DivotMaker
New member
Today, I was excited about smoking 8 chicken leg quarters. I brined them for 3 hours, in my poultry brine. They looked so nice, after a 3 hour swim! :-*
I rinsed them, coated in olive oil and Famous Dave's country chicken rub, and set the Auber. I planned to smoke them @ 275° until they hit 170°, no water pan, and 2.5 oz of cherry. I wrapped the bottom of my wood chunk with foil, since I wouldn't be ramping the temperature up slowly.
In the smoker they go at 2:20 pm! Smoke started rolling at about 15-minutes in. At 40 minutes, the temp was at 225°, but climbing slowly. The Auber probe is fairly large, and probing a chicken thigh is not an easy task. I planned on around 2 hours, but at 1 hour, the Auber said the meat was 170, and shut off. Ugh. Probe placement was the problem. I shut the Auber off, repositioned the probe, and switched back on. At 3:40, the Auber shut off again, due to being at 170°. The quarters were not done, but I couldn't seem to get an accurate temp reading.
So, in an attempt to crisp the skin, I fired-up the old Weber gasser! The legs had received 1:20 of smoke, so they just needed to finish cooking. When the grill heated, on they went.
Now, the story behind the post title: It was a day of enlightenment, because I realized that I no longer care about chicken skin! Except on whole chickens or turkeys, I'm going skinless from now on! Chasing the elusive "crispy skin" is as pointless trying to get a smoke ring in an electric smoker! Just face it, we're never going to have "good" chicken skin in these smokers! If you look at the finished pics, you'll see the skin shrank terribly. It was still rubbery (even finished on the grill), so I'm done. Throwing in the towel on chicken skin. Whew! Glad I got that off my chest! I feel SO much better, now! 8)
Taste? Great! The chicken was very moist and flavorful, just the skin was terrible.
Also, this was the first time I tried foiling the bottom & sides of my wood chunk (but left the top open), and it worked well. I was able to go straight to 225° with no combustion. I'll be trying this again, on the 12 lb packer brisket I'm putting in tonight!
Next time: Skinless @ 225, brined of course!
I rinsed them, coated in olive oil and Famous Dave's country chicken rub, and set the Auber. I planned to smoke them @ 275° until they hit 170°, no water pan, and 2.5 oz of cherry. I wrapped the bottom of my wood chunk with foil, since I wouldn't be ramping the temperature up slowly.
In the smoker they go at 2:20 pm! Smoke started rolling at about 15-minutes in. At 40 minutes, the temp was at 225°, but climbing slowly. The Auber probe is fairly large, and probing a chicken thigh is not an easy task. I planned on around 2 hours, but at 1 hour, the Auber said the meat was 170, and shut off. Ugh. Probe placement was the problem. I shut the Auber off, repositioned the probe, and switched back on. At 3:40, the Auber shut off again, due to being at 170°. The quarters were not done, but I couldn't seem to get an accurate temp reading.
So, in an attempt to crisp the skin, I fired-up the old Weber gasser! The legs had received 1:20 of smoke, so they just needed to finish cooking. When the grill heated, on they went.
Now, the story behind the post title: It was a day of enlightenment, because I realized that I no longer care about chicken skin! Except on whole chickens or turkeys, I'm going skinless from now on! Chasing the elusive "crispy skin" is as pointless trying to get a smoke ring in an electric smoker! Just face it, we're never going to have "good" chicken skin in these smokers! If you look at the finished pics, you'll see the skin shrank terribly. It was still rubbery (even finished on the grill), so I'm done. Throwing in the towel on chicken skin. Whew! Glad I got that off my chest! I feel SO much better, now! 8)
Taste? Great! The chicken was very moist and flavorful, just the skin was terrible.
Also, this was the first time I tried foiling the bottom & sides of my wood chunk (but left the top open), and it worked well. I was able to go straight to 225° with no combustion. I'll be trying this again, on the 12 lb packer brisket I'm putting in tonight!
Next time: Skinless @ 225, brined of course!
