Stuffed Smoked Turkey

hey welcome back to how to barbecue right I'm Malcolm Reed today I'm going to show you how I do a sausage and herb stuffed turkey now I've got some fresh spicy country sausage that my mom made I'm going to mix it with some sauteed vegetables green apple some fresh herbs all with some bread crumbs we're gonna get that stuffed inside this bird and then we're gonna get it in some smoke it's gonna be good let's get to cooking so today I've got a 15 pound turkey I brought froze at the grocery store had to let it thaw out for a few days in the refrigerator and then I took it all out of the package remove the neck took the giblets out then I got it in a brine for the Brian I use Kosmos turkey Brian it's just one cup of brine to a gallon of water I dropped the bird down in the big ziploc bag put the seasoning in dump the water in and cinched it up real tight to make sure the bird was submerged it went in the refrigerator for 24 hours and then I took it out and let it drain I wanted to get all that moisture off of it leaving the seasoning leaving the juice on the inside of the turkey and that's where we're at now now you can see all that flavor got inside the cavity those seasons of penetrated to me you know the birds gonna have some flavor it's gonna have a lot of moisture on the inside so now I want to get the outside completely dry and I've just got it on a raised rack over a drip pan and I'm taking paper towels and we're just gonna blot off as much moisture as we can you want to put some paper towels inside the cavity absorb all that we want to get that skin as crispy as we can we are smoking it so it's not going to be like a fried turkey but the skin is going to be really good it's gonna be bite through so the turkey needs to sit on the rack for about 3045 minutes to air dry we're gonna make the stuffing a brown one pound of that spicy country sausage just break it up in a skillet and get it draining on some paper towels also chopped up some celery and onion a green apple we sauteed that and a stick of butter added some garlic and we just sweated it down you're really not caramelizing it we just want it to break down get a little bit soft to start the cooking process so the main element in it stuffing is the bread and today I'm using a store-bought bread cube you can use whatever kind of bread you want we're gonna combine all of these elements with our bread cubes so we're gonna add the sausage our sauteed vegetables an apple then I've got some sage some rosemary and some thyme that I've chopped up really fine we're gonna add those herbs as well we're gonna just give this a stir to kind of combine it a little bit now we're ready for our wet ingredients I've got one egg lightly beaten then we're gonna add some chicken broth I've got about 22 ounces that we're gonna add in here that should be perfect for this we're just gonna start combined it all together we're gonna add just a little bit of salt pepper garlic that's an AP rub and we're just going to mix it all together let those bread cubes absorb that moisture mixed with the vegetables and the sausage so now we're gonna get this stuffing all inside the cavity of the turkey there's no right or wrong way to do it we just want to start spooning it in and we want to fill it up get as much stuff in as you can it goes way back up in there it's gonna give it more mass as the turkey cooks and all those juices run into the stuffing it's gonna make it taste really great and it's gonna help the turkey cook real even and get one more spoon that looks perfect right there now to keep all this stuff fit inside the cavity of the bird I'm gonna tie these legs with some butcher twine we're just going to cross them then we're going to take the twine and wrap around the legs wrap it a couple times so it's good and tight and then just tie basic knot in it easy to do I'm just gonna trim off this excess line it's gonna hold our stuffing in this will also help these legs cook because it holds them together on the bird they won't fall off and crack the skin right around the breast there so now the inside of the turkey is done we're gonna get some seasoning on the outside now our skin is really really dry it's been out in the air for about a half-hour patted it with the paper towels but we need some oil we need some fat on it that's what's gonna help it brown it's gonna help our seasoning stick so I'm just gonna use cooking spray and we're just gonna move it around spray all the skin it's a good dose of cooking spray now we're ready for our seasoning so the first thing I'm putting on the skin is my AP seasoning it's salt pepper garlic it's one a good dose of it not too heavy and for a good dose of savoriness and a little bit of color I'm using some Aswan lights Mississippi grind you use whatever kind of flavors you want on the outside of the turkey make that your own this is what I like I'm firing up my Traeger pellet grill for this kook running it 300 degrees with a blend of hickory maple and cherry pellets for smoke you can cook this on any kind of grill you want just keep it those same temps so the skin renders down and so the bird cooks even all right the Traeger sitting right at 300 that means this turkey is ready to go on I'm leaving it on this little small chicken rack so it makes it easy to move around we're just gonna put it dead center got the breast face in front the legs crossed on the back it looks beautiful all we got to do down is let the tracker do its job we'll come back and we'll spray it probably about every 30 45 minutes with a little cooking spray make sure it's cooking even we'll put a probe in it after a while I'll show you that in just a little bit okay it's been 2 hours so it's time to check in on our bird let's see what it looks like the color is looking great on it you can see the crust is starting to build on our legs wings are looking good I want to get a little more cooking spray on it I want that breast to brown up so I'm just gonna hit up the breast a little bit I'm gonna keep those legs a little bit old so they keep on brown and we don't want them to get too dark I'm also gonna put my thermal works diet in the breasts because at this point I want to start monitoring internal temperature so I'm just gonna pick the thickest part go right in make sure we don't hit bone and I've got it set for 165 you can see right now we're about 127 stabilized we still probably have another hour or so to go but now we can watch those internal temperatures we don't have to worry about overcooking it we also got to make sure that stuffing is at least 165 because we're cooking it inside the bird it has to be done now to keep the turkey cooking even I'm gonna rotate it since it's on the rack that's real easy all we got to do is raise it up spin it right around now you can see the stuffing see how the legs are cooking it's looking fantastic we might go ahead and give it just another spray here on the backside and get our lid closed we're gonna keep letting it cook alright y'all could see this thermal works dot is hit 165 that means our turkeys done it's steady trying to tick up 166 at this point we need to get it off I'm definitely gonna wear some heat gloves for this because I know that racks gonna be hot let's take a look at our turkey it's been about four hours total cook time and it is beautiful we spun it around so it would cook even you can see the front side of it caught up with the back side and I'm just going to verify that our stuffing is 165 internal is it's got to be the same as the breast and look at that 168 it is perfect that's exactly right where I wanted it to be so let's get this turkey off take it to the cutting board I'm just gonna lift the rack up get my gloves hungry let's pull this turkey off I mean check that thing out that's not a showstopper I don't know what it is beautiful kind of golden brown it's got that smoked look to it from all that hickory and maple and cherry wood on it it's browned all over but it needs to rest so I'm gonna take it over to the cutting board so the turkey is done at this point we've hit our internal temperatures we've got the stuff and done on the inside it looks great I really want to try it but you can't cut into it right now it needs to calm down we need to let all those juices soak back into the meat we need to let it rest so what I'm gonna do is just let it sit out here on the counter it needs about 15-20 minutes I want to cover it with foil loosely just kind of tent it over it I'm not trying to wrap it up tight I'm just gonna let it hang out until I can't take it no more so it's been about 20 minutes I couldn't take it no more I just let the turkey sit there covered in the fall I lifted it off the little cooling rack we had it on and just put it on the board it did lose a little juice but really not much at all because I didn't cut into it right away the first thing we're gonna do is I got to try this cause I'm gonna free up the legs because I want you to see that stuffing that's in there but you can see how beautiful the stuffing turned out it's golden brown it's cooked firms first thing I'm gonna do let's get me a taste cuz I'm really interested to see the sausage stuffing cooked inside that turkey mmm oh man that's really good you get the herbs you get the sage unis from the sausage and from the fresh sage we put in it's a little spicy man that's really really good now I'm gonna cut some of this turkey and I'm not gonna bust it up into pieces I'm just gonna cut me a few slices off we're actually gonna eat this a little later today but I've got to try it I can't just leave y'all hanging so I'm just gonna take me a knife cut me a few pizzas all man check that out look gorgeous that's a juicy piece right there Wow I mean just look at the moisture in that turkey I'm gonna take a little bit stuffing put over here with it that looks good right there you can see the stuffing you can see the skin I mean that's fantastic now I'm gonna go in here and just cut me a bite of this turkey get a little bit of the stuffing to go with it got to use a fork on this one I guess I'm not opposed to eating with my hands phenomenal they just says Thanksgiving there that cosmos Brian's really got a good flavor inside the turkey we didn't inject it we didn't do anything to the meat itself but it's got so much flavor and so much moisture in it twenty-four-hour Brian is the way to go and the stuffing really picks up all those flavors as that juice is cooking out of the cavity of that turkey the stuffing is absorbing it so it's mixing with the sausage and the celery and the sweetness of the apples all those herbs we put in there it just it just screams Thanksgiving I'm not gonna stop here today I'm gonna go ahead and have me another bite because it is really that good in the skin my goodness you could take this skin it's crunchy ton of flavor that is excellent one more bite for y'all and I'm sorry to torture you like this I'm ready for Thanksgiving if you really want to impress your family this Thanksgiving put this smoked stuffed turkey on the center that Thanksgiving table carve it up right there in front of them and a little dig in I promise you they're gonna love you for it thanks for checking us out here at how to barbecue right if you like what we're doing subscribe to our Channel you can find us on Instagram Facebook Twitter shelling I do a podcast every week where we talk about this recipe in more detail and all the other stuff we're up to we'll see y'all next time

Channel: HowToBBQRight

Views: 355,566

Rating: 4.9516592 out of 5

Keywords: Malcom Reed, HowToBBQRight, How To BBQ Right, stuffed smoked turkey, traeger turkey stuffing, smoked stuffed turkey, smoked turkey stuffing recipe, smoked stuffed turkey breast, smoked turkey, traeger turkey, traeger turkey recipe, smoked whole turkey, best smoked turkey, traeger smoked turkey recipe, smoked thanksgiving turkey, pellet smoker turkey

Id: 8KdrhqDYF6A

Length: 11min 8sec (668 seconds)

Published: Thu Nov 14 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/Reinheitsgebot43]

It almost looks like a snail.

[u/choosetango]

Not sure, but that doesn't look like a green egg he is cooking in to me.

[u/thisisfakereality]

Yummy.

[u/ItsDaBigFella]

Noice! I do wish they would fix the app. That app was the best when I was first starting out with my Egg.