Bradley Smoker with Poultry [General]

2010 Jun 4
Hi I know that there are a lot of Bradley owners out there...I'm planning to use a Bradley on the weekend at a friends place, hopefully with a spatchcocked goose and apple pucks. Any tips on slow smoking poultry...I gather from the other threads that pucks last about 20 minutes and you can run food in the smoker 2-3 hours max before food starts to taste like fire. I figure 2 hours and a BBQ or oven finish should do the job, but I'd certainly welcome any recommendations...Thanks.

2010 Jun 4
I wouldn't go over 2 hours of actual smoke time, and would opt for a milder smoke until you really find what works for you. Hickory is a good place to start IMO. I'd say that a little less smoke is better than a little too much smoke. Good luck!

2010 Jun 4
Yes I'd second going for about 2 hours. I'd stick with the apple pucks over the hickory with goose - but I don't think you can go too far wrong.

2010 Jun 4
I third for 2 hours of apple. Tracinho if you BBQ it after post your results as I have not done chicken in the smoker I usually BBQ it with smoke packets.

2010 Jun 5
Tracinho - i don't use a lot of smoke with poultry, usually 1hr20min to 1hr40min max (4-5 bisquettes). a little goes a long way. the first time i did chicken in the Bradley it tasted like an ashtray. tip - make sure you keep the vent fully open for poultry. would also recommend apple over hickory.

definitely finish in the oven or on the BBQ, because if you finish in the Bradley at 225F-250F the skin will turn into rubber.

let us know how it goes!

2010 Jun 7
Ok, thanks for all the info guys. I’ve never cooked goose before so it was a learning experience, definitely delicious but like anything I think it is something you can improve upon with experience.

First trimmed the wing tips and all extra skin and fat around cavity openings, then brined goose in a simple sugar saltwater brine for about 12 hours. We set up the smoker with five cherry pucks at low temperature.

Rendered all the extra fat and trimmed skin in a sauce pan and then poached the organs in that. At a dead low simmer the heart was perfectly tender after about 2 hours and the gizzards had the melt in your mouth texture of Schwartz’s smoked meat after about 3ish hours. I’d say in flavour goose is close to a pork/roasted beef hybrid. The skin cracklings were perhaps the most tasty thing I’ve ever tried.

Put a roasting tray at bottom of cabinet to catch the rendered goose fat, put whole goose and neck above that and then 4 pork hocks at the top shelf of the cabinet. Ran smoker on low for two hours until 5 pucks were gone and then jacked it up to high (which seemed to be around 250F) for another 1.5 hours. Chopped up the smoked neck and then poached that in fat, it reminded me of oxtail in a good way.

Simmered the ham hocks in water until tender, and then quickly grilled them on the BBQ, they turned out quite well, lightly smoked with a pleasant but not overpowering flavour of a homemade smoked and cooked ham. I sliced some of the goose off after about 4 hours total (skin was a perfect golden brown colour) and the meat was a bit tough but really tasty. I ended up carving off all the goose meat into two big fillets (flesh had the colour of a smoked ham, very pink), grilled these fillets over direct heat for about 15 minutes to crisp the skin and then carved it all into bite sized pieces.

As I said flavour was excellent, just smoky enough without being unpleasant, but it was still chewy in the end, so it was somewhat of a miss in my opinion. I think it might take about 6-8 hours or more on low heat in the smoker, 3-4 hours on a low rotisserie or obviously goose would really take to moist methods like a dutch oven.