Turkey Hasselback

Day 1/Brine the Turkey: Combine ½ cup kosher salt, ½ cup sugar, and 6 cups cold water in a container.Stir well to dissolve the solids. Put the turkey breast in a Ziploc bag, and put that inside a bowl. Pour the brine inside the bag, and put it in the fridge for 6–8 hours. Note: The longer you leave it in the brine, the stronger the solution will

Day 2/ Make your Haselback: Prepare a shallow baking tin, oiled and layered with onion slices (which will be handy for the gravy). Apparently, using a shallow tin to roast turkey allows the air circulate better, leaving you with a moist bird!

Preheat the oven to 260 degrees Centigrade (about 500 degrees Fahrenheit). Then make your stuffing, following the instructions on the pack. In my case, I added finely chopped sage leaves to the stuffing mix. Other opions are chopped apricots, orange/lemon zest, fresh thyme leaves, etc

Remove Turkey from brine and shake off excess liquid (no need to dry). Place it on a chopping board. Using a sharp knife, make slashes/slices across the length about 1cm apart – till you have hasslebacks. Be careful not to cut right through, you want to make the cuts but still keep the breast whole.

Fill each cut with some stuffing and press the turkey breast back together to shape. Place on the shallow oiled tray and place the tray on a rack, two rungs from the bottom. Let roast for half an hour. When the 30 minutes, is up, lower the temperature to 180 degrees Centigrade (about 360 degrees Fahrenheit). At this stage, the breast should have taken on some colour - cover it with a piece of foil and let it to cook for another 40 minutes. Check for doneness and allow cook a while longer if necessary.

Remove from oven, allow it to rest and slice into potions to serve. Use the onions and pan juices to make the gravy.