Just made a chicken for the 1st time using my rotisserie and the infrared back burner.
Turned out great! Skin was a perfect, crunchy brown, and the meat tender and moist.
Real trick to this is to brine the chicken overnight first.
Here's how it went:
Started with a 4 lb. roaster. Wash well with cold water. Trim off any extra fat around tail.
In a stockpot or other large vessel, add 1/2 cup kosher salt, 1/2 cup brown sugar, 10-15 peppercorns, 2-3 large garlic cloves - mashed. Add just enough hot water to stir and disolve salt and sugar. Take a couple lemons and jest the skins into the brine mixture. Then, halve the lemons and add to mixture. Place chicken in the stockpot and add cold water to just cover. Place in refrigerator overnight.
Next day, remove chicken and rinse well with cold water and pat dry with paper towels.
At this point, you can do all sorts of prep for the chicken, such as adding butter and rosemary under skin, in cavity, etc. I decided that since this was my first attempt with the rotisserie and infrared that I would keep it simple. All I did was spray a little canola oil spray on the chicken, season well with kosher salt and ground black pepper, and add 3 nice sized garlic cloves to cavity. I then tied the legs and wings up well with butcher twine.
I preheated the left and right bottom burners on the grill at medium heat. I left the center bottom burner off. I centered the chicken on the rotisserie bar, placed on grill, and started the rotation. Using aluminum foil, I made a "drip catch" and placed under chicken on grate to save on clean up later. I then fired up the infrared burner in the back. I started out on high and checked every few minutes. After about 20 minutes, it appeared that the skin might be getting done a little too fast, so I backed it down to about half. I took a couple readings with my instant read thermometer, and at about 1 hour, it read 170 F when inserted into the thigh. Done.
I removed the chicken and let it set, tented with aluminum foil for about 20 minutes.
It was the best tasting rotisserie chicken I've had yet!
