Another Caribbean holiday

[HankB]

Yesterday I saw Aawa's post involving jerk chicken. It looked pretty good to me! Earlier in the day I had picked up 7 lb. of chicken leg quarters. I reviewed the jerk chicken marinade and realized I had all of the components in the pantry (or in the case of thyme, on the window sill.) Last night I prepared the marinade and put it on the legs. Today after I got back from some errands, I fired up the 26 and got the chicken on.



It was cold, but at least above zero. We got a new recycling bin last week and it's huge, making it a pretty good wind break.



I used a couple firebrick to constrain the fire to make it an indirect cook. When the chicken was nearly done, I pushed the firebrick aside and spred the coals out to finish the legs with some direct heat.



It came out really good.



I'm not sure what jerk chicken is supposed to taste like, but I really like how this came out.

Thanks Aawa for pointing me in this direction!

[salad]

Man, that looks good!  I need to do some chicken parts myself. 

[Aawa]

That jerked chicken came out righteous looking!

Jerked flavor you are supposed to be able to taste all of the ingredients.  The garden flavors of green onions and thyme, hint of sweetness from the brown sugar and slight acidity from the vinegar and the slight notes of savoriness from the all spice and cinnamon and of course the heat and fruitiness from the chile/pepper you used.

[Jeff]

Looks good Hank.  I thought I smelled something good coming from your direction!

[Mmmmm]

How was the skin? Bite through or flap over chin variety?

[HankB]

Jerked flavor you are supposed to be able to taste all of the ingredients.

The flavors are there but on the subtle side. I went easy on the habanero because SWMBO doesn't like too much heat.

How was the skin? Bite through or flap over chin variety?

I've never seemed to crack the nut on crisp skin. I think one requirement is to have the skin dry and this had the marinade on it when it went on the cooker. I've seen some cooks where they use some kind of thin coating that helps to crisp the skin, but that seems not doable with a wet rub/marinade.

[OoPEZoO]

Jerked flavor you are supposed to be able to taste all of the ingredients.

The flavors are there but on the subtle side. I went easy on the habanero because SWMBO doesn't like too much heat.

next time, see if you can get ahold of Scotch Bonnet peppers instead of Habaneros.  They give about the same amount of heat, but they have a lot more flavor.  They are supposedly in the same range on the scoville scale (my experience has been that they are milder), but I think they have a much sweeter taste.  I decided to grow some last summer and ended up smoking then drying the peppers.  The results are fantastic, especially when used in jerk recipies.

[Aawa]

Jerked flavor you are supposed to be able to taste all of the ingredients.

The flavors are there but on the subtle side. I went easy on the habanero because SWMBO doesn't like too much heat.

How was the skin? Bite through or flap over chin variety?

I've never seemed to crack the nut on crisp skin. I think one requirement is to have the skin dry and this had the marinade on it when it went on the cooker. I've seen some cooks where they use some kind of thin coating that helps to crisp the skin, but that seems not doable with a wet rub/marinade.

It is more work but you can get bite through skin with a wet marinade.  You have to remove the skin and scrape the off.  I did that with the Jerked Chicken I made.  I removed the skin connection on one side and let 1 side connected.  Scrapped the fat off the skin with the knife then put the skin back over the chicken.  It came out nice and bite through instead of chewy.