Tea-Smoked Chicken Recipe

I have patience for many kinds of elaborate cooking but smoking meats on a grill for hours is not one of them. I enjoy the Chinese approach of tea smoking because it’s easy, fun and fast. I've tea-smoked pressed tofu (see Asian Tofu for my recipe) and most recently, I tea-smoked a chicken for a Lunar New Year dinner with friends. You can spread the process out over the course of days and impress guests. In fact, my friends Mike and Jennifer thought that I’d done it all outside in our grill. Nope, I just used a wok and the smoking took about 30 minutes. Such brilliant Chinese cooking.

American-style smoking is often done when the protein is raw. The Chinese approach is to apply the smoking action after the protein is cooked. You can vary the outcome with smoking mixture. That’s to say, use more or less of the sugar, rice, tea and aromatics. If you didn’t smoke enough, no problem. There’s room for a re-do.

For this tea-smoked chicken, I bought a medium bird and marinated it overnight before steaming it. Once steamed the chicken sat in the fridge for days until you smoke the bird. It was intensely smoky and I initially served it at Lunar New Year with some Sichuan peppercorn salt and Vietnamese pickles.

There were leftovers. I put some in a stir-fried noodle dish to spread out some of the smoky wealth. I had some cold right out of the fridge. I tried deep-frying a chunk but that wasn’t very exciting. I also made divine banh mi sandwiches with the chicken.

There’s a lot you can do with one small, boldly flavored chicken. It’s great for low-protein eaters. The Asian approach it not to serve it in big pieces. You can chop it with bone-in pieces or cut small pieces off the bone. In any event, you can’t lose.

Recipe

Tea-Smoked Chicken

Yields: 6 to 8 servings

Ingredients

• One chicken about 4 pounds (900 g), Wings detached backbone removed
• 1 tablespoon Szechuan peppercorns
• 2 tablespoons kosher salt 
• 4 to 6 ginger slices, smashed
• 3 green onions, cut into short lengths
• 5 index-finger lengths dried strips of tangerine peel, broken into small pieces
• 2 to 3 cinnamon sticks broken into small pieces
• ⅓ cup light or dark brown sugar
• ⅓ cup raw rice
• ⅓ cup loose leaf tea (one kind or a mixture)

Instructions

1. Detach the wings from the chicken then remove the backbone. Chop off the knees. Splay the chicken open as if it was butterflied (see this post for guidance). Set aside. 
2. In a wok or heavy skillet over medium low heat, toast the peppercorns and salt for about 3 to 5 minutes until the peppercorns are slightly smoking in the salt has discolored of it almost off-white. Grind to a powder.
3. Rub two-thirds of the peppercorn salt on the chicken, getting some under the skin too. Put into a bowl, cover, and refrigerate overnight. 
4. Return the chicken to room temperature. Put the ginger, chicken and green onion on a plate or reuse the bowl that the chicken marinated in, if it fits in the steamer. Set up a Chinese steamer with water to boil and steam the chicken for 20 to 40 minutes, until done (the juices run slightly pink or clear when you poke the thigh meat). Turn off the heat, remove the lid and let the chicken cool naturally and finish cooking. (Chill the chicken up to 2 days before smoking it. Return it to room temperature before smoking.)
5. To smoke the chicken, use a wok or large pot. Line the vessel and lid with aluminum foil. Add the tangerine peel, cinnamon, sugar, rice, and tea. Mix well. Put a rack on top so it sits about 1 inch (2.5 cm) above the mixture. Put the chicken, breast side up on the rack.
6. Cover with the foil-lined lid. Turn the heat to high heat. Once you see smoke coming from under the lid, lower the heat to about medium-high to maintain faint wisps of smoke coming out. Smoke the chicken for 20 minutes. Slide off the hot burner and let sit for 3 to 5 minutes before removing the lid. If the chicken is not a dark, gorgeous brown, add more rice and sugar and smoke for another 5 to 10 minutes. 
7. Cool the chicken on a rack before cutting and serving with the remaining Sichuan peppercorn salt and maybe a pickle or two.