Thermometers and Competition Chicken

The quickest way to improve your bbq skills is to own an accurate meat thermometer. Just ask Dean, the head cook of “Mean Dean’s Smokin’ Machine” competition team. We were cleaning up after a contest and Dean was complaining that he could not get his brisket done. He said the internal temp never got above 160 degrees Fahrenheit. I asked him to go and get his thermometer and I checked the calibration. It was a brand new thermometer and was reading 40⁰ too low. He’d spent around five hundred bucks on entry fees, meat, and supplies and didn’t stand a chance in the contest because he trusted a nineteen dollar thermometer. Now, there’s nothing wrong with using an inexpensive thermometer, just as long as you check it before you use it. You should have two types, one that goes to around 500⁰ for your pit, and another one for internal meat temperatures. The meat thermometer should be checked for accuracy at two temperatures. 32 and 212⁰ for a digital thermometer and 212⁰ for a dial type.

 To check the low end, fill a glass with crushed ice and then pour in enough water to cover the ice. Wait a minuite or two. Stir the ice with the thermometer. It should read 32⁰F. For the high end, get a pot of water to a full boil. Insert the temperature probe into the water about 2/3 of the way up. Use a pair of tongs so you won't burn your hand. The temperature should be 212⁰F if you are at sea level. If you live at high altitude, you'llneed to take that into account when testing your thermometer. As a general rule, the boiling point decreases approximately 1.8⁰F for every 1000-foot increase in altitude. Here in Kansas City (800 feet above sea level), it's 211⁰F.  In Denver, it's around 204⁰F. If you are a few degrees off don't worry about it.  If you are off by 10 or 20 degrees, we're talking dried out or under cooked meat. 

When I was a kid, my dad would break out the brazier, soak some charcoal briquettes in lighter fluid, and incinerate a dozen or so chicken pieces. There’s nothing like a leg that’s a little bloody in the joints with a heavily charred skin tasting slightly of lighter fluid. It’s a wonder I made it out of childhood alive.

It doesn’t matter whether you own a thousand dollar grill or one you put together yourself.

The most important factor to me is not over-cooking poultry. The temperature window for white meat is pretty narrow. If you go much over 165⁰, it starts to toughen up and dry out. Under 160⁰, well… nobody likes rare chicken. Although that may be changing. I’ve heard some top chefs say that if you’ve got a local organic rancher that you trust, medium rare chicken is safe and quite tasty. You won’t be able to tell by me though. In competitions, probably 80 percent of cooks turn in nothing but thighs. There’s more fat and moisture in a thigh, they take longer to cook at the same temperature, so they will take on more smoke, and the window for doneness is wider. Thighs are dark meat. I call them done anywhere from 180⁰ to 190⁰ though, the USDA says they are safe to eat at 165⁰, I like dark meat to go a little higher. We use birds called fryers or broilers. These are birds about seven weeks old. Lay down a thigh and a breast in front of a judge and they’ll score the thigh higher every time.

Getting the skin “just right” is an obsession in contests, where one-fourth of your score is based on tenderness. Smoke a chicken or turkey for 2 to 3 hours at 250⁰ and the skin is rubbery. You need to grill or roast it at a high temperature for the skin to get crispy. The problem with crisp skin is, we put the chicken in styrofoam boxes for presentation to the judges. The box holds in the moisture and the skin loses it’s crunch and becomes soggy after a few minutes. The solution is to break down the skin the same way you break down the tough connective tissues in a brisket; exposure to heat for a long period

of time.

Here is one method many competition cooks use for chicken:

1. Marinate your thighs in 1 bottle of your favorite Italian dressing overnight.

2. Pat dry with paper towels and season with bbq rub.

3. Smoke at 250⁰ for around 1.5 hours.

4. Pour one bottle of bbq sauce and ½ cup of water into a foil pan.

5. Lay the thighs in the sauce, skin side up, and spoon some on top to get the skins wet.

6. Cover the pan with foil and put back into the smoker.

7. Remove the thighs from the pan after an hour and put back on the smoker (add more sauce if you

     like) for 15 minutes to set up the sauce.

What we are trying to accomplish here is tender, bite-through skin that doesn’t slide off when you take your first bite. The tough tissues turn to gelatin if we apply moist heat for a long time. If your first attempt doesn’t get you tender skin, just leave it in the steam pan longer. If you want to see what competition chicken tastes like, use Paul Newman’s Italian Dressing, Smokin’ Guns Hot BBQ Rub, and Blue’s Hog Sauce. I personally don’t like Blues Hog regular sauce. It’s the sweetest sauce on the market. However, Blues Hog Tennessee Red is an excellent vinegar based sauce. Half regular and half Tennessee is pretty good according to the judges.

When I make my kids chicken wings in the kitchen, I do a variation of this method. I will season them up, stick them under the broiler or brown them quickly in a frying pan, then throw them in a big stock pot with a lid on it. Simmer them on top of the stove for about 30 minutes or until they break down (pull one out and see if it pulls apart easily). Then, put them in a bowl, toss them in sauce and put back under the broiler to cook the sauce on.

At home, I usually smoke whole chickens. If you always grill chicken pieces, I encourage you to try smoking a whole bird. Since the bird isn’t cut up, the skin stops a lot of moisture from evaporating. This makes for a very juicy bird.

Since I’m cooking dark and white meat at the same time, the trick is to get the thighs and legs to 180⁰ while keeping the breast under 165⁰. The easiest way I know of is to find the “hot spot” on your bbq pit. Get your pit stabilized at whatever temp you want to cook at. Open up a can of biscuits and lay them out evenly spaced on your cooking grate. Close the lid and wait ten or fifteen minutes. See which biscuits are the darkest and you’ve found your “hot spot”.

Picture courtesy of http://amazingribs.com/menumachine/sitemap/navigation.html

(A great site for BBQ knowledge)

Now that you know where it is, place the whole bird with the legs over that spot and it will cook more evenly. When cooking a turkey, I know some guys that will fill a ziploc bag full of ice and lay it on top of the breast. They let the bird sit out on the counter like this before they cook it. The dark meat warms up but the breast stay cold. This gives the dark meat a head start when they put it on the smoker.

The most sure-fire way of getting perfect bird is to monitor the internal temperature of the bird in the thickest part of the breast. When it reaches between 160⁰ and 165⁰ take your poultry shears and cut around the base of the breast removing the whole thing intact. Put the leg/thigh/back section back on the pit until the thighs reach 180⁰. Both light and dark meat will be done without over-cooking.

One popular method of grilling a chicken more evenly is called “Spatchcock Chicken”. Lay a whole bird on it’s breast and cut out the backbone with poultry shears. Oil and season the bird.

Flip it over and lay it out flat, and grill or smoke it. This method takes less time than cooking the bird whole, and ends up almost a juicy.

As always, if you have any questions about bbq, just shoot me an email at: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.