Not Another Way To Roast Chicken!

[dcarch]

To me, roasting chicken and roasting turkey represents a great challenge. There are so many parts in a very thick and very cold bird, each requires a different way of cooking it.

 

Here is a method I am trying out, with a chicken first, then I will be doing it with a Thanksgiving turkey.

 

1. Chicken is dry brined all over, under the skin and inside the cavity. This is very easy to do. Refrigerate chicken overnight. 

 

2. Take the cold chicken out of the refrigerator into the convection oven set at 170F, and at the same time cook the chicken from inside out with a heater inside the chicken's cavity. This solves the universal problem of quickly and evenly cooking a big cold bird with thick meat. using very low temperature. The convection oven dries up the skin, which is required for the skin to be crispy.

 

3. Once the internal temperature reaches 140F, The bird is taken out and into the refrigerator for 20 minutes. Meanwhile, get the oven's broiler fired up at high.

 

4. Take the bird out from the refrigerator after 20 minutes and put it into the broiler. To help better making the skin evenly crispy, use aluminum foil as reflectors, shiny side facing the bird at 45 degree angle. Broiler cooks by infrared and aluminum reflect IR. This setup minimizes soggy skin.

Sounds a very complicated way to roast a chicken or turkey. I don't think so, especially not with what the end result I can get. 

dcarch

[rotuts]

that looks quite delish

 

however

 

they way to to a Turkey

 

it to de-bone it

 

a la Julia and Jacques

 

brine or not

 

and place the Turk on the fantastic stuffing or your choice

 

w the stock made from the bones and etc the day before 

 

as the liquid for the stuffing.

 

bake  etc

 

and done.

[IndyRob]

48 minutes ago, dcarch said:

... cook the chicken from inside out with a heater inside the chicken's cavity.

 

 

What kind of heater?

[Lisa Shock]

What cavity? Looks like you butterflied the bird....

[FeChef]

5 hours ago, IndyRob said:

 

 

What kind of heater?

electric charcoal starter?

[ElsieD]

46 minutes ago, FeChef said:

electric charcoal starter?

 

Funny, that's what crossed my mind.

[jmacnaughtan]

Why do you start with such a cold bird?  Is it not easier to bring it to room temperature first?  I find it cooks much more easily this way.

[lindag]

Too much of a rigmarole for something that can be done so simply.

Aren't we trying to reinvent the wheel here?

Edited September 24, 2017 by lindag (log)

[dcarch]

18 hours ago, rotuts said:

they way to to a Turkey

 

it to de-bone it

 

Yes, I have done that, but that takes longer.

 

17 hours ago, IndyRob said:

What kind of heater?

Two ways I have tried:

a. A heated thermal gel packs inside a food safe SV bag.

b. Electric 50 watt heater with PID control inside a SV bag. 

 

16 hours ago, Lisa Shock said:

What cavity? Looks like you butterflied the bird....

The bird was whole,  not trussed. Because I don't like soggy skin which you will get if trussed.

 

1 hour ago, lindag said:

Too much of a rigmarole for something that can be done so simply.

Aren't we trying to reinvent the wheel here?

I can't think of another way to have the chicken (turkey) cooked uniformly to about 140F - 145F very quickly and at the end with very crispy skin. If the bird is cooked, say in an 375F oven, there is no way that part of the meat will not be cooked at 212F. There is a big difference in juiciness between meat cooked at 212F and 140F.

 

Why is placing a heater inside the cavity takes a lot of work? Seems less work than deboning, spachcocking, trussing ----.

 

dcarch 

Edited September 24, 2017 by dcarch (log)

[Yiannos]

3 hours ago, jmacnaughtan said:

Why do you start with such a cold bird?  Is it not easier to bring it to room temperature first?  I find it cooks much more easily this way.

 

I have experimented with roasting chickens every which way and have found that this is the key to the most even cooking. If I start with a cold bird, no matter what I do some part of the it is sacrificed, either over-cooked breasts or under-done legs/thighs.

[dcarch]

26 minutes ago, Yiannos said:

 

I have experimented with roasting chickens every which way and have found that this is the key to the most even cooking. If I start with a cold bird, no matter what I do some part of the it is sacrificed, either over-cooked breasts or under-done legs/thighs.

 

To get a frozen turkey to room temperature takes a very long time, long enough for part of the bird to get into food safety danger zone.

A warmer bird helps, but not that much. Thermal conductivity is a physical constant, you can't make heat travel faster, you can only make travel distance shorter, which is what I was doing.

 

dcarch

 

 

[Lisa Shock]

3 hours ago, Yiannos said:

 

I have experimented with roasting chickens every which way and have found that this is the key to the most even cooking. If I start with a cold bird, no matter what I do some part of the it is sacrificed, either over-cooked breasts or under-done legs/thighs.

 

Well, the generally accepted solution is to butcher the bird into parts and control the situation by having white meat on a separate sheet pan (and separate thermometers) from the dark. You don't get a picturesque whole carcass to carve at the table, but, you do get precise cooking of the meat.

[Okanagancook]

Yeah and when was the last time you carved a bird at the table!  I like spatchcock a bird.

[gfweb]

To me it's an easy solution to cook white and dark separately so that each is nicely done. Maybe even SV the breasts. 

 

Its an an interesting challenge to cook a whole bird well. But why bother when there are easier ways with better results?

 

A nicely composed platter of sliced turkey is as good to my eye as the midieval "presentation" of a browned bird. 

[dcarch]

Another way  for quicker roasting,  whole bird presentation, for stuffing, for easy of slicing, without chopping the bird into multiple parts, is to remove all bones without opening up the bird. Yes, it can be done. All the bones including thigh bones, wing bones, etc 100% removal, leaving only meat and skin.

Feels like a rubber chicken, LOL!

 

dcarch.