Cooking for Thanksgiving
I cooked a Habanero Brined Turkey a day early. The recipe was adapted from one I found online. My modifications include using ten air-dried Habanero chilies and six ounces of peeled garlic. Both were ground up using an immersion blender in the brine solution. The ten pound turkey was brined for 48 hours in the refrigerator. The turkey was removed from the brine solution and allowed to dry overnight in the refrigerator. The cavity of the turkey was stuffed with two stalks celery, two onions, six ounces of peeled garlic, and five dried habanero chilies (all chopped in a food processor). A basting solution was prepared from eight ounces of duck fat and four dried habanero chilies (ground up in the duck fat using an immersion blender). Part of the habanero infused duck fat was used to coat the turkey, part injected into the turkey, and the remainder saved to baste the turkey while it was cooking. The turkey was covered with aluminum foil and placed in a pre-heated 400°F oven. After 45 minutes the aluminum foil was removed, and the turkey basted with the habanero infused duck fat every 30 minutes. The turkey was removed from the oven when the internal temperature was 165°F and allowed to rest covered for one hour.
Daily Electric Energy Used (54.7 kWh) from Sense. Daily Solar Electric Energy Produced (20.1 kWh) from Sense and SolSystems. Cloudy. Geothermal HVAC system on. A deficit of 34.6 kWh.
