Kicking off Grilling Season. Photo courtesy of Christina Dugan

Grilling season is back. Despite the spring rain, and the near-constant threat of afternoon storms, the smell of smoke and the char of seasoned steel grates is just too strong to deny.

I love to grill. So much that each season, when winter truly sets in, I go through a little of what I call OSGD, or off-season grilling depression. It’s like seasonal affective disorder, but you’re also hungry for foods you can’t have.

To show you how much I hate NOT grilling, I’ve taken the liberty of altering, ever so slightly, the great B.B. King song, The Thrill is Gone. B.B., plucking away at his guitar as though they were my heartstrings, couldn’t have said it better. Unless, of course, he was singing about Grilling.

The GRILL is gone
The GRILL is gone away
The GRILL is gone baby
The GRILLis gone away
You know you done me wrong baby
And you’ll be sorry someday

The GRILL is gone
It’s gone away from me
The GRILL is gone baby
The GRILL is gone away from me
Although I’ll still live on
But so lonely I’ll be

The GRILL is gone
It’s gone away for good
Oh, the GRILL is gone baby
Baby its gone away for good
Someday I know I’ll be over it all baby
Just like I know a man should

You know I’m free, free now baby
I’m free from your spell (Okay, not true)
I’m free, free now (ditto)
I’m free from your spell (double ditto)
And now that it’s over
All I can do is wish you well

Thankfully, the grill is NOW BACK. And last weekend, to kick of the grilling season, I went with perhaps my favorite grilled chicken dish of all time: Brined Chicken Thighs with Chimichurri.

Although I added in a few breasts for people who don’t like chicken bones (yes, they exist), I LOVE cooking with thighs for a few reasons:

1. They hold up well. The bone inside the chicken acts as a natural conductor of heat, but also helps to keep the flesh moist. So, if you’re distracted, or playing badminton, or whatever, you don’t have to be quite as watchful of the grill in worrying that you’ll make chicken beef jerky.

2. They are CHEAP. I bought what amounted to 34 pieces of chicken thigh for 11 bucks. These were all natural, hormone free birds, too. Not these roid freak water beasts you so often find at grocery stores. So, when you’re cooking for a lot of people, thighs go a long, long way.

3. They are kind of like the mullet of chicken – business in the front, party in the back. In other words, they are like a wing, in that you can serve them and eat them as finger foods (great for a cookout), but those that want to sit down and use a fork and knife will also find enjoyment in the meal.

So, next time you’re grilling, pay special attention to the great grill equalizer that is the chicken thigh.

On to brining.

Brining is something everyone should learn, and a basic brine is a beautiful thing. And, once you’ve found a basic recipe that you like it’s easy to expand on it using different spices. For instance, using Lapsang Souchong, I developed what I believe is the best smoked brine on the planet. Have I tasted all the brines on the planet? No. Which is why I think mine is the best. You can find the recipe, as well as the basic brine recipe for chicken (minus the tea) in my Lapsang Souchong Brine post.

Using the brine recipe, or one that you prefer, brine the chicken for at least 8-10 hours in a large container or cooler surrounded with ice, or in your fridge. A full day is preferable to allow the salt-sugar solution to permeate the chicken meat.

When the chicken is ready, fire up your grill. I add a little veg. oil to the grill when it’s hot and then take the chicken directly out of the brine and place it on the grill. I actually don’t like to rinse the brine from the chicken. But, you should at least pat the pieces dry before placing them on the heat so that you’ll get a nice char on the flesh and won’t cool the surface heat of the grill too much.

I’m always a bit hesitant to provide cooking times, especially for grilling. I can’t possibly know if you’re the slow and steady, indirect charcoal kind of person, or the “I make bullets over my 40,000 BTU gas grill on off days” type. So, I’ll go with a basic recommendation that for bone in thighs, cook the chicken about 15 minutes per side, moving often to avoid flare ups from skin fat dripping into the fire.

On to the Chimichurri. This is a sauce of Argentinean origin, which gauchos favor for use on the country’s beautiful grass fed beef. It’s also quite amenable to sausage – namely chorizo – and chicken.

My favorite thing about this sauce is that you don’t really need a recipe. Below are the base elements, but you should experiment with cumin, curries, red onion, fresh oregano (gorgeous) and other spices. As I know you’ll need at least some place to start, below are the approximations I used to pull it together.

• 2 cups fresh Italian parsley (remove stems)
• 1 cup fresh cilantro (stems removed)
• 1.5 cups extra virgin olive oil
• 1 whole head of garlic (I like a LOT of garlic)
• 1/2 cup red wine vinegar
• 1 teaspoon dried crushed red pepper
• Salt and Pepper to taste

Just throw all this into a food processor and blend up to a level of your own comfort. I like mine just a little chunky, but also love the fully emulsified sauce.

For this dish, I used the Chimichurri as my grilling sauce, but it’s often reserved for the table, where you spoon it directly onto finished meats. As I use quite a lot of garlic, I like to apply just a bit of heat to it as the chicken nears its final turns on the grill. I find this tempers the heat of the garlic without burning, too much, the parsley and cilantro. I brush the Chimichurri sauce onto the chicken with about 5-8 minutes remaining per side, and, when using a gas grill, turn off one whole side to place the brushed pieces upon so that they don’t burn.

Lastly, I place the finished pieces on a cookie sheet, cover with foil and place into a 350 degree oven. This gives the bone-in pieces a little more time to loosen up and also allows me to move on to more time sensitive dishes for the grill such as vegetables.

Serve with cold beer, grilled asparagus and grilled zucchini.

Enjoy.

A pocket full of goodness

• 6-8 dough rounds from a package of La Saltena pre-made empanada dough,
• 1 cup chicken, shredded
• 2 small-medium sized leeks
• 2 Tbsp D’Artagnan White Truffle Butter
• 2 Tbsp White Truffle Oil
• 1 egg yoke, beaten

When in season, I try to use leeks as often as possible. Onion-like, and a distant cousin of asparagus, their texture is delicate and their flavor is subtle yet undeniably distinct.

Here’s a cool entry about leeks on Eat the Seasons

Leeks are also quite versatile. Use them in any recipe that calls for onions for a change of pace, and perhaps a more subtle flavor. I find that they also pair quite well with the earthiness of truffle – in this case truffle butter and truffle oil.

The shredded chicken adds depth of flavor and makes the empanada more of a complete snack or, when paired with a fresh salad, a light lunch.

Cook and shred chicken. You can also use leftover chicken breasts or chicken thighs. Either white or dark meat will work. I had leftover chicken thighs that I’d braised in a touch of white wine and chicken stock. They worked well.

Remove darkest part at the top of the leeks. Wash thoroughly to remove dirt within the leaves. Cut leeks lengthwise down the middle, then dice into quarter inch pieces. Heat truffle butter on low to medium in a saute pan and add leeks, cooking gently until warmed through and ever so crunchy when you bite them. Do not overcook.

Remove from heat and fold leeks into chicken. Add the truffle oil as you go.

Roll out empanada dough on floured surface. Two light turns of the dough should work. brush the upper and lower lips of the dough circle, and add 1.5 to 2 heaping tablespoons of the chicken and leek mixture.

Dip your fingers in water and fold over the dough to seal. Use a fork or the back edge of a butter knife to make small slits (don’t cut through the dough) on the fold all the way around.

Brush beaten egg over the empanada.

Add to a 425 degree oven and cook for 15-20 minutes, depending on the oven.

Remove from the oven and let sit 2-3 minutes. Drizzle a few drops of truffle oil on top and the warm empanadas will emit a heavenly smell.

Serve with salad and a floral white wine.

However, for a wonderful vegetarian option, replace the chicken with cooked potatoes, or, simply use only the truffle butter leeks on their own.

Here’s a link to Foodista’s page on Leeks, including some fabulous photographs:

And, here are a few other foodies’ cool leek recipes:

• In the Making’s Panko Fried Flounder with Caramelized Leeks
• Palate to Pen’s Rose Risotto with Porcini Mushroom and Leeks
• Off the Meat Hook’s Seared Sea Scallops with Melted Ginger Leeks and Crispy Mushrooms

it's all about skin side down in a hot, hot pan

Here’s the link to the Roast Chicken recipe page on Foodista:

As promised, here is the result of the deboned whole chicken.

I find few things more comforting than a properly roasted chicken. They’re quite affordable and ready cooked at most grocery stores, but cooking one at home is a skill you should learn to master.

Recently, I’ve found that I achieve far better results by cutting up the whole roaster into separate pieces. For this version of Recipe Play, I butterflied the breasts and removed the breast bone from within, rather than separating the breasts from the bone during the deboning process. It cooked evenly and was quite easy to carve. I found that it also preserved the integrity of the skin.

But how to prep it? I’ve tried so many different approaches to seasoning and prepping chickens. This worked the best. The secret ingredient here: one packet of powdered ranch dressing mix. Yep, you read that correctly, Ranch…Dressing…Mix.

Now, if you’re worried about the contents of a spice pack such as this, you can replicate it using the parsley, onion and garlic powder below…plus a decent amount of salt.

And, here is a recipe to make your own mix – Ranch Dressing Mix

I used the following:

• The rind of one whole lemon, grated with a box grater
• The juice of the same lemon, squeezed out over the chicken
• Dry parsley (if you’re not using the spice mix)
• Dry marjoram
• Onion powder (if you’re not using the spice mix)
• Garlic powder (if you’re not using the spice mix)
• Salt (go ahead, be generous with your use)
• Pepper
• Lemon herb butter (recipe coming soon, but basically butter, fresh parsley, a pinch of the lemon rind, a squeeze of lemon juice and garlic powder)
• Two onions cut up into pieces

Arrange the roaster on a cookie sheet with foil. Cover the pieces with the lemon juice. Massage the herb butter into the skin and onto the flesh. Combine spices in a bowl and cover liberally (even under the skin, being careful not to tear it too much. Just to be thorough, go back over all the pieces with cracked pepper and sea salt. Cover and throw it in the fridge for about an hour.

Remove from the fridge and let stand at room temperate. Prepare your roasting pan by adding a small glug of olive oil and rubbing it around the surface with your hands. Turn the oven to between 400-425 to preheat and add the pan. By the time the oven is up to temp, the pan should be super hot.

Remove the pan and add the chicken pieces skin side down. Add the onion pieces around the chicken and the quartered pieces of squeezed lemon. You’re going to cook the chicken skin side down only (this method produced the crispiest chicken skin I’ve ever achieved) for about 40 minutes depending on the temp of your oven. Check the temp at around 35 minutes. It should be about 160 degrees when taken from the flesh – not the bone. When it reaches this temp, pull the roaster out of the oven, and turn the pieces flesh-side down. Let sit in the pan for about 5-10 minutes and then remove pieces to a cutting board. Tent with foil and let rest for 10 minutes or so (the chicken will continue to cook, but letting it rest allows the juices to redistribute into the meat).

While the chicken is resting, add cooked onions and lemon pieces from the pan, a can of chicken stock (about 8 oz. of fresh stock if you have it) and the juices from the roasting pan. Blend until it becomes smooth, then strain (you can actually serve it as is if you’d like, for a more rustic approach). Serve gravy in a gravy boat to allow your guests, friends, family to add the sauce if they’d like. The chicken really doesn’t need it, but it is tasty.

Serve with sauteed broccoli, green salad and rice. For this particular spice mix, a dry french chardonnay would pair nicely.

Or, you can merely eat the chicken as you carve it, as I am want to do.

More later

The site’s library of cooking techniques is quite good.

As it’s often difficult to read about cooking techniques, I hope this visual description of a basic, but often intimidating, topic would be useful to you.

In these tough economic times, you have to save money where you’re able. Buying whole chickens, and then de-boning and cooking or freezing at home will most certainly save you money. As you’ll see in this video, it takes about five minutes. Probably about the same time it takes to unwrap separated chicken pieces, wash and re-bag. Plus, you’re helping the environment by not immediately discarding that Styrofoam and plastic wrap.

In the next few days, I’ll add a recipe that uses a fully broken down chicken. Next week, I hope to share with you a great recipe for butterflying a chicken breast, and then stuffing it. Works easily as well with Turkey and saves you tons of mess usually accompanying the carving process.

In any case, enjoy the video, brought to you by Lori Schneider of Figs Catering in Austin, Texas.