turkeys and chickens

[dono]

o.k so I've read it all and my brain is awash with a hundered different ideas on how to smoke a chicken or a turkey, so here's what I've been doing so far, I've smoked about 6 turkeys this way and they seem to come out just fine, but i'm willing to listen to suggestions on how to improve my smokes. I'll be doing a couple of turkeys and a couple of chickens on Sunday,

on friday I'll take the two thawed turkeys and rub them down inside and out with Kosher salt and seal them in a plastic bag over night in the frig on saturday night I'll take them out and wash all the salt off, then I'll rub them down with a little oil and my favorite spice mixture I buy locally , on sunday I'll take them out of the fig again tie them off with some stainless steel wire and put them in the smoker that's been heated to around 250 degrees,

my two chickens I'll rub down with poultry spice on saturday night and put them in the frig sunday morning I'll put them on beer can stands with some coke or pepsi in place of the beer

my pork roast will be just rubbed down with some musterd and crushed cloves and put in the smoker sunday morning.

so that's how I've been doing it, I'll watch the temp and try to maintane a steady 250 to 300 degrees using lump charcoal as a base and cherry wood pieces from a lumber mill starting with the turkeys and the pork at around 7 am and adding the chickens around 10 am I figure to have the gang over to eat by around 5 pm

so? what do yas all think, I'm open to fine tuning give me any and all suggestions I'll try what sounds good and leave the rest, but I'll thank you just the same for you input so bring it on I'll be waiting :-)

 

[ajthepoolman]

Sounds good to me! So you are saying that we should show up Sunday right? :D

 

[hell fire grill]

Sounds tasty to me. One good way to smoke chicken n turkey is to spatchcock it. Try a chicken for the first one cause its easy on a chicken. I like to brine them first. Check this out.

 

[bombo80]

I wasn't sure what spatchcock was, so I looked it up. I've been doing my chickens that way, for several decades.

Been a long time since I smoked a chicken. (I'm not even going to go to the papers thing ... LOL)

I have brined turkeys and geese. I have a brine tester (salometer) to measure the amount of salts in a brine solution. Easy to use, and cheap guarantee, to NOT make your brine too strong. I find that ~25* is a good place to start.

I mix up my brine, usually just kosher salt, or pickling salt, and inject the breasts and legs. I then weigh down the bird in a 5 gallon bucket, and soak it overnight. Then smoke as usual.

 

[hell fire grill]

How about a turchen. A turdukchen without the duck. Sounds like you have the main ingredients.

 

[deejaydebi]

A turchen? Sounds like a fish!


Brine those birds hon you won't be sorry!

http://www.deejayssmokepit.net/Chicken.htm
http://www.deejayssmokepit.net/Turkey.htm

 

[ds7662]

Pork Roast? As in pork shoulder or pork butt? What size? How are you planing to serve the pork? Sliced or pulled?
If it is a butt or shoulder and has anysize to it you might want to give it a little more smoking time just to be on the safe side. I had a 12lb butt that took over 15 hours to reach pulling temps.
Everthing sounds good otherwise. Just thought I would ask those questions.

 

[homebrew & bbq]

If you know your smoker well enough, you might want to put your birds in the hotter spots and the pork where the temp is going to be a little lower. The birds don't benefit much from the "low-n-slow" but the pork will (at least that's what I keep reading around here).

 

[dono]

welcome to the great white north, it's 7:30 am and -20c with the lite wind chill, I started up the smoker as soon as the sun came up this morning
decided todo a couple pork roasts and some ribs insead of the chickens, still got two turkeys in the tho, had abit of a flare up problem under my ribs as you can see in the qview but it's only surface burns no biggy, i'll post more qviews as the day goes on

have a good day eh

 

[bbq bubba]

Look's like your in need of a baffle at the firebox.
Nothing like a full pit, kudo's to you for attempting a smoke on such a cold day!!

How's your temp's running?

 

[dono]

I do have a baffle inside the smoker blocking direct flame from the fire box, problem was I over fed the box with lump charcoal and it got too hot while i was inside getting a coffee, I have it now running at a steady 250f but its gunna take a lot of checking and stoking to keep it at cooking temp in this cold, I'm thinking this will be my last smoke till spring

 

[bbq bubba]

Are you using a charcoal basket?? It'll help ya carry temps longer and avoid flare-up's.
Keep up with the pic's....

 

[dono]

charcoal basket?

 

[rip]

LAST SMOKE UNTIL SPRING!!!

How can you stand it?

I would have withdraws.

 

[dono]

naw I'm just being a cry baby cause it's so darned cold out there, we always have a thaw in January I'll be back out there again before spring :-)

 

[bbq bubba]

Last smoke??? I don't think so.........
A charcoal basket is to hold your charcoal so you can stack it with the minion method, raised up in your firebox so ashes can drop and air can circulate and give you a long burn time with just minor vent adjustments!

This is the basket

It should sit about 3" off the bottom of your firebox.

You stack charcoal (or lump) on 1 side

And unlit on the other side

I get about 6 hrs. burn time on 8# of charcoal and all i have to do is adj the vent once in a while!!

 

[dono]

I will make one next week, it's times like this I love working at a scrap metals yard :-)

 

[dono]

meats close to cooked temps already I wrapped the ribs an hour ago and the pork roasts a few minutes ago and the turkeys are already close to 180f I'm thinking eather my thermometer isn't working or I just plan let it run hot too long, oh well It's been a fun smoke anyway, I'm gunna take all the meat and put it in the oven at 250 for a couple hours then just keep it warm till supper time, what ya think should I wrap the turkeys in foil ?

 

[rip]

I wouldn't rubbery skin.