The trick is to smoke the meat and not make the meat smoke

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FAVORITE FOODS - Poultry

  Date: October 2, 2014
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BEST CHICKEN BREASTS:

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  PHOTO ENTRY NAME:  TUNISIAN CHICKEN
  SOURCE:  Weber's Way to Grill
  ;DATE FIRST COOKED:  April 9, 2009
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This Middle Eastern recipe featured some very interesting and unique flavors. You start off by making a toasted spice rub which gets applied above and below the skin of the chicken. Make sure to have a fan running and your windows open when you toast the spices for this rub, because there are some very potent aromas generated. The chicken breasts are direct grilled to start and finished indirectly. While the chicken is grilling you make a parsley-based sauce to be used on the chicken. This was an amazing recipe with flavors I have never had the pleasure of experiencing before.

BEST CHICKEN PARTS:

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  PHOTO ENTRY NAME:  GRILLED FRIED CHICKEN
  SOURCE:  Virtual Weber Bullet website message board
  DATE FIRST COOKED:  December 1, 2010
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I absolutely love fried chicken. I saw a link to this indirect grilled chicken recipe that supposedly turned out chicken which tasted like fried chicken. I rushed out to the supermarket that same morning. The recipe is very easy to make, and to my great pleasure and surprise it lived up to its billing. The fried chicken was tasty and crunchy without being deep-fried.

BEST CHICKEN THIGHS 1:

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  PHOTO ENTRY NAME:  SERBIAN CHICKEN BUNDLES
  SOURCE:  Planet Barbecue
  DATE FIRST COOKED:  October 18, 2010
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This was another recipe I knew I had to make the moment I saw it. Chicken thighs were butterflied, boned, and pounded flat. The insides were seasoned with mustard and spices and then received a diced meat and cheese filling. The thighs were closed and pinned shut with skewers. The final touch that helped put these over-the-top was the outside skin being brushed with bacon fat before they went on the grill. I had great expectations for this recipe and it actually exceeded my expectations.

BEST CHICKEN THIGHS 2:

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  PHOTO ENTRY NAME:  CEDAR PLANKED CHICKEN THIGHS
  SOURCE:  Weber's Way to Grill
  DATE FIRST COOKED:  August 9, 2009
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This recipe was a bit of a surprise. I found it when I was looking for a cedar plank salmon recipe. Chicken thighs are marinated in an Asian-influenced marinade. Some marinade is reserved and gets used as a glaze while the thighs are cooking. The chicken thighs are plank grilled and the resulting flavor was amazing. The chicken thighs themselves have a lot of flavor. Combine that with the Asian flavors from the marinade/glaze, plus the cedar smoke, and you have something special.

BEST CHICKEN WINGS 1:

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  PHOTO ENTRY NAME:  CALGARY HOT WINGS
  SOURCE:  BBQ University website
  DATE FIRST COOKED:  April 18, 2011
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These chicken wings were bit of a surprise to me. I expected them to be good, but they were excellent. The wings were marinated for 24 hours in a wheat beer. Then they were seasoned with a spicy rub and were cooked directly on the grill. There was a hot sauce, together with some chopped fresh herbs that were put on the wings when they came off the grill. These wings were very pleasant surprise when I tried them. Your first bite gives you a spicy flavor from the sauce, which was to be expected. After the initial spicy blast wears off you get a wheaty/yeasty flavor from the wheat beer used for the marinade.

BEST CHICKEN WINGS 2:

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  PHOTO ENTRY NAME:  HOT WINGS
  SOURCE:  Serious BBQ
  DATE FIRST COOKED:  January 21, 2011
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Typical of an Adam Perry Lang recipe, these wings used layers of flavor. The wings received a spice rub and then went into a foil pan together with some butter and water. The pan was covered and heated for 45 minutes on the grill. The wings were removed from the pan and brush with some oil, returned to the grill and direct grilled for 10 minutes to crisp up the skin. While on the grill the wings were brushed with mixture of some of the cooking liquid and grated chili and garlic. Once off the grill they were tossed in Buffalo sauce. These wings didn't even have amazing flavor and where that moistest chicken wings I've ever tried.

BEST CHICKEN WINGS 3:

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  PHOTO ENTRY NAME:  PIRI-PIRI CHICKEN WINGS
  SOURCE:  Planet Barbecue
  DATE FIRST COOKED:  September 20, 2010
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These wings from South Africa use a spicy hot pepper sauce for both the marinade and glaze. The wings are marinated for 24 hours and then indirect grilled for about 45 minutes. When they are finished grilling they are coated with a glaze made from the. Piri-Piri sauce and coated with freshly chopped cilantro. These wings had a unique sweet and hot flavor that I like very much. They are definitely not your typical American hot wing.

BEST CHICKEN WINGS 4:

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  PHOTO ENTRY NAME:  LOUISVILLE WINGS
  SOURCE:  BBQ USA
  DATE FIRST COOKED:  January 26, 2006
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These wings are as spicy as buffalo wings and feature more flavors. They use very spicy rub and a hot sauce that uses a bottle of Tabasco sauce. This tells you all you need to know about how spicy these wings can be. The wings are rubbed and then start off being grilled indirectly. To crisp up the skin they finish up with a quick direct grill. If you are looking for a great tasting hot wing, that is not a Buffalo-style hot wing, look no further.

BEST CHICKEN WHOLE 1:

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  PHOTO ENTRY NAME:  3-GINGER ROTISSERIE CHICKEN
  SOURCE:  Mastering the Grill
  DATE FIRST COOKED:  July 13, 2008
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This Asian influenced whole chicken recipe uses ginger in three different ways throughout the cook. There is an herb paste that uses glazed ginger as an ingredient. There is a glaze which contains ginger preserves that is applied during cooking. The chicken is served with relish made from pickled ginger. This was a totally amazing chicken dish, moist and tender with many complementary flavors. If I wanted to impress somebody with a whole chicken dish I would look no farther than this one.

BEST CHICKEN WHOLE 2:

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  PHOTO ENTRY NAME:  BIG BOB GIBSON'S BAR-B-QUE CHICKEN (BGE)
  SOURCE:  Big Bob Gibson's BBQ Book
  DATE FIRST COOKED:  August 2, 2012
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This is a unique chicken dish using a white barbecue sauce popular in Alabama. The chicken is butterflied and indirect grilled. When it is done it is served with the white barbecue sauce. This version of it was interesting because it was the first meal I cooked on my new Big Green Egg. I made the same dish for a month or so before and while it was good, there was no comparison to this version. This chicken was the moistest chicken I've ever had. No doubt this was a result of the tight seal of the ceramic Big Green Egg and it's bill to retain a lot of the moisture normally lost during cooking. The white barbecue sauce, though unusual, is excellent. This dish is a great change of pace from your typical whole chicken recipe..

BEST TURKEY BREAST:

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  PHOTO ENTRY NAME:  WILD RICE STUFFED TURKEY
  SOURCE:  Smoke & Spice
  DATE FIRST COOKED:  February 19, 2011
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This turkey breast recipe lays on many layers of flavor. The breast receives a spice rub and is injected before receiving an overnight stay in the refrigerator. On the day of the cook, a pocket is cut into the breast and receives a rice-based stuffing. The breast then gets tied and wrapped with moistened cheesecloth which helps to retain moisture during cooking. After 3 hours the cheesecloth is removed and the breast gets sprayed with water every 30 minutes after that. The turkey comes out very moist flavorful including a nice layer of flavor added by the smoking wood.

BEST TURKEY WHOLE 1:

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  PHOTO ENTRY NAME:  DOUBLE WHISKEY SMOKED TURKEY
  SOURCE:  Project Smoke TV Show & Website
  DATE FIRST COOKED:  November 26, 2015
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This Stephen Raichlen recipe became my new favorite whole turkey recipe in 2015. I was looking for a new recipe for 2015 and where I was taking over making the ENTIRE Thanksgiving dinner from A-Z, the relative simplicity of this recipe appealed to me. One of the things I have always liked about his recipes is he seems to excel at getting a lot of flavor out a relatively little amount of ingredients.The bird was brined for 24 hours the day before and then injected with butter before going on the Big Green Egg at 250 degrees with Cherry wood smoke. This bird was outstanding! Credit has to be shared between the turkey, which was the best quality all-natural bird I have tried; the Big Green Egg, which helped keep it moist; and the recipe. This was the best turkey I or any of my guests said they had tasted. But please note: It is not all good. The version of this recipe differed greatly between the version he made for the Project Smoke TV show and the version on the show’s website. The brine methods and cooking methods differed and the website version listed the butter, but left out the step about injecting the bird. Read both recipes and reconcile the differences.

BEST TURKEY WHOLE 2:

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  PHOTO ENTRY NAME:  HERB ROASTED TURKEY - BGE VERSION
  SOURCE:  Various websites
  DATE FIRST COOKED:  November 22, 2012
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This recipe had been my go to Thanksgiving turkey recipe for many years now. It is a close second to the new Best Turkey Whole that I made for the first time in 2015. This turkey is a bit more work, but if you like fresh herb flavors this might still be the Number 1 choice. The turkey is brined for two days and then removed from the brine and air dried in the refrigerator overnight. The turkey skin is rubbed both inside and out with a fresh herb paste. The cavities filled with chopped apples and onions to serve as aromatics. Doing this on the Big Green Egg the last two years has allowed me to grill roast it at a higher temperature and still add smoke. Unlike my gas grill, I can still get lots of smoke on the food at higher cooking temperatures. The higher cooking temperature allows me to also get a crispy skin. So I no longer have to choose between the lesser of two evils: Smoking it low and slow and getting nice smoke flavor with a rubbery skin. Grilling it at a higher temperature and getting crispy skin but just a kiss of smoke flavor. Now I don't have to choose, I can get both and cooking it on the Egg insures it is extra moist.

  Motivation:

People are always asking me what my favorite recipes are. This section had it's origins in a seven part BLOG entry I wrote in 2011 called A Few of My Favorite Things. I have made many great dishes since then and also started making other types of foods such as Stir Fries. This section needed to be updated and expanded to stay current or be dropped. I chose the later and you have the results of my reworking the section in the Fall of 2014
  Poultry Info:
The POULTRY section of the site contains pictures of recipes I have made using Chicken, Duck and Turkey. I have only made two duck dishes , so that is too small of a sample size to say they were the best. I am including chicken and turkey dishes using various parts & whole birds. I will admit to loving chicken wings and there are 4 recipes listed here. They are ranked, but they are also so close that on any gien day I might switch the rankings.

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