cooking @ home

Apricot-Glazed Grilled Chicken Drumsticks

October 1st, 2007 |

Author: HarryK

I had a BBQ party this weekend with relatives and friends attending. The star was (no surprise) my BBQ pork spare ribs. But that wasn’t going to be enough to feed this hungry crowd — not even with appetizers and sides, so I needed a second “main” course or second meat here, and while still maintaining that grill theme wanted to vary it as much as I could. Fist way to go different was a different meat, natch, in this case good-ol’ chicken, still there was no way it was going to be sauced identically to the first one.

Afterall, just because it’s barbeque doesn’t mean it has to be the “same BBQ”, if you know what I mean. If you don’t, then what I mean is this: there’s the traditional wood-chip “real” smoked BBQ. As you might recall from the primer, real BBQ means smoked and cooked by indirect-heating. Now to vary things up there’s the other way — which here in America is not technically called BBQ but grilling and this is — with direct heat, over the coals, and using dry rub and BBQ sauce

What ways can you vary it? Many. Go a different direction: Spicy, or sweet, tangy, fruity, mustardy, tomatoy, southwestern, Asian, Morrocan, Turkish, etc .. plus combinations of each. So for me, for this party, time to change up with sweet, so an apricot glazed chicken drumstick. Now mind you “sweet” is another relative word. I’m not trying to make this dessert. As you’ll see later in the ingredient list there’s some tang and always a touch of fire. But the predominent characteristic is, in this case, sweet.

Now drumsticks are difficult to cook. Hmm, difficult might not be the correct word. Let’s say, for their size, they take a surprisingly long time. A good medium drumstick will take around 45 minutes. I had bought a mix from the store, and opening the package, even though they were overall large, the 14 pieces did have a variety of sizes. About eight medium (ok, I said large overall, so medium here means “of those in the pack”, if you were looking at it normally, this medium you would consider “large”). For large (red jumbo) and four smaller ones (what you might normally consider to be “mediium”). Ah, everything is relative.

Point is that was three different cooking weights and cooking times. When this happens when I’m on the grill, I just start taking the smaller ones that look done, and move them over to a cooler side of the grill. If there is no such thing as a cooler side, or if the grill is just very hot overall, then I remove them right to a plate and cover immediately with foil.

Ok, one thing here to remind folks. You have to be careful, even over-careful with chicken. When you have something like this, drumsticks, you’re talking some meat around a big bone. That bone is what really causes “difficulty” in cooking. Especially in taking the internal temperature. You get false readings. Both pro and con, that is, high and low. They do take long. But I was having a tough time getting these to the proper temperature near the end. Every time I’d poke the largest pieces with the thermometer I was getting back 130.And after 40 minutes and having added red-hot charcoals from my chimney smoker, I knew what I was seeing on the thermometer just didn’t jive with what I was seeing with my own eyes and with experience. (Guess this is part of where cooking becomes part art and part gut feeling.)

When I finally said, these have to be done, took them inside and sliced one open, it was definitely done, even though the temperature gauge had been telling me it wasn’t.

What though had it been true that it wasn’t cooked all the way through? Hey, it happens to the best of us. Here’s a tip to be safety conscious. Use a microwave. You won’t lose any flavor, you won’t mess it up. Microwaves cook from the inside out, so you’re sure to get it right without and lose nothing that way. Who cares if a chef in a five-star restaurant or even a grizzled veteran of BBQ comptetions would never do that. This is us, not them. You want pride to stand in your way and take a chance on your guests getting sick? Hell no. A little nuking (my sometimes funny term for microwaving) might not be found in Culinary Institute’s handbook, but this is you and me in our front patios and backyards and in our kitchens. Never serve chicken undercooked, either put back on the grill, place in the oven, or give it a minute or two in the microwave if you definitely need to or just feel unsure about things.

Apricot-Glazed Grilled Chicken Drumsticks
©2007 Harry Kenney

14 large chicken drumsticks

rub:

salt
pepper
cinnamon
ginger
cumin
garlic powder
chilli powder

glaze:

4oz apricot preserves
3 tblsp apricot snapps (you can use regular brandy)
2 tblsp whole-grain mustard
1/4 cup soy sauce
2 tbsps worsteshire
1 tbsp honey
1 tsp chilli powder
salt
pepper

Put on rub and in ziplocked bag into the refrigerator. Put in fridge for about 30 minutes minimum, up to four hours is great. Take out and leave out on table still in the bag another 30 minutes so chicken gets more towards room temperature and they’re ready for the grill.

This is should take in total about 20 minutes per side. This is one item that you baste early and you turn often on the grill. Many times my advice is leave it alone. Not this one. Place on grill, baster with glaze. Five minutes later, turn, baste. Do that about every 10 minutes, getting all the sides a few times. Do put the lid or cover down in between. At about 35-40 minutes, start checking with an internal meat thermometer the largest ones.

Drumsticks are difficult at times because of that big center bone. You don’t want to serve raw and get anyone sick. You also don’t want to so overcook as to make things dry. Chicken needs to be 165°F minimum, and starts drying out at higher than 175°F. After 50 minutes over a good hot grill if you find you are still having problems, put the larger drumsticks and any others you feel may not have cooked thoroughly into the microwave for a minute or two to be sure. Serves about seven, depending upon if you are serving lots of sides or if your guests are football player size, serves: 5-9.