Name: Easy Smoked Chicken Legs
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 120 min
Total time: 130 min
Yield: 8
Ingredients: 14 chicken legs; easy brine (if desired (optional!)); 2 cups barbecue sauce

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Easy Smoked Chicken Legs made with just a few simple ingredients in 2 hours. Simple recipe for smoking chicken drumsticks during your next BBQ. Perfect recipe to start learning how to use your electric smoker!

This Smoke Chicken Drumsticks post is sponsored by Traeger. All opinions are 100% mine. I made these Easy Smoked Chicken Legs for dinner the other night and oh heavens were they good! I brined them for 5-6 hours beforehand, but that’s not a necessary step- they still come out fantastic without brining. They were super moist and had incredible flavor.

We got our Traeger Electric Smoker recently and I was so nervous and excited to begin using it. To be honest, I wasn’t looking to win any “Pit Master” awards, I just wanted to learn some great recipes that I could use to cook my family dinner. I have to say, mission accomplished! I thought learning how to use the Traeger would be difficult, but it was actually really easy and I was thrilled at all the possibilities.

Cooking Chicken Drumsticks on the Smoker

Generally speaking, most people don’t cook chicken on the smoker because it’s easy to dry the meat out. However chicken drumsticks are a bit different. They’re a dark meat section of the chicken and because of the bone, they need to cook longer. I found this to be one of the easiest meats to smoke because it only took a couple hours and the results were fantastic. The meat was super moist and had a great smoke flavor that complimented the barbecue sauce perfectly. We used “Traegercue” sauce with has a lot of fruity flavors, which were great in this dish.

I opted to brine my chicken beforehand which just increases flavor and moistness. Most brines call for submerging the meat for at least 24 hours. This is not one of those! I slept in, then ate breakfast, THEN brined the chicken. Yep! If you opt to NOT brine, sprinkle the chicken with a bit of salt & pepper when you place on the smoker.

Hungry for more? Try some more grilled chicken recipes!

How to make Easy Smoked Chicken Legs

14 chicken legs
easy brine, if desired (optional!)
2 cups barbecue sauce

Easy Smoked Chicken Leg BRINE: Combine 8 cups water with just under 1/4 cup salt and 2 teaspoons each onion powder, garlic powder and rubbed sage. Place chicken legs in a large container with lid. Pour brine on top. Replace lid and refrigerate for 4-6 hours. Pour brine out and rinse chicken. Pat dry and proceed with recipe.
Preheat smoker to 275 degrees F. Add pellets to hopper. We used Applewood pellets.
Rinse chicken legs and pat dry.
Place on smoker and cook for 1.5 hours.
Increase temp to 350 degrees F and slather sauce on one side of the drumsticks. Replace lid and let cook for 15 minutes.
Turn chicken legs over and sauce the other side. Insert temperature probe in the thickest part of the drumstick, making sure to NOT TOUCH THE BONE. Replace cover and cook until internal temp reads 165 degrees F. Remove from heat and let sit 5-10 minutes, then serve.

To know when your chicken reaches the right temperature, your best tool is going to be a meat thermometer. My all-time favorite meat thermometer is the Thermapen. It’s super fast and incredibly durable. Another great meat thermometer is the ThermoPop which is a more basic version that works just as well!