Southern Collard Greens Recipe with Smoked Turkey Leg

4.67 from 3 votes
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This Southern Collard Greens Recipe with Smoked Turkey is the best collard greens recipe and awesome as a holiday side dish or for New Year’s Day. Adding a smoked turkey leg is the best way to infuse additional flavor during the cooking process versus using a ham hock. This is a delicious side dish with southern roots and great flavor.

Collard greens in a bowl with smoked turkey.
Tender braised collards topped with smoked turkey.

Recipe Highlights

First things first. This easy collard greens recipe is inspired by our friend Lynn while we were visiting her home over a holiday. She shared with us her families collards recipe, which had three factors that contributed to their amazingness and rooted in Southern cooking. The secrets to this easy recipe:

  • Use fresh collards
  • Massage the greens to break the cells and get a nice texture
  • Use smoked turkey versus a ham hock
  • Vinegar

What Are Collard Greens?

Collard Greens are a member of the cabbage family. That means for a collards recipe, the leafy greens will have thick stems, and dense leaves. When buying collard greens at grocery stores it’s important too look for good color (vibrant green leaves) and hearty stems. They should not be wilted or browning. That is a sign they have been picked for a while and won’t be great for any dish.

Farmers markets are a great place to find fresh greens or any leafy green. Alternatively you can sub mustard greens as well for this recipe and use the same ingredients and steps.

A bunch of collard greens in hand.
Fresh Collards have strong stems, and the leafy green is stable and stands up on its own.

Simple Ingredients

  • Fresh Collard Greens
  • Turkey leg or thigh
  • Olive Oil (for the turkey leg or thigh)
  • Poultry Seasoning
  • Red Onion
  • 3 cups Chicken Broth or Stock
  • Apple Cider Vinegar, (white vinegar works well too)
  • Worcestershire Sauce
  • Kosher salt
  • Garlic Powder
  • Cayenne Pepper or Red Pepper Flakes

And hot sauce for the finishing touch – preferably Crystal for this recipe.

Preparing Collards

Collards will have tough stems and tough leaves. In order to break down and prepare the greens for the simmer you need to remove the stems and discard or compost and massage the leaves so the cells get crushed and allow them to get a nice texture after they have simmered.

  1. Rinse in cold water and dry the bunch.
  2. Remove the harder portion of the stem by cutting up and around the thicker stalk. A sharp paring knife is perfect for this recipe. As you cut along the edge of the thick stem it will eventually soften mid way up the green. From there cut down along the harder stem and compost it.
  3. Take a handful of the greens and roll them up into a cigar like roll. From there use your hands to gently roll and massage the greens. By doing this, it is breaking down some of the dense fiber of the greens which will help with a tender braised green.
  4. Slice the rolled greens into thin strips.
Side by side of collard greens with stem removed and sliced after massaging.
Remove the stems and massage the greens before cutting into strips.

Smoked Turkey Leg

Most recipes for collard greens will use a ham hock. Ham hocks are a great alternative as well and add a more pork-like flavor. But we absolutely love the smoked turkey leg for this (and very appropriate for the holidays).

If using turkey you can buy a pre-smoked turkey leg (or thigh). BUT in our experience (and we used to take this short cut ALL the time, especially for our smoked turkey gravy), store-bought smoked turkey legs are pretty flavorless and don’t add much magic to your end product. And you want the magic, right?

  • Just buy an uncooked, unsmoked, turkey leg, season it liberally, and smoke it at 250 degrees Fahrenheit until the internal temperature is 160 degrees. 
  • Can’t find a leg? Use a thigh. This can take anywhere from 90 minutes to 2 hours depending on the size of the turkey thigh.

You can do this in advance (hours or even days) prior to making your greens, which is great when prepping for a holiday meal.

Smoked Turkey Leg
Smoking your own turkey leg will give more flavor than the frozen versions.

Then use that smoked turkey leg to infuse your greens as the greens braise.

How To Cook Collard Greens

With the smoked turkey done, and the collards prepped, it’s now time to create a broth and then braise the greens. The vinegar is an important flavor profile and gives a great backbone to the dish.

  1. In a large stock pot (or Dutch Oven) over medium, sauté and soften onions. This will take roughly 6 minutes. We find red onions give the most flavor, but yellow or sweet onions are great alternatives.
  2. Add the stock, apple cider vinegar, spices, and Worcestershire to a boil and then reduce to a simmer.
  3. Once the broth is simmering add the smoked turkey leg and continue at a low simmer for one hour. The simmering will infuse the broth with the smoky flavor, and keep the turkey tender.
  4. Finally add the chopped greens into the simmering pot and stir to mix, then cover. Be sure to keep the pot at the lowest heat possible for a simmer and stir every 15 minutes. We don’t want to break the greens, just braise them. The greens should be tender and full of flavor after an hour. Salt and pepper to taste.
  5. Serve in your favorite bowl and shred the turkey for some added topping.
A pot of cooked collard greens with smoked turkey legs
The greens will darken in color as they simmer.

Storing and Making in Advance

You can make this ahead of any large meal. Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator. When ready to reheat add back into a large sauce pan over medium-high heat and bring to a simmer, then reduce the heat to a low simmer for 5 minutes. Then it’s ready to serve.

Holiday Main Dishes

Some of our favorite roasts are a great complement to this dish.

More Holiday Side Dish Recipes

We definitely encourage you to add this dish to your inventory and we are grateful to Lynn for sharing with us an amazing recipe with strong family traditions.

A bowl of Smoked Collard Greens
This also makes a great comfort food recipe on the grill.

This post was originally shared in March of 2016 and updated in November 2020 with new photos, side dishes, and details for recipe steps.

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collard greens with smoked turkey in a white bowl
4.67 from 3 votes

Collard Greens Recipe With Smoked Turkey Leg

How to make smoked collard greens with a homemade smoked turkey leg. One key tip is to be sure the collards are gently rolled or massaged to tenderize them.
Prep: 30 minutes
Cook: 1 hour
Total: 1 hour 30 minutes
Servings: 6 servings

Ingredients 

For the Smoked Turkey Leg:

  • 1 ½ pound turkey leg
  • 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
  • 2 tablespoons poultry rub

For the Collard Greens:

  • 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 small red onion, diced
  • 3 cups chicken stock
  • 1 cup apple cider vinegar, (white vinegar works well too)
  • ¼ cup Worcestershire sauce
  • ½ tablespoon kosher salt
  • ¼ teaspoon garlic powder
  • teaspoon cayenne pepper
  • 1 smoked turkey leg (from above)
  • 1 pound collard greens, rinsed, de-stemmed, massaged for a couple minutes, and sliced 1-2 inches wide strips after

Instructions 

For the Smoked Turkey Leg

  • Preheat the smoker to 250 degrees F using fruit wood.
  • Coat the turkey leg with olive oil and poultry rub.
  • Place on smoker until internal temperature reaches 160 degrees Fahrenheit (approximately 2 hours).

Collards Recipe

  • Start by preheating a large stock pot over medium high heat.
  • Add olive oil and the diced red onions and soften for about 6 minutes, stirring occasionally.
  • Add apple cider vinegar, chicken stock, salt, cayenne pepper, garlic powder and Worcestershire sauce and bring to a simmer.
  • Add turkey leg and adjust salt to taste. (You can let this simmer without the greens for up to an hour for more smoky stock flavor if you have time)
  • Finally add the chopped greens into the pot over a simmer and stir to mix. Cover and let simmer for one hour or until the greens are soft to taste. Take care to not let the stock come to a boil, keep the simmer as low heat as possible.
  • Serve in your favorite bowl and add some of the turkey from the leg in your dish.

Notes

Short Cut Tip: You can buy frozen pre-cooked smoked turkey legs or turkey thighs and substitute smoking them yourself.

Nutrition

Calories: 457kcal | Carbohydrates: 14g | Protein: 46g | Fat: 23g | Saturated Fat: 6g | Cholesterol: 151mg | Sodium: 1035mg | Potassium: 1009mg | Fiber: 3g | Sugar: 4g | Vitamin A: 3856IU | Vitamin C: 30mg | Calcium: 247mg | Iron: 5mg

Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.

Additional Info

Prep Time: 30 minutes
Cook Time: 1 hour
Total Time: 1 hour 30 minutes
Course: Side Dish
Cuisine: barbecue side dish, bbq, Christmas, holiday, southern, Thanksgiving
Servings: 6 servings
Calories: 457
Keyword: collard green recipe, collard greens with smoked turkey, collards recipe, smoked collard greens
Like this recipe? Leave a comment below!


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Vindulge

About Mary


I'm Mary, a wine/food/travel writer, Certified Sommelier, mom of twins, former vegetarian turned BBQ fanatic, runner, founder of Vindulge, and author of Fire + Wine cookbook. Thanks for stopping by!

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12 Comments

  1. 5 stars
    My fiancé has Alpha Gal so I am always looking for new things to make or new twists to some of our favorites. My uncle taught me 15 years ago how to cook his famous collards and the recipe is the same except we always used ham hock or bacon or pancetta. I was in the mood to smoke some turkey legs and wings yesterday and ran across your page looking for inspiration on side dishes and WOW. The smokiness of that turkey really took the collards to another level! Even our 11 and 7 year old boys “semi” liked them lol. Will definitely be adding this to many bbqs in the future!

    1. Yesss!! Thanks for sharing. We love the ham or bacon method too, but something about the smoked turkey just works.

    1. Donnie, no we simply place the leg in there (or thigh) and over the simmer it will soften and you can pull at the end for the meat.

  2. Ha! I had my own collard greens love affair this week too! Must be something in the air (err, or soil…) I’m sure all your catering clients will love this recipe.

  3. I discovered collard greens a few years ago, and fell in love with them. I can’t wait to try this.