The big moment has come! It’s Whiskey Glazed Turkey Breast. That’s Turkey and whiskey, what could not be good about it?
Here is the cast of characters: Turkey breast, whiskey, honey, orange juice, orange zest, turkey stock, and my friend, real butter.
You start by preheating the oven to 325 degrees F, and then melting butter on the stove top in a nice heavy bottomed skillet.
Once it begins to bubble, you add the turkey meat, breast side down. Resist the temptation to move it as it browns. You want to get some nice color on there and you don’t want the skin to tear. Moving it too soon will tear the skin. Once things are nice and brown you can rotate it a bit to get the outer areas.
Then you flip it over.
I highly recommend keeping the skin on your bird. Turkey feathers are quite easy to pluck as long as you do just a few at a time so the skin doesn’t tear. It is better to leave the skin on after you’ve harvested one, since attempting to remove it while the feathers are still on can result in a feathery mess. Nevertheless, if you don’t have skin on your turkey breast, simply layer it with bacon or lard before cooking. Most importantly, it is essential that you brine the breast meat before cooking it. I have a friend that uses a brine of simple filtered water from the sea, which has ample salt, then after 24 hours, switches to a bath of unsalted purified water. Or if you’re not feeling quite as adventurous, you can also use my homemade brine recipe.
Now you are going to deglaze the pan with your stock and scrape up the brown bits with a wooden spoon. Once you’ve done that, turn off the heat and put the turkey in the oven covered in foil and let it cook for 10 minutes.
Meanwhile, in a separate pan you melt the remaining butter.
Add the honey. From my bees! BZZzz. I can’t wait for this year’s honey harvest.
Mix the honey in well as it begins to bubble. You want to keep the heat low so the honey doesn’t over caramelize and burn.
Then add the whiskey.
Then the orange juice.
Then the orange zest.
Then the cayenne.
Let it bubble as you whisk until it is thick and a nice deep orange. Or do they call that burnt sienna?
Brush half of the glaze onto the turkey.
Until it is nice and blanketed in burnt sienna goo. Then cover it again with foil, and return it to the oven.
Then add the other half about 20 minutes later. This time, leave the foil off when you return it to the oven and turn the temperature up to 400 degrees F.
15-20 minutes later the internal temperature should read 140-150 degrees F. I highly recommend a digital probe thermometer, those are much more accurate than the dial thermometers. I’m just sayin’.
And there she is! A beautiful juicy tender turkey breast, with a sweet and tangy whiskey glaze.
