Below is my first attempt at chicken lollipops after seeing a number of them on this site. I did these clear back in November but now I'm finally getting around to writing about them and sharing my experience with the site.
I did some research regarding the best way to clean up the chicken legs and found it fairly simple to do but definitely time consuming (Make sure you have a SHARP knife). I decided to keep the chicken in the fridge for a few hours uncovered to hopefully dry out the skin a little bit so it was nice and crispy as a final result. Crispy skin has always been a challenge for me, whether that is with chicken or turkey.
My method did allow the skin to be crispy, but not bite through like I wanted. After speaking with a friend of mine who does some local BBQ competitions in Texas, it sounds like the best way to get crispy skin, is to remove the skin, clean the fat from it with a sharp knife, then attach it back with toothpicks. From what he tells me, when the skin cooks it'll shrink and stick to the chicken once you removed the toothpicks. So I'll be trying this the next time I make these.
1200 - Prepped the chicken and put back into the fridge uncovered.
1400 - Seasoned the chicken and put aluminum foil on the ends of the legs so they didn't burn.
1600 - Started UDS smoker, used hickory wood and added my A-Maze-N Tube filled with apple pellets
1645 - Smoker at 270. Basted the chicken with room temperature melted butter then put chicken on the smoker standing up.
1720 - Smoker at 244
1730 - Smoker at 252
1745 - Smoker at 268
1825 - Smoker at 224, IT at 165, pulled wings and started putting sauce on them. Opened up smoker vents to get temperature up.
1840 - Smoker at 298, Put wings back on smoker
1900 - Smoker at 275
1910 - Smoker 275, pulled the chicken and let rest for 10 minutes
Prepped
Seasoned and foiled
Smoked and ready to be sauced
BBQ Sauce
Sauced and ready for the smoker
Peach BBQ Sauce legs finished
Pineapple Habanero Sauced and finished
I did some research regarding the best way to clean up the chicken legs and found it fairly simple to do but definitely time consuming (Make sure you have a SHARP knife). I decided to keep the chicken in the fridge for a few hours uncovered to hopefully dry out the skin a little bit so it was nice and crispy as a final result. Crispy skin has always been a challenge for me, whether that is with chicken or turkey.
My method did allow the skin to be crispy, but not bite through like I wanted. After speaking with a friend of mine who does some local BBQ competitions in Texas, it sounds like the best way to get crispy skin, is to remove the skin, clean the fat from it with a sharp knife, then attach it back with toothpicks. From what he tells me, when the skin cooks it'll shrink and stick to the chicken once you removed the toothpicks. So I'll be trying this the next time I make these.
1200 - Prepped the chicken and put back into the fridge uncovered.
1400 - Seasoned the chicken and put aluminum foil on the ends of the legs so they didn't burn.
1600 - Started UDS smoker, used hickory wood and added my A-Maze-N Tube filled with apple pellets
1645 - Smoker at 270. Basted the chicken with room temperature melted butter then put chicken on the smoker standing up.
1720 - Smoker at 244
1730 - Smoker at 252
1745 - Smoker at 268
1825 - Smoker at 224, IT at 165, pulled wings and started putting sauce on them. Opened up smoker vents to get temperature up.
1840 - Smoker at 298, Put wings back on smoker
1900 - Smoker at 275
1910 - Smoker 275, pulled the chicken and let rest for 10 minutes
Prepped
Seasoned and foiled
Smoked and ready to be sauced
BBQ Sauce
Sauced and ready for the smoker
Peach BBQ Sauce legs finished
Pineapple Habanero Sauced and finished
