Smoked Chicken
THIS RECIPE CALLS FOR A SMOKER!
Feeds 2 if you have to share
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Ingredients
- 1 four pound whole chicken (Don't get that organic chicken either. If you just want to blow money, go do it on one of our t-shirts!)
- Garlic Salt
- Injectable creole butter, if you can find it
- 1 beer (shouldn't be hard for a genuine bluesman or blueswoman
- Apple smoking woodchips
- Apple Cider
- 1 apple
- 1/2 stick butter
- Kickin' Chicken spice
- 1/2 cup sugar (your choice)
- 1/2 cup salt (your choice)
Matt's Note:
I make smoked chicken frequently, partially because I get a lot of requests for it, partly because you simply can't beat
smoked chicken done right. It's a life changer. Hope you love it! By the way, you can do this exact recipe on a turkey, though
you'll need to slow smoke it for about 7-9 hours at just below 200 degrees. Yes, 7 hours is a long time, but your guests
will remember it for years and years to come. It's worth it.
If you don't have a smoker, you really can't do this recipe. The "smoked" part is the best part! We HAVE used a charcoal grill with smoking woodchips over the top in a pinch before, but it's hard to keep a regulated temperature, which is crucial. You CAN make a smoker out of cardboard, which we've also done in a pinch, but you're going to have to ask Alton Brown about that one.
Directions
1) This part is, in theory, optional, but should always be done. The flavor difference is noticable. Add a half cup of
sugar and a half cup of salt to a pot large enough to fully submerge the chicken in. Add a mixture of 3:1 water to cider,
stir with passion until the salt and sugar are well mixed and dissolved. Fully submerge the chicken. This is called a
"brine" and it's purpose is to break down the meat to make it much more tender. The chicken should be left in the brine for
at least a couple of hours. It's best to leave it in the refridgerator overnight if at all possible.
2) Place the woodchips in a bowl and soak them with a combination of water and cider. Bear in mind, though, that you'll
need to leave at least 4 or so cups of cider for later.
3) There will be some fat and extra skin around the giant hole where the chicken's ass was. Go ahead and cut it off. Don't
remove skin that's over the meat, though. If you'd like, you can remove that extra skin connecting the two pieces of
the wings as well. Now dry the chicken, rub some butter on the skin, and add your spices. Try to add about the same amount
of spice over the whole chicken, front and back. Cut the apple up and stuff it inside the chicken. If you have injectable
creole butter, you can go ahead and inject it now. Be sure to inject around the breast and the thighs, where most of the meat is.
4) Most smokers have some sort of tub or bowl to place liquid in (to keep the meat from drying out). If it doesn't have one,
get a bowl of some sort that can withstand heat and hold liquid. Add 10 oz of the beer to the container
(the other two are for you ;)...) and what's left of the stick of butter. Add several cups of cider to the mix. Finally,
if you've got it, sprinkle paprika evenly on top of the liquid. If you don't have a place for this in your smoker,
place a rack below the chicken and slide the bowl on the lower rack.
5) Drain the water from your woodchips and put them wherever woodchips go in your smoker. You'll want at least a few good
handfulls of woodchips.
6) Keep your smoker temprature consistantly at a little less than 200 degrees. Put the water/cider mixture and chicken in!
Chickens take roughly 3 hours to smoke. Be sure to rotate out your wood, depending on how spent it is, every hour
or hour and a half. Just be sure the smoker is constantly smoking!
If it's done right, this can easily be a crowd favorite and some of the best chicken you've ever had.
