New to the forum , smoking a whole chicken

[hambone1950]

Hello
I'm hambone1950 and I live in the suburbs of Boston. Ive been getting the smoking meat newsletter for a couple of years now. I just got a weber smoky mountain cooker and I am so pleased I can't even tell you. I had a brinkmann cheapie and it was nothing but aggravation. But that is behind me. I smoked a Boston butt on the wsm and it was killer. 8 hours of rock steady 250 degrees with one load of charcoal. Absolutely unbelievable.
Anyhow , I want to smoke a whole chicken and I want to know how much charcoal will give me 4 or 5 hours of good heat....can I cut the number of briquettes in half .? I know I can snuff the fire when I'm done cooking , but I'd like to conserve charcoal if I can. I plan to do a lot of smoking now that I have the wsm, and I want to learn to use it as efficiently as possible. Thanks in advance for any good tips you can give me.

 

[lght]

I use a WSM 18 and I actually use a full chimney and a half.  I try and keep the temps a little hotter and shoot for 275.  However the last time I did whole chix I did cook 9 of them at once.  How many are you cooking?

 

[hambone1950]

hello SB

actually im just thinking of one good sized bird..and do you use any unlit charcoal  in that amount or do you fire it all up at once ?.

.and while i have you , would splitting the chicken (spatchcock) effect the time much ?

hey , thanks for the input

 

[mdboatbum]

Welcome Hambone!

A couple things: First, I'm by no means an expert so take what I say with a grain of salt. That being said, you shouldn't need much charcoal. One fully lit (large) chimney should be more than enough to run your pit at 275˚-325˚ for the 60-90 minutes you'll need to get your bird to 165˚.

As to this question: "and while i have you , would splitting the chicken (spatchcock) effect the time much ?"  Most definitely and absolutely YES!!

Spatchcocking a chicken, in my opinion, is the absolute best thing to happen to chicken since the invention of charcoal. It cuts your cooking time roughly in half, and most importantly IT ALLOWS THE WHITE AND DARK MEAT TO COOK AT THE SAME RATE, THUS GETTING DONE AT THE SAME TIME.

I usually put my temp probe in the fattest part of the breast, and the second it hits 165˚ i pull it off the smoker and check the internal temp several other places, Pretty consistently, the breast meat is uniformly 165˚-170˚, while the dark meat will be 175˚ to 180˚. And, I'm not bragging, but this method has consistently produced some of the most moist, tender chicken I've ever had. I usually use hickory for this method, as there isn't a lot of time for the bird to take on a lot of smoke. The stronger flavored wood tends to compensate for this, giving just the right amount of smokey flavor.

I've tried this method on "all natural" chickens both with and without brining, as well as "enhanced" or "self basting" chickens, with good results across the board. My favorite is probably a non enhanced chicken that I brine myself, but that's just me.

Now, for the spatchcocking part, you'll see a lot of different methods on u-tube and the like. They're all pretty similar for the most part, with the exception of the keel bone removal. Some do, some don't. I always do. It's a little tricky, but if you run a sharp knife on either side between the keel bone and the little bones that run beside it, then get your fingers in there and wiggle it loose, it's pretty simple. I then take it a step further in that I "fillet" the rib bones out. This is also pretty simple, just run your knife (a sharp flexible filet knife works best here) under the ribs from the bottom side until you get to the wing bone. Cut through the joint and everything will come out, leaving you with a completely boneless breast, except for the wishbone, which will have broken when you flatten out the chicken and break the breast bone. You'll have to kinda dig it out, but it's easy to feel it in there.

Deboning the breast I believe lets it cook a little faster, and also makes for stupid easy carving. Just cut the bird in half lengthwise, then separate the leg quarter from the breast (no bones so it's a breeze), then slice the breast meat and separate the leg from the thigh. 3 minutes tops.

Sorry for the longwinded post, but I've been doing a lot of chicken lately so it's fresh in my mind.

Good luck and let us know how it goes!!

 

[hambone1950]

Hey boatbum

Thanks for the input. Some good suggestions in there and I will use the spat chock method next time. I ended up buying a big ol 5lb chicken and a family pack of (10) thighs. I used a full chimney of lit charcoal plus a handful of unlit and got a good 5 hours of 250-275 heat out of it.
The thighs were done in just under 2 hours and the whole chicken was at 175 after 4hours. Both were the best I have ever made on any grill or smoker. I am so pleased with the WSM.
Have a good day
Hambone1950

 

[geob]

all sounds mummy to me

 

[smokey charlie]

i usually run my birds 4 hours an 2 hours on the quarters your right on target hambone1950 :welcome1::grilling_smilie::yahoo:

 

[oldschoolbbq]

Right on for heats ,  Boatbum. and Buda Birds are good too! I like to use Dr.Pepper as my liquid