Smoking a Beer-Can Chicken

[Cy Robinson]

For T-Day we will be having a "Brined Big Boy" from Steven Raichlen's book, Beer-Can Chicken, pages 48-51.

Since I have no way to smoke the crittur on my gas grill is it possible to smoke it in the WSM for the first few minutes of the cook to get some smoke flavor and then transfer to the grill for the remainder of the cook?

Also I'm not sure of just how long the above "few minutes" should be. Right now I'm planning on 20 to 30 minutes

Plan on using a small amount of Kingsford and some wet pecan chunks to produce max smoke in a short period of time.

The bird is a 6.24 lb roaster all natural chicken. According to the book it should be done in about 2 hours.

Everything should work out just fine but I'm not certain about the smoking part. If anybody has any thoughts on the subject I'd sure like to read them. TIA

 

[Larry Wolfe]

Cy,
You are making things too hard on yourself. You can do the whole cook on your WSM. Do a search on "beer can chickens" here and you will see many people do them on their WSM. Good luck!

 

[Art Sobczak]

Cy, I'm with Skins Fan. Don't even fire up the gasser unless you're direct grilling or warming something (on an unlit side) on T-day. WSM all the way.

Go easy on the smoke. Pecan is great. I also mix in a fruit like apple, or somthing else light like sugar maple with poultry. To get max juiciness (I saw that word in a **** spam email) I like to use a butter/spice rub/roasted garlic paste underneath the breast skin.

Right now, begin practicing, "Thank you. Glad you enjoyed it." You'll need it with your guests.

 

[Brian L.]

I concurr as well. Just smoke it on the WSM. I do it all the time. I try to maintain 250-300 degrees, and light on the smoke. It will turn out great.

 

[Bryan S]

Beer can chickens all the time on the WSM for me also. If using pecan for smoke wood go easy on it. If you have apple or cherry i would use that instead. JMO. You do not need to soak the wood in water. Any more questions just ask.

Bryan

 

[Greg Rempe]

If you are using sand in the water pan, the skin on the beer can chicken will turn out really nice...espically if you put it on the bottom rack!

 

[Cy Robinson]

Thanks to one and all for advice. However, in spite of my best intentions, plans changed and we went out for dinner with friends. So the "big boy buzzard" is still in the freezer waiting for a more opportune time. Thanks again for the help.