OK, I cooked the bird (on a beer can) yesterday and wasn't too pleased with the results. Here's the log:
- 6.7lb roasting chicken
- Filled charcoal chamber with Kingsford briquettes and 3 chunks of smoking wood
- 30 briquettes in inverted chimney starter, dumped on top of charcoal chamber when ready
- Water bowl filled with warm water
- Chicken went on at 11am
- Temp stayed near 200 for a while and then slowly started to climb, reaching 225 after ~35min, 250 at ~1hr.
- Managed vents to maintain 250
- Basted w/apple juice at 2.5hrs
- Went to baste again 2hrs later but bird was obviously done. Temp reading in breast was over 180
- Total cook time: 4.5 hrs
Needless to say, the bird was overcooked and done WAY too early.
I had read that for a large roasting chicken we were looking at about 1hr/lb when cooked at 225, which would have given us a cook time of 6.5-7hrs. I figured that by cooking at 250 I'd be able to shave an hour or so off. I never thought that going 25 degrees warmer would cut more than 2 hours off the cook time.
I had read that you shouldn't lift the cover to check the food so unless you're going by experience, all you have to go by is time. When your time calculations are off, the results are not good.
Hopefully, as I do more of this I'll get the hang of it.