This weekend's attempt at smoking goodness was a whole chicken and a pan of mac and cheese. I figured that both would take about the same amount of time, and both, of course, would fit in, so I gave it a shot.
The chicken was a "minimally processed" Amish chicken from the local grocery store, just shy of 4 and 3/4 pounds (from
Hiller's for those of you in Detroit. I swear I have no ties to them, but for good meat, it is hard to beat them. Next best thing to a butcher shop, which sadly, I don't have nearby). I know a lot of people spatchcock them, but I just left it intact. I did a quick (around 3.5 hours) brine in a very simple salt/sugar solution, and cut back on both a bit because the rub I was going to use had a lot of salt already (a store-bought chili lime rub my in-laws sent me). I got that all over the skin, and under it, put my probe thermometer in the breast, stuffed some fresh rosemary and thyme I had growing on the kitchen windowsill into the inside, and was ready to go.
The mac and cheese was adapted from
this recipe at
Smokin-Meat.com. The biggest changes I made were using milk instead of half and half (my wife is one of those people whose cholesterol runs high despite medication, diet, or exercise), instead of the Smokin-Meat guy's rub, I used
Meathead's Memphis Dust (that stuff really *is* good on everything), and I left out the bacon (there were comments that the smoke flavor in bacon combined with the smoking process to make an oversmoked flavor).
I put both in at the same time, and fired up the #3 to 250. Usually I do 225 for almost everything, but I'd read that people tend to do chickens at higher temps. I used 4 ounces of applewood chips (we bought the chip screen with the #3). It took just about exactly 3 hours for the chicken to hit 165, which is also about the length of time the mac and cheese was supposed to smoke. The chicken went into a double-foil wrap for about 20 minutes. Then the chicken got dissected and eaten along with the mac and cheese (and some salad, to redeem ourselves with some green veggies). The chicken was done perfectly--even the breast was nice and tender. The skin, as many report, was a bit rubbery. Apparently, you either have to smoke it at an even higher temp to get it crispy (beyond the range of my #3) or you can try to crisp it on the grill, which seemed like too much effort and too fraught with peril for the first time out. The mac and cheese was also excellent. I've never had the original recipe, but I don't think my changes hurt anything.
And, of course, I got pictures, having learned the error of my ways from the first post.
I've seen that people will often take the skins and make "cracklins" by putting them in the oven at 375 for 45 minutes or so, and I was going to try that, but I just ran out of steam after that, the laundry, and chasing the three-year-old around.
But I have a feeling that this won't be the last chicken taking a ride in the #3, either.
