Beer can chicken advice

[DoctorJ]

One problem I’ve run into is that whole chickens from the supermarket have usually been frozen. Sometimes when you buy it the outside seems thawed, but the inside is still frozen fairly solid. If you cook the chicken without knowing this, you’ll end up with perfectly cooked to overcooked chicken on the outside with a cool salmonella center.

As such, I always buy chicken the day before I want to cook it (leaving it in the fridge), or I buy one that I can be pretty sure hasn’t been frozen.

[Cervaise]

Brining also helps a bit to accelerate thawing of a frozen bird. It’s probably not necessary to brine and beer-can a bird, but it can’t hurt, either.

@cbawlmer

Do any of you recommend a specific brand of probe thermometer?

I currently have this one. Twenty bucks, and it’s lasted about a year and a half so far without problems. It also has the advantage of a temperature alarm: stick the probe into the thigh, set the alarm for 175F, and forget about it until the beeper goes off.