Drumsticks are the cheapest proper chicken you can cook well. They have skin to crisp, a bone to keep them juicy, and they forgive a minute more in a way breast will not. Chicken Drumsticks 900g-1.1kg (Frozen) is a frozen 900g–1.1kg pack. Chicken Drumsticks x2 – Butcher’s Pick doubles it. Shop chicken drumsticks and traybake meat together if the same tray is picking up sausages.
Oven and air fryer
Defrost in the fridge. Oven: 200°C for 35 to 40 minutes, turning once, until 75°C at the thickest part next to the bone. Space them on the tray. Air fryer: 190°C for 22 to 25 minutes, shaking once. From frozen, add 8 to 10 minutes and still probe — colour on the skin is not doneness by the bone. Salt, oil, and paprika on plain drums; they do not need a jar of sauce. Rest 5 minutes so the juice stays in when you eat them in your hands, which is how drums should be eaten.
BBQ and pan
BBQ: indirect 25 minutes, then 5 to 8 minutes over a hotter zone to crisp. Direct heat from the start blacks the skin and leaves the bone-side pink. Pan: you can brown drums and finish them in a 180°C oven for 25 minutes if you want a gravy in the same pan. Teriyaki Chicken Drums & Thighs 700-800g already carry a glaze, so oven 190°C for 30 to 35 minutes and watch the last 10 so the teriyaki does not catch. They sit in teriyaki chicken as well as with the plain drums.
Packs, leftovers and mistakes
A 900g pack is three to four people as a main with potatoes, more as a side. The 2x butcher’s pick is a freezer fill. Leftover drum meat comes off the bone easily once cold and makes a better fried rice than leftover breast. Shop frozen chicken if you are adding thighs and legs in the same order. Do not crowd an air-fryer drawer with ten drums; cook a batch, keep them in a 100°C oven, then do the next batch. Piled drums steam and the skin stays flabby.
A 900g frozen pack is a week-night tray, not a bucket of wings. Cook what you will eat, cool leftovers within an hour, and strip the meat for tomorrow if nobody wants a cold drum in a lunchbox. The bone is not waste; it is why the meat stayed juicy. Plain drums plus a good salt beat a sticky sauce you then cannot get off the tray.
Space, 75°C next to the bone, rest. That is a drumstick, and it is why they belong in a weekly rotation rather than only at a kids’ party.