Recipe: Sous-vide and smoked turkey breast

In the restaurant industry, holiday meals are cooked very differently than in a home setting.  It is impractical to roast a bunch of turkeys for a few hundred people,  there's simply too much room for error and it's too frantic at service time to be carving varied cuts from the birds.  The most efficient way to do it is to separate all the parts of the meal, cook each one perfectly, then bring them all together on the plate.  This means that white and dark meat are cooked separately and off the bone (the bones are used to make turkey stock which is then turned into gravy) and stuffing and vegetables are all cooked separately and perfectly on their own too.  While the traditional ceremony of carving the turkey still holds strong in most homes, some people are starting to take more of an industry approach to the holiday dinner in the pursuit of each dish being the best it can.  With proper organization, it also means that the cook can at least socialize a little bit as things get ready.

This is a fantastic way to cook the breast portion of the meal.  If you like turkey sandwiches throughout the year, this is definitely the way to go as the meat cuts beautifully cold and is just as juicy as fresh roasted.  Use the brine recipe from the previous post as preparation.  I've also included a smoking stage in this method - if you have the capability, it adds a bit of that "roasty" character many people would be worried about losing by straying from the traditional method.  If you don't, it's ok, the meat is still fantastic.

If you still want to have the roasted skin effect, one way to do it is to leave the skin on throughout the sous-vide process, but shorten the time (an hour would be ok), then heat the breast up for the meal in a hot oven skin side up (and patted dry, then basted with some fat).  Make sure to check the temperature in the middle of the breast to ensure it is fully cooked (165F / 74C).

If you are from the South and like to deep fry your turkey, follow the same procedure as the roasting finish, just use the deep fryer.  Again, you only need to warm it through and finish off the cooking.

You will need:

as needed           turkey breasts
as needed           turkey brine

Method:

 - clean up the breasts nicely and prepare your brine
 - brine the breasts (48 hours if using the one in the previous post)
 - rinse the breasts well under cold water and pat dry
 - cold smoke for 1-2 hours, depending how much you like to smoke
 - seal in a vacuum bag (don't squish them together in the bag, give them breathing room)
 - set the circulator to 76C / 168.8F
 - submerge in the bath and cook for 2 1/2 hours (less if you plan to finish by roasting)
 - remove from the bath - if not serving right away, plunge into an ice bath to cool
 - open the bag, put the breasts on a rack to let the extra surface juices drain away (save them as stock)
 - carve slices and serve