Dutch oven on stove top enough heat to cook a whole chicken?

[wahoowad]

I have a cast iron dutch oven that I have used on top of the woodstove to bake bread. I'd like to bake a whole chicken today and wondering if enough heat will transfer to the dutch oven to cook the chicken?

My woodstove surface will vary between 400 - 550 and I know it won't boil water - it will only simmer which suggests the pot/water isn't surpassing 212. This makes me doubt I can get enough heat to fully cook the chicken even if I let it go for 3 hours or so.

Anybody done a whole chicken on the top?

 

[rideau]

Sorry for the double post. The webserver kept telling me the post failed due to an error.

Same happened to me a minute ago, and I've seen at least 2 others today. Something quirky.

 

[rideau]

OK- so what is happening is that the server tells you it could not post, try again later. So you check, it didn't post, so you hit reply and it double posts. Fun and games.

I've cooked a 25 pound turkey in under 6 hours on a Progress Hybrid, the soapstone top before the cast iron cooktop was available. Stove top temp was 350 or so and the turkey cooked beautifully...best tasting turkey I ever cooked. Moist and tender. I don't see any reason why the chicken won't cook on a nice long simmer. Personally, I'd probably go for roasting it, maybe put a small amount of liquid in the bottom of the pot, and add some roastong vegetable for the last hour or two. Should work fine. Just stick a meat thermometer in the breast so you know when it's done.

 

[begreen]

I'm hoping to make a chicken stew in a dutch oven on the stove this weekend. It doesn't need to get boiling hot. As long as the meat temp is raised high enough it will be fine. This is how a slow cooker (crock pot) works. On high a crock pot will only take a chicken up to about 190F, but that is ok. Just use a recipe tailored to slow cooking and give it enough time:

(broken link removed to http://allrecipes.com/recipes/meat-and-poultry/chicken/slow-cooker-chicken/)

PS: It's helpful to have a cooking thermometer to check temp when stove cooking.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Yes, you can cook the chicken.

On the other problem, I've seen this happen but if you hit F5 (refresh), you'll then see if it did post or not.

 

[EatenByLimestone]

(broken link removed to http://www.target.com/p/coleman-camp-oven/-/A-10221957?ref=tgt_adv_XSG10001&AFID=Google_PLA_df&LNM=%7C10221957&CPNG=Unassigned&kpid=10221957&LID=PA&ci_src=17588969&ci_sku=10221957)


This is made to sit over the top of the dual burner colman stove we all know from camping with our parents. I bet this could be used on top of a 500+ degree stove easily.
Matt

 

[colin.p]

That is the one thing I miss the most about a wood stove. I used to cook beans, soups, stews and the most amazing pot roasts on an old generic 70's stove I had in my old place. I bought (and still have) a grey cast iron dutch oven to cook the stuff in.

Even though my current stove is a lot better and far more efficient, as far as a heater is concerned, it is too small a surface to cook anything on. However, I still think of the wonderful aromas I got from cooking on the stove top........

 

[Machria]

Definitely will cook a chicken, no problem. And if you have a 450 to 500 top, you should be able to boil water on it, it will just take a while to get there.

I've cooked some huge pots of chile on the stove. A huge pot of chile starting out all cold incgredients takes a long time to heat up, and then cook normally (on a regular stove or crockpot...). I found it took a long time to heat up on the stove, but then cooked quicker once up to temp. And that is on my PH cooktop which has a heat shield under it, so it doesn't get that hot (350 max ussually unless I really fire it up).

Here's some of my and others cooking recipes....:
https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads/recipes-for-the-progress-hybrid.94828/#post-1332459

Take pics and post results!

 

[mellow]

How did the chicken turn out?

I smoke my chickens at 225 so you should have no issues.

Hopefully you didn't spill anything on top of the stove, that is a mess to clean off.

 

[dave_376]

As long as the dutch oven doesn't have legs on it you should be good to.

 

[mtcates]

I have a cast iron dutch oven that I have used on top of the woodstove to bake bread. I'd like to bake a whole chicken today and wondering if enough heat will transfer to the dutch oven to cook the chicken?

My woodstove surface will vary between 400 - 550 and I know it won't boil water - it will only simmer which suggests the pot/water isn't surpassing 212. This makes me doubt I can get enough heat to fully cook the chicken even if I let it go for 3 hours or so.

Anybody done a whole chicken on the top?

Sometimes I will preheat the dutch oven and its contents on the kitchen range then place it on the wood stove to finish cooking. Saves lot of cooking time.

 

[Machria]

I'm wondering if a Pressure cooker would work? They cook very fast once they get up to temp/steam.... but I'm not sure it would get hot enough?

 

[mellow]

Maybe if you stick it IN the stove on hot coals.

 

[westkywood]

Absolutely it will. Of course the temp will go up and down, but it'll get the job done. We had an ice storm here a few years ago and I was without power for 5 days. I became very creative cooking with the wood stove. Frozen pizzas on top of the stove. Stews. Baked taters in the stove wrapped in foil. Some things, like the pizza, was actually better on the stove than in the oven. I miss using the wood stove for cooking in the summer time.