Beer Butt Chicken
The name may be awful, but this recipe very tasty. It is basically your poor man’s rotisserie chicken. It’s also easy and entertaining to make for your guests.
The way it works is that you use an opened, almost full, can of beer to help hold up your chicken on an outdoor grill to roast it evenly as opposed to searing it on the grates which would never work. The beer inside the can will also steam the bird making it tender and juicy.
The way you do it is to stuff the beer can up inside a whole, cleaned, chicken and stand the chicken upright on the grill sitting on the beer can and balance it in combination with the chickens legs. My family tries to use the more politically correct and friendly name of “Chicken Sitting on a Beer Can”.
There are recipes and tricks to make a great beer butt chicken. You can season the chicken, or put fresh herbs and garlic down the neck of the chicken. I have found the best seasoning, however, to be the smoke from the drippings. To get this effect without torching the bird, you need to put down a small square of heavy duty aluminum foil under the bird to catch most of the drippings, and most importantly not hit the flames directly below which would cause flare ups. You also need to keep the lid closed as much as possible for the best effect. Cooking time can be anywhere from 40 – 100 minutes depending on the size of the chicken. (and how often you open the lid) I prefer to use smaller chickens and always use a meat thermometer. I also like to do a few at a time, as everyone likes the legs and it makes great chicken sandwiches the next day.
This technique has become quite popular as you can now buy stands to help hold your beer can and chicken up at Wal-Mart. I’ve found this to be a worthwhile investment in order to move the chicken around on the grill, especially if your grill has hot spots. The best piece of equipment you can buy is the grill. Don’t fool around, get a Weber.
The best part of all this is that it is the perfect way to use up that six-pack of crap your neighbors left behind in your refrigerator last week and you can enjoy a fine, craft brewed, beer while grilling and eating. A smoky chicken does nice with an English pale ale, ESB and some porters. I’d avoid a smoky or roasty beer because the lack of contrast, they will fight more than compliment each other, in my humble opinion.
