]

butterball: 8% water salt and spices according to label.

Well you are about middle of the road as far as frozen turkeys go, I've seen as high as 15% solution. You can successfully brine an enhanced turkey as long as you take care to not brine it too long or use too strong a brine solution so the meat doesn’t become too salty. A good starting place would be a base brine of 2 gallons of water and 1 cup of Morton kosher salt (Diamond Crystal has larger grains so you need more) plus any aromatics you like. This is roughly half strength of a typical brine. For your brine time I would not go longer than 8 or 10 hours.