Beer Bottom Roast Chicken

Beer Bottom Chicken

Ingredients:

• 1 can of beer, with about 1/5th -1/4 of the beer gone
• 1 Whole Chicken
• Dab of butter
• Tin foil
• 1-2 Clove Garlic, finely minced
• 1 Tablespoon Poultry Seasoning
• 1 Teaspoon smoked Paprika
• 1 Teaspoon Pepper
• 1/2 Teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1 Teaspoon basil
• 2 Teaspoons brown sugar
• 1 Tablespoon honey
• 1 Tablespoon olive oil

Glaze

• All the pan drippings
• 2 Tablespoons honey
• 1 Tablespoon cider vinegar

Instructions:

1. If your oven has two racks, take one out and move the one oven rack left to the lowest level possible.
2. Preheat oven to 300°F
3. Lightly mist roasting pan with cooking oil spray.
4. Prepare the chicken rub in a small bowl by combining the minced garlic, poultry seasoning, paprika, pepper, cayenne pepper, basil, brown sugar, honey, and olive oil. Mix well and set aside.
5. Remove the neck and giblets from the chicken cavity if they are there, and if there is a neck place it in the roasting pan right next to your beer can that has some missing. The neck will cook down and help make the glaze for later even richer.
6. Rub the spice blend all over the chicken, seriously all over and under the skin anywhere you can. 
7. Also try and get some on the inside of the cavity walls. 
8. Use all the spice rub for 3-4 pound chicken. 
9. Pick up the chicken with both hands and confidently wedge it down onto the beer can in the roaster, legs at the bottom. 
10. When I was doing it I thought the chicken was down as far as it could go but it was only half way. Make sure it goes all the way down. 
11. Dab some butter on the top of the chicken, under the skin at the top, and tops of the wings and legs.
12.  Cover the chicken with tin foil and place into oven.
13. Roast for 40 minutes. Remove chicken from oven and Baste with pan pan drippings. 
14. Baste every 30 minutes thereafter until a meat thermometer says it is ready to go. About 2-2.5 hours. 
15. If the chicken isn't getting brown take the tin foil off after about 1-1.5 hours and roast till the color improves.
16. When the chicken is finished cooking, remove from oven and let rest about 5 minutes before moving it off the beer can.
17.  I wrapped the chicken up in tin foil and used my silicone oven mitts to lift it up off the beer can. Then place it on a plate to rest about 15-20 minutes before carving.
18. Make the glaze to serve with chicken:
19. Dump what is left in the beer can into the roaster and transfer to a sauce pan. 
20. Heat over medium heat and once boiling add the honey and cider vinegar. 
21. Stir often and remove from heat once the sauce starts to thicken and is a rich glaze. 
22. Serve over the sliced roasted chicken.

This recipe goes great with roasted corn on the cob and mashed potatoes.

Enjoy!

Notes:

Back in the days of university and terrible mall jobs I use to spend a lot of time just walking around bad mall stores and Bed Bath and Beyond I used to see really expensive kits for beer can kitchen with a strange little roasting pan contraption and a spice blend and then you could buy refills of the spice blends to make more chickens. What a racket that nonsense is. I assure you that if you get a standard can of beer and take a healthy gulp, or a few lady like sips, and wedge a standard 4ish pound chicken on it, it will remain standing in your normal chicken roasting pan, without the rack in it if you have one with a rack. But getting the chicken wedged on the beer can is only half of the deal. I also suggest maybe giving your chicken a quick brine, and of course using a spice rub on the poultry before roasting. Normally I would never use any spice blend on chicken that has brown sugar in it, because I am not a huge fan of sweet on meat tastes, but this recipe needs just a pinch of sugar to tone down the spice and help glaze the chicken down.

Also the brine and spice rub aren't needed, you can just roast a chicken whole on the beer can and season it with a Poultry Seasoning, or salt and pepper. But I will suggest that if you aren't using a spice blend that you dust the chicken with just a light touch of flour and of course, dab some butter on the top of the chicken and baste often!

This recipe is not for the faint of heart when it comes to raw chicken, you are going to need to touch it and be forceful with it in order to get it wedged far enough on the beer can. It should look like a cute fat little headless man sitting in your roaster. Bad imagery but an apt description.