OliverLeveritt
TVWBB Member
I just did a chicken in my 14" WSM this afternoon. I dumped about 2/3 of a Weber chimney of blazing B&B in the basket on top of the remaining Kingsford "nuggets" from my last cook. (ashes cleaned out -- clean nuggets) I had placed one small piece of pecan chunk down on the bottom of the charcoal grate among the nuggets. After putting the hot stuff in, I put a smaller pecan chunk out at the side. I put the smoker together with a foil wrapped water bowl to let it settle and start producing clean smoke. It got up to about 380 and then it started dropping -- with all vents open.
Since I had clean exhaust, I plugged the chicken into my Thermoworks Signals and set it on the bottom rack. Temp probe was on bottom rack almost under the chicken. Piddled around with it for about 20 minutes while the temp dropped to about 260 with all the vents open.
Finally, I opened it up and removed the chicken, tilted the bottom grate and pulled out the water pan. Put it all back together and watched the temp quickly rise to about 400 degrees. It stayed between 390 and 410 for the (relatively short) duration of the direct cook.
The chicken was quite tasty -- nicely smoked all the way into the most moist tenders I had ever tasted. (24 hr. wet brine followed by 24 hr. open air dry in refrigerator). It was a nice balance of chicken flavor, seasoning, and not overpowering smoke.
Shortly after putting the chicken in, the breast brobe was reading about 110 degrees. I knew that was wrong. I moved the probe. Still high. Moved it to the other side and made sure I got it in the thickest part of the breast. Still high. I pulled that probe out and took the thigh probe and put it in the breast. 45 degrees. OK.
When the breast probe indicated 165, I pulled the probe and stuck it straight down into the thickest part of the other side of the breast, ensuring that the half inch or so at the tip was as close to centered in the thick part as possible -- just like on the other side. It read 143, so I put the lid back on, it jumped back up over 390 and then started waning a bit, but it hit 165 in a few minutes, so I pulled the chicken.
Something is definitely wonky with one of the probes. I'm not that far off on placement.
At any rate, it's a nice looking chicken. It was decent. It was definitely an "experimental" cook, but at least I can still eat the results and say, "OK". Better next time . . .
I like the B&B. That stuff gets started faster than the Kingsford over one of those Weber paraffin cubes. The B&B doesn't put off a lot of nasty smoke at first like the Kingsford. I don't remember how long it took from chicken insertion to pull, but it wasn't heinous in spite of opening the lid several times to diddle with the wonky probe and then pull the water pan.
Since I had clean exhaust, I plugged the chicken into my Thermoworks Signals and set it on the bottom rack. Temp probe was on bottom rack almost under the chicken. Piddled around with it for about 20 minutes while the temp dropped to about 260 with all the vents open.
Finally, I opened it up and removed the chicken, tilted the bottom grate and pulled out the water pan. Put it all back together and watched the temp quickly rise to about 400 degrees. It stayed between 390 and 410 for the (relatively short) duration of the direct cook.
The chicken was quite tasty -- nicely smoked all the way into the most moist tenders I had ever tasted. (24 hr. wet brine followed by 24 hr. open air dry in refrigerator). It was a nice balance of chicken flavor, seasoning, and not overpowering smoke.
Shortly after putting the chicken in, the breast brobe was reading about 110 degrees. I knew that was wrong. I moved the probe. Still high. Moved it to the other side and made sure I got it in the thickest part of the breast. Still high. I pulled that probe out and took the thigh probe and put it in the breast. 45 degrees. OK.
When the breast probe indicated 165, I pulled the probe and stuck it straight down into the thickest part of the other side of the breast, ensuring that the half inch or so at the tip was as close to centered in the thick part as possible -- just like on the other side. It read 143, so I put the lid back on, it jumped back up over 390 and then started waning a bit, but it hit 165 in a few minutes, so I pulled the chicken.
Something is definitely wonky with one of the probes. I'm not that far off on placement.
At any rate, it's a nice looking chicken. It was decent. It was definitely an "experimental" cook, but at least I can still eat the results and say, "OK". Better next time . . .
I like the B&B. That stuff gets started faster than the Kingsford over one of those Weber paraffin cubes. The B&B doesn't put off a lot of nasty smoke at first like the Kingsford. I don't remember how long it took from chicken insertion to pull, but it wasn't heinous in spite of opening the lid several times to diddle with the wonky probe and then pull the water pan.
