The chicken is one of the most common whole served animals.

And so that's why I thought it would be worthy

of doing a whole episode about.

- Why didn't you say "Worth It"?

- What?

♪ Is it Worth It? ♪

♪ Make it Worth It ♪

♪ Make it Worth It ♪

♪ Worth It, Worth It ♪

- Today on "Worth It",

we're gonna be trying three whole chickens

at three drastically different price points

to find out which one is the most worth it at it's price.

- We've had whole chickens before.

- In the fried chicken episode,

the last chicken was a whole chicken.

In the Korean soups episode,

the last soup was a whole chicken.

- [Steven] I am salivating as you say that.

- You get the fat, the skin,

the cartilage, the whole thing.

- It's true.

You wouldn't watch a movie an act at a time,

you'd watch the whole thing.

- And when you describe a very attractive individual,

they're often described as the whole package.

- Andrew, where are we goin' first?

- So our first whole chicken is going to come from

DOMESTIC BBQ in Covina,

where we're gonna be speaking with Milton and Erika

about their whole chicken.

It is prepared in halves,

but the menu item is a whole chicken.

This chicken is both smoked, fried, and grilled.

- You say both if it's three things?

- What? - Both, yes.

- Smoked, fried, grilled? - Yes.

- Is that the whole-ly trinity or what?

(Andrew laughing)

- Yes.

(upbeat music)

How would you describe DOMESTIC?

- California style barbecue.

- It's not Texas style, it's not Mississippi style,

it's our stamp on barbecue.

- We take a lot of the regional classic barbecue technique

and some of the flavors, and then we blend it into our own.

We use different wood blends, different dry rubs,

it's the flavor and balance between the wood

and the seasonings that we use that make it unique.

- Where does your background in barbecue come from?

- Passion. - Backyard.

(Erika laughing)

- Backyard passion.

I went to culinary school to become a chef,

and barbecue has always been in my background,

doing it on the weekends with family, with friends.

It's one of those processes that takes so much time

that you really gotta love it to do it on a regular basis.

- We are interested in the whole chicken that you guys have.

Can you talk a little bit more

about how it found it's way on the menu?

- We used to go to a ton of barbecue spots.

One of the things that was always missing

on the menu was chicken.

So when we opened up DOMESTIC, he's like,

"Let's do something completely different and do chicken."

It's really hard to execute,

just because any misstep can over dry the bird.

We split through the spine,

and then we do something called a dry brine.

A wet brine you usually dip it into,

you leave it, you soak it.

The dry brining draws out the moisture

from the chicken itself.

- [Milton] It's osmosis, so it's pulling out the moisture

from the chicken and replacing it

with the salt that we're have in our dry rub.

- [Erika] We put it into a smoker.

- [Milton] Anywhere from two hours

to two hours and 45 minutes.

- [Erika] We actually deep fry our chicken real quickly

just to crisp up the skin.

- [Milton] Throw it on the grill, get some nice cross marks

on the breast side of it.

We glaze it with our house-made barbecue sauce

so you're getting a sweet tackiness

that comes with a crispy skin and moist chicken.

You're hitting all the senses texturally.

- [Steven] The chicken's getting the full spa treatment.

- [Erika] It really is.

- [Milton] We're giving it the respect it deserves.

- [Erika] It's a very simple item,

but we wanna transform it and make it something spectacular.

(cash register dinging)

- My favorite part of the chicken is always the drum stick.

- [Andrew] I'm down to start there.

- [Steven] Wow.

- I swear I'm usually better at this.

- Remember when you said 20 minutes would be enough time?

- I am skilled at the anatomy of a chicken.

Boom, there we go.

- [Steven] Ready?

- That's what you want.

Cheers Steven.

- Look at the juice drip, cheers.

- It's straight up drippin'.

(upbeat music)

Mm.

Wow.

Mm, that meat is so tender.

- I never thought chicken that's cooked

for that long could still retain so much moisture.

- I roast a chicken for like five minutes too long,

it's dry as (beep).

I don't know what sorcery they're doing to this thing.

- Oh my God.

You wanna take a little side break?

- I do, yeah.

- [Milton] Our bacon mac and cheese starts with a base

of bechamel with, we use real cheddar,

real mozzarella, real jack cheese.

- [Steven] Oh my goodness.

(Steven exhaling)

- God damn that's good.

- This is my fantasy.

I love melty cheese.

- All right, I'm gonna get a breast chunk.

The often maligned portion of the chicken.

People think it's too dry, it's boring.

- It's because it's easy to cook wrong.

- The breast is good.

Look at the juices running down my hand, from the breast.

- [Milton] And our cornbread is a little bit sweeter.

Whereas if you go to the deep South, it's more savory,

it's a salt profile with a little bit of sweetness

added on top, we're vice versa.

- Whole chicken, whole cornbread.

Whole corn in the whole cornbread.

- Whoa, it's actually corn.

You don't see that a lot.

Whoa, that cornbread is so good.

I'm not gonna lie, I was like,

oh, this looks like it's gonna suck.

- You were ready for it to be bad.

(Steven speaking gibberish)

- I was like it's gonna be bad.

The texture of it looks like it's a typical cornbread,

like, oh, it's like dry and crusty,

but it's fluffy and sweet.

- Oh my God.

- Before our next whole chicken--

- [Both] A whole chicken fact.

- Adam Driver who attended Juilliard

has said that in college he regularly ate

an entire rotisserie chicken himself.

- [Both] Adam Driver.

- Went to Julliard?

- I mean, depending on what else I ate

over the course of a day, a whole chicken is not that crazy.

Like I crushed half a chicken yesterday

and I didn't even break a sweat.

- You were a little sweaty.

- So our next whole chicken, we're going to Saucy Chick.

We're gonna be speaking with Rhea and Marcel.

We're gonna be trying their rotisserie dinner to share.

And they actually do two styles of rotisserie chicken,

we're gonna be trying both.

- Sweet, I always love family style meals.

- For sure.

- And a whole chicken,

unless you're Adam Driver, great to share.

(upbeat music)

How did you guys get started?

- Both Marcel and I worked corporate jobs.