My First Turkey Breast in my SI#2

[CUTiger80]

I have been scouring the forum for brine & rub recipes, cook times, smoker temp, wood preferences, etc. and have been bugging you guys with questions and now I am ready to try my first bone-in turkey breast but thought I would run my plan by you “veteran smokers” and get some final input before it is “too late”.
First of all, my turkey breast is 8.5 lbs and is thawing in the refrigerator (it has been in there for about 2 days and still seems pretty hard to me).
I plan to brine the breast with the skin on for about 8 hours in the following brine (which is a combination of Tony’s & Ed’s brine recipes)
1 gallon water
1 C Kosher Salt
1 TBS granulated garlic
1 TBS onion powder
1 TBS rosemary
1 TBS thyme
1 TBS Old Bay seasoning
1 C brown sugar
1 C orange juice

After 8 hours in the brine, rinse well and dry.
Apply olive oil and rub (I decided to go with a commercial rub I picked up at the local meat market for this smoke).  Pull up skin and get rub under the skin and then on the skin.  Use toothpicks to hold skin in place if necessary.
Cover and put back in refrigerator overnight.
Put half and half water and apple juice in a water pan in the bottom of the smoker.
Use about 2 ozs of cherry wood in foil boats.
Put breast on rack near top of smoker and insert Maverick probe in breast.
Start smoker at 150 deg for 30 minutes then crank up to 240 or 250 deg.
Take off the turkey when the internal temp reaches 160 deg. (I have budgeted 5-1/2 hours for this).
Double wrap breast in foil, then towels, put in cooler and transport to my Mom’s house and eat about 3 hours later. 
(Should I plan to put the breast in her oven for 20-30 minutes or so right before cutting & eating?  Is 3 hours from smoker to table too long?)

Any comments or suggestions would be appreciated.

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[NDKoze]

I haven't smoked a turkey, so I will let the specific turkey questions to the experts. But, I can tell you that if you are using foil boats there is no need, nor should you bother ramping up the temp for 30 minutes. Just go full board at 240 right off the bat. The ramp up is only needed if you do NOT use the foil boats.

Good luck on your smoke!

[DarbyDog]

You may want to consider not using the water pan.  I smoked a turkey breast two weeks ago and used a pan with apple juice.  Both my wife and I thouugh tthe meat was too moist.
Others on the forum have noted that added moisture is not necessary for turkey since the skin keeps the meas from drying out. I am smoking a turkey breast for Thanksgiving and do not plan to use a water pan.

[DivotMaker]

Cool mod on the brine recipe, Ravel!  Here's a couple of my thoughts:

First, don't use a water pan for poultry, unless it's skinless.

Next, after the brine, rest in the fridge uncovered.  This helps the skin dry out a bit.  No need to cover poultry that's resting in the fridge.

Also, go to 165 internal temp, vs. 160.

Finally, since you're foiling your wood, just crank the temp to 250 right off the bat.  No need for the 150 step.  It will only delay the cook, and you probably won't even get smoke (depending on ambient temp).  I skip this step since discovering the foiled wood method.

Hope this helps!

[swthorpe]

I agree with Gregg...I do the foil boat on the wood and skip the slow start up.  However, I did have some really dry hickory wood a couple of weeks ago, and even with the foil, I had a blast of belch!  Unreal.

Tony...after the brine, do you put the turkey in the fridge uncovered first and then rub, or do you rub and put the turkey in the fridge uncovered?   I have always washed off the brine, rubbed, covered with plastic wrap and into the fridge.   The idea of leaving it uncovered is intriguing, but I am not sure if you are applying a rub first.

[RSNovi]

I put the rub on right before it goes into the smoker after letting it sit in the fridge to dry.

[DivotMaker]

Steve, I rub before going in the fridge.  This allows the rub to penetrate, and lets the skin dry out a bit.  You still won't get really crispy skin, but it's much better than not letting it rest uncovered.

[swthorpe]

Many thanks!  I will give this a try...assuming the 12# turkey that I bought yesterday thaws in the fridge in time!  I will probably be doing the water thaw method tomorrow night to get it ready for smoking on Thursday by noon.   I keep telling my wife...smoking meat requires planning, this is not beep-beep microwave!

[DivotMaker]

Yep, no "instant" microwave life for us smoker!

[CUTiger80]

Guys, again many thanks for all of the input, and patience with me as I try to figure out this new found hobby.  Maybe one of these days I will be confident enough to not have to ask a ton of questions before I smoke something.
Per my current plan, the breast will come out of the brine about 12 hours before it goes in the smoker.  Following Tony's suggestion to rinse, dry, rub & put in the fridge uncovered, is 12 hours too long to sit uncovered in the fridge? I could delay the brining and cut this to about 6 hours, if that makes any difference.
Also, after smoking, is a 3 hour rest period (covered, wrapped & in a cooler) too long or potentially dangerous?

[Pork Belly]

(Should I plan to put the breast in her oven for 20-30 minutes or so right before cutting & eating?  Is 3 hours from smoker to table too long?)

If the meat has been resting foil wrapped in a cooler covered in towels you should not have to reheat. I would rather use some scalding hot gravy to warm the sliced meat that to risk drying it out with a trip to the oven. Also you don't want to slice hot meat. By putting it into the oven you are negating the affect of the rest time in the cooler.

[swthorpe]

CU...I think 6 hours in the fridge after rubbing will be sufficient for the rub to penetrate the turkey breast, so you could cut the time down.   I plan to brine a whole 12# turkey overnight tonight, and rub it at 6am for a trip to the smoker at noon.

The rest period can be shortened too; I would go for an hour in foil and then serve it up!   The turkey breast should not need a lot of time for juices to redistribute.   Good luck!

[CUTiger80]

I finally had some time today at lunch to post some results from my first turkey breast smoke.  Thanks again to everyone who helped me to somewhat refine my process before the smoke.
First of all, the turkey breast was excellent and I received compliments from all of the family.  An overall success!

These are the things I changed/adjusted from my original plan:
I think that the brine was too "complicated".  In the end, I didn't notice much flavor from all the spices, etc. in the finished product.  The breast was very moist.  I'm wondering if salt & water would be sufficient?
I delayed the brining process and let the breast sit uncovered in the fridge overnight (about 7 hours).
I did not add water/apple juice to the smoker based on some comments from others.
I did not ramp up the temperature, but turned the smoker up to 250 immediately.

These are my observations with reference to a few photos that are at the end of the post:
(I put the breast in the smoker at 05.15.  I kept the time reference in the photo titles showing the smoke from the smoker so that it will be easier to see where I was in the process.)
I started getting smoke at 05.31 (see photo).  Smoker temp was about 120 deg.
Between 05.31 and about 05.50 I had intense smoke (see photos).  I had a "smoker belch" at 190 deg and again at 205 deg. 
At about 05.50 smoker reached 250 deg (35 min after starting) and smoke became less intense (see photo).
At 09.00 (3:45 after starting) IT of breast reached 160 deg.
At 09.30 (4:15 after starting) IT of breast reached 165 and I took it off (sorry no photos).
I removed breast from smoker, wrapped in foil, put in a thick styrofoam cooler, covered with towels and put the lid on.  I didn't remove the breast to slice until about 12:30 (3 hours later).  Meat was still very hot and moist.

My questions are about the smoke intensity & belching:
The smoke was very intense for about 20 minutes and then tapered off for about 15 minutes and then all but disappeared.  Is this normal?
I did get 2 intense "belches" that were fairly loud and forced smoke out from around the door.  Is this normal?  If not, should I change my process somehow?
I included before and after pictures of the wood chunks in the foil boats.  Do these look normal?
If I had to do over, without any comments from you veterans, I would probably ramp up the temp of the smoker (against the recommendation of Gregg, Tony & Steve) and see if the smoke is less intense and continues for a longer duration and if that will eliminate the belches.
Thanks for reading through this long post and for any comments/suggestions.

[swthorpe]

Yes, Ravel, everything you have described about the start up time, initial smoke, and the lighter smoke after the first hour or so is pretty normal.   I have minimized the "belches" by using the foil boat method and setting the smoker at my desired temp (no ramping up).    I did have a big belch, even with the foil, a couple of weeks ago, but I am sure that the wood I was using was very dry.   The dry wood catches fire, and I believe it was around 180F in the box when that happened.   I am now using hickory from fruitawood and with the foil I have not experienced the huge "belch", but I do get a couple "puffs" at around 200F where the smoke stops for a couple of seconds and then returns.  My wood chunks after the smoke look like yours in the picture.

After the first hour or so, the smoke does taper off to where it is not visible, but I believe the wood is still producing smoke, albeit light.

[CUTiger80]

Steve,
Thanks for the insight.
My wood was dry because it is Weber brand I ordered from Amazon.
Do you think it would help to soak the chunks in water for a while or should my "boats" be a little tighter at the top?
Or should I just throw away the wood chunks that I have and buy some that is not so dry?