BBQ Chicken. It’s a pretty perfect food. The only food more perfect than BBQ chicken may be fried chicken. And I don’t have that perfected yet. But it will be mine. Oh yes. It will be mine.
Where was I? Oh yes, the virtues of BBQ chicken! You can serve it at a dinner, a lunch, a picnic, or anything, and if you do it right, it makes great leftovers. Don’t be that chef who cooks the chicken over a hot grill, ending with the outside burned and the inside raw. You’re better than that! Here’s my version.
Ingredients
Chicken
4 Chicken Thighs with Skin (my favorite, but use the pieces you like)(I put 4 here, but choose your number folks. Leftovers are always good!)
Seasoned Salt
¼ cup Balsamic Vinegar
Balsamic Glaze
½ cup Balsamic Vinegar
⅔ cup Brown Sugar
2 tbsp Dijon Mustard
½ tsp Salt
Directions
Season chicken liberally on both sides with Seasoned Salt. Sprinkle balsamic vinegar on them and place in plastic bags for 1 to 8 hours.
I use a reverse sear process here. I put them on the Big Green Egg at 300 degrees or so first. I use some apple wood with that. You could use indirect heat on a grill, or you could do this part in the oven. (See note below). Flip over every 10 minutes or so. Cook until they are done – 175 degrees for thighs; 165 for breasts. Cooking the dark meat a little more is fine, but you have to be pretty exact with white meat. Remove the chicken when it hits the right temp and cover tightly with foil until ready to sear. You can hold it here for at least an hour – for safety reasons, don’t let the chicken temperature dip below 140.
Note: Indirect Heat is the key to good BBQ. Big Green Egg people put a “platesetter” over the coals to turn the BGE into an oven. Traeger people flip a switch. If you have a gas grill, you can turn on the burners on one side of the grill, close the lid and let the oven heat up, then use the side of the grill where the burners are off. Real outdoor chefs use indirect heat!
While the chicken is indirect cooking, prepare the glaze. Add all ingredients in a sauce pan, whisk together and simmer for 10 minutes. It will thicken. Do this while the chicken is cooking.
Using direct heat, heat up your grill to a high temperature. Apply oil to the grill grates. You can spray it or wipe it with a paper towel dipped in canola oil and held by tongs. Move the chicken to the hot grill, basting with the glaze and flipping every two minutes until it looks perfect. A little flame is not going to hurt you! You’ll have a nice beautiful charred glaze on there and be ready to serve!
Pizza Night is a big deal in our house. And you can buy dough at Trader Joe’s or your supermarket, and it’s just fine. But why settle for just fine, when making great pizza dough is so easy to do! And when people ask if you made the dough yourself, you calmly answer, ‘Why yes I did.” It feels good.
You need at least 90 minutes of time, and preferably two hours, but 90% of that time is waiting for it to rise. Try it out!
Ingredients
4 cups White FlourIf you want to get fancy, you can use the Italian 00 flour, which is much softer and will impress your friends who know pizza. I like to substitute 1/2 cup whole wheat flour, as I think it gives the dough some nice rustic appeal.
2 tsp Kosher Salt
1.50 tbsp Active Dry Yeast(Equivalent to two packages)
1.25 cups Warm Water
1 tbsp Olive Oil
Tomato/Pesto/BBQ SauceYou choose!
Mozzarella and Parmesan Cheese
Awesome Pizza Ingredients
Directions
Mix Warm Water with yeast. Let sit for 5-10 minutes until bubbly.
Mix Flour and Salt.
In a Kitchen Aid Mixer, or with a spoon or with your clean hands, mix, then knead the flour with the yeasted water. Do this for 5 minutes in the mixer or at least 7 minutes by hand. I prefer kneading it, as my hands can feel the dough when it starts to soften up and become more pliable. Knead it for another minute after you feel that change, and you’re good.
Separate into two or three dough balls. Two makes two 12-inch pizzas. Three makes three 8-10 inch pizzas.
Let rise for at least one or two hours. Some ovens have a “proofing” mode, where you can set the temperature to 90 degrees or so. Otherwise, just cover with a cloth in the warmest place in your kitchen and let rise. It should double in size.
About an hour before you are ready to start putting those pies in the oven or Big Green Egg, start the oven at 550 (or as hot as yours will go) and put the pizza stones in there. If you have multiple pizza stones, they work great on the different levels of the oven. Also, if you have a convection oven, that works best.
I’m working on using my gas grill too, and I hope to update you on that soon.
Start in the middle and press out until you have a nice circle, or something that approximates a circle, or some kind of amoeba-like crust that will taste wonderful. 1/4 of an inch is a good thickness target – as that allows some rise an those nice bubbles in the oven. If you want it super thin, roll out with rolling pin to about 1/8″. Or, if you’re really good (I’m not) toss it and make it the artistic way!
Cover with your favorite sauce, cheese, and toppings (keep it light – pizza is not meant to be overloaded) ingredients, bake at 550 degrees ((or the highest your oven will go) on a pizza stone for 6-8 minutes, and you are ready!
One more note – there is always a debate about how to keep pizza dough from sticking to the stone. Cornmeal is a favorite answer, but it’s not my answer. Parchment paper. After you roll out the dough, put it on parchment paper and then add the ingredients. When you are ready to bake, slide the pizza WITH THE PARCHMENT PAPER STILL ON THE BOTTOM, into the oven. I take out the parchment paper after 2-3 minutes, it will be brown on the edges, and then the pie loses its stickiness and can be easily moved around on and eventually removed from the stone.
I had been eyeing the Tomahawk Steaks at our local grocery store for sometime. They were the showcase feature of the butcher’s display case. A few years ago (when Dawson was just 14), I decided it was time and invited our friends Steve and Karen – great cooks themselves – over to enjoy. Steve, who burns about 17,000 calories a day biking all over the Santa Monica Mountains, thinks that one of these is just about a perfect serving size!
These super big and super thick steaks are quite a show and really fun to cook, serve, and eat! Cooked low and slow, then seared at the end, they are super tender and just amazing.
Ingredients
1 Tomahawk Ribeye Steaks – With the bone, they weigh about 3 pounds. Serves 2 to 3.
Soy Sauce
Montreal Steak Seasoning
Directions
You may need to ask your butcher for these. These were choice grade (fantastic), and I got them from Pavilions. I have heard they can be found sometimes at Costco.
Try to stop your son from playing with the food. Another parenting failure on my part.
I only use two seasonings on steak: soy sauce and Montreal Steak Seasoning. I went heavy on the Montreal. Please let this sit with the spices for at least 30 minutes. You can go up to 12 hours. Letting the salt do its magic is worth the time.
The key with these steaks is that they are almost roasts. They are almost 3″ thick. I think the best way to cook them is to use low, indirect heat (250 degrees) for an hour or so until they reach the desired temp. Then sear them to get a crust and make them look beautiful. My indirect heat source is our course my Big Green Egg, but Traegers are wonderful too. If you are using the cool side of the grill, make sure to rotate the steak every 20 minutes or so.
I am using my new Thermopro probes in there to monitor the temp. I’ll take them off when they hit 128.
I used a small amount of pecan wood for a hint of smoke flavor. Don’t over do it!
Turn them over once during the cook.
Take them out of the Big Green Egg/Oven when they hit your desired temp, and let sit for 10 minutes.
Prepare a high heat grill, and sear each side for 1 to 2 minutes. You’re just looking for a beautiful seared finish here. Turn the steaks 90 degrees halfway through to cross hatch it.
Plate it up!
Serve it up!
Every year, we go “glamping” (glamour camping) at El Capitan Canyon above Santa Barbara with four other families. Jill’s friend Shari and I love cooking for the group. Shari is an outstanding cook who carries a tackle box of cooking tools on every trip. It’s a good look. I’ve learned a lot from Shari over the years, and I’m happy to share one of her recipes here.
This Korean marinade is so easy, and it’s perfect with any beef, pork, or chicken. And I always reserve one half cup (at least) to spoon over the dishes as I serve them.
Ingredients
1 cup Soy Sauce
4 tsp Sesame Oil
4 tbsp Sugar
2 tsp Crushed Hot Red Peppers
2 tbsp Fresh Ginger, gratedI often don't have fresh ginger, so I'll use 2 tsp of ground ginger instead.
2 Bunch Green Onions, Chopped
Directions
Uh . . . Mix it Together!
We love steak in my house. Except for my lovely vegetarian wife. But she supports the three boys in the house in our passion for steak. So what cut is best?
According to Dawson, nothing beats a filet. It’s butter soft, not as fatty as ribeyes, and a perfect steak for home or the steakhouse.
Ryan and I both prefer ribeyes – the fat is much higher, and so is the flavor. To me, the bone in ribeye is the steak to order in a steakhouse, and nothing beats it.
If high quality New York steaks are on sale, it’s always a fantastic option. They are tougher than filets, but a little more flavorful.
People love Porterhouses, which are like a T-bone, with a New York on one side of the bone, and a filet on the other. To me, they are too hard too cook. Getting two different cuts to the perfect temperature is super challenging.
Finally, when I’m buying steak in the grocery store, a good grass-fed steak is always a great option, as it creates both great flavor and texture.
Ingredients
1 Steak, per person*
Soy Sauce
Montreal Steak Seasoning
Directions
Take it out of the fridge and let it sit at least 30 minutes. Don’t let it sit for hours – it’s unsafe.
Season with Soy Sauce To me, it’s more interesting that Worcestershire sauce
Season with Montreal Steak Seasoning. It’s the best. I cover mine with it, and sprinkle Dawson’s lightly. It has a Steak-au-poivre feel to it.
Cook it on the grill or on the Big Green Egg (Direct Cooking). No other way to do it. Get it hot – 400 to 500 degrees is great.
3 Minutes on each side, Rotate 90 degrees and cook 3 minutes on each side again (makes nice cross-hatch marks). I cook my steak until it’s 130 degrees. It’s a perfect medium rare.
Now, if you have a super thick steak – over 2″ thick, please see my recipe for Tomahawk Steaks. You are going to need to use some indirect heat.
Let sit for 3-5 minutes, then serve it up!
It’s easier than ever to add smoking to your outdoor cooking abilities. And with the right equipment, you don’t have to devote a whole day to the effort. I used to have to tend my $100 offset smoker every 30 minutes. It was tricky to keep the temperature right and the results were inconsistent. If you know this site, you know that I love my XL Big Green Egg. It holds the temperature like a champ, but it takes a little work to get it going, but once you do, it’s a rock and needs little to no attention. And the results are fantastic. But there are easier versions – the Traeger and its copycats are even easier. Plug it in, flip a switch, and you’re smoking. If you like smoke flavor, find your right fit and make it happen.
This is just like the Roasted Turkey recipe, but better. A real smoker is just like an oven. A lot of people believe in “low and slow,” where the temperature is 225 or 250, and it takes a long time. That’s a great strategy, but I like to smoke a turkey just like I do it in the oven. Same temp, same time, but a way different flavor.
Ingredients
1 cup BBQ Rub. Choose your favorite or go with my Arkibu Rub .
Directions
Instead of dry brining the turkey, rub the turkey with the BBQ rub. There’s plenty of salt in that to do the work. Let sit for 24 hours.
Instead of preparing the oven, prepare the smoker. For me – it’s the Big Green Egg. Use the same temp as the Roasted Turkey Recipe – 320 degrees. Apple wood chips are outstanding.
Add apple wood chips, and Smoke until the breast temperature reaches 165. There’s no basting.
