Smoked some pheasants..came out great

We had a great trip to South Dakota earlier this Fall and I've been doing my standard recipe for them (bone out the breasts, pound them then, cut into strips, stuff with cream cheese and a jalepeno pepper, wrap with bacon and grill)

Those always come out great, but I wanted to try to smoke a few for Christmas Eve so...

I was really worried about them drying out so I brined overnight in the following:
1 quarts apple juice
1/2 pound brown sugar
1/2 cup kosher salt
2 oranges, quartered
2 ounces fresh ginger, thinly sliced
7 whole cloves
3 bay leaves
3 large cloves garlic, crushed

Got all that simmering until the sugar and salt desolved, then let it cool down to room temp. When cool, I added in about 2 quarts of ice and water. Put all that in a big cooler with two pheasants. Brined them overnight. Next morning did a quick rinse and patted them dry. I didn't want them to taste like bacon so I just put a couple of pieces of bacon on each pheasant.

Set up my large with plate setter legs up, an old roasting pan into which I poured the leftover brine, and put my grid right on top of that pan.

Smoked at 225 with a very generous amount of apple wood for about 3 1/2 hours and pulled when the breasts were at about 145.

Absolutely fantastic. I shared last night with the extended family and I wish I would have done at least 3-4 more pheasants. They went quickly. I'll definitely be doing this one again.


Final results: