While we live in a
rural area, we are only about sixty miles form the Dallas/Ft. Worth
(DFW) metroplex which has a multitude of supermarkets including many
ethnic markets. What this means for us is that our local Walmart
actually price matches all the sale ads from the DFW area. Almost
every week someone has chicken thighs and or drumsticks on sale. As I
am writing this article 'Save-A-Lot' supermarkets has chicken
drumsticks and thighs on sale for $0.69 per lb, while the Mexican
market 'Rio Grande' has drumsticks regular or marinaded for $0.39 per
lb. Chicken breasts on the other hand were $1.69 per lb on sale. The
drumsticks I am cooking for this article we comp'd at our local
Walmart for $0.49 per lb a few weeks ago. While not as nutritious as
chicken breasts, legs and thighs can help you to put good quality
food on your table for a quarter of the cost ($1.69 / $0.39 = 4.33).
And I do not have to tell you if you are cooking on a budget or fixed
income, every little bit of savings you can find helps to stretch
your food dollars.
Cooking chicken on
the grill is pretty easy, but my brother-in-law “bless his heart”
just cannot seem to get the hang of it. His chicken either looks like
it is cooked but ends being raw and bloody in the middle, or he cooks
the bejesus out of it and it is so burned on the outside that it is
not only unappealing to look at, it's not very tasty either. The sad thing
is that he thinks he is a grill master, but everyone is just to
polite to say anything. It is not all his fault, part of the problem
is the equipment he uses. The recipe for this chicken is quite
simple, season the chicken with salt and pepper and grill it for 36
minutes and then apply the sauce of my choice and cook for another 5
minutes. No rub, no marinade, simply put, this grilled chicken could
not be easier.
The Grill Matters
Multi-burner gas
grills are great for cooking foods, the old single burner type of gas
grill (which is 20 years old) that my brother-in-law uses is
terrible. It is simply to hard to regulate the heat effectively
without either burning the food or having it be undercooked. The
problem with single burner grills (as well as cooking directly over
charcoal) is that you have to stand there and constantly monitor the
cooking process and most often you have to grill with the lid open to
be able to manage flareups and keep the food from burning. This not
only causes you to lose heat, but it uses up more of your valuable
gas and or charcoal costing you money. So why is this important? Well
the key to cooking moist and delicious chicken on the grill is
indirect heat, regardless of whether you are using a gas or charcoal
grill.
Gas grills with
multiple burners help you to maintain an even heating and cooking
source, as well as allowing you to cook foods throughly while using
less gas. Your gas grill does not have to be fancy. I cooked for
years on a small two burner Char-Broil grill without a temperature
gauge with amazing results. All you need is the ability to turn off
the burner that is directly under the food during the cooking
process. Have not fear, if all you have is a charcoal grill you can
still cook fantastic chicken. While the process for cooking with
indirect heat on a charcoal grill is slightly different, it is not
difficult, and I will quickly cover how to do so later in this
article.
Saving The Sauce For
Last
Before we get into
the actual instructions for grilling the drumsticks, there is one key
thing that you must do to keep your chicken from burning, and that is
saving the sauce for last. When it comes to grilled meats, the sauce
that you apply will not absorb into the meat, rather the sauce is
used as an additional flavor component to the poultry. Almost all
sauces contain sugar which when heated will burn and increase the
number of flareups during the cooking process.
Properly grilled
chicken only needs to have the sauce applied during the last five
minutes of cooking. Apply the sauce liberally to one side, then turn
the chicken and apply the sauce to the other side and cook for 5
minutes. Adding multiple applications of sauce during the grilling
process does nothing but waste sauce, increases the chance the
chicken will burn and does not add any additional flavor to the
chicken. It simply falls down into the bottom of the grill. If you
want to add an additional layer of sauce, then when you remove the
chicken from the grill and place it on your tray or plate add another
light coat of sauce. Then allow the chicken to rest for 5 minutes
before serving. This not only allows the additional layer of sauce to
slightly thicken, but keeps you and your guests from burning your
mouths when you bite into your hot and juicy grilled chicken.
Grilling The
Drumsticks
A lot of people
prefer the flavor of cooking meats on a charcoal grill, and I must
admit I do like the flavor of charcoal, but to be honest it is down
right inconvenient when you have a group of hungry guests or family
members and you need to quickly throw something on the grill. The
biggest disadvantage to using a charcoal grill is that it is more
difficult to cook on consistently using indirect heat. It can be
done, but you have less control of the temperature range of the grill
so it requires a more experienced hand managing the grill.
If you want to cook
your chicken over direct heat regardless of the type of grill you are
using, you need to get yourself a cold beverage because you will need
to stand outside and monitor the grill as there will be multiple
flareups due to the fats released from the skin of the chicken during
the cooking process. Now, depending on your house guests and your
cold beverage of choice, standing outside by the grill cooking over
direct heat just might be considered an advantage. Anyway, when
cooking over direct heat, the outside of the chicken tends to cooks
quickly and while the drumsticks may look cooked on the outside, the
inside often remains raw and bloody. So keep in mind that if you are
cooking your drumsticks over direct heat you may need to turn them
every 5 to 7 minutes to keep them from burning. Cooked drumsticks are
fantastic, burned and blackened drumsticks not so much; and no one I
know likes to eat bloody chicken.
So the million
dollar question is at what temperature do I grill my chicken? My
basic answer is somewhere between 325 to 400 degrees. That may seem
like quite a temperature range and it is, but to be honest when I
used my old Char-Broil gas grill, it had no thermometer so I just
cooked the chicken with one burner on high and the one under the
chicken turned off. My new Char-Griller has a temperature gauge that
reads a consistent 400 degrees (if this is accurate) when it comes up
to heat and one burner is kept on low. The optimum temperature would
be 350 degrees. For this recipe the gauge on my grill was always at
400 degrees. If cooking at a slightly lower temperature 325 to 350
you may need to increase the overall cook time by about 10 minutes.
Using A Gas Grill –
When using a gas grill, heat with both burners on high for 5 minutes,
then turn one burner off and place the meat on the side of the grill
in which the burner is off and cook for 12 minutes. Then turn on both
burners and turn the meat and place it on the other side of the grill
and turn the burner under the meat off and cook for another 12
minutes. Repeat this process for three times or a total of 36
minutes. After 36 minutes, baste the chicken with the your sauce of
your choice and then turn and move the chicken to the opposite side
of the grill and baste the other side (at this point you should have
sauce on both sides). Cook for an additional 5 minutes.
Using A Charcoal
Grill – If you are using a charcoal grill heat the coals until they
turn ash white. To cook the chicken indirectly on a charcoal grill
you will need to move the coals either to the middle of the grill and
cook the chicken on the outside of the grate away from the coals, or
push the coals all to one side and cook on the side away from the
coals. Follow the same cooking process as if you are using a gas
grill.
Conclusion
Buying meat and
poultry when it is on sale and freezing them for later use can be a
valuable way to stretch your families food budget. At our house, we
rarely any purchase meat or poultry unless it is on sale. Having
purchased chicken when it was on sale is only half the equation, if
you cannot grill it correctly, you are simply throwing your money
away. The great thing is that grilling chicken thighs and drumsticks
on the grill is easy and anyone can learn to grill juicy, delicious
chicken, all it takes is a little practice. Just because I did not
use a rub or a marinade for this recipe does not mean that you
cannot. I have several recipes such as jerk chicken in which I use a
marinade, and I have my own barbecue chicken rub that I also like to
use. Rather my goal was to show you just how easy you could cook
great grilled chicken with just a liberal amount of salt and pepper
and a quick grilling sauce of your choice. Heck you do not even have
to use a sauce. I grilled a couple of pieces for the wife without the
sauce because she likes her grilled chicken with just salt and
pepper. As always, if you have enjoyed this article, please share it
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