How to Grill BBQ Chicken Like a Pro

I'm Matt Abdoo, chef and pitmaster,

and today we're firing up the grills

to show you an incredibly easy take

on grilled barbecue chicken.

We're gonna show you all those amazing flavors

as we finish this chicken the entire way on the grill.

This is grilling 101.

[hand clapping]

This is not to be confused

with the low and slow verb of barbecue,

of cooking with wood, cooking with smoke,

and making barbecue chicken.

We are taking all the iconic seasonings

and flavors of the rubs and sauces

and putting it on our chicken

and finishing it entirely on the grill.

We're gonna be showing you how to cook breasts, legs,

and thighs, skin on and bone in.

Now, if you're doing it at home

and you wanna use boneless product,

by all means, you absolutely can.

The processes are still gonna say more or less the same,

but I love cooking with the skin and the bone on

because I just feel it gives so much more flavor.

Who doesn't like crispy skin?

And anytime you're cooking on anything on the bone,

it's always gonna have more flavor within it.

Every great barbecue chicken

starts with a great barbecue rub.

You probably already have all these ingredients

in your pantry.

I love making it in a food-safe container like this

with a lid.

First is light, brown sugar.

Next, we have some granulated sugar.

My barbecue seasoning has a good amount of sugar in it.

Now comes our spices.

Some sweet paprika.

You can make this smoked paprika

if you wanted to add a little bit more smoky flavor to it.

Some chili powder.

Next, we got some ground black pepper, some kosher salt.

Again, I like kosher salt here.

If you use table salt, it could be too fine.

Some granulated garlic.

I like granulated instead of powder.

Again, we're just looking at coarser textures.

But if all you have at home is powder,

you certainly can use that.

Some granulated onion.

Next, coming in with our green herbs,

I have some dried thyme.

I'm using dry because it's a dry rub.

This is not one of those times

where you can swap fresh for it

'cause we're making this a shelf-stable rub.

Some dried oregano, some ground cumin.

And last but not least, some ground fennel seed.

So now that everything's together in our container,

we're gonna put on our lid and give it a good shake.

[upbeat music]

Now let's give it a taste.

[upbeat music continues]

Perfect.

Sweet, salty, herbaceous, all those amazing spices in it,

delicious on chicken, pork, ribs, fish, you name it.

It's also amazing to take it

and shake it on your favorite potato chip

or even microwave popcorn.

Now it's time to season up our chicken.

But first things first,

what I'd like to do is brush the chicken

with a little bit of oil.

It's gonna help the chicken release from the grill

when we start cooking it.

Anything that's got a little bit of oil on it

is gonna help be a little bit more non-stick.

And it's also gonna be great for that barbecue seasoning

to really adhere well to that chicken skin.

We're just gonna flip and do the same on the bottom side.

I'm using olive oil because I'm partial to olive oil.

But if you don't have olive oil at home,

you can certainly use a vegetable oil.

We're looking forward is a nice, neutral oil.

One of the biggest distinctions between a pro chef

and a home cook is we like to season our foods aggressively.

We want to go heavy

'cause we want to really develop all that amazing flavor

that's in that barbecue rub.

We're gonna give it a flip

and just continue seasoning the top sides.

We wanna season from up high.

We don't wanna get too close.

We want it to evenly rain down onto that meat, that chicken,

whatever it is that we're seasoning.

Now that the chicken is seasoned,

we're gonna let it sit at room temperature

with the seasoning on it for about 10 to 15 minutes.

And what you're gonna notice in that time,

the sugars and the salts are gonna mix

with the natural moisture in that chicken

and they're almost gonna start to form a beautiful glaze

on the outside of this chicken

before we bring it to the grill.

[hands clapping]

Super important, we need to clean our grill

before we start cooking.

There are two types of grill brushes that are on the market.

One is a cold grill brush style,

which you can notice by the red bristles.

They're typically made out of some form of like plastic.

These are used for cleaning the grill when it's cold.

You do not want to use this grill brush

when the grill is hot.

The hot grill will melt these bristles.

And this is a style of a hot grill brush

that has the wire metal bristles on it.

These are great to use when the grill is nice and hot

to really scrape off any of those bits of carbon

or burnt on bits that are on the grill grates.

And sometimes if you're cooking multiple cooks,

make sure in between each protein you're putting on there,

we're cleaning the grill, so it's starting off like new.

Now, guys, when we're preheating the grill,

what I like to do, and I'm gonna teach you a phrase,

it's called zone cooking.

Meaning that we're gonna set one side of the grill

to medium, medium-high heat, and the other side set to low.

What we want is to create that high heat

on one side of the grill to start charring up

and rendering out that skin on the chicken.

And then when it comes time to flip,

we want it to finish nice and low and slow

with the skin side up on the cooler side of the grill.

It's gonna give us a lot more control

and also make a beautiful, more juicy finished product.

The first thing we need to do is preheat it.

I can see a flame coming out.

Hold it for a few seconds,

then we're just gonna turn this burner onto median heat.

Same with this burner, turn it down to medium.

And I'm gonna set these two knobs here

to a lower temperature.

While the grill's heating up

and now that the burners are lit, we're gonna close our lid

and let those grill grates get hot.

[hands clapping]

Our chicken's been seasoned, our grill is hot.

You see how the chicken kind of gets

that natural glistening like the sugars and the salts

in that rub are starting to dissolve

in the natural juices of that chicken.

We're gonna take our breasts first,

have the right side of the grill set up to high heat,

and I'll put them skin-side down.

[chicken sizzling]

Hear that sizzle?

That's what we need.

If it's not sizzling, your grill isn't hot enough yet.

Not time for the thighs and the legs.

Don't fidget with it.

Don't move it around.

Let that skin get nice and charred and rendered,

and then I'll be ready to flip.

Our chicken's been cooking for about four minutes.

I'm gonna take a look to see if it's releasing

and it's ready to turn.

No resistance.

The chicken picks right up.

And look at that.

The browning and the charring of the skin.

it looks gorgeous.

So from here, we're gonna take it skin-side up

and we're gonna move it over

to the lower heat side of the grill

and let it finish cooking.

It just gives you more control over the food you're making

and ultimately will result in a juicier interior.

The thighs are probably, believe it or not,

are gonna cook the fastest,

only because they're the smallest.

The chicken breast was probably gonna take the longest

because it's bigger and it's got that bone on the backside

that's really insulating the meat.

So our skin, they're charred,

they're rendered, they're golden brown.

It's time to put them over

to the lower heat side of the grill.

We're gonna close the lid

and we're gonna let it finish cooking

in that lower temperature,

creating almost like an oven environment over the chicken.

Our chicken's been cooking for about 10 minutes,

now's a great time to check the internal temperatures

to see where we are.

This is such an important tool.

Whenever you're cooking or barbecuing,

we're simply just gonna take it, open it up,

and we're gonna put it into the thickest part of the meat

and try to find the coldest temperature we can find.

The eyes are at 165, the legs are at 168.

Perfect.

Let's check our breasts.

The breasts are at 155,

so everything is coming along just as I expected.

Now is the perfect time. We wanna take our barbecue sauce

and glaze up that top side of the chicken.

We don't wanna put the barbecue sauce on too soon, guys.

I've seen lots of recipes out there

where somebody might be taking chicken,

they marinate it in barbecue sauce

and they put it on the grill,

and all that ends up happening is creating a burnt,

sugary flare up of a mess.

All you need to do is get your favorite barbecue sauce

that you know and you love out there, pour it into a bowl,

and use a brush to apply the barbecue sauce

to the top side of that chicken.

So we're just gonna take our brush,

dip it into the barbecue sauce

and just start painting the top side

in every area that's exposed on that chicken.

For this style of barbecue chicken,

I like to go pretty heavy handed

'cause we're only gonna be mopping it.

Once the barbecue sausage you're using,

make sure it's one of those that's a little bit thicker.

We don't want something

that's a vinegar-based barbecue sauce.

It's just not gonna stick

and it's gonna run off the chicken.

So now we're just gonna close the lid.

We wanna create that oven environment on our grill side,

which is gonna start cooking that barbecue sauce

without burning it.

It's gonna thicken it and make it really nice and sticky

and tacky to that chicken.

It's been 3 1/2 minutes since we've closed the lid.

Let's take a look.

Check that out.

See how that sauce has gotten nice and thick and sticky?

It still has that gorgeous shine.

So the last thing to do is take a temperature check.

The thigh, 175.

Perfect.

We have so much more wiggle room on the leg and thighs.

And honestly, for me, I think it eats better

when you cook the thigh to about 175.

Leg, same thing, we're at 170.

Perfect.

Let's check our breast.

Amazing.

We're right at 163.

That's gonna be great 'cause I'm gonna pull it off.

We're gonna let it rest.

Let's gonna carry you over cook a few more degrees,

right to that 165,

and that's exactly where we want it to be.

So now our chicken's perfectly cooked.

That sauce is sticky, it's glazed onto it,

let's move it over to our rack to let it rest.

If you cut into it too soon,

all that juice that's in the inside

is just gonna bleed out onto your plate.

Let it rest for about five minutes, then it's time to eat.

[hands clapping]

And there we have it.

Check this out.

Gorgeous, beautifully cooked, grilled barbecue chicken.

See how that barbecue sauce is nice and sticky.

It's on the chicken.

I don't know if you guys at home are salivating

as much as I am looking at this chicken,

but it's time to take a bite.

I'm gonna take a bite of the thigh.

Let's go.

Look at that.

Just perfectly cooked.

That glaze, it's sticky.

Here we go.

[upbeat music]

Oh yeah, it's everything you want

in barbecue grilled chicken.

Guys, I hope we've taken out a little bit of that mystery

behind cooking barbecue chicken.

I hope you're not afraid to do it.

Just go after it.

Have fun.

Do it.

Your friends, family, and loved ones

are definitely gonna love this recipe.

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