Beer Lime Smoked Whole Chicken

I wanted to try smoking a whole chicken with a beer based marinade. I must say, the lime flavor came through much stronger than the beer flavor did. Either way, it was a delicious tasting bird.

Injecting, then slow smoking the bird in a pan that contains the marinade always produces a very tender and moist bird. I think you’re really gong to like this one. Just follow along, and you can’t go wrong!

Beer Lime Smoked Whole Chicken

Ingredients

1 whole chicken
1 apple
1 (12oz.) bottle beer
1/4 cup lime juice
1 teaspoon honey
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper

Preparation

Lets start with the marinade for injecting. In a bowl, mix all of the ingredients together, except for the chicken and the apple of course. Set this aside.

Thoroughly rinse the chicken and pat dry. Put the chicken in a medium sized aluminum baking pan. Cut your apple in half, then cut one half into four wedges and put the wedges loosely into the cavity of the bird. Don’t stuff it in there. There needs to be plenty of breathing room inside of the cavity when smoking to allow the heat and smoke to cook from inside the bird. You can eat the other half of the apple. It’s good for you!

Now take the marinade you made up, and using an injector, inject the bird in the legs, thighs and breast. Now pour the rest of the marinade into the  bottom of the pan.

Note: You don’t want too much liquid on the bottom of the pan. Too much, and the bottom of the chicken gets a little soggy.

Now put this into the refrigerator for about 2 hours.

After 2 hours in the refrigerator, remove the bird and set it on the counter to let it start getting close to room temperature before you put it on the smoker.

Now, let’s get the smoker going.

I loaded up the fire ring in my 18.5 Webber Smokey Mountain. You can check out my article, “Starting the Fire in a 18.5 Webber Smokey Mountain” for details on how to do that. For this cook, I decided to go with apple wood that was still green. I’ve noticed that using wood that’s still green imparts a stronger flavor to the meat.

Once the smoker is up to about 230 degrees, I put the chicken on.

I smoked it at an average temperature of 265 degrees. It fluctuated between 250 and 275 degrees. I typically smoke most meats at about 230 degrees. Especially if it’s something like pork or baby backs that I plan to take up to an internal temperature of around 200 degrees for pulling. But I believe chicken works out better if you cook it at a little higher temperature.

After a little more than 4 hours, the internal temperature of the bird was at 170 degrees. Time to pull it out, wrap it in aluminum foil, and let it set on the counter to rest for about an hour before carving.

After an hour of resting, wrapped in aluminum foil, I carved up the chicken. It was so tender, I didn’t even have to use a knife to remove the leg and thigh. And so tasty! I could definitely detect the lime flavor. Not so sure the beer flavor was all that distinct.

Here’s what it looked like before taking it off the smoker.