Spatchcocked chicken on the PBC

[VideoWolf88]

The wife said she's more than happy with either ribs or chicken this weekend from PBC "practice", but when I mentioned chicken to her, she said she'd love to have a spatchcocked bird. Has anyone tried this yet on the PBC?

[MBMorgan]

Yep ... works great. These days out of pure laziness, instead of spatchcocking, I tend to just cut chicken in half and cook'em that way.

[Jerod Broussard]

Make sure and run it HOT HOT HOT.

[Brian_M]

I agree with MBMorgan . Chicken halves in the PBC have become a go-to at our house.

fzxdoc has perfected this cook. Her idea of cooking a couple sausages along with the chicken always works out well also.

I've got to get back to work or I'd hunt up the links to her posts for you. Good luck.

[JeffJ]

I'm lazy and since I have the turkey hanger for the PBC I just go full bird. The couple of times I've spatchcocked I didn't think the results were any better than whole bird.

[jfmorris]

I don't have a PBC yet. but knowing what I know of it, think that if you are going to the effort to spatchcock, you ought to just split them the rest of the way, so that you can hang each half on a single hook. I often spatchcock birds when cooking 1 or 2, but more often than not just split the chickens for cooking on my offset or kettle, as it makes handling the meat and moving it around those grills a lot easier.

Then again, there is something to be said for "presentation" when serving up a full bird.

[MBMorgan]

fzxdoc has perfected this cook. Her idea of cooking a couple sausages along with the chicken always works out well also.

I've got to get back to work or I'd hunt up the links to her posts for you. Good luck.

Here are a couple of Kathryn's ( fzxdoc ) best:

https://pitmaster.amazingribs.com/forum/grills-and-smokers/charcoal/pit-barrel-cooker/340677-pbc-chicken-at-410%C2%B0f-pit-temp

https://pitmaster.amazingribs.com/forum/grills-and-smokers/charcoal/pit-barrel-cooker/121278-smoking-sausage-on-pbc

[Brian_M]

Thanks for looking these up, MBMorgan. I got busy and never got back to it.

[fzxdoc]

Here's how I smoke chicken on the PBC, VideoWolf88 :


Chicken on the PBC: How to get juicy chicken with crispy skin

First, about salt: if my rub contains salt then I don't add any extra salt. Ever. I use the salt-containing rub as a dry brine.

Even though it contains a lot of salt, I love PBC's AP rub with chicken and use it as a dry brine. I never add more salt. I smoke chickens once every two weeks, on average, and they're always done in an hour or so and the skin is crispy.

Chicken prep:

1. Slice the chicken in half the way Noah shows on his PBC chicken video.
2. Slipping your fingers between the skin and the underlying muscle, separate the skin from the muscle underneath on the breast, thigh, and leg.
3. Sprinkle AP rub all over that exposed muscle and rub/pat to get it to stick.
4. Smooth the skin back into place and sprinkle the skin with a mixture of one Tablespoon of rub and a teaspoon of baking powder.The baking powder helps to dry the skin. (Some people use baking soda, but when I tried it, my family didn't like the flavor it imparted).
5. Set the chicken, uncovered, on a rack placed over a rimmed cookie sheet, positioned with the maximum amount of skin exposed, in the refrigerator for 24 hours. This helps to dry the skin.
6. When it comes time to smoke the chicken, sprinkle it lightly with sweet paprika. This helps give it a pretty color.
7. Hook and hang the chicken in the PBC once it has gone through the 15-10-10 lighting procedure outlined in the first post of this topic . I let the PBC temp get over 400 before hanging the chicken. The PBC temp drops quickly when this cold meat mass is introduced, then climbs back up.

Smoking:

1. Keep the PBC temperature up between 325 and 360 or higher if you can. Usually I keep it around 350 or so. I do this by judiciously cracking the lid for short periods of time and by pulling a rebar if I'm only doing one chicken.
2. Check the chicken temp and pull it when the breast reads 160. The carryover cooking will bring it to the safe 165. At this temperature, the legs and thighs are done as well.
3. Let the chicken rest for a little bit before slicing. Otherwise, because the meat is so juicy and tender, the bone sometimes pulls right out of the leg when you try to eat it!

If you're smoking only one chicken, use only one rebar and run it diagonally. This gives you more room for the meat, and the open holes help keep the PBC temperaure in the desired 325°-375° range. The chicken should be done in an hour or so.

For high temp poultry cooks where I need both rebars for hanging the meat, I have switched out the rebars for thin stainless steel rods. This leaves a lot more air space in the rebar holes and helps keep the temps up even higher than 400°F if you want to cook really hot and fast. Nothing wrong with that!

Notes:

I like slicing the chicken in half in the prep phase because I can get 3 chickens in the PBC that way, or 2 chickens and 2 hanging sausage holders filled with sausages. (Those sausages add a flavor bomb to the chicken, at least to my taste buds.)

The chicken easier to carve if I remove the breast bone after slicing the bird in two in the prep stage. Then during carving, breast section easily pulls away from the rib cage so I can slice it crosswise.

I don't use any oil on or under the skin for two reasons: first, Meathead now says that it doesn't do much, flavorwise, for oil-soluble spices, and second, for me at least, it prevents the chicken skin from crisping. I get crisper skin without it. Lots of folks use oil, though, so try for yourself and see what works best.

HTH,
Kathryn

[Nate]

Have you ever used MMD in conjunction with the AP rub?

[fzxdoc]

I usually do one hanging sausage rack full of mild Italian sausage and another full of hot Italian sausage, wrgilb .

No, Nate, I haven't used MMD with the AP rub, but it sounds like a taste sensation. Thanks for the tip.

Kathryn

[Nate]

Oh not a tip just something I have thought about trying... was just curious

[lukenich18]

Definitely gonna try this method next time I do chicken

[apologeticus]

I agree with folks who say high temp is key. I use lump for chicken to help achieve this.