Cooking Chickens-Need advice

I would do a practice cook with a few birds cut in 1/2 You can do a dry brine that works great- Harvest brine by Naturiffic I would also cook them 325-350 as poultry takes on smoke quickly and then it wont taste good I would also use a mild wood like apple
Moose has a good roadside chicken recipe that's good too

I'm a big fan of brining. Are you sure you can't get some bags and coolers together? If not, the only way I can think of is using a water pan, spritzing and cooking faster rather than slower. Good luck.

We just cooked 20 this weekend in a cookoff (although we were using a propane hog cooker). My best advice would be to pull the white meat close to 160 degrees and place in a cooler to hold the heat and the steam that forms will keep them moist. Our white meat was incredibly moist and juicy.

creek bottom said:

I need some advice from the pros. I've been tasked with cooking 30 chickens for a grad party in a couple weeks. My plan is to get them halved, so that's 60 halves. Doing them on my A1, which is a reverse flow, offset stick burner... Any advice on keeping them moist. Brining is not really an option, I don't have the means to do that many. Any advice will be greatly appreciated! Thanks in advance.

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My advice would be to butcher them ^^ this way ^^... splitting at the pelvis for your "dark half", remove the backbone from the breast for your "white half", and remove the wings to cook separately.

Inject the breasts with an injectable "lite brine" about 2 hours before cooking (I have several recipe options). Injecting the brine into the dark meat is optional. Marinate the wings in Italian dressing in zipper bags in a cooler on ice.

When the breast is 160°, remove and hold in hotel pans in the cool end of the smoker, or a sterilized insulated cooler. Cook the dark halves and marinated wings until they are 175°+, and hold the same way. Move the meat to a carving table which is at the end of the serving line. Do you want pulled chicken or pieces? I use a curved blade cleaver and will cut the breast into 4 or 6 pieces, and separate the leg/thigh, and serve the wings whole... this give you 10 or 12 pieces per bird.

+ 1 on thirdeye's lite brine I use it frequently and I use about 1/2 of the recommended salt

It is some work, but I have injected some squeeze butter under the skin of the white meat to help it stay moist during the cook, but I do prefer brine with that much bird. Another thing is a simple marinade of Itallian salad dressing, or Mojo marinade for about an hr or two before the cook. Just shake off the excess or you have flare-ups.
Have a good cook for the grads.

I use my barrels for large groups, however you brine rub etc, our trick is too finish the chicken early 1.5-2 hrs, and place in in the cambro and just let it finish. Moist, and falling off the bone.

Without brining or injecting you are left with proper cooking and keeping. Cook around 300 till you hit 160, pull keep in a foiled pan in a cooler. The warmth and humidity should keep them from drying out. Really with one cooker there is only so much u can do. I'm guessing u are looking at 9 hrs of cooking (don't know what kinda capacity you have). So some of them will be sitting up to 6 hrs. I've held for that long and still had very juicy chicken.

Don't over think it, just be sore to cook it properly and keep it covered.

Good luck, it definitely sounds like fun.

Rb

Great advice above. Brining will buy you some moisture help but if you can't, you can't. I've injected before. Any type of liquid butter mixed with some chicken broth is always good (just watch the salt level.) Finishing early for internal donees and then holding is a great idea. You can always finish on the grill for final color and crispy skin. Good luck.