Sous vide turkey

[JBailey]

Have you checked out the recommendations by Polyscience? My local Costco (and I might think nationally) has a great breast of turkey from Butterball that would work well for your sous vide. Also, Polyscience recommends duck fat and it may be available from certain Williams-Sonoma stores. Personally, I take off the skin and do it separately and not sous vide the skin.

[therippa]

Have you checked out the recommendations by Polyscience? My local Costco (and I might think nationally) has a great breast of turkey from Butterball that would work well for your sous vide. Also, Polyscience recommends duck fat and it may be available from certain Williams-Sonoma stores. Personally, I take off the skin and do it separately and not sous vide the skin.

Yes, I have duck fat and all that in the bag. I feel their temp for the breast (160) is too high though. I don't want to remove the skin, it crisps up fine for me in a very hot oven. My problem isn't how to sous vide the turkey, I've got that down, it's more the ideal way to keep it warm/reheat it and keep the skin somewhat crisp

Edited November 22, 2011 by therippa (log)

[KennethT]

Opening this topic again. I would like to do the turkey leg confit but my turkey legs are too big for my SV setup. I see you're breaking them down and building a brick but that is too advanced for me and I don't have the ingredients anyway. So what would a middle-ground option be?

You can always cut the raw meat off the leg and put the chunks in a bag in your SV setup... Usually the turkey confit is pulled from the bone anway once it's done (like pulled pork) - so if it won't fit, you might as well debone it first.

Then should i leave the skin in one piece to SV (and help render some fat) and brown that at the end?

I think it depends on what you want to do with the skin... typically, if you were cooking the leg unboned, you would leave the skin on, and then remove it prior to pulling... The skin which has been cooked has become really gelatinous and tender, and will crisp very nicely between silpats/cookie sheets in a hot oven (450?)... So, if boning out the leg first, you can leave the skin in one piece and remove it if you'd like and cook it in the bag with the meat... then when you remove the skin from the bag, you can crisp one big piece if you'd like, or cut it into strips or whatever... just be careful when removing it from the bag as it will tear easily because it's so fragile.

Oh, and when I was thinking about turkey confit, I figured it would be cured like confit with the bone in... then prior to cooking, you'd wash off the salt, and bone it out to get it to fit in your SV...

[ahpadt]

I think it depends on what you want to do with the skin... typically, if you were cooking the leg unboned, you would leave the skin on, and then remove it prior to pulling... The skin which has been cooked has become really gelatinous and tender, and will crisp very nicely between silpats/cookie sheets in a hot oven (450?)... So, if boning out the leg first, you can leave the skin in one piece and remove it if you'd like and cook it in the bag with the meat... then when you remove the skin from the bag, you can crisp one big piece if you'd like, or cut it into strips or whatever... just be careful when removing it from the bag as it will tear easily because it's so fragile.

Oh, and when I was thinking about turkey confit, I figured it would be cured like confit with the bone in... then prior to cooking, you'd wash off the salt, and bone it out to get it to fit in your SV...

I can vouch for this technique, although I don't think you even have to cook the skin before you cook it in the oven like that. For my Christmas dinner I put raw pieces of turkey skin (from the breast), seasoned, between two oven dishes, with parchment paper, and cooked it at 190c for ~30 minutes. Turned out like crispy crackers. Delicious. I find that by cooking the bird with the skin on, once fried, the steam from the flesh tends to ruin the skin quite quickly. I would SV the breasts at 59c and do the legs to your liking. Either ~68c for "tender/juicy" or 80c for "confit-style". Both methods with duck fat of course. I like to debone the thighs and cut them into two. This yields very nice portions.

Edited December 27, 2013 by ahpadt (log)