Well, I've been doing a lot of whole chikkins lately for pulled/shredded chikkin. Easy to package up into vac seal portions ranging from ½ lb to around 1½ lbs for easy use in future dishes. Enchiladas. Tacos. Quesadillas. Taco soup. Chikkin salad. Nachos. Whatever comes to mind.
I've been doing them lately in the drum smoker. Trying to get them prepped and get salt & seasoning under the skin is kinda a PITA. You just don't get great coverage of rub anywhere but on the breasts under the skin. Trying to free up the legs and thighs from the skin typically results in a tear of varying severity on the skin over the lower portion of the breasts, and still can't get it well distributed around the backside of the thighs and such without a lot of work, etc. And when I pull them off the Super 55 drum after a hot and fast cook (325-400ºF if I can get it high enough), I end up with soggy, unappealing skin anyways, so I don't want to waste rub on the skin and end up throwing it away or giving it to the dog (who knows how the various rub combinations will affect her... mmmm... gastrointestinal system). If I'm doing it on the offset, I'm probably spatchcocking it, and that makes it a whole lot easier to get rub up under the skin on the legs and thighs on all sides, and I get better skin anyways due to the higher airflow and convective cooking. Just more effort to run the offset and doing several chikkins takes up more space, too. Drums are low airflow cooking, so it's harder to dry out and crisp up that skin.
People do skinless chikkin breasts all the time, right? So why not do the whole bird that way? Hell, dark meat is more moist, has lots of fat and is able to go to higher temps without drying out during a regular cook, so I would think it should be fine.
Today I decided to give it a try, hanging them on the Super 55. It was rainy and cold (low 50s, to high 40s later) and my charcoal basket had a lot of JD lump left in it from previous cook. I fired up about a half chimney of lump to put on top of that leftover. I should have let it go longer to get it all really hot and burning, but I didn't have much left in the bag, and I wanted to get things fired up, so I put it in on top of the existing supply probably before it was really solidly lit. Also, I didn't shake down, rattle and tamp the leftovers to get things packed in there so it would light better, so I think that hurt my performance, as well. I only got it up to about 325 before I started hanging birds in there, and it slowly dropped down to 275 and even 250 by the end of the cook.
I prepped the birds in sets of 2, one normal (salt & rub under the skin) and one fully skinned and just bare meat all over, then salted and a good heavy coat of salt and rub. I used a local one called Payne County Bird and then Kosmo's Q's Honey Chipotle Killer Bee. I put one pair on at 1240, then came back in and prepped the second pair, which took more than 15 but less than 20 minutes to get them also hung on the drum. Honestly, it took about the same amount of time to remove the skin and rub as it did to try to work rub under the skin leaving it in place. So the prep time savings was a wash.
Here are the 4 birds after they were finished, in the low/mid 150s in the breast.
The two at the top were with the skin left on, the two on bottom were 'nekkid'. The top left fell off the hook when I was temping it just before pulling it and it split the skin on the breast. No biggie.
Next I spent the next half-hour or so pulling them apart, trying to get all the meat off the carcasses I could, shredding as I went into various-sized chunks and shreds, as I like to leave some chunky texture in the end result, not have it all finely shredded - depends on which dish I want to make eventually, but for stuff I want smaller/finer pieces, I'll chop it up more at the time of meal prep. But for tacos and things, I like to have some larger chunks in there for a variation in texture.
Observations:
1. I did not notice a significant difference in the overall moisture level between the birds with skin left mostly intact during the cook and those which were deskinned.
2. Flavor of the pieces I sampled of the deskinned birds was better overall if there was an exterior piece in the bite - obviously, due to the salt and rub which was more prominent and more evenly distributed on those birds.
3. The deskinned birds DID have a notably drier and slightly tougher exterior surface. Almost like that surface developed into a sort of thin 'pellicle'. This was not, however, unpleasant to eat, nor was it notably worse in the shredding process on the dark meat, but it was a bit tougher to shred on the breasts. Not a big deal, just had to be a little more aggressive on the breasts, but the minimally chewy texture on the very external portions of the breast meat wasn't unpleasant when mixed with all the other meat (or by itself). Almost like bark on pulled pork. On the dark meat, the thighs and drums, it was less dry and firm, probably due to the higher fat content in those areas of the bird. Overall, not bad at all.
I think I would consider this experiment a strong success, though perhaps not a RAGING success. I think part of the issue is these cooked slower than I am used to, about 2½ hours or so, as the temps were not as high as I usually like it on the drum. I think this led to less moisture overall in the birds, as they took longer to cook (more almost low and slow, dammit) and lost more moisture. Usually running hot (350+), they are a 1h15m or 1h30m cook, and I find them very juicy. These birds (all 4, not just the deskinned ones) were very moist, but not really dripping juice like my normal birds are. I chalk this up to my impatience and suboptimal charcoal game today.
The end result of all 4 birds:
I ended up with 9 vac sealed bags.
I did 4 bags for the kids, 2 each, about a half-pound per bag, to take back to college with them, as they came home last night and were leaving today. So that was just around 3.2 lbs or so.
This left me with 5 bags for The Wife and me, ranging from 1lb3oz to 1lb8oz. I figured nearly 7½ lbs total for us.
Initial weight with all the juices and giblets, necks and packaging was just around 25 lbs for 4 birds, at $1.34/lb. This ended up at about $3.13/lb of usable meat, not counting rubs and charcoal costs. Not bad, overall.
And the skin and gristle has been set aside to mix in over the next few nights with dry and wet dog food. She's a spoiled-rotten GSD who is rapidly assuming a fairly... tubular bologna chub shape. lol No more the svelte, slim girl she was the first couple of years.
Overall, I am pleased, and I do think I will do this again, and it may become my go to method for chikkin hanging. Not sure how this would work on the offset - the higher airflow and more convective cooking might end up drying that exterior 'pellicle' out a bit more, but also, if I sprayed it with some oil before adding the rub (or even after), it might come out quite good. I dunno, I'll have to experiment with that, as well.
I like it!
I'm interested to see someone else do the same and would be curious to hear your thoughts on the end product. We kind of 'assume' you need to keep the skin on whole chikkins to keep them moist, but this seems to fly in the face of that logic. I don't know, I need to repeat the experiment with a TRUE hot and fast cook at 400ºF or so and see if they all come out as absolutely dripping juicy as they have in the past.
We shall see!
Let me know your thoughts!
I've been doing them lately in the drum smoker. Trying to get them prepped and get salt & seasoning under the skin is kinda a PITA. You just don't get great coverage of rub anywhere but on the breasts under the skin. Trying to free up the legs and thighs from the skin typically results in a tear of varying severity on the skin over the lower portion of the breasts, and still can't get it well distributed around the backside of the thighs and such without a lot of work, etc. And when I pull them off the Super 55 drum after a hot and fast cook (325-400ºF if I can get it high enough), I end up with soggy, unappealing skin anyways, so I don't want to waste rub on the skin and end up throwing it away or giving it to the dog (who knows how the various rub combinations will affect her... mmmm... gastrointestinal system). If I'm doing it on the offset, I'm probably spatchcocking it, and that makes it a whole lot easier to get rub up under the skin on the legs and thighs on all sides, and I get better skin anyways due to the higher airflow and convective cooking. Just more effort to run the offset and doing several chikkins takes up more space, too. Drums are low airflow cooking, so it's harder to dry out and crisp up that skin.
People do skinless chikkin breasts all the time, right? So why not do the whole bird that way? Hell, dark meat is more moist, has lots of fat and is able to go to higher temps without drying out during a regular cook, so I would think it should be fine.
Today I decided to give it a try, hanging them on the Super 55. It was rainy and cold (low 50s, to high 40s later) and my charcoal basket had a lot of JD lump left in it from previous cook. I fired up about a half chimney of lump to put on top of that leftover. I should have let it go longer to get it all really hot and burning, but I didn't have much left in the bag, and I wanted to get things fired up, so I put it in on top of the existing supply probably before it was really solidly lit. Also, I didn't shake down, rattle and tamp the leftovers to get things packed in there so it would light better, so I think that hurt my performance, as well. I only got it up to about 325 before I started hanging birds in there, and it slowly dropped down to 275 and even 250 by the end of the cook.
I prepped the birds in sets of 2, one normal (salt & rub under the skin) and one fully skinned and just bare meat all over, then salted and a good heavy coat of salt and rub. I used a local one called Payne County Bird and then Kosmo's Q's Honey Chipotle Killer Bee. I put one pair on at 1240, then came back in and prepped the second pair, which took more than 15 but less than 20 minutes to get them also hung on the drum. Honestly, it took about the same amount of time to remove the skin and rub as it did to try to work rub under the skin leaving it in place. So the prep time savings was a wash.
Here are the 4 birds after they were finished, in the low/mid 150s in the breast.
The two at the top were with the skin left on, the two on bottom were 'nekkid'. The top left fell off the hook when I was temping it just before pulling it and it split the skin on the breast. No biggie.
Next I spent the next half-hour or so pulling them apart, trying to get all the meat off the carcasses I could, shredding as I went into various-sized chunks and shreds, as I like to leave some chunky texture in the end result, not have it all finely shredded - depends on which dish I want to make eventually, but for stuff I want smaller/finer pieces, I'll chop it up more at the time of meal prep. But for tacos and things, I like to have some larger chunks in there for a variation in texture.
Observations:
1. I did not notice a significant difference in the overall moisture level between the birds with skin left mostly intact during the cook and those which were deskinned.
2. Flavor of the pieces I sampled of the deskinned birds was better overall if there was an exterior piece in the bite - obviously, due to the salt and rub which was more prominent and more evenly distributed on those birds.
3. The deskinned birds DID have a notably drier and slightly tougher exterior surface. Almost like that surface developed into a sort of thin 'pellicle'. This was not, however, unpleasant to eat, nor was it notably worse in the shredding process on the dark meat, but it was a bit tougher to shred on the breasts. Not a big deal, just had to be a little more aggressive on the breasts, but the minimally chewy texture on the very external portions of the breast meat wasn't unpleasant when mixed with all the other meat (or by itself). Almost like bark on pulled pork. On the dark meat, the thighs and drums, it was less dry and firm, probably due to the higher fat content in those areas of the bird. Overall, not bad at all.
I think I would consider this experiment a strong success, though perhaps not a RAGING success. I think part of the issue is these cooked slower than I am used to, about 2½ hours or so, as the temps were not as high as I usually like it on the drum. I think this led to less moisture overall in the birds, as they took longer to cook (more almost low and slow, dammit) and lost more moisture. Usually running hot (350+), they are a 1h15m or 1h30m cook, and I find them very juicy. These birds (all 4, not just the deskinned ones) were very moist, but not really dripping juice like my normal birds are. I chalk this up to my impatience and suboptimal charcoal game today.
The end result of all 4 birds:
I ended up with 9 vac sealed bags.
I did 4 bags for the kids, 2 each, about a half-pound per bag, to take back to college with them, as they came home last night and were leaving today. So that was just around 3.2 lbs or so.
This left me with 5 bags for The Wife and me, ranging from 1lb3oz to 1lb8oz. I figured nearly 7½ lbs total for us.
Initial weight with all the juices and giblets, necks and packaging was just around 25 lbs for 4 birds, at $1.34/lb. This ended up at about $3.13/lb of usable meat, not counting rubs and charcoal costs. Not bad, overall.
And the skin and gristle has been set aside to mix in over the next few nights with dry and wet dog food. She's a spoiled-rotten GSD who is rapidly assuming a fairly... tubular bologna chub shape. lol No more the svelte, slim girl she was the first couple of years.
Overall, I am pleased, and I do think I will do this again, and it may become my go to method for chikkin hanging. Not sure how this would work on the offset - the higher airflow and more convective cooking might end up drying that exterior 'pellicle' out a bit more, but also, if I sprayed it with some oil before adding the rub (or even after), it might come out quite good. I dunno, I'll have to experiment with that, as well.
I like it!
I'm interested to see someone else do the same and would be curious to hear your thoughts on the end product. We kind of 'assume' you need to keep the skin on whole chikkins to keep them moist, but this seems to fly in the face of that logic. I don't know, I need to repeat the experiment with a TRUE hot and fast cook at 400ºF or so and see if they all come out as absolutely dripping juicy as they have in the past.
We shall see!
Let me know your thoughts!
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