Herb & Buttermilk Brined Turkey

Buttermilk brined turkey brings together the plump juicy texture of brined turkey with the tang of buttermilk and an infusion of rosemary, thyme, and sage. It’s a simple approach to making a delicious Thanksgiving turkey that you will want to come back to year after year.

Note: It does take 24 – 48 hours to brine after your turkey is thawed, so don’t forget to plan ahead!

A Turkey Brine Built on Buttermilk and Herbs

While a classically brined turkey is soaked in a mixture of kosher salt, sugar, and water to add moisture, this buttermilk-brined turkey takes it one step further, leveraging the acid of the buttermilk and herbs to add flavor. The end result is a tender, juicy turkey, with all the traditional flavors of the Thanksgiving table.

Worried that a brined turkey means extra work on the day that matters most? It doesn’t. The brine does the heavy lifting two days ahead of time, so by Thanksgiving morning all that’s left is roasting. Inspired by Samin Nosrat’s buttermilk marinated roast chicken from Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat, this recipe takes her basic buttermilk brine and infuses it with sage, rosemary, and thyme, so the turkey is seasoned through and through, not just on the skin.

What You’ll Need for Buttermilk Brined Turkey

This buttermilk-brined turkey starts with a fresh or thawed frozen turkey. I aim for 14 pounds, but this recipe works for most 13 – 15 pound turkeys.

Most standard grocery store turkeys are already injected with a light saline solution (typically around 3% – 8%), and that’s not a problem here because brining works through osmosis. The salt and flavor in this brine (about 5%) balance out with what’s already in the turkey, effectively replacing that plain solution with the buttermilk, herbs, and aromatics in this recipe. The exception is kosher turkeys: they’re salted more heavily throughout during processing, not just lightly injected, so brining one again risks an oversalted bird. Stick with a standard fresh or frozen turkey for this recipe.

You will also need buttermilk, thyme, rosemary, sage, kosher salt, whole peppercorns, bay leaves, and cold water for the brine, plus garlic and onion to place inside the turkey before roasting.

How to Make an Herb & Buttermilk Brined Turkey

The easiest way to approach this turkey recipe is to break it down into three major sections: making the brine, brining the turkey, roasting the turkey.

Making the Herb-Infused Buttermilk Brine

We start this turkey recipe by building our herb-infused buttermilk brine, which is kind of like making a very large cup of tea.

• Start by dissolving the salt in boiling water. Combine salt and 1 quart of water in a large lidded stockpot then bring to a boil, stirring to dissolve the salt.
• Infuse the brine with herbs. Add the herbs, bay leaves, and peppercorns. Cover the pot and let it steep for 5 minutes. Like when making tea, the residual heat from the boiling water will draw out all the flavors from our aromatics, giving us a salty, spiced, herbal blend.
• Cool the brine. Now that the flavors from the herbs are in the water, we need to cool it off before adding the buttermilk. Add an additional 1 quart of cold water and allow the brew to cool uncovered for about 5 – 10 minutes.
• Measure the buttermilk, as we will add it in the next step.

Roasting a Thanksgiving Turkey

Once your turkey has absorbed all those delicious flavors, it’s time to start roasting. Times will vary by bird size and oven, but the chart at the bottom of this section is a great starting guideline for gauging how early you need to get the bird in the oven. Using an in-oven meat thermometer can save you some stress, but I always double check it with an instant-read thermometer before I declare the turkey done.

• Remove the turkey from the brine, discard brine and brining bag, then pat the turkey completely dry with paper towels. The dryer the skin now, the crispier it gets in the oven. You can pat down the turkey and put it directly into the oven now, or for extra crispy skin let the turkey dry out uncovered in the fridge for a couple of hours before roasting.

• Prep the turkey for roasting. Transfer the turkey to a heavy roasting pan, breast side up. Roughly chop the onion and cut the garlic in half to expose all the cloves, then place the aromatics in the turkey cavity. Preheat the oven to 400ºF, adjusting the oven racks if needed to get the turkey centered vertically.
• Roast the turkey. Place the uncovered turkey in the center of the hot oven with the legs pointing to a back corner.
• Rotate the turkey. Switch the position of the turkey legs (one back corner then the other) to encourage even cooking and avoid burning, then drop the heat to 325ºF to continue cooking. Continue rotating the leg position about every 30 minutes to achieve even browning.
• Check the internal temperature. The turkey is done when an instant read thermometer registers 180ºF in the thickest part of the thigh and 165ºF in the deepest part of the breast. If the skin starts getting too dark, cover the turkey either with the roasting pan lid (if you have one) or a tented piece of aluminium foil.
• Rest the turkey. Remove turkey from the oven, cover to retain heat, then allow it to sit in a warm location to rest 15 minutes or more before carving.

Tips for Turkey Success

Whether this is your first attempt at brining and roasting a turkey or you’ve been doing it for years, here are a few of my favorite tips for getting it done right.

• Cool the brine completely. Hot water is necessary to melt the salt and infuse the herbs, but adding a raw turkey to warm brine is a recipe for a food safety disaster. Even room temperature is too warm. Cool the brine completely then add the rest of the cold water and the cold buttermilk.
• Keep the whole turkey submerged in the brine and keep it cold. No fridge space? Use a large cooler. Place large reusable ice packs in the bottom of the cooler. Place the bagged, brining turkey on top and cover with more ice, preferably cubes that can melt. Check every 4 – 6 hours, draining the melted ice and adding more as necessary.
• The onion and garlic don’t count as stuffing. The cook time chart above is based on an unstuffed bird, and the aromatics in the turkey cavity are there for flavor, not bulk as they don’t pack the cavity or slow cooking the way a traditional bread stuffing does. If you want to add real stuffing, plan for extra time in the oven and check both the turkey’s temperature and stuffing temperature separately before pulling it.

Serving Suggestions

This buttermilk brined turkey will be the shining star of your Thanksgiving table, but that doesn’t mean it should stand alone. At my house, that means all the traditional fixings, from sides to dessert, which you can see for yourself in Your Ultimate Thanksgiving Menu Planning Guide. If I had to choose a favorite, it would probably be my garlicky green beans with fried onions, a lightened up version of green bean casserole free from mushrooms and canned soup. Looking for something a little less expected? You can’t go wrong with these gorgeous roasted root vegetables.

How to Store and Reheat Buttermilk Brined Turkey

Cooked turkey can be refrigerated in air tight containers for 3 – 5 days. It can also be frozen for longer storage. Leftover turkey makes for good sandwiches, but it makes for great turkey soup, turkey tacos, or turkey pot pie. Eat it cold, or reheat small portions in the microwave or larger portions in the oven.