Help with chicken


 
S

S. Dover

TVWBB Fan
Smoked some chicken quarters this week. I brined them overnight then dried them out in the fridge before putting on the cooker.

I was very pleased with the overall taste and flavor of the chicken. My problem was with the appearance. Not sure what went wrong.

Here is what I did:
<LI>started with 1 lit chimney poured over 1 unlit with hickory chunks.
<LI>placed skin side up in center of top grate for +/- 1.5 hours. Grate temp never got above 300.
<LI>at 45 minutes, the skin had a nice color but was starting to separate from the meat. Pic #1
<LI>at 1.5 hours, the chicken was up to temp but the skin had almost rolled off the top. Pic #2

Any help would be appreciated.
 
Steve -

I do the same process - brining then drying in the fridge overnight. My skin usually looks like yours too - though it doesn't really bother me.

Others may be able to give you a more definitive answer... but I think when you dry the skin in the fridge to get rid of the moisture, it is more prone to shrinking. That said, I still do it because it makes for a good skin.

Not sure what effect brining has on skin. Would be interesting to test out.

I can only think of two options - when cutting up the chicken, try and be generous on the amount of skin. When cutting off the backbone, sometimes you can try to leave more skin that can be stretched to help cover. The other, more viable option, is to try and use a few toothpicks to pin the skin into place a bit. However, you run the risk of the skin splitting a bit doing that.

Others may have better advice... good luck.
 
Out of curiosity, did you rinse your chicken after brining? If not, that may have left too much brine in the skin which MAY have led to the skin shrinkage. I'm only guessing though...
 
Not to answer for Steve... but I rinse very thoroughly after brining and the skin still shrinks like Steve's does... That said, I'm not bothered by it at all...
 
Skin shrinkage comes from the heat. If you cook at high temps as I do you'll get more shrinkage. If you cut your own chickens it is easy to cut them so the sking coverage is adequate. Though shrinkage still occurs, when there is enough to start with it does not pull back so that much if any meat is exposed. Store-bought and all bets are off. You might find quarters (breasts too) with better-than-required skin but usually not. Unfortunately you usually can't tell in the package.
 
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