Are you planning to cook a turkey breast for Thanksgiving this year? Let me show you 5 different mouthwatering ways to cook the most perfect and juicy turkey breast. The recipes include ways to roast the turkey breast, air fry it, make one in the Instant Pot, and a sous vide option. Whatever way you want to cook it, your in for the most amazing white meat turkey.
Some people are white meat fans and some are dark meat fans. I appreciate both types of turkey but I know people who just can't stand the dark meat. Whether that is you or you are just having a small gathering where you only need a turkey breast, let me show you how to make juicy, flavorful turkey breasts.
Below you will find 5 different recipes. You can either go and immediately check these out or keep scrolling by and hear a little more about each one with all of my best turkey breast tips.
- Dry Brined Air Fryer Turkey Breast
- Instant Pot Turkey Breast
- Herb-Roasted Turkey Breast
- Brined and Roasted Turkey Breast
- Sous Vide Turkey Breast with Herb Filling
Top Tip
Before I get into any of these recipes, I have to say that the number 1 thing you can do to cook the most perfect turkey breast is to track the turkey's temperature. The con of white meat is that it dries out easier than the dark meat. I always tend towards dark meat when I was growing up because I had a lot of turkeys that were overcooked. But when you nail the temperature perfectly then white meat can be amazing too.
Check out my post on Using Thermometers For Thawing and Temping a Turkey
Roasting
The way that most people cook a whole turkey breast is to roast it in the oven and you can do this with great success as long as you got a good thermometer as I just mentioned.
Many years back I reviewed a couple different recipes from Food Network personalities:
Whenever you brine a turkey it's like taking out a tasty turkey insurance plan. It's more forgiving if you overshoot the temperature, more likely to come out moist. Plus brining allows you get flavor to the center of the meat. Turkeys are big and if you just season just the outside a lot of your meat is going to be bland. You might be able to get away with that with chicken, but not turkey.
Roasting the turkey on a sheet pan also gives you the chance to collect the dripping to be used in your gravy. It's not really enough so it's good to have chicken stock or better yet turkey stock on hand to make your gravy. I like to make a turkey stock from smoked turkey parts in my Instant Pot. That makes for a gravy full of smoky, good flavor.
Instant Pot
Speaking of the Instant Pot, why not cook the whole turkey breast inside the Instant Pot. It's fast for sure. And a whole turkey breast should have no issues fitting into the most common 6 quart sized Instant Pot.
The downside to the Instant Pot is that you can't track the temperature as the turkey is cooking. Since you are cooking the turkey fast it's more forgiving when it comes to the final temperature. I do check the temperature once I open up the Instant Pot to make sure it did come up to temp.
The turkey also won't get the nice brown color you want when you Instant Pot it, so to brown the turkey I put it in the oven with the broiler going. Make sure not to have it too close to the heating element. Watch it and turn frequently to get it browned quickly. Makes for a much pretty presentation that way as well as crispier skin.
Air Fryer
If you are really into crispy skin then you need to try my next recipe. I got to say that this one is my personal favorite.
Here is what I do:
- I buy a whole bone-in turkey breast
- I remove the bones and save them for stock
- Each turkey breast then gets a dry brine, which is a rub of salt, dried herbs, and spices.
- Then the turkey sits undercovered in the fridge for 48 hours.
- Then I air fry the turkey until my thermometer says it's done - yes you can get a probe thermometer cord into an air fryer basket with it nearly completely shut
Because I dry brine the skin and cook it so quickly in a small space that skin gets incredibly crispy. I have feed it to people who hate turkey skin and they were basically fighting for the last piece of crispy skin. Also since I seasoned the turkey 48 hours ahead of time the flavor is saturated throughout the meat. It's truly amazing and one of the best recipes I have made in my 15+ years of blogging. My wife would agree!
Try my Dry Brined Air Fryer Turkey Breast yourself. You are going to love it!
Sous Vide
The final recipe I want to talk about is not my own but it's from my friend Chelsea from a Duck's Oven. She really knows her sous vide and has even published two fantastic books on the subject.
I was at a campground with my camper in Savannah, Georgia one Thanksgiving. I didn't have room to cook or even store a whole turkey, so got a turkey breast and decided to try out her Sous Vide Turkey Breast with Herb Filling.
What you do is you make a herb filling and flatten the turkey breast out. Then you roll it up with the herb filling being a swirl throughout the meat. It's like a swiss roll cake. It's also a great way to get flavor into each bite without having to brine. You tie the turkey breast up and then vacuum seal it for cooking.
Then the turkey breast is cooked for 4 hours in a water bath. It will be perfectly done since you are telling the circulator exactly what temperature you want the turkey to be done too - oh the power of sous vide!!!!
Then to brown it, get a cast iron pan or Dutch oven really hot and quickly brown it on all sides.
If you want to hear more about sous vide cooking for Thanksgiving, take a listen below to the podcast episode that I did a couple years back with Chelsea.
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