HOW TO: Make Barbeque Chicken for the Holidays

The art of cooking is beautiful on its own, because it comes with a lot of precision and technique. Personally I love good food, because it brings a high level of satisfaction that is unparalleled. Meat in the world of food could fall under two descriptions; white or red meat. According to health specialists, white meat is preferable to red, because of the health benefits attached to it. The most preferred form of white meat is CHICKEN. The holidays are here, there will be lots of celebration, as well as toasting, grilling, frying and cooking, but there is nothing as exquisite as well seasoned and garnished meat. It’s annoying when you eat chicken and all you can taste are the spices and the sauce all clustered on the skin of the chicken, leaving the inner white flesh tasteless, or looking like a burnt offering as result of too much heat. One of the first steps you should take when preparing barbeque, is considering what meat you want to cook and the number of people you desire to feed. The focus of this article is chicken. When selecting a chicken for your barbeque, always look out for a good balance between the meat and the fat content. In my own experience of making a good chicken barbeque, one of the things I put into consideration is the quality of the charcoal. The quality of the charcoal affects the outcome of any barbeque. When selecting charcoal for barbeque, lump charcoal is the best, because it burns down leaving very little ashes behind. The main secret to a great barbecued chicken, one that is all tender with moist, cheerily smoky golden brown skin, is to lower the heat of the fire and leave the sauce off until the last minutes of cooking. I believe good barbecue chicken is low and slow followed by fast and hot; that’s the easiest way to achieve fantastic results .The chicken is seasoned, but not sauced, for most of the cooking. Maintain a temperature between 230° and 250°F. Opening or closing the vents and adding charcoal is also primary. The rationale behind this cooking process (low and slow heat) is to help keep the chicken tender and moist, allowing fat to drain from the meat.The old saying goes, “you can’t get too much of a good thing”, but in this case we don’t want much fat in our barbeque. Chicken can be cooked at a hotter temperature in a shorter amount of time. If using your grill, cook indirectly with a low flame. Barbecue Sauce What’s a good barbecue without a tasty sauce? A simple way to prepare your barbeque sauce: There are no specific ways to make a tasty barbeque sauce, it all depends on preference; how you want your barbeque to taste depends on the outcome of your sauce. Tomato paste (ketchup) is considered as one of the best bases for chicken barbeque. Other ingredients include cooking oil, brown sugar, cider vinegar, onions, water, large green pepper, chilli powder, salt, mustard or mustard powder, soy sauce etc. Prepare the barbecue sauce by putting all the ingredients into a small saucepan on a slow and low heat. Heat should be regulated just to make sauce steam and bubble a little until it’s dark and thickened (close to brown), 7-10 minutes of heat and a little stirring will do the magic. The Art of BBQ All tasty barbecue needs smoke. Smoke not only adds that authentic barbecue flavour but the nitrates in the smoke break down the connective tissues and changes the very nature of the meat. Get the cooked chicken closer to the coals, In the case of charcoal, bank all the coals on one side of the grill and line up the chicken on the cool side, after that apply your home made sauce on the pieces (chicken) using your brush or mop, cover pieces completely with your home made sauce, making sure all parts are well dressed. This is an essential part of barbeque, it’s an art- constant brushing and moving of the pieces all over to get them equally cooked and well sauced. Give it a couple of minutes on the fire for the sauce to glaze the meat. Watch out for the signs, once the sauce turns dark creating this syrupy colour and the skin is all golden brown looking all crispy, then our barbeque is all ready. Remove the chicken and place on platter, letting the pieces give away the heat, making it perfect to be served.

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This article was first published on 21st December 2012

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