Smoked barbecue chicken on a gas grill
Binging with Babish · ♥ 16.4K likes · 506.3K views · 9 min video
Read about whole bird in the BrightCulinary Book
Timestamp
Ingredients
Method
Techniques
- chicken
Break a whole bird down with kitchen shears: cut out the spine, cut between breast and thigh, snip the breastplate and remove the keel bone, split the breasts, and separate thighs and drums along the line of fat at the joint.
Breaking down a whole chicken with shears
- ⅓ cup chili powder
- sweet paprika
- 1 tsp smoked paprika
- ½ tsp cayenne pepper
- ½ tsp cumin
- ½ tsp oregano
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tsp onion powder
- ½ tsp crushed dried rosemary
- brown sugar
- black pepper
- kosher salt
Mix the dry rub: mostly chili powder and sweet paprika, smoked paprika, cayenne, cumin, oregano, garlic and onion powder, crushed dried rosemary, nearly as much brown sugar as spices, black pepper and kosher salt. Taste: almost equal parts sweet, spicy and salty.
Rub evenly over every surface of the chicken and under the skin; cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate at least a couple of hours, ideally overnight.
Rubbing and resting the chicken
- 60 % ketchup
- 20 % yellow mustard
- hot sauce
- leftover barbecue rub
- garlic powder
- onion powder
- Rochester sauce
- pepper
- kosher salt
- sweetener of your choice
Mix the barbecue sauce, taste and adjust to sweet, tangy, salty and spicy; bring to a simmer and cook about 10 minutes.
- neutral flavored oil
Season the grates: burners on max about 15 minutes, scrape with a wire brush, turn off, oil generously, then max heat again about 10 minutes to cure.
Seasoning the grill grates
Make smoke packets: wood chips or pellets wrapped tight in a wide flat foil packet with holes poked in the top.
Set up for indirect heat with only the far right burner on, aiming for about 225F at the grates, 325 on the gauge, which reads about 100F low.
Put the chicken on the cool side, dark meat nearer the heat; set the smoke packet on the heat shield over the lit burner. Close the lid and adjust the burner to hold temperature.
- apple juice
Open only to spray the chicken with apple juice and to replace the smoke packet every 30 to 45 minutes; smoke about an hour and a half.
When dry, tight and coloured, start temping and shuffle pieces nearer the heat; target 130F in the thickest part of the breast and 140F in the dark meat.
Checking internal temperature
Coat with barbecue sauce and crank the heat directly under the chicken; after about five minutes, when the bottoms are charred, flip to char the skin, closed, three to five minutes.
Paint the bottoms, flip, give a last coat and close to finish; lower the heat if needed until the breasts read 155F and the dark meat 175F.