Practice Chicken


 
L

Larry Wolfe

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I did a practice competition chicken cook yesterday. The chicken thighs turned out fantastic, however I would have liked a little more color!

BTW, check out the bite threw skin in the last pic!!!:Bow:

 
Larry,

Looks great. I would love to learn a little on how you did it. Can you provide some details on how you cooked these (temp, time, etc.). Also what are the toothpicks for.

Thanks for sharing.

James
 
Looks great Larry... thank you for the pics. pictures are worth thousands words...

BTW, what are the toothpicks for?
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by John Suh:
Looks great Larry... thank you for the pics. pictures are worth thousands words...

BTW, what are the toothpicks for? </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

i'm guessing it's so the skin doesn't pull up.
 
if you want more color!! At the end of the cook you need to get the heat up to around 350 Deg. to give the skin and meat more color.
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by James H:
Larry,

Looks great. I would love to learn a little on how you did it. Can you provide some details on how you cooked these (temp, time, etc.). Also what are the toothpicks for.

Thanks for sharing.

James </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Morning James,
The toothpicks are for presentation purposes only. We use it in competition chicken in order to give a uniform turn in to all of our individual pieces. It holds the skin in tact as well. Believe it or not there was about 40 minutes worth of prep time in those pieces of chicken (trimming excess fat, meat and skin)

I cooked the chicken at 250* for three hours. Then I basted with a very thin sauce every 3 minutes for 30 minutes.
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">I would have liked a little more color! </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
You can do this by adding the key color variable to your baste. That way you're adding the color as you go rather than having to rework your cooking flow so that you get the color from the cooking which can lead to overcooking.

Looks good though.
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by K Kruger:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">I would have liked a little more color! </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
You can do this by adding the key color variable to your baste. That way you're adding the color as you go rather than having to rework your cooking flow so that you get the color from the cooking which can lead to overcooking.

Looks good though. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

That would definitely work. But the problem I had was my skin never "set", therefore never got tacky like I want it to, so the baste was rolling off as I applied it. I know what I did wrong and will correct it next weekend when I do another test run.

The baste I'm using is pretty red to begin with and should dramatically change the color of the meat on it's own. I'm using the same baste on the ribs I'm doing today, so hopefully we'll be able to see the difference.
 
Might not have been red enough for the comp, but your cooks always look good to me Larry!

BTW - I like to trim up the thighs neatly as well, and use the toothpicks since that trimming tends to allow the skin to loose some grip during the cook and flipping. But looks like you didn't flip yours?
 
They look great Bud.
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<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by r benash:
Might not have been red enough for the comp, but your cooks always look good to me Larry!

BTW - I like to trim up the thighs neatly as well, and use the toothpicks since that trimming tends to allow the skin to loose some grip during the cook and flipping. But looks like you didn't flip yours? </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

I did flip them one time about 3/4 of the way through the cook.
 
I had wondered myself if the chicken thighs should be turned or not.

I have a batch on right now, that I let sit for 3.5 hours at 230. Then the middle section of the WSM came out, and I put the chicken in a sauce bath right over the coals to braise for about an hour. After that, I'll try to crisp up the skin directly over the coals. I have been taking pictures of each step as I go, since this is my first time doing a KCBS style turn in container at home for practice
 
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