almonds and asana roasted turkey out of oven.JPG

It seriously seems like cruel and unusual punishment that during pregnancy, when your food cravings and aversions are totally random and out of your control, that there are so may food restrictions.

The list of foods that pregnant women are told to avoid is LONG and includes some favorites like:

deli meat (so far I have caved and had J. Mikes)
hot dogs (anything with nitrates)
soft cheeses (anything that is unpasturized - luckily I'm not a goat cheese/blue cheese fan so not a tough one for me )
fresh pressed juices/smoothies (that whole pasturization thing again)
raw fish (bye bye sushi & poke & steak taretar for that matter)
runny yolks (this also includes things like hollandaise, someone get this girl an eggs benny once baby arrives)

That said, on most occasions when a craving for something I can't have comes up I just move on, but the deli meat/turkey sandwich craving is REAL. And although my pregnant friend and I did discover that the shredded turkey sub from Capprioti's in our neighborhood is OK because it's oven roasted in house everyday, I decided for this particular craving to try taking matters into my own hands. I set out to roast my own turkey breast.

The Brine:

I actually had no intention of doing this but the butcher at Whole Foods really suggested it, and I had the time so, I did it. I'll be honest I messed up the quantities here so take this with a grain of salt (pun totally intended):

What I Used:

1 large turkey breast (mine was 2.25lbs, but this brine recipe was actually for a whole turkey)
1 cup kosher salt (use 3/4 if you do less water like I did)
4 quarts water (yea I first used 4 cups, this should really be 16 cups, and in reality after I botched it I probably ended up with about 10 cups)
aromatics: I used a palmful of tri-color pepercorns and 1 lemons worth of lemon peel

How To:

Fill a large pot with 10-16 cups of warm water (doesn't have to be boiling but warm enough to dissolve the salt).
Add the 3/4-1 cup of salt. Stir around until dissolved and the water cools a bit.
Add the turkey breast to the pot along with the pepper corns and the lemon peels.
Cover and place in the fridge overnight for up to 24 hours
When you're ready to roast it, remove the breast, rinse it thoroughly and pat it dry.

How To Roast The Turkey:

Once you rinse and pat dry your brined turkey, place it in an oven safe baking dish with sides to catch the juices
Drizzle with about 2 Tbsp of olive oil and a bit of salt and peper
Roast in the oven at 350 for 30 minutes per lb. My turkey breast was 2.25 lbs so I roasted for an hour and 15 minutes until the thermometor read 165 degrees.
Remove the turkey from the oven and let it rest for 30-45 minutes, DO NOT CUT RIGHT AWAY you will lose all the juice and moisture
Once you do go to cut it, use a really good knife, I used one with a slightly serrated edge. Then place the slices back into the dish you baked it in and store covered in the fridge!

This turkey was super duper moist and nicely salty. You could definitely add other herbs or spices if you had a specific flavor you were going for, I just wanted to keep mine simple.