Steven Raichlen - Beer-Can Chicken: And 74 Other Offbeat Recipes for the Grill

Table of Contents

BEER-CAN CHICKEN

AND 74 OTHER OFFBEAT RECIPES FOR THE GRILL

STEVEN RAICHLEN

ILLUSTRATIONS BY JIM LAMBRENOS

WORKMAN PUBLISHING NEWYORK

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This may be a small book , but it took the hard work of a lot of people to bring it to fruition. The author would like to thank:

Suzanne Rafer, for her skillful editing and friendship

Lisa Hollander, for her lovely design work

Peter Workman, for his commitment to barbecue (who else would be wacky enough to publish a book on beer-can chicken?)

Barbara Hawkeye Mateer, for her meticulous copy editing

Jim Eber and Kate Tyler, publicists extraordinaire

Patty Bozza, Patty Berg, Kim Cox, Katherine Deitrich, Beth Doty, Jenny Mandel, Sue Macleod, Kim Newman, Pat Upton, Paul Gamarello, Paul Hanson, Bruce Harris, and all my other friends at Workman Publishing

My agent, Angela Miller

My computer guru, Allan Drezner

My recipe tester, Elida Proenza

A huge thanks to all you Bubbas and pit bosses out there who so generously shared your knowledge about smoking, grilling, and new ways to use beer!

And finally, my wife, Barbara, for surviving another book!

CONTENTS

CAN-DO GRILLING

Quiche, fajitas, carpaccio , tiramisu, and the currently unavoidable sushi and crme brleevery few years, a dish or two comes along that captures the fancy and taste of a generation. Typically, its a dish that most people had never heard of one year, then couldnt seem to live without the next.

And now another dish is about to join the ranks of these gastronomic superstarsa dish that, once seen, you simply must prepare for your family and friends. A classic of the barbecue scene in the United States about to go mainstream. Im talking about beer-can chicken.

The idea is startlingly simple: You grill a chicken upright over an open can of beer. What results is the moistest, most succulent, and most flavorful chicken youve ever tasted. And lets face it, few things have more power to pop eyes and slack jaws than the sight of a gorgeous roast chicken perched jauntily upright on that beer can.

Since the moment I encountered my first beer-can chicken at a barbecue contest, Ive made this singular dish to the great delight of television audiences and cooking class students, of family members and guests in my home. Ive varied the recipe, using different beers or other steaming liquids and a wide range of seasonings. For that matter, Ive used the beer-can method for cooking a wide range of poultry, from quail to turkey. Ive come to regard beer-can chicken not just as an offbeat cooking method but a way of life.

I offer this book as a guide to the fine points of beer-can chickenand other surprising dishes you can grill. I hope youll use it as a springboard for your imagination. And I look forward to hearing about your favorite beer-can chicken creations. You can reach me on my Web site: www.barbecuebible.com .

Now pop open a cold one, and get ready to have some fun.

THE OFFBEAT GRILL

The best chicken I ever tasted wasnt Paul Bocuses truffle-and-foie-gras-stuffed poulet de Bresse en vessie (poached in a pigs bladder). It wasnt the chicken I once dined on in Hong Kong, wrapped in lotus leaves, baked in a mound of clay, and served with a hammer for cracking its casing. It wasnt even my Aunt Annettes plump, juicy, golden gedempte capon (although that last comes close). No, the best chicken I ever tasted came off a barbecue pit in Memphis, Tennessee, where it had been smoked upright in a singularly undignified position: straddling an open can of beer.

Beer-can chicken, also known as drunken chicken, dancing chicken, or chicken on a throne (and some other names not fit to print in a family cookbook) is a classic on the American competition barbecue circuit. To make it, you roast a seasoned chicken in an upright position on an open can of beer. This is usually done on a barbecue grill using the indirect method of grilling or in a smoker, but you can also roast beer-can chicken in the oven.

I first tasted beer-can chicken in 1996, at the Memphis in May World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest on the banks of the Mississippi River. Since then I have written about it in The New York Times , demonstrated it on Good Morning America , and taught how to make it in countless cooking classes across the United States. Everywhere it has met with enthusiastic acclaim.

A TECHNIQUE LIKE NO OTHER

So what is it that makes beer-can chicken so irresistible? Well, first theres the flavor and texture. The rising vapors impart a delicate beer flavor, simultaneously keeping the bird juicy and tender. And because the steaming takes place inside the chicken, the meat stays moist but the skin doesnt become soggy.

Then, theres the benefit of grilling the chicken upright. A vertical position allows the fat to drain off and the skin to cook evenly, even on the back. The result is a bird thats crackling crisp on the outside, moist and tender inside, and bursting with barbecue flavors.

Next, theres the irresistible tang of wood smoke, for beer-can chicken is almost always cooked in the presence of smoldering wood or wood chips. To reinforce the beer flavor, many pit masters actually soak their wood chips in beer.

Finally, of course, theres the wow factor. Few sights are more amusing or arresting than a chicken on a can of beer on the grill, its breast thrust forward, its legs stretched out in a leisurely fashion. Some folks heighten the comic effect by inserting a stalk of celery for a head, the eyes, nose, and mouth formed by cloves stuck in the celery.

The Birth of a Legend

My initiation into the rites of beer-can chicken came from the Bryce Boar Blazers barbecue team. I happened on their site at Memphis in May one Friday afternoon just as team captain Jim Birdsong was lifting the lid off a giant smoker. Inside were a half-dozen chickens, their skins bronzed with smoke and gritty with spice rub, sitting upright on cans of one of Americas favorite beers. The Blazers had injected their chickens with Cajun seasoning, using the culinary version of a hypodermic syringe, and rubbed brown sugar and onion and garlic powders under and over the skin. They seasoned the open cans of beer with more spice rub before inserting them in the cavities of the upright birds. Then the Blazers slow roasted the birds to perfection in a smoker for 4 hours over smoldering mesquite. Its easy to see how these slamming beer-can chickens won the Bryce Boar Blazers a coveted first place at the Memphis in May barbecue contest the next day.

So where did beer-can chicken originate?