Pellet Smoker Cooking: Pulled turkey leg sandwiches and a caprese salad

Today’s cook was kinda fun since I was trying something new; pulled turkey legs. This is just the second time I have smoked turkey legs. The first time I didn’t like them too well.
I bought 6 Honeysuckle fresh turkey legs. It said all natural but not sure what that could mean!

I made up ½ gallon of brine, a scant ½ cup kosher salt, a good ½ cup of brown sugar, 2 Tbs. molasses, 2 Tbs. soy sauce, and 2 Tbs. liquid smoke. Ok so I used liquid smoke! They were in the brine for 10 hours before smoking.

I rinsed the legs & let dry some in a colander. I then coated well with some Penzey’s Galena Street rub. I did them on smoke mode P5 for one hour & was holding pretty good at 170 deg. I then went to P3 for ½ hour, then to P0 & was at 225-230 deg. for the rest of the cook. After 2 hrs. 10 min. the first leg was at or over 165 deg IT. I pulled them as they reached temp and took another 20 minutes.

I covered with a towel for 15 minutes then removed the towel. Another 20 min. they were cool enough to handle so I removed the skin and pulled the meat. I nuked the skin until crisp for a cooks treat! Now that was a chore pulling the meat. I ended up doing more chopping than pulling but got some nice looking meat for sandwiches.

For my sandwiches I toasted the buns w/a little olive oil in a skillet, topped with the turkey and a slice of Swiss cheese. All went under the broiler to melt the cheese.

I made a caprese salad, romaine lettuce w/ a splash of red wine vinegar, a slice of tomato, some mozzarella cheese, fresh basil, a little ELOO, and gray salt & pepper.

The sandwiches were good, great flavor but I thought the meat was a little on the tough side. Unless I can get fall off the bone turkey meat I think I will stick with pork & chicken for my pulled meat sandwiches. The salad was great!

Brined and seasoned