Debunking Beer Can Chicken
June 4, 2016 4:09 PM   Subscribe

A Waste of Good Beer, An Inferior Cooking Technique, And Dangerous
In the words of Sterling Ball ... "I think Beer Can Chicken is a religion. We need a little separation of faith and science here."
podcast
posted by maggieb (96 comments total) 23 users marked this as a favorite
 
Two words. Spatch Cocking.
posted by Sphinx at 4:12 PM on June 4, 2016 [19 favorites]


MetaFilter: The beer is wrapped in a chicken coozie
posted by zachlipton at 4:13 PM on June 4, 2016 [6 favorites]


Sphinx I spatchcock my chicken even when I'm just roasting it in the oven. Which is every time I make a whole chicken, because I don't have a grill. I can do a five pound bird in 45 minutes flat, and that's a game changer.

You know what else is good? Slow cooker whole chicken. Stick it under the broiler for a few minutes after it's done, and baby you got some damn fine chicken.
posted by SansPoint at 4:16 PM on June 4, 2016 [12 favorites]


The best part about spatchcocking is that when you cut the spine out of the chicken you can pretend you are a Predator.
posted by srboisvert at 4:20 PM on June 4, 2016 [22 favorites]


I wish I could distribute this all over the world and infuse it into the brains of all men. Along with the "feel" test for determining if a steak is rare or medium, the belief that somehow putting a chicken on a beercan infuses it with flavor is one of those mind viruses that cooks (mostly masculine macho grilling men) consider to be The Absolute Gospel. I suggested once to one relative that there are better ways to grill a chicken than the beercan method and the backlash was worse than if I suggested America was not the Greatest Country on Earth, with all kinds of swearing to the fact that they know that the beercan method makes better chicken because they have seen and tasted the evidence.
posted by dis_integration at 4:39 PM on June 4, 2016 [14 favorites]


Spatchcocked and broiled at 500° over a pan full of cut carrots and parsnips which turn to schmaltzy candied veg OMG
posted by nicwolff at 4:41 PM on June 4, 2016 [33 favorites]


Unless you're making stuffing and no one makes stuffing anymore , just spatchcock your roasts, faster , easier to manage, easier to store leftovers, all god.
posted by The Whelk at 4:44 PM on June 4, 2016 [2 favorites]


Spatchcock is a great word, but hardly robust enough to replace "Beer can chicken."

"Brick Chicken" - where you get to cook on the grill with construction materials, and step one is "rip out the spine of your prey" - now you got yourself a red-blooded, nail-spitting, two-fisted OMGWTFBBQ recipe.

Also you can intimate to your guests with your scariest Christoph Waltz impression zat zee vurd für zis technique ist "Spatchcock", undt means "dead rooster", from zee Englischer vurd "dispatch," vich means "to kill" undt zee Englischer vurd "cock" vich means a boy-chicken." And then you raise a conspiratorial eyebrow.
posted by Slap*Happy at 4:49 PM on June 4, 2016 [20 favorites]


On reading the article all the way to the comments, the pushback there is real, starting with threatening ad hominems and continuing on to "cooking is not science, beer can chicken imparts the magical beer fairy dust of pure testosterone into the chicken" woo-type thinking. Why is this so treasured a technique?
posted by dis_integration at 4:50 PM on June 4, 2016 [3 favorites]


The feel test absolutely works for cuts that are one muscle
posted by JPD at 4:51 PM on June 4, 2016 [9 favorites]


I guess maybe if you cook a lot of steaks, like a professional chef might, you can develop a sense of the feel. I've found that the only thing I trust is a thermometer.
posted by dis_integration at 4:54 PM on June 4, 2016 [6 favorites]


Oh no, the best thing about spatchcocking a bird is the unrelenting hysterics it causes when you say the word to teenagers.
posted by SecretAgentSockpuppet at 4:54 PM on June 4, 2016 [13 favorites]


I think Beer Can Chicken is a religion.

I spatchcock my chicken


SPLITTER!!
posted by pyramid termite at 5:00 PM on June 4, 2016 [18 favorites]


No trussing the bird with butcher's twine? Is that just an aesthetic thing?
posted by indubitable at 5:09 PM on June 4, 2016


I made beer can chicken once. It was good! I might even do it again, regardless of all this bean plating.

IMO, try to find air-cooled chicken. There's a brand in Chicago available at Mariano's grocery stores called Bell & Evans. It's more expensive, but still not really pricy. I have found that it's nearly impossible to get a bad result with this kind of chicken in any cooking method, unless you are being really inattentive.
posted by jeff-o-matic at 5:11 PM on June 4, 2016 [1 favorite]


The only way to really tell when a chicken is cooked well enough is to roast it with your hand in the cavity the entire time so you can feel exactly when it's ready
posted by beerperson at 5:12 PM on June 4, 2016 [42 favorites]


Also... I'd agree that the beer doesn't impart flavor. But what it does is allow you to bake the chicken in an upright position, where no particular piece is getting more heat than any other. It could be done with some other prop, but a can of beer is handy and will add moisture to the roasting environment. I also happen to think that untrussed is generally better in a BBQ.
posted by jeff-o-matic at 5:16 PM on June 4, 2016 [1 favorite]


Also... I'd agree that the beer doesn't impart flavor. But what it does is allow you to bake the chicken in an upright position, where no particular piece is getting more heat than any other. It could be done with some other prop, but a can of beer is handy and will add moisture to the roasting environment. I also happen to think that untrussed is generally better in a BBQ.

The article debunks these points.
posted by dis_integration at 5:20 PM on June 4, 2016 [13 favorites]


I very tentatively sent this page to a friend of mine a year or so go ago.
I was very careful to really hedge, y'know things like "of course I haven't tried it but" and so on.
He was upset at first, but I think conceded to the force of the evidence here.
It was a difficult time though.

Thing is, most people haven't tried an upright cook without the beercan, so the benefits of the upright cook get merged in to the idea of the beer.
posted by Just this guy, y'know at 5:21 PM on June 4, 2016 [8 favorites]


Yeah, I read that but disagree. Everyone's grill is different, even the level of wind on a specific day makes a difference.
posted by jeff-o-matic at 5:21 PM on June 4, 2016 [2 favorites]


Yeah but... It's fun. And it looks funny. And guests like it. And the end product is tasty. So what if there are better ways to make chucken? This way is good and entertaining.

Do we have to ruin everything?
posted by bondcliff at 5:24 PM on June 4, 2016 [16 favorites]


6) Pieces kick Beer Butt Chicken in the butt. Cutting the bird into pieces is the best method, if you do it right.
[...]
You can monitor each individual piece, and if you use a good digital thermometer you will be shocked to see how different they are. You can move each piece closer to or further from the direct heat so nothing overcooks. At about 150°F, you move each piece skin side down to the direct heat hot side and brown it. It is vital that you use the 2-zone system to make this work or the thin edges of the chicken will overcook and the meat will dry out.
Finally, a method to accomodate the griller who needs to be constantly messing with the meat while it cooks.
posted by indubitable at 5:27 PM on June 4, 2016 [13 favorites]


bondcliff I'd just rather drink the beer, is all.
posted by SansPoint at 5:30 PM on June 4, 2016 [5 favorites]


You can drink it once you pried the can out of the chicken cavity. Win win.
posted by peeedro at 5:32 PM on June 4, 2016 [1 favorite]


> Finally, a method to accomodate the griller who needs to be constantly messing with the meat while it cooks.

A blog called "Amazing Ribs" would be preaching to the choir if it was telling them that they have to be even more detail-oriented about their meat grilling than they realized.
posted by ardgedee at 5:33 PM on June 4, 2016 [1 favorite]


According to this picture you can also do this without using any beer at all
posted by beerperson at 5:34 PM on June 4, 2016 [9 favorites]


You've never seen a fine dining restaurant serve Beer Can Chicken, have you?

I certainly have. Nice restaurants are not above having fun with food.

I've tried beer butt chicken (no one says beer can chicken) with good results but then I read some articles getting at the main criticisms here and I stopped making it that way. Upright chicken using one of the racks shown in the article works just as well as far as I can tell. Spatchcocking is always fun but gives a different result, sometimes better.
posted by Dip Flash at 5:41 PM on June 4, 2016


I think beer can chicken is very much Tim Allen-grunting-man voodoo, but I don't feel strongly about it.

I do feel strongly, though, that the Amazing Ribs Memphis Magic Dust (original recipe, with salt; not the one up there now) really is amazing on long-cooked meat, if you use good, potent spices. Killer, killer ribs.
posted by uncleozzy at 5:45 PM on June 4, 2016 [7 favorites]




Spatchcocking is nice and all, but the next next level is taking out all the bones.
posted by kenko at 6:41 PM on June 4, 2016 [15 favorites]


(Pepin goes on to tie up the chicken with stuff inside. But you can skip that part and just set it on a rack over a pan in the oven. The skin will get very crisp, serving is easy since it has no bones, it's great.)
posted by kenko at 6:42 PM on June 4, 2016 [2 favorites]


A Waste of Good Beer

I'd always assumed this was done with Miller, Coors, or some equally shitty beer. Anyway, that way, with Budweiser's recent name change, you could say that you "opened a can of America all over that bird's ass."
posted by duffell at 6:43 PM on June 4, 2016 [8 favorites]


Hell go a step further and say "blasted a can of america into the horrific wound that once hosted a cloaca"
posted by Ferreous at 6:56 PM on June 4, 2016 [17 favorites]


Never mind the spatch cocks. Gonna try this with an unwired champagne bottle.
posted by Mr. Yuck at 6:59 PM on June 4, 2016 [3 favorites]


The article claims that there is only a teaspoon of flavor in a can of beer. Assuming a beer like Yeungling, as illustrated in the article, or even better, if it's a can of Narragansett Lovecraft, if it's anything like my Patented No-Kidding Secret Poultry Rub applied to the body cavity, a teaspoon is damn plenty. You can legit taste that. Also the onion, shallots, garlic and rosemary sprigs, but also the rub.

You should still brick the chicken.
posted by Slap*Happy at 7:01 PM on June 4, 2016 [3 favorites]


Never mind the spatch cocks

...Here's the Sex Pistols?
posted by indubitable at 7:03 PM on June 4, 2016 [29 favorites]


Brewers do not test the plastic liners inside the can at cooking temperatures, and the ink on the outside of the can is not likely food grade.

Why this aspect doesn't make the recipe unpalatable to the aficionados is incomprehensible to me. I guess it's difficult to taste that plastic and roasted paint, but I'd rather not try, thank you very much.
posted by Rash at 7:09 PM on June 4, 2016 [10 favorites]


If crispy skin isn't essential, but intense flavor and juicy meat is, the dutch oven method is great. No butchering required!

As for boning (de-boning if there are teenagers around), my mother makes the best turkey every thanksgiving, She completely bones the bird, even the wings, and uses the bones for stock that will later be used for gravy. Stuffs it with oyster dressing and roasts it in the oven, then uses the drippings for gravy while the bird cools enough to carve. Doesn't look as pretty; the lack of bones makes it look like one of Tom Brady's underinflated footballs, but it is juicy, flavorful, and carving is foolproof-just slice straight through it.
posted by TedW at 7:18 PM on June 4, 2016 [5 favorites]


That Jaques Pepin vid tho! I saw another one where he made an omelette, and it was WRONG. Or so I thought. I saw another vid where he minced an onion with his little hardwood-handled carbon-steel paring knife, honed after every use, and now I do it that way every day, and I have little bitty onion bits and am satisfied, tho my knife now seems unweildy big. Now I also know how to debone a chicken. I can use this.
posted by Slap*Happy at 8:05 PM on June 4, 2016 [4 favorites]


Never mind the spatch cocks

Is that what Phil Jupitus is up to now?
posted by davros42 at 8:26 PM on June 4, 2016 [6 favorites]


The article claims that there is only a teaspoon of flavor in a can of beer. Assuming a beer like Yeungling, as illustrated in the article, or even better, if it's a can of Narragansett Lovecraft, if it's anything like my Patented No-Kidding Secret Poultry Rub applied to the body cavity, a teaspoon is damn plenty

The point the article makes is that the aromatics found in beer are incredibly diffuse (far less strong than a rub), but more importantly, due to the fact the beer never reaches the appropriate temp, the flavorings never leave the can.

People feel the beer imparts a flavor because they can smell it. You can open a beer, set it on the counter and smell it from across the kitchen, but that doesn't mean it's going to impart any flavor to any nearby foods you set out.
posted by sourwookie at 8:42 PM on June 4, 2016 [2 favorites]


the key to cooking meat is to use the lowest temperature your immune system will allow, until it is hot... then sear if you feel like it. steak, chicken whatever...

bbq is what you do when the meat has already gone off and you want to hide the taste of decay...
posted by ennui.bz at 8:44 PM on June 4, 2016


I gather from the response here this is a real thing that people do often enough to require debunking, rather than a very subtle parody of an "everything you know is wrong" article focused on a made up thing that clearly nobody has actually ever done?

Also, though I obviously have no dog in this fight, I find the temperature diagrams really surprising. If one had to guess at the ratio of thermal conduction to the inside surface of the bird from rising air to the thermal conduction from a liquid filled aluminum cylinder in direct contact with a very large and very hot metal grill, it's pretty hard to see how the hot air wins. This is especially true if the top of the bird is closed and doesn't allow hot gas to escape easily. That there's a temperature plot for the beer case, but not the non-beer case, makes me wonder if the temperature diagrams have any basis in reality.
posted by eotvos at 8:53 PM on June 4, 2016 [1 favorite]


Oh no, the best thing about spatchcocking a bird is the unrelenting hysterics it causes when you say the word to teenagers.

Also fun to describe your cats as spatchcocked when they're lying frog-style, belly down with splayed legs. (And the first time I heard of spatchcocking, it was in a French cookbook that said the French term is "a la grenouille," or froggy-style, but Google is not backing this up.)
posted by lazuli at 8:57 PM on June 4, 2016 [3 favorites]


I saw another vid where he minced an onion with his little hardwood-handled carbon-steel paring knife

The youtube video is predictably charming but Bon Appétit should definitely fire the person who gave it the caption "Jacques Pépin dices an onion better than you. Fact.". That is not the Jacques Pépin spirit!!!
posted by kenko at 8:58 PM on June 4, 2016 [15 favorites]


This guy is full of beer can.
posted by Docrailgun at 9:01 PM on June 4, 2016


Also from Amazing Ribs: resting your meat is a myth. All About Juiciness, Why It's Time To Give The Resting Meat Myth A Rest, Why Resting & Holding Meat Are Different, And Why It's Time To Stop Crying Over Spilled Juices

Ok I don't really care about the chicken but can we talk about this? Intuitively, it feels like regardless of mopping up juices with the meat after slicing, warmer (unrested) juices are going to evaporate more quickly?
posted by juv3nal at 9:08 PM on June 4, 2016


warmer (unrested) juices are going to evaporate more quickly?

You had better not have juices coming out of your steak anywhere near a temperature where you would notice evaporative loss. If it were that hot in the first place it would be tough as nails anyway.
posted by kenko at 9:12 PM on June 4, 2016 [2 favorites]


Finally, a method to accomodate the griller who needs to be constantly messing with the meat while it cooks.

I tried that once, but got distracted and ended up burning dinner.
posted by Greg_Ace at 9:33 PM on June 4, 2016 [2 favorites]


A lukewarm mug of tea will still leave visible condensation if you stick a plate over it to try to keep it (luke)warm for later though?
posted by juv3nal at 9:34 PM on June 4, 2016


Step 1: throw whole chicken in Vitamix, run on high for 7 minutes
Step 2: dump that in beer
Step 3: Bask in glory
posted by Joseph Gurl at 9:55 PM on June 4, 2016 [5 favorites]


Pink Slime Beer - only for the adventurous!
posted by Greg_Ace at 9:56 PM on June 4, 2016 [3 favorites]


I mean, you joke, but in the 17th century a drink called Cock Ale, which consisted of beer fermented on an entire chicken, was a major thing.

Not even kidding
posted by Itaxpica at 10:07 PM on June 4, 2016 [4 favorites]


If crispy skin isn't essential,

Flagged as noise.
posted by ActingTheGoat at 10:09 PM on June 4, 2016 [33 favorites]


The beer can method always seemed dumb to me. Never tried it. The best chicken I ever had was in Brittish Columbia. We bought it at some grocery store then drove up the Sunshine Coast. We parked and as soon as we had the kayaks packed and in the water it started to rain. We paddled to our campsite in a downpour. I somehow got a fire lit in the rain and we slow roasted that chicken on a spit over the fire melting butter on to it as we went. It was amazing. But that was probably mostly the circumstances. If I had to do it again I would bring salt, at least. And check the weather first.
posted by jeffamaphone at 10:25 PM on June 4, 2016 [2 favorites]


Also forget spatchcocking, beer canning, or anything else: Thomas Keller's recipe makes the best damn roast chicken on the planet. And pretty much all you do is stick the bird in the oven.
posted by Itaxpica at 10:34 PM on June 4, 2016 [11 favorites]


I love how many recipes links I've saved from this thread
posted by flaterik at 10:38 PM on June 4, 2016 [1 favorite]


Beer Can Chicken was How You Grilled Chicken when I was growing up in Indiana. A couple of years ago I got deep into the Amazing Rivs tests and tried a bunch of his chicken recipes. Completely parting out the chicken has always worked best for me - better overall meat than whole on a grill, and faster, too.
posted by JoeBlubaugh at 10:41 PM on June 4, 2016


I mean, you joke, but in the 17th century a drink called Cock Ale, which consisted of beer fermented on an entire chicken, was a major thing.

Huh. My recipe is really different...
posted by Joseph Gurl at 12:33 AM on June 5, 2016 [6 favorites]


I think Meathead Goldwyn (the author of the linked article) is wrong.

Because the way beer and can are set up for beer can chicken, crude as it is, gives them all the essential elements for a functional heat pipe, and heat pipes are formidably efficient mechanisms for transferring heat from one place to another:
A heat pipe is a heat-transfer device that combines the principles of both thermal conductivity and phase transition to efficiently manage the transfer of heat between two solid interfaces.

At the hot interface of a heat pipe a liquid in contact with a thermally conductive solid surface turns into a vapor by absorbing heat from that surface. The vapor then travels along the heat pipe to the cold interface and condenses back into a liquid – releasing the latent heat. The liquid then returns to the hot interface through either capillary action, centrifugal force, or gravity, and the cycle repeats. Due to the very high heat transfer coefficients for boiling and condensation, heat pipes are highly effective thermal conductors. The effective thermal conductivity varies with heat pipe length, and can approach 100 kW/(m⋅K) for long heat pipes, in comparison with approximately 0.4 kW/(m⋅K) for copper.
In the case of beer can chicken, the working fluid, beer, evaporates from the upper surface of the beer in the can -- which is about 2/3 of the way up the can according to Goldwyn -- and will then condense in one of two places: the interior walls of the empty upper third of the can, or the chicken itself, and will there give up two kinds of heat to the surface it condenses on: 1) the heat it would take to raise that packet of vapor from the temperature of the surface to the temperature the vapor has just before it condenses, and 2) the latent heat of vaporization of the beer, which is independent of the temperature of the surface it condenses on and independent of the temperature difference between the surface and the vapor. Then the condensed liquid (all that condenses inside the can and at least some that condenses on the chicken directly) drips back down into the liquid in the can, and the whole cycle begins again.

What Goldwyn fails to appreciate, if he was thinking in terms of latent heat at all in the first place, is that the latent heat is much, much greater than the heat due to the temperature difference, and does not require a large difference in temperature to efficiently transfer heat:
The advantage of heat pipes over many other heat-dissipation mechanisms is their great efficiency in transferring heat. A pipe one inch in diameter and two feet long can transfer 12,500 BTU (3.7 kWh) per hour at 1,800 °F (980 °C) with only 18 °F (10 °C) drop from end to end.[2]

And that huge bolus of latent heat is what makes beer can chicken an efficient cooking mechanism.
posted by jamjam at 12:46 AM on June 5, 2016 [12 favorites]


What I would like to know is whether any individual who played a major role in developing the beer can method knew they were making a heat pipe, or whether it was all intuition, close observation, and trial and error.
posted by jamjam at 1:08 AM on June 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


Science fight!
posted by corb at 1:09 AM on June 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


Mod note: A couple of comments deleted. 1) Don't drag in arguments from other threads. 2) If someone drags in arguments from other threads, flag it and move on instead of extending the derail.
posted by taz (staff) at 1:52 AM on June 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


What I would like to know is whether any individual who played a major role in developing the beer can method knew they were making a heat pipe

Zog, inventor of wheel, have no clue how to build Tesla car.
posted by rhizome at 2:07 AM on June 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Heat pipes have to actually boil the liquid* though, and one of the main points in the article is that the beer is never getting hot enough to boil. In a heat pipe the vapor also has to circulate, and another point in the article is that chicken fat drips into the can where it floats in a thick layer on top of the beer and prevents any possible circulation of beer vapor.

* Water based heat pipes, like you see to cool computers, are hermetically sealed, and the internal pressure is lower than ambient in order to lower the boiling point of water, which is how they are able to operate at temperatures lower than 100C.
posted by Pyry at 2:16 AM on June 5, 2016 [5 favorites]


Zing!
posted by Joseph Gurl at 3:42 AM on June 5, 2016


I SWEAR TO GOD ME AND THAT CHICKEN WERE JUST FRIENDS
posted by Spatch at 3:58 AM on June 5, 2016 [26 favorites]



bbq is what you do when the meat has already gone off and you want to hide the taste of decay...


I'm sorry for whatever upbringing led you to this sad outlook on life (ignoring the fact that it's French cuisine and the sauces to cover the turned meat that you're thinking of).

Goldwyn's site is a treasure trove, and yeah, he can get a little too "all that you believed is wrong" sometimes, but if nothing else, the bit about contacting AB to ask about using bud cans is worth paying attention to. AB said that their process of labeling cans doesn't take into account the idea that someone might use them in a grill, and don't account for that. Not only that, but a good number of beer cans have linings to preserve the beer, and they aren't designed with high temps in mind.

Vertical roasting is pretty great, and wire rack stands are pretty cheap. Since I read about the AB response on Amazing Ribs, though, I'll pass on using the actual can.

And meat thermometers are awesome for cooking. Lots less guess work, and let's you know when your meat has reached minimum safe doneness.
posted by Ghidorah at 4:23 AM on June 5, 2016 [7 favorites]


I'm sceptical about the heat pipe theory, at least as things stand. It seems feasible with much less beer (allowing the liquid to evaporate at a non-negligible rate), although I suppose it's entirely possible that convection through an upright chicken on a trivet would still do a better job of heat transfer and would definitely do a better job of adding flavour through browning.
posted by howfar at 4:30 AM on June 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


I SWEAR TO GOD ME AND THAT CHICKEN WERE JUST FRIENDS

You're never going to become primer minister at that rate.
posted by sebastienbailard at 5:31 AM on June 5, 2016 [5 favorites]


Along with the "feel" test for determining if a steak is rare or medium, the belief that somehow putting a chicken on a beercan infuses it with flavor is one of those mind viruses that cooks (mostly masculine macho grilling men) consider to be The Absolute Gospel.

I think "searing meat locks in juices" is still a more pervasive myth.
posted by werkzeuger at 5:33 AM on June 5, 2016 [4 favorites]


That means that in a 12 ounce can of beer, there is less than 1 teaspoon of flavor, even in big dark beers like stout the flavor compounds are a very small part of the brew. Since only a few whispy vapors emerge from the can to condense only on the inside of the shoulder, it is impossible for the beer to flavor the meat in any detectable way.

What if I apply a salamander blowtorch to the beer periodically to, you know, put the beer at evaporation temperature?

That's also quite a big deal made about "only" "one teaspoon of flavor." Lol whut. I'm assuming the author would protest if I applied "only" a teaspoon of habanero-infused BBQ sauce to his eyes. It's only a teaspoon. IT'S ONLY A TEASPOON.
posted by iffthen at 5:41 AM on June 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Thanks for the Pepin video, kenko, that is something I wanted to learn, and seeing Jacques work is aweworthy.
posted by Dashy at 5:41 AM on June 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


Seconded thanks kenko. That video showed a masterful performance. "For stock, of course"... I love that man.
posted by iffthen at 5:57 AM on June 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


I know this kind of thing riles some people up, but for those who are willing to try: Take Pepin's method of deboning, separate out the leg/thigh from the breast, making sure there is lots of skin. Take some transglutaminase and re-attch the skin back on. Now you have a boneless chicken leg/thigh with skin complete around it. Cook to taste; I usually SV it for 3 hours or so @ 65 C and then deep fry in very hot oil (about 200 C) for a couple of minutes. You get super juicy chicken, lovely to eat with no bone in side, just meat all the way through and completely surrounded by delicious crispy skin. I've done this a whole bunch of times, to the point where i've gotten the whole break-down and debone process to less then 5 min/chicken. In any case, it is a great way to eat chicken.

For summer though, spatchcocking on the grill is the way we go more most of the summer. Occasionally broke down into pieces and pan roasted on the grill (cast iron and the grill get along fine).

I brought up the fact the taste testing has show that beer can chicken doesn't make a difference with a couple of hard core grillers. They were outraged and said they could taste the difference (but by memory only, of course). I didn't bother to engage the argument about taste testing entirely by memory, and the pointlessness of it. In either case, it still tastes good, and if gets people out cooking their own meals instead of eating prepared foods, I'm good with it.
posted by Bovine Love at 7:34 AM on June 5, 2016 [4 favorites]


dis_integration: "I suggested once to one relative that there are better ways to grill a chicken than the beercan method and the backlash was worse than if I suggested America was not the Greatest Country on Earth, with all kinds of swearing to the fact that they know that the beercan method makes better chicken because they have seen and tasted the evidence."

The placebo effect is powerful; and to someone feeling its effects the chicken would taste better done this way.

I've done chicken this way quite a bit however I use one of those stands rather than an actual can (after someone on metafilter pointed out the melted plastic thing (which maybe is bogus if the can doesn't reach even the boiling point of alcohol)) and my stand came with a cup that I pour 7-up not beer into. The cup doesn't block the flow of air and because it isn't touching the interior cavity it doesn't collect fat to any appreciable degree.

Also the cup has noticeably less fluid in it at the end than when starting because unlike stated in the linked article evaporation does not require boiling temperatures. That is such a weird error to make for someone who is being all science-y in his writing.
posted by Mitheral at 7:37 AM on June 5, 2016 [5 favorites]


I am a big fan of BCC mainly because it's just so darn easy. But I do want to argue the point about the beer not imparting any flavor or penetrating the chicken. I had a dinner party once and did 3 chickens on the grill. I used empty cans and in 2 of them I put chardonnay, butter, lemon, and herbs. In the third, I ran out of chardonnay and didn't want to open yet another bottle, so into the third can I finished off a bottle of red, along with some herbs. I cooked all three chickens, and they hit the table. The first two tasted and smelled of chardonnay and butter throughout. (The chickens had not been basted or otherwise prepped with butter, beyond what went in the can.) The third chicken I cut open and it was pink. Through and through, it was pink. At first I thought, How did this one not get cooked? But I tested it all over with a digital thermometer and it was 175-180 through and through. After a couple experimental bites, it was agreed (again by smell and taste) that the red wine had made its way throughout the third chicken. So maybe it doesn't get hot enough to boil or steam, but there is certainly something going on there.
posted by xedrik at 7:49 AM on June 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Oh my god, Dutch oven chicken. DUTCH. OVEN. CHICKEN. The best thing I ever ate was a chicken we'd marinated with basically Italian dressing (olive oil, vinegar, wine, bunch of herbs) all day while we canoed on a sparkling Cascades lake not catching bass, threw it in a cast iron pot and directly on the campfire. Cook for exactly the amount of time it takes to drink two whiskeys (sizes may vary) and one beer and when everyone agrees that it "looks about done" remove from coals. The heat of the cast iron directly on the fire with the olive oil perfectly crisped the skin.

I doubt I could replicate the exact conditions again, but beer cans go in the cup holder on your camp chair.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 9:22 AM on June 5, 2016 [7 favorites]


The reason I will never make beer can chicken is the same reason I don't heat up anything in the original can. I don't eat burnt plastic. Or burnt aluminum.
posted by Splunge at 11:53 AM on June 5, 2016


Also fun to describe your cats as spatchcocked when they're lying frog-style, belly down with splayed legs.

Yes it is.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 12:17 PM on June 5, 2016 [3 favorites]


From the comments:

Meathead, the article stunk, just as most do written by liberals. I'm surprised the article didn't suggest eating tofu

Oh, man. I love how having a hypothesis, testing it, and presenting your case with collected facts and data is somehow liberal.
posted by sourwookie at 1:27 PM on June 5, 2016 [13 favorites]


> Also from Amazing Ribs: resting your meat is a myth.

I don't reach such a strong conclusion from the evidence presented. Resting more than 5 minutes might be pointless as one of his source's found, but it probably takes under 1/2 minute pan to table at my house (serving hungry impatient teenager), so 5 minutes is not just found in the slack. That source, J. Kenji López-Alt of the 1,536 cookies, previously.
posted by morganw at 4:23 PM on June 5, 2016


I like to spatchcock 45 chickens and sew them around a beer keg before grilling. Best of both worlds.
posted by ryoshu at 4:46 PM on June 5, 2016 [8 favorites]


I SWEAR TO GOD ME AND THAT CHICKEN WERE JUST FRIENDS

Not according to jessamyn.
posted by MikeKD at 7:33 PM on June 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


For those following along at home, I made a fantastic chicken via the bone-and-lay-flat method, with a fermented hot pepper puree rubbed under the skin (lift the skin from the flesh for extra crispiness!) and potatoes and broccoli in the pan under the rack. As for the beer, reader, I drank it.
posted by kenko at 8:31 PM on June 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Like all Real Men I prefer to flash-fry my chook in liquid oxygen. It will turn the bird, the grill, the patio, and your guests to a savory ash.
posted by um at 10:56 PM on June 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


I made two BCCs just today (using a proper thermometer) and they were delicious as always... Which I cannot say about my attempts at cooking a flattened/spatchcocked bird on the grill.

The beer can does prevent the inside from browning, but I don't need browned chicken meat. I need crisped skin, dark meat that falls off the bone, and white meat that is juicy. I have never been able to accomplish that for a whole chicken on a grill except when using the BCC method.

I suspect he's right that a wire stand will work just as well, and I'm going to buy one and try it. But I'm not going to subject chicken skin to the direct heat of a grill (unless it's on VERY low). I like smoke, but not the smoke from incinerated chicken fat.
posted by Pruitt-Igoe at 2:10 AM on June 6, 2016 [2 favorites]


Personally, I've never had to resort to the beer can, as I've had good results with just grilling the chicken whole, as well as spatchcocking and jointing. But I guess a lot of that is going to depend on the sensitivity of the grill and the insulation properties of your cover. But doing what works for you is always going to be the ultimate answer to any of these "You are doing X wrong" things.
posted by howfar at 3:47 AM on June 6, 2016


So, using the Pepin link upstream, I've just deboned an entire chicken. To the amazement of teenagers who now think I'm some sort of kitchen ninja. Hee!
posted by SecretAgentSockpuppet at 8:49 AM on June 6, 2016 [5 favorites]


I remember coming home from college one summer and my dad had discovered beer can chicken. Both my parents were incredibly excited about it. I found it to be just another roast chicken, dry because of my dad's usual overcooking. I never seemed to get the juiciness that my parents swore was in the chicken. I always suspected that part of why he did this, however, was to have an additional six pack to drink that night.

Beer can chicken - enabling alcoholics since whenever.
posted by Hactar at 10:00 AM on June 6, 2016 [2 favorites]


I mean, you can't just leave those other five beers on the rings like that, they'll be all lop-sided in the fridge.
posted by tobascodagama at 10:57 AM on June 6, 2016 [2 favorites]


Metafilter: the bone-and-lay-flat method
posted by hanov3r at 11:02 AM on June 6, 2016 [4 favorites]


It's actually unlikely you're melting the plastic lining unless you let the can somehow run completely dry. Aluminum is an excellent conductor of heat, so it literally can't get above 100C until there is no more water to boil off.

I'd be slightly more concerned about the paint, except that the same maillard reaction that browns the skin on the outside also creates carcinogens. If you eat anything that is cooked, you are eating some amount of something that could possibly cause cancer. A tiny amount of charred paint seems unlikely to add significantly to the load of bad shit in the final product. (It seems unlikely to me that the paint would char anyway for the same reason I wouldn't worry about the plastic, but I can't say it doesn't happen)

Does anybody know what base the paint on aluminum cans actually is? The pigments wouldn't likely be a problem since they are almost certainly solid minerals that don't pyrolize at cooking temperature anyway...
posted by wierdo at 8:20 PM on June 6, 2016 [2 favorites]


If you eat anything that is cooked, you are eating some amount of something that could possibly cause cancer. A tiny amount of charred paint seems unlikely to add significantly to the load of bad shit in the final product. (It seems unlikely to me that the paint would char anyway for the same reason I wouldn't worry about the plastic, but I can't say it doesn't happen)

This is not remotely logical. Without knowing what's in the paint or what may burn off the can, you can't even pretend to compare it to the carcinogenic content of Maillard browning.
posted by Joseph Gurl at 12:19 AM on June 7, 2016 [2 favorites]


I didn't like removing the bird from the can, and I wasn't sure the beer cans didn't have some toxic liner or paint, so I bought a tray that was purpose-built for it. Now I slow cook my veggies and chicken at the same time.

Adding beer and spices that allegedly evaporate inside the bird, and matches the dry rub on the outside, results in a tender, juicy bird.

Now, please excuse me while I burn in my speaker cables. I have more important things to do.
posted by Chuffy at 9:38 AM on June 7, 2016 [1 favorite]


I finally got around to deboning a chicken, a la Pepin, and it was impressively straightforward! And so much better than carving a steaming hot bird. Thanks again, kenko.
posted by Dashy at 6:01 AM on June 17, 2016 [1 favorite]


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