Smoked Chicken with Alder Wood

[Habanero Smoker]

Thanks for that information. Nice tip.

[Smokin Soon]

Jeff, that's exactly what I do to "hide" the heavy sugar rubs from the Big Easy. On Turkey Legs that I have cured, I put the sweet stuff under the skin, and the spicy rub on the skin. And yes, once you have "violated" the skin you need to tack it down with toothpicks. Works well for me.

[pfowl01]

Something else I tried last night is to slice the skin open over the breasts
and peel it back even over the legs so that it's easier to get rub thoroughly
covered. I've been having a hard time getting rub into several areas including
the legs with the skin in place. After the rub, I just pin the skin back up with
toothpicks in order that it keep the moisture in the meat

Something else you could try is mixing the rub with softened butter to make a compound butter. Loosen the skin from the meat with your fingers and put a spoonful under each area...breast,thigh, drumstick. Then use your fingers to spread the mixture from the outside.
I haven't done this in the smoker yet, but I've done it with beer can chickens on the grill....excellent ;D

[jeff_smoke]

Hi guys,
    sorry I've been pretty busy and didn't get a chance to log in.
pfowl01; good idea about the butter mixture. It's interesting that I thought of the same
thing about a month ago, except that I was going to try to make a slushy mixture that maybe
I could inject around the bird and then use your rub from the outside method. I didn't get a chance
to try that before I decided to just peel it back.
I found no difference in the moistness of the chicken after I peeled the skin back. It is so much
easier to put the rub on that I've made that a permanent change to my cooking.
With the toothpicks in place, the skin sort of fuses together during cooking
so that it seems it was never cut to begin with.
     Smoking Soon, my brother loves the Big Easy that I got him for his birthday. We were going to do a turkey today. I was going to smoke it for a couple hours, then transfer to his BE to finish it off. However, he ended up getting the second spoiled fresh turkey in about a month. Even though he purchased before the "sell by" date, both were bad. So, we'll try again maybe next week.
I was amazed how juicy the BE makes the turkey though.
     Has anyone had any experience with the larger BE sold from Costco ? I thought it would be nice to have one that could handle a larger bird or just more food in those multi-level baskets. But, some of the reviews were bad regarding unevenness of cooking. Could it be the larger size is not a good thing for some reason? Maybe it's something to do with trying to cook a smaller bird in that large container. Maybe the bird might sit off-center in that case or something? I heard wind is not good w/ BE. Maybe that was it.
    Anyone have experience with the jumbo Big Easy ?

[MrCucumber]

Great idea with Alder Wood, thanks! I was looking for something new to try :) I can also recommend this recipe https://club.cooking/recipe/smoked-chicken-breast/ Very easy and helpful  ;)