I decided to smoke a few whole chickens this weekend and to do that, I spatchcocked them first.  If you’re unfamiliar with that term, you can read my post all about it here:  How To Spatchcock a Chicken

Now, since they’re just chickens, I didn’t fire up the smoker, but instead went with the charcoal grill and indirect heat.  I had the cooking chamber running a little hotter than I normally would on the smoker, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing with these chickens.  It always works well for me, though, your mileage may vary.

Inside of Chicken prior to seasoning

So I prepped the chickens by cutting out the backbones.  Then I liberally applied my Cinnamon Chipotle rub to the underside and the skin side.  I allowed those to just hang out in the fridge for about an hour while I got the grill ready.

Inside of chicken, post-seasoning

Topside of chicken, pre-seasoning

Top side of chicken, post seasoning.

Then, I placed them on the grill with the breasts facing the heat source, but not on top of the heat directly.  And shut the lid.  About 3 hours later, I temp probed it, it was done and I removed it from the grill to rest for about a half hour before I pulled it.

Just perfect. Pull apart tender and really juicy.

Truth be told, these chickens would have pulled apart into quarters just fine, but we usually just pull it and mix the dark and white meats together so everyone can have some of everything.

Ready to dive in to

And with leftovers?  We got about two days’ worth of lunches out of that.

Super easy to do, and super tasty too.