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Guest
Guest
I have been bbq'ing a lot in the last two years, and seem to be seeing improvement in results. Or at least my family and those who have to eat the results say. Anyway, I've been working with my chicken, and my one month old WSM - I also use a Offset cooker, a King Kettle, and a regular 22 1/2 Weber Kettle (my wife says that its getting to be more like an obsession than a hobby, oh well). Anyway, last weekend I tried two butterflied Chickens. I marinated overnight in apple juice, and rubbed with a paprika/sea salt/italian spices and other things that looked good (just a touch of brown sugar, relatively low sugar rub). I used a large Weber chimney full of Big Green Egg lump (I now use lump exclusively, I think that it's a much better product than Kingsford briquettes). I put a good sized chunk of apple wook, and a smaller piece of oak and one of hickory. When everything was good and flaming, I dumped it on the coal grate. I left the water pan in, wrapped in foil and empty. When I put the chicken in my lid thermometer read 335 and the Maverick smoker/food remote was 325 and 38 (for the chicken, with the probe on the chicken on the top grate running through the breast adn thigh). With the vents at 50% the temp remained rock steady through the hour and a fifteen minutes I cooked.
The end result was the best chicken I've done. I've probably done 12 - 15 low and slow chickens in my offset and kettles (225 -250 for 4 to 6 hours) and never had chicken as tender and juicy as this was. I've found the low and slow "rubbery" texture to be slightly off putting, even if the flavor is good. The skin on this chicken could have been crisped just a tad more, if I had been ambitious I would have fired up one of the kettles and done it, but it was still good. The tenderness was absolutely what fantastic - not too soft, but moist and flavorful. I see here that there are devotees of this kind of roasting for chicken - Is this real bbq or something else? I'm going to keep working this, I think that I'm on to something!
The end result was the best chicken I've done. I've probably done 12 - 15 low and slow chickens in my offset and kettles (225 -250 for 4 to 6 hours) and never had chicken as tender and juicy as this was. I've found the low and slow "rubbery" texture to be slightly off putting, even if the flavor is good. The skin on this chicken could have been crisped just a tad more, if I had been ambitious I would have fired up one of the kettles and done it, but it was still good. The tenderness was absolutely what fantastic - not too soft, but moist and flavorful. I see here that there are devotees of this kind of roasting for chicken - Is this real bbq or something else? I'm going to keep working this, I think that I'm on to something!