First cook in the new WSM...some ? and lessons learned (long)

Well, I fired up the new WSM Sunday afternoon. The "load" was two racks of baby backs and two whole chickens butterflied. Made my rub per the BRITU recipe....pretty much what I've always used on my own and in about the same amounts...just never had used a written recipe before. The ribs already had the membranes removed, so that was easy!

I used a 'modified' Minion method to fire up the cooker about noon to 12:30. I filled the ring with unlit and buried a couple of chunks of pecan wood. I then made a hole in the center and fired up about 30 briquettes in the chimney. Once ready, they were poured into the 'hole', but instead of loading the cooker right away I let the rest of the pile catch and cook down a little.

I assembled the cooker using cool water with the ribs on the bottom rack and birds on the top. I was a little concerned about chicken drippings on the ribs, but figured the birds needed the higher temps of the top grate. (was this poor thinking?) I rolled the ribs using skewers to hold, but those two chickens WOULD NOT fit on the top grate until I split them into halves. Finally had the lid on at 1:10 pm.

Well, wouldn't you know I forgot to put my Polder-like thermometer on the top grate, so I just hung it thru the top vent just above the chicken. The temp stabilized very quickly at 258, which I thought seemed almost perfect for my 'load out'. I LOVE the way the WSM holds temp without having to jack with the fire. My old Bandera was a beast to control. After about 2.5 hours I flipped & rotated everything and basted the chicken with a mix of Lea & Perrin steak sauce and beer. When I closed up the cooker the temp spiked really fast up to 290, but some vent management took care of it. I did fire up about 15 briquettes when it started to rain...just in case. At the 4 hour mark everything was looking real good and the chicken was done. The ribs stayed on an extra half hour or so before I pulled them.

Results were excellent. Ribs were a huge hit and pulled easily from the bone but didn't fall apart. Both slabs disappeared quickly. The chicken was very tasty and very moist with the exception of the exposed edges of the breast once I had to split them into halves.

Lessons Learned: If doing a big load of chicken I'll have to make sure to split them into halves or smaller. Also, rib racks might be necessary to fit enough ribs for a pure "rib cook". If cooking for longer periods, I'll make sure to use the true Minion method as there weren't too many coals left when the meat finished...I might have gotten an extra couple of hours had i used the extra briquettes I started as a backup.

Can anyone point out any mistakes or tips I need for my next cook? (which will probably be a butt or two)

KT

Congrats on your 1st cook! Ulitimately, the your food is proof of your success. Sounds like everything came out just fine. Most people wouldn't cook chicken over another meat to prevent any potential contamination. Your temps and duration appeared to be sufficient to prevent any problems. I'd just say continue to experiment and tweak your own system. Maybe try an even higher temp for the chicken next time; how did the skin turn out?

Paul

The chicken over ribs should not be a problem given that you cook the ribs past 165 and thus kill anything that may have contaminated it. I was also wondering about the skin at that temp. I seem to have to keep my temps around 350 for good chicken skin. sounds like a great first cook.

Chicken Skin -

The skin was nice. It was dry and almost crispy on the outside and would tear easily and audibly. It could have been a little more crisp, and probably would have been if I wasn't keeping the temp down for the ribs. I was a little concerned about the possible contamination, but I knew the temp would kill anything that dripped. I just knew that the birds had to be on top to get as high a temp as I could without crisping the ribs.

I know I'll be doing a turkey for Thanksgiving, but was considering doing it like a butterflied chicken and split into halves. Anyone done that before????

Keith,
Glad to see your first cook was a memorable one. The only suggestion is to avoid putting poultry on top of other meats. You didn't get sick and that's a good thing, but it is bad practice. ALWAYS put your poultry on the lower grate to avoid cross-contamination. Plus there's a bonus - the drippings from the ribs really add to the flavor of the chicken!

Keith's assumption and G Rose's comment are correct. There is no reason to avoid chicken over other meats at normal cooking temps. One might not like the idea of it but that is psychological, not science. Cross-contamination in this circumstance is a myth.

Kevin, I agree with your statement. I am just wondering why the health dept doesn't agree with that. Is that just another thing they are behind the times on?

When they gave me my inspection on the restaraunt they told me I could cook pork and beef together and everything else had to be cooked seperate. Chicken, fish, turkey.

Wow, this has sparked an interesting discussion. Believe me, I stood over the cooker for a good 5 minutes pondering...but the logical engineer I am went with the temp killing anything that would drip.

Jeff, I find your comment about the health inspector interesting...but maybe it's because they can't guarantee that the internal temps will always get high enough (they aren't there to check) to kill those poultry/fish drippings????

KT

I was thinking about a rib rack too as I recently had to cook 4 racks and a couple of chickens.

In the end, I found rolling ribs worked great. I would guess I can get 7-8 baby backs in a wsm using this method.

maybe it's because they can't guarantee that the internal temps will always get high enough (they aren't there to check) to kill those poultry/fish drippings????

Click to expand...

Well, then that would mean that the poultry/fish isn't safe--it would have nothing to do with the ribs (or whatever) below as dripping juices, in the unlikely event that they emerged contaminated from the chicken and were able to survive the vastly hotter temps at the chicken's surface, would certainly pasteurize on their way through the air to the meat below where they would contact the vastly hotter temps on that surface. It is extremely unlikely that the juices from the chicken can work their way into the ribs with any pathogenic bacteria intact so the issue remains, as I noted, the chicken's temp, the cooker temp, perhaps, if you wish, the rib's surface temp but not the internal temp of the ribs.

HD inspectors cannot guarantee a lot of things, nor can the FDA, on whose authority most HD rules are based (most states simply adopt the FDA food code though it takes many states years to update to the latest--several states are still operating with the 1997 Code, for example). One must comply with the laws of the HD when operating commercially but let's not mistake inspectors or the laws' authors for being rigorous scientists. Though much of the Code is based in science do not assume that the FDA exhausts themselves trying to keep the public safe through the Code or the info disseminated to the public. There are political considerations and considerations that the public cannot be trusted to temp food correctly or accurately.

The FDA and, by extension, the HDs that adopt the FDA codes pre-suppose a fine line that the food service workers and the public walk between handling food safely and the unsafe handling of food. The line is not all that fine. One wonders why, if the government is so serious about food safety, government-sponsored PSAs are not all over the airwaves reminding people about the necessity and frequency of proper handwashing, cross-contamination which can occur when raw, tainted food is handled before ready-to-eat food or when RTE food in placed on a surface previously used for raw food; why the majority of the public does not know what safe temps actually are; why the use of bi-metal therms is not discouraged if not banned outright; why the proper cooling of foods to be reheated is so important; why 'time @ temp' charts, easily accessible and readable by the public are not widely disseminated as for many foods a lower temp at a longer time has the same bacterial reduction as the single 'safe internal temp' to which so many refer.

Though Jeff has no choice but to follow the directives of his HD inspector it does little good for the inspector to insist on following directives that have no science to back them up. It is not enough to say that Jeff 'might' temp the chicken wrong and serve unsafe food--that could happen irrespective of ribs (or any other food) being cooked in the same apparatus at the same time. The critical point is whether Jeff knows to cook the chicken and any other meat in the cooker to safe temps or to correctly use time @ temp variables. The public assumes Jeff (and anyone else preparing and/or serving food to them in a commercial endeavor) knows what he's doing. Many states require certification to operate as a food professional (unfortunately ServSafe certification, which does little more than rehash Code directives, is acceptable in many places) but if the Feds or state governments really wanted to be serious about the public and professional food service workers having an excellent understanding of food safety they would require its teaching in schools--starting in elementary--and would require HACCP (Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point), the science-based method of determining safe operating procedures thoughout the teaching and food services arenas. Both would go a very, very long way to assuring a knowledgeable public and reassuring all of us that the food we eat was grown, harvested, shipped, prepped, sold or cooked and served as safely as possible. This information is science but not rocket science.

Just so we're clear, here are some comments by a few noted food safety consultants and scientists that were responding specifically to the question of safety regarding chicken cooked over other meats:

"I don't see a potential micro problem even though the food code bas[e]s its log reduction values upon the internal cooking time and temperature of food. The food code basis for internal time/temps in cooking are developed based [on] studies on the typical microbial load of the product as well as the nature of the food matrix. While there may be a regulatory issue here, this appears very similar to cooking several meats together, say stir-frying beef and chicken, even though we do not have the heated surface of the pan. I believe the surface temperatures of the meats in question would probably exceed the temperature required to inactivate heat resistant strains of Salmonella, and no internalization of the juices from above could occur. As long as internal temps were met within your code, I wouldn't worry about this at all. Since rotisserie cooking of several meats toegther, or cooking on a spit is relatively common, and CDC does not list this as a hazardous practice in its reports on FBI, I think this is a safe practice as long as the internal temps are met."


Roy E Costa, R.S., M.S.
Public Health Sanitarian Consultant
Environ Health Associates, Inc


"None of these scenarios [cooking chicken over various meats] give me heartburn from a food safety perspective. If [safe] internal temperatures are [reached], the outside is much hotter and any drippage should be rendered safe bacteriologically."

Thomas L. Schwarz
Food Safety Consultant


"[Cooking chicken over another meat s]eems like Turducken or Chicken Kiev.
If it's all going to be properly cooked to 160°F or so, so what?

Carl S. Custer
Multidisciplinary Microbiologist
USDA FSIS OPHS MD MIB

Wow Kevin...that's almost more post and legalese than this engineer can digest . But the comparisons to stir-fry and turducken are what seal the deal for me....if that's safe, then cooking one over the other would be, too.

Thanks for all the info.

another thing to remember is that a local health inspector must at least follow food law but may go beyond as much as s/he wishes. unfortunately they have the final say in these cases. you can do one thing in one town while in the next it is not aloud(can make it very hard for buisnesses with multiple establishments or caterers) the best you can do is understand the science behind serving safe food and follow guidelines to ensure you are.

Very true. Commercially, one has no choice but to follow the dictates of one's inspector and HD.

Understanding the science is not difficult but many inspectors don't bother (the feeling is, apparently, that they are there to enforce codes only) and this is unfortunate to put it mildly. I think many operators would be thankful for an overview of the data that support the codes the inspector enforces but rarely are data included--or even referred to--when the codes are written (and some codes don't have data to support them or are made despite contradictory data). These data, if available and supported, could be used by the operator when he or she seeks to alter a procedure, e.g., and wants to ensure that sufficient safety measures are incorporated into the new plan.

It is widely assumed by the various powers that be at the FDA and USDA that the public cannot be trusted with actual data, that everything has to be dumbed down or simplified to a point where it is felt the public might be able to understand it. Private agencies are often no better. A good example is the cooking of hamburgers, one of the most cooked meats by consumers, who are often told to cook them to 'well done' without a temp to go with it. 'Well done' to many consumers means cooked to a point where there is no red or pink but most consumers are unaware that color might have little to do with determining doneness as the burgers might already be gray in a raw state or might, with the addition of flavoring items to the burger mix that alters Ph, gray quickly or hold onto their red color long past the point pasteurization was reached. When temps are included in instructions to consumers it is practically automatic that this temp will be adjusted upwards because it's felt that the public can't be trusted to understand time @ temp variables or to use a proper thermometer properly. (When was the last time you saw information that told consumers not to use dial-type bi-metal thermometers on thin items like burgers?) So, we have ServSafe and the USDA telling the public 160F for burgers but saying nothing about what type of therm to use and how to use it correctly.