In Southern Delaware and the Eastern Shore, chicken is more than just a bird. In the birthplace of American’s first thriving poultry farming industry, chicken is a means to existence and a whole way of life. Delmarva also has its own tradition of charcoal-grilled chicken BBQ, one with a surprising history that traces back to the inventor of the chicken nugget.
Beginning in April, and going as late as October, the chicken shacks begin to appear at firehouses and VFWs and community clubs across the peninsula. Each one has a secret sauce and its own techniques kept for generations, related to the others but not the same.
People from as far away as Florida or Colorado have been known to plan their vacations around the chicken at a particular shack.
Here’s where to find Delmarva-style chicken before the season ends this year.
Where: 12611 Sussex Highway, Greenwood, Delaware
When: Saturdays and Sundays, from Memorial Day weekend to Labor Day weekend, 8 a.m. till early afternoon when the chicken’s gone.
Where the two directions of Sussex highway split in two, the Greenwood Volunteer Fire Company holds perhaps the most famous of the Delmarva-style chicken BBQ shacks in the region: a monumentally popular fundraising barbecue for the fire company and countless other community groups from baseball teams to local schools.
The oil-and-vinegar sauce has perhaps more oomph than most: packed with seasoning and herbs and made thick with the addition of egg. People call ahead from Florida to make sure they can come get it each year, said fireman and pitmaster Ryan Boyce.
Where:Crossroads of Scott’s Store Road and Seashore Highway., Bridgeville, Delaware
When:Saturdays and Sundays from April to October, 8:30 a.m. till the chicken’s gone in mid-afternoon
The Kiwanis may lay claim to the oldest chicken barbecue in Delaware’s Sussex County, stretching back to the 1950s at their first location. The “new” spot stems back only to 1960. And for just as long, the Kiwanis have been raising money for community projects and and groups like 4-H with their own version of barbecue that’s a bit distinct for the area.
Though they baste their chicken over charcoal the same way as Greenwood six miles or so away, their sauce is made with vinegar and butter rather than vinegar and oil, a habit pitmaster Tom Carey thinks they may have picked up from North Carolina. Then, the grilled half chickens rest in foil-packed coolers till they’re tender and lovely.
Where:In front of the Delaware Army National Guard post, 163 Scannell Blvd., Bethany Beach
When:Saturdays only, 8:30 p.m. until 3 p.m. or sold out
For 50 years, the Ocean View chapter of Veterans of Foreign Wars has stood watch in front of the Bethany Beach National Guard outpost… with chicken. Pitmaster Ken Weber, himself a veteran of the Korean War, says that veterans of every foreign war in the past century have sold chicken here, with the same recipe, since 1972.
The recipe has a similar base to the Greenwood chicken, but Weber says they have a special and secret marinade that keeps it extra-tender.
Where:Arthur W. Perdue Stadium, 6400 Hobbs Road, Salisbury, Maryland
When:Saturday, Oct. 7, 1 to 7 p.m.
The Delmarva Chicken festival began in 1958 as the Chicken of Tomorrow Festival, devoted to helping Delmarva peninsula farmers grow better and bigger chickens. But within a year it was home to a chicken cooking contest that became famous across the country, an equally famous 10-foot frying pan for birds, and a Delmarva Chicken Beauty Queen.
If you’re not here for country music or some of that fried chicken, you can also get some Delmarva-style chicken barbecue. And take heed: If you don’t go this year, you might not go. This is both the 100th anniversary of the Delmarva chicken industry, and the last year the festival is scheduled to exist. Get some while the getting exists.
More:The ancient BBQ chicken shacks of Delaware, and a secret recipe tied to chicken nuggets
