Your Brine's All Wet

From The Great Book of Culinary Confessions... I've never been a huge fan of brining. It's practically de rigueur in today's food world, so of course I've done it. Heck, for years I was an active member of a foodie message board whose members called themselves "Briners." Still, there are a couple things that bother me.

Unlike a lot of people, I've never had a problem with pork being dry... you cook it to 138-140 and STOP. It's pretty simple. People think you have to incinerate it to make it "safe," so a lot of pork ends up being overcooked. If you cook it correctly, I don't think it needs a brine.

No, my larger issue is with poultry - turkey, specifically, with its longer cooking time and therefore increased susceptibilty to drying out. Brining will make your turkey moist... or more accurately, wet. The additional moisture resulting from standard brining is water, which tastes nothing like the natural juices of a turkey. Instead of enhancing the taste of the bird, it dilutes it. Secondly, I've always thought that the added moisture, err, wetness, produces a strange, spongy texture to the meat.

I see why people brine... a moist turkey is a hundred times better than bird reminiscent of sawdust. Still, I've always felt it was an imperfect method.

That opinion was only reinforced this Thanksgiving when I tried "dry" brining for the first time. I had first read about it last year, but it was too late to work it into the holiday plans. This year, however... Wow! I will never do the old bucket o' brine again. I didn't think turkey could be so good. The meat was very moist without being soggy, spongy, or having its flavor diluted.

You can even see in this picture how "plump" it remained after cooking...

I'm convinced the lack of residual moisture left from a wet brine also helps contribute to the great skin as well.

Another bonus (as if there had to be another)... it's super simple... no boiling/cooling brines, no buckets, no ice, no muss, no fuss (but yes, a truss).

Today, I scaled it down for a roast chicken. I combined it with (my modified version of) Thomas Keller's roast chicken recipe and it was outstanding...

There are plenty of culinary things I can't do, but I think I've got this poultry thing down pat. ;)