UDS Chicken

gaspipe1 · Jul 30, 2011

Hey guys, I'm not a big fan of chicken on the bone but I need to make a smoked chicken on my UDS. Does anyone have a very good simple recipe? I bought some Plowboys Yardbird rub on everyones recommendation. I figure between the rub and some cherry chunk for smoke I should have a good foundation for a good meal.

Any help is much appreciated

Thanks in advance

tamadrummer · Jul 30, 2011

Yup, spatchcock the birds, inject them with Tony Chachere's cajun butter and season under the skin and on the skin with your rub. Baste the birds with butter and lime as you cook them. I also spritz them with 50/50 cider vinegar and apple juice. I like that acidic flavor on the crispy skin.

You should not need to flip the bird but one time. At the end when you are ready to crisp up the skin. That is when I put the butter and lime juice on the exposed rib sections.

Enjoy it man. I would also only smoke wood in the first part of the cook. (One load of wood) otherwise it will be over powered on the chix.

baldbill · Jul 30, 2011

yardbird and cherrywood... you are on the right path grasshopper!:clap2:

the UDS is an awesome chicken cooking machine!!

baldbill · Jul 30, 2011

tamadrummer is right... go light on the wood, chicken takes up smoke really well and you can overdo it... once you get your fire started don't put the chicken on until you get a good clean ( light blue smoke), on a uds once the chicken starts the smoke may be a little whiteish, thats ok, its the fat hitting the coals, but make sure you get the uds to temp and have that light blue first :thumb:

gaspipe1 · Jul 30, 2011

baldbill said:
tamadrummer is right... go light on the wood, chicken takes up smoke really well and you can overdo it... once you get your fire started don't put the chicken on until you get a good clean ( light blue smoke), on a uds once the chicken starts the smoke may be a little whiteish, thats ok, its the fat hitting the coals, but make sure you get the uds to temp and have that light blue first :thumb:

TY for the tip.. I normally use 3 pieces of chunk, 2 soaked in water and 1 dry. Does this work for this too?

Carbon · Jul 30, 2011

I plan on doing chicken splits tonight on the UDS as well. I'm doing them at 350°F.

gaspipe1 · Jul 30, 2011

OK as intimidating as this may seem I will give it a try..

tamadrummer said:
Yup, spatchcock the birds, inject them with Tony Chachere's cajun butter and season under the skin and on the skin with your rub. Baste the birds with butter and lime as you cook them. I also spritz them with 50/50 cider vinegar and apple juice. I like that acidic flavor on the crispy skin.

OK regarding spatchcock I will figure that out...
-Injection: I will look for that if I can't find it I will try some injectable substitute. Perhaps a salad dressing packet mixed with apple juice.
-Basting: do I baste the bird the whole time or is that for the part you said at the end? If I baste the whole time every 30 min or so?
-Spray: spray every 30 min or so? If I am basting the bird can I spray and baste the same time or alternate between spraying and basting?

tamadrummer said:
You should not need to flip the bird but one time. At the end when you are ready to crisp up the skin. That is when I put the butter and lime juice on the exposed rib sections.

Enjoy it man. I would also only smoke wood in the first part of the cook. (One load of wood) otherwise it will be over powered on the chix.

-Flip: So the bird should initially be placed skin side up? After I flip the bird, do I need to raise the temp? How many hours before I flip and how long till it's done?
-Temp: What should the grate temp be?
-Do I use a pan under the bird or do I let the drippings go into the firebox?

Tamadrummer I know you not my personal coach but I thank you in advance for you input, your help and your willingness to teach.

BTW: I normally place 3 chunks of cherry wood in the beginning (2 soaked in water and 1 dry)

ytsejam · Jul 30, 2011

Spatchcock it. I don't season the skin, because i don't eat it. but i will season up under it. then put it on the uds and open up all air holes, get the temp about 350-400 and cook about 1.25 hrs.
nice, good, juicy chicken every time

jalon · Jul 30, 2011

gaspipe1 said:
BTW: I normally place 3 chunks of cherry wood in the beginning (2 soaked in water and 1 dry)

That one piece dry will probably be enough on a UDS, like others said, chicken will take up that smoke real good.

Jalon

Cook · Jul 30, 2011

One chunk should be enough...certainly no more than two. Three will be too many in my opinion.

A couple semi-related thoughts (only my thoughts...not meant to offend anyone)...

- I season the skin because I eat the skin. The skin is about the only reason I eat chicken. I also don't use "rub" on chicken as I don't like the flavors I tend to get. I season, but very simply.

- Soaking your wood chunks does no good. If it makes you comfortable, then continue to do it. Just realize that you get no benefit from it. Sometimes the placebo effect can be a good thing.

sandiegobbq · Jul 30, 2011

Cook it nice and high heat.

Whole chicken should be just over an hour at 400 deg or hotter.

Make sure you don't over cook it or it will be dry.

Team DD · Jul 30, 2011

Google loaf pan chicken... Easy to make and nice and juicy chicken...

Blackened · Jul 30, 2011

Brine for 8 hours, pat dry and rest uncovered in fridge for an hour, rub with evoo and your favorite poultry rub and fire roast in drum w/ apple wood @ 350-400 for 75-90 minutes, breast side up or until 160 in the breast, 180 in the thigh..

I don't spatchcock, I like to fill the cavity with something aromatic like onion and fresh rosemary

My poultry brine

1 gal water
1 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup kosher salt
1/3 cup old bay seasoning
1/3 cup black peppercorn

rondini · Jul 30, 2011

gaspipe1, I hope I don't confuse you. With what you said you have, this is how I'd do it. 1st. Spatchcock the chicken into 2 halves. 2nd. Generously coat with Yardbird rub(sprinkle on good, both sides). 3rd. Put chicken in frig to rest 45 min. 4th. Start my UDS(plan on 350 or higher). 5th. Planning on 1-1 1/2 hours put chicken in skin side down. 6th. 35 min into cook quickly flip chicken and recover Drum. 7th. Check chicken at 1 hour for prop temp, pull when temps good. 8th. Eat and enjoy :idea:

gaspipe1 · Jul 30, 2011

As always I humbley thank the community for their help and support.. Here is what I have done so far:

-Spatchcocked two chickens (One into halves for easy handling and the second whole ala Steven Raichlen style via youtube)
-I put each bird into a ziplock bag and marinaded them in a Vadalia Onion dressing. I couldn't find an injectable marinade in Costco, and my Italian dressing packet was expired. So I found this salad dressing and remember reading that someone uses it as a marinade.

My plans tomorrow are to pat dry the birds and sprinkle Plowboys Yardbird rub... come to think of it...perhaps I should experiment and see if I can taste a difference. One with rub and one without.

Get the drum temp 375* +/- for the 1 to 1.5 hours that everyone recommends. Use the mop (butter/lime) and spray (apple juice and cider vinegar) every 30 min or so.

Hopefully I do not get over whelmed and am able to take some pr0n.

tamadrummer · Jul 31, 2011

Sry it too so long to get back to you.

You can inject with anything that floats your boat. I may mix up some italian dressing and inject it too. Sounds good to me.

As far flipping goes, I cook with the skin up for about 1.5h at 300 in the COS Brinkmann (COS = Cheap offset smoker) and I use 3 fist sized chunks of cherry wood for smoke. Very light flavored wood, you could do hickory but I would only use 2 pieces back to back not all at once. After 1.5h or if you think it is done sooner, flip to skin side and baste that side with the butter and lime/lemon juice or you can even paint some more italian dressing in there. Up to you.

BTW you can use other woods, like mesquite or whatever but be careful. Mesquite will really be super strong flavored, if you like heavy flavored smoke, use it otherwise stick to the fruit woods. Apple, pear, cherry etc....it takes a real effort with those woods to ruin meat by over smoking unlike with the hickory/mesquite.

All those flavors work really well together. You need to just have fun and relax. Smoking is slow fun cooking. Drink a cold beer or root beer (I don't really drink) and enjoy some good company and food.

ytsejam · Jul 31, 2011

gaspipe1 said:
As always I humbley thank the community for their help and support.. Here is what I have done so far:

-Spatchcocked two chickens (One into halves for easy handling and the second whole ala Steven Raichlen style via youtube)
-I put each bird into a ziplock bag and marinaded them in a Vadalia Onion dressing. I couldn't find an injectable marinade in Costco, and my Italian dressing packet was expired. So I found this salad dressing and remember reading that someone uses it as a marinade.

My plans tomorrow are to pat dry the birds and sprinkle Plowboys Yardbird rub... come to think of it...perhaps I should experiment and see if I can taste a difference. One with rub and one without.

Get the drum temp 375* +/- for the 1 to 1.5 hours that everyone recommends. Use the mop (butter/lime) and spray (apple juice and cider vinegar) every 30 min or so.

Hopefully I do not get over whelmed and am able to take some pr0n.

That sounds like a pretty solid plan. Only 2 steps i would add:

-Remember to have fun

-takes notes, to learn from it

enjoy

gaspipe1 · Aug 8, 2011

So sorry for the delay to post some pics.. but here we go. Just so you know I did do this meal 3 different ways.

-All 3 had the sweet vidalia marinade over night (bought at Costco)
-Then 2 had sprinkled Plowboys Yardbird rub
-And one of them had lime/butter baste along with a spray of apple juice and apple cider mist.

The last one came out by far the best.. Although the one with only the rub (no mob or spray) skin came out great.

Thanks again for everyones help on this

bobsuosso · Aug 8, 2011

split & rubbed with salt, coarse pepper & sesame oil, gets a beautiful auburn color.

Moose · Aug 8, 2011

That chicken looks beautiful, BTW!

Here's a tutorial I did on Roadside Chicken you might like:

www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/showthread.php?t=93647

For some reason, it comes out amazing on the drum and it's the only way I can get the skin uniformly crisp. I use a higher temp, around 325, and put the breasts on about 15 mins into the cook so they are done when the rest of the pieces are cooked through.

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