So, How long does it take to cook drumsticks you ask?
Timing is everything with chicken. Leave it in the oven a couple minutes too long, your family will need a better dental plan. Take it out too early, get the sick bucket and Pepto ready.
However, cook it right and you’re a star chef. Chicken really can be the most delicious protein in the butcher shop if done right.
What’s the trick to making chicken that is cooked through, moist, and delicious?
Do not be afraid! Chicken doesn’t have to be difficult.
In fact, with our favorite easy chicken recipe below, you can make well-cooked chicken any day of the week. As with anything, the more you practice with a recipe, the more likely you are to master the cook times.
We like using drumsticks because dark meat has more room for error and they’re easy to eat. Plus, bones give flavor to meat. Any cut of bone-in chicken will have a deeper natural flavor that will be accentuated by your choice of seasoning.
Healthy Crispy Oven Baked Drumsticks.
This is a great recipe for the healthy family who need an easy weeknight meal. Preparation is minimal, but flavor is on point! Using just a few pantry ingredients, any home chef can get their chicken drumsticks to sing on the plate.
Pantry ingridients.
Gather pantry ingredients and favorite poultry seasonings. I like to add salt (obviously), paprika for peppery color, a few pinches of black pepper, onion and powder for sweetness, and a sprinkle of parmesan cheese. The cheese will add a hint of nuttyness that rounds out the profile.
You can use anything in your spice rack to kick these sticks up a notch. Just make sure not one spice dominates the rest – your mix should be balanced. Pro tip: take notes on your amounts so you can adjust the next time to find your perfect balance.
Mix it up.
In a large mixing bowl, create a blend of your spices, flour, baking powder. Dry the chicken with a paper towel so that any wetness on the skin is removed. Water is the enemy of crispy, so we want to make sure the chicken is as dry as possible. After drying, throw the drumsticks into the large bowl of your seasonings. Toss to coat the chicken. Let sit while the oven comes to temperature.
Some ingredients and tools we recommend
- Chicken Seasoning
- Blend-Cooking Seasoning
- Baking Sheet & Rack Set
- Paper Baking Sheets
- Stainless Steel Mixing Bowls
Don’t forget your oven.
Set the oven to 425F. This is the sweet spot temperature that will create that beautiful crispy skin and cook your chicken through. If you have a convection oven, set the temperature lower at least fifteen degrees. The convection setting will blow hot air around using internal fans. This will cook the interior of the chicken through without having the temperature as high.
Get out a baking sheet. Using a wire rack to lift them off the sheet surface will allow air to circulate around the drumstick, helping to cook evenly. If you don’t have a wire rack, crumpling
some aluminum foil can achieve the same effect. Prop the chicken on the peaks of the crumpled foil to get airflow underneath.
Timing when to remove the chicken is the most challenging part of the cook. This will vary based on the size of your drumsticks. Larger, meatier drumsticks will take up to an hour. Smaller drumsticks will take anywhere from 40-50 minutes. The key to knowing how long to cook your poultry is to first rely on temperature.
Once you’ve cooked this meal and achieved the right temperature a few times, you should begin to see the signs of perfectly cooked chicken. You will only learn this through practice and feel. Keep trying – learning from your mistakes is the most important quality in a chef.
Give your drumsticks some rest.
Remove the chicken from the oven after 40 minutes and check the temperature with a meat thermometer. Place the tip of the thermometer into the meatiest part of the drumstick, as close to the center of the meat as possible. Do not let the thermometer touch the bone. Bones conduct heat and will give you an inaccurate reading.
The optimal temperature is 165F. If the temperature is lower, simply keep cooking the chicken in the oven and continue taking the temperature once every 5-10 minutes. Once your chicken gets to 165F let the drumsticks cool on the counter for five minutes before serving.
As you let the drumsticks cool, finish off the rest of your meal. A fresh romaine salad gives a cool, refreshing quality to the whole dish – perfect for a spring meal. Round it out with homemade baked beans or a batch of rice and beans. Drumsticks don’t have a whole lot of meat to them, so pairing them with beans ensures your meal will be both healthy and satisfying.
The best drumstick recipes from around the world.
- You could also use this recipe for bone-in chicken thighs. Thighs tend to be larger than drumsticks. Turn the heat down and keep them in the oven longer. Thighs tend to be more tender and meatier. However, they can be messy to eat. Both are delicious so choose your cut based on how you plan on serving the meal.
- In the summer months, try these on the grill over indirect heat. They won’t get as crispy, but the grill will give a great smokey flavor to the meat. You could also baste with a touch of BBQ sauce at the end of their cook time. Turn the grill heat down to low after basting to prevent the sugar from burning. Drumsticks are the perfect cookout food. Easy to eat and everybody likes chicken, right?!
- Use any spice combination you enjoy. There are plenty of pre-made spice mixes in the grocery stores these days. If you’re making your own, be sure to stick to a flavor profile that complements the rest of your meal.
- Go Greek: Keep your seasonings simple (salt, pepper, onion powder) and count on a nice yogurt and dill (plain greek yogurt, a healthy amount of fresh dill, salt) dipping sauce for added flavor. Add a jar of pitted kalamata olives and feta cheese to your romaine salad. Substitute some roasted chickpeas for beans for a starch.
- Korean Chicken: Pick up some Korean BBQ sauce (my favorite is from Trader Joes) and use it to baste the chicken for the last five minutes of cook time. Drop the salad and opt for a vegetable-dominant fried rice instead. Mix in some kimchi (pickled, fermented cabbage – can be found in the Asian section of most large grocery stores) to give that traditional Korean flavor. I like to put in shelled edamame, bell peppers, and mushrooms, but the beauty of fried rice is you can put anything you want in it (even hot dogs!).
- Island Style: Find a pre-made jerk seasoning and use that as your chicken seasoning. Be careful! Jerk seasoning can be spicy so make sure you don’t overdo it. Add some mango, pineapple, papaya, or guava to your salad and substitute the romaine for spinach. The bitterness of fresh spinach will balance the sweetness of the fruit nicely. Be sure to add some acid with a lemon vinaigrette. Rice and beans round out this island meal nicely. Add some curry powder to the beans to account for the Indian influence in Caribbean food.
Have Fun!
With any new recipe or food challenge, be sure your first priority is fun. If you make dry chicken, don’t . You’ve learned something that can be taken into account next time you’re in the kitchen. Cooking is all about trying new things and seeing what works for you.
