Smoked Chicken with a Caribbean Jerk Marinade

[Toby Keil]

I got two whole chickens now cut in half and the plan is to smoke them on Saturday for dinner, then vac seal the rest of the meat for later meals. My question is this. I plan on adding lemon juice, lime juice and some evoo to the jerk marinade then let the birds soak as long as possible. How long can they sit in the marinade with out the risk of the chicken getting mushy. I was hoping to start marinading them this afternoon then put the birds on around 4pm. Thouhgts? and thanks.

 

[ScottyDaQ]

A high citric acid marinade will cook the chicken if left too long . I wouldn't go over 6-8 hours....but that's just me.

I'd dunk em before I went to bed.

 

[bigwheel]

Yeppers I concur (sic?) wouldn't want to push splits past about 8 hrs. Now that aint gonna neccessarily keep the mush monster away. Biggest influence I have noted is meat tenderizer...aka Papain. If the marinate or rub got it in there all ghurhontees is off. I have also had cheap buttermilk which turn em mushy even in the alloted time span. Not sure why but the high dollar stuff dont act thataway.

bigwheel

 

[Toby Keil]

Thanks fellers. What I'll do is start them marinating around 9am on Sat as I'll be placing them on the smoker around 3pm.

 

[bigwheel]

Best of fortunes to you sir. I just love Jerk Seasoning. Cant wait to hear how they turn out.

bigwheel

 

[Toby Keil]

Best of fortunes to you sir. I just love Jerk Seasoning. Cant wait to hear how they turn out.

bigwheel

BW, I'll document the cook with pics and will definitely let you how everything turns out. Can't wait and I'm gettin right anxious as someone in my neighborhood is smoking somethin somewhere and it's smellin real good. It's coming from the north of me, wish I knew who it was so I could talk BBQ with em. Maybe I'll take the dog and my nose for a walk and see I can track em down.

 

[bigwheel]

Well I am fixing to fire up the gasser and stink up the neighborhood with a combo smell of daid fish and smoldering cedar roofing shingles. The Warden bought it from Omaha steaks. Its quite a ways beneath my dignity to cook fish on the grill but guess I give it a whirl. Got the planks soaking as we speak. I'm fairly optimistic cuz everything we have got from them has been real tasty. I am about to run out of storage space for the big kewlish styro ice chests they use for shipping and I am way too big of a cheapskate to throw them away as is the custom of the yups. They dont want them in the recycle bin and they too big to put in the regular trash. I'm conflicted as you can tell.

bigwheel

 

[ScottyDaQ]

BW........ Just......... Ummm.... Wow....You sure better be watching for a rope. (you know what I mean).

 

[bigwheel]

Errr gulp..yes I do know whut you mean about the rope. I should neva have cornfessed to doing this I know..kick kick. Bad news is I soaked the roofing shingles for an hour before it dawned on me they was covered in an invisible sheathing of plastic wrap undetectable to the humany eye. Fortuantly noted it just prior to loading the stinky fish on there...so had to peel that off and start over. Good news is the warden loved it. Tasted like sweet dead fish to me. I take some good old fried Crappie or Catfish any old day.

bigwheel

 

[Toby Keil]

OK so here's how the day went. I got the chicken in the marinade at 9am and I added a little evoo, placed em in plastic zip lock bags and let em rest in the fridge then about 2 hours later I added Lemon and lime juce. At about ten, the boss said "I'm goin to the gym then your daughter and I are goin shoppin", I responded "cool...see ya". With that said, I prepped the smoker, I hadn't done diddly with it from the last time I smoked so I had to clean her up a bit. Buy the time I was done, I looked at the clock and it said 11:30. I said to myself, "It's gotta be 12noon some where" so I cracked a cold one, then two, then three, well you get the story and I cooked away. I couldn't have asked for a more perfect day. The sun was out, I got a ton of stuff done around the house and the food was loved by the family. Oh, I also made a habanera fatty stuffed with cheese and pepperchinis, yum...yum. We also had sweet corn and a fresh tomato, basil and buffalo mozzarella salad. Here are the pics.

Chicken just on the Smoker

The fatty ready to be rolled, stuff with peppers and cheese.

A really tasty salad, thanks to my neighbor and his tomatoes.

The chicken is ready.

Ready to eat.

My plate.

 

[Cliff H.]

Them chickens look fantastic.

 

[ScottyDaQ]

Sure does !

 

[surfinsapo]

WoW what colors !! Great cook Tob

 

[Oak]

Great looking birds. Did you crank the temperature to get that skin?

 

[BluzQue]

Toby You R Still Da Man!

8)

 

[bigwheel]

Well that looked like a scrumtious repast from all perspectives..but I know a good chicken when I see one and them are some grand prize winners. Will venture to say whutever you soaked em in did not have any meat tenderizers in it. Otherwise you would have had big time busted skin. Outstanding performance.

bigwheel

 

[john a]

Top shelf Toby, another great job.

 

[007bond-jb]

Man that looks great

 

[Griff]

Toby, that really looks good.