Today we’re doing another Kamado Joe JoeTisserie chicken.
This just might be the best JoeTisserie chicken recipe you ever made. If you never had a JoeTisserie chicken, you’re definitely missing out.
A chicken on the JoeTisserie is really easy to make and takes about an hour to cook once it’s on.
This rotisserie chicken turns out incredibly moist and juicy with golden brown and crispy skin.
So time to quit messing around. Let’s get started …
Kamado Joe JoeTisserie Chicken
We’re going to show you how to cook the best JoeTisserie chicken you’ve ever had.
Our JoeTisserie chicken recipe is really easy to make and takes about an hour to cook.
We’ve been cooking rotisserie chickens on the Kamado Joe quite a bit. With just a bit of advanced planning, it makes for an easy to make lunch or dinner meal.
After tasting this Kamado Joe JoeTisserie chicken recipe, you’ll be making this all the time! Great skin texture, juicy, and flavorful, this is one fantastic way to cook a chicken.
Once you make one of these you may never want to buy another grocery store rotisserie chicken again! This is a rotisserie chicken recipe that will outshine grocery store versions any day of the week.
There really is nothing better than a homemade rotisserie chicken hot off the spit!
Supplies Needed
Kamado Joe JoeTisserie, check out our product review here
Heat resistant gloves
Instant read thermometer, check out our product review here
Smoking wood, today we are using cherry
Barbecue towels, you need these, check out our product review here
Cotton kitchen twine for trussing
Paper towel lined sheet pan with wire cooling rack
The JoeTisserie spit will branding iron hot coming off the cook. You will need heat resistant gloves to handle the hot metal spit rod as you take it from the Kamado Joe to the cutting board.
We use these heavy-duty heat resistant gloves; they have held up very well. With hundreds of mostly 5 star Amazon customer reviews, this is evidence of a great product at a good price.
Ingredients
Whole chicken, about 4 pounds
Kosher salt
Fresh ground black pepper
JoeTisserie Chicken Recipe
This whole chicken we are spinning today weighed in at 3.82 pounds in an up to 5% saltwater solution. So said the cryovac label.
The day before the cook, cold-water rinse and paper towel dry the chicken.
Then place the bird on the wire cooling rack.
Next, liberally sprinkle the skin with kosher salt and fresh ground black pepper.
The salt will pull moisture from the chicken skin. Basically, the skin gets dehydrated. This method will give us that golden crispy skin texture we want and crave.
Now, refrigerate the seasoned bird overnight, uncovered.
The Next Day
You’ll want to get the bird going about an hour before meal time.
We also need to truss the chicken wings and legs using cotton kitchen twine so nothing flops around and falls into the charcoal while the JoeTisserie is doing its thing.
Place the chicken on the center of the spit rod and loosely secure the spit forks. We’ll do the final adjustments out on the grill.
Kamado Joe JoeTisserie Chicken – Grill Preparation
We found the best way to cook a whole chicken on the JoeTisserie was to bank up the lump charcoal more to the right side of the firebox. In this way, there is more charcoal heat under the legs and thighs.
We will also place the fire starter towards the top of the charcoal pile in the fire box. Just 1 charcoal fire starter is all that is needed for this cook.
In other words, this is almost like a two-zone cooking system!
Next, fire up and stabilize the Kamado Joe to a target temperature of 350 °F (177 °C) with the JoeTisserie insert place for this cook.
Don’t forget to add your smoking wood of choice. Today, we are using cherry. Cherry smoking wood produces a milder smoke and won’t overpower your food.
Want to know more about different smoking woods and how to use them? Then check out our book for more information, Wood Smoke and Smoking Wood, available only on Amazon.
How to Place the Chicken on the JoeTisserie
After fitting the spit rod into the JoeTisserie insert, make sure your chicken sits slightly to the right of center and secured on the spit rod. Just 2 or 3 inches should do it. As a result, having the legs and thighs slightly closer to the radiant heat ensures they get cooked to a higher temperature and not overcooking the breast.
The theory is that a sweet spot exists. Getting the chicken close enough to the thermal energy of the charcoal fire and focused where I want it, on the legs and thighs. The goal is to get the breast cooked to 165 °F (72 °C), and the leg and thigh meat cooked to 175 °F (79 °C), or more, all at the same time.
We don’t want any loose chicken pieces flopping about as the rotisserie motor turns. They will fall off into the hot charcoal fire. So make sure you truss those lose wings and tie together the legs.
JoeTisserie Chicken Cooking Time
The USDA says chicken, breasts, whole birds, legs, thighs, wings, all need to be cooked to a minimum internal temperature of 165 °F (74 °C).
Once the chicken is on the spit and spinning, it will take about an hour to get to that recommended USDA temperature.
Dark meat has an abundant amount of connective tissue which dissolves into gelatin as the meat cooks. The longer it cooks, the more the connective tissue breaks down making it juicy and tender. This means that chicken thighs are good at an internal temperature of 175 °F (74 °C), but they’re even better at 195 °F (91 °C).
So, we’ll start checking temperature at the 45-minute mark. Today, the thigh area was at 160 °F (72 °C) and the breast area was at 130 °F (54 °C). Not quite done enough.
At the 1-hour mark, the breast meat was running at 162 °F (72 °C) and the thigh meat area was at 185 °F (85 °C) as measured on the instant read thermometer. So we pulled it off for a short rest and carry over cooking.
Kamado Joe JoeTisserie Chicken Taste Test
So I overshot the final JoeTisserie chicken temperature by just a teeny tiny bit, just a few degrees.
But, the Kamado Joe JoeTisserie chicken was awesome as always! Actually, it never made if off the cutting board and over to the table. It was that good.
The skin was golden brown and had the texture that we like. The meat was wonderfully juicy, tender, and the aroma was out of this world.
Check out my Outdoor Eats page for more Kamado Joe and Kamado Joe JoeTisserie recipes.