The Webber returns - Mexican BBQ

After a wet and almost barbecue-less summer in 2010-11, the gorgeous spring weather in Canberra inspired me to get the Webber out. Since the citrus season is in full swing, this Mexican recipe adaptation makes use of oranges and tamarind to produce a scrumptious caramelised roast pork.

I served this with a potato salad with blanched green beans, charred corn and capsicums, garlic, lemon juice and scallion oil.

Chicken with tamarind orange glaze

Adapted from Mexconnect

2kg chicken

Zest from two oranges

1/2 cup orange juice, freshly squeezed

Salt and pepper

For the glaze:

3 cups chicken stock

1 cup orange juice

1/2 cup light brown sugar

3 tablespoons light vegetable oil

2 tablespoons tamarind paste

1 tablespoon orange zest

Zest 2 oranges and juice them, this should provide 1/2 a cup of juice. Butterfly the chicken and rub with zest, pour the orange juice over and leave to marinate for 2-3 hours.

Combine all glaze ingredients in a saucepan, bring to a boil then lower heat and cook until the glaze reduced to 3/4 cup and is quite sticky. This reduction takes a while, so get it started right after setting up the chicken marinade.

Grill he chicken in the Webber with all vents open; glaze the skin after 45 minutes.

Worldwide BBQ

In summer 2009-10 the Webber and I attempted a BBQ world tour, cooking a meat dish and an accompaniment from each county. Here's a recap before the 2010-11 season begins.

Africa and the Middle East
Lebanon
Morocco

Asia
India
Indonesia
Malaysia
Thailand

The Americas
Argentina
Jamaica
South Carolina
Texas

Europe
Spain
Portugal

Moroccan BBQ

We had the final barbecue of the season about a month ago. On the menu, grilled harissa chicken legs, made with a hastily prepared harissa paste when my tube ran out.  A stew of broad beans and pumpkin made also well seasoned with harissa from a Sheridan Rogers recipe for the vegetarians and the table and cous cous.

Dessert was the remarkable part, a simple salad of watermelon and lemon balm.

Watermelon Salad with Lemon Balm
Adapted from Flavors or Morocco by Ghillie Bassan
Serves 4-6

1.5 kg of seedless watermelon
2 tsp white sugar
2-3 tablespoons of orange blossom water
A small bunch of fresh lemon balm

Remove the skin from the watermelon and cut into bit size cubes and place in a serving bowl. Add the sugar to the orange blossom water and stir until the sugar has dissolved Pour the mixture over the watermelon, mix gently then cover the bowl and leave to chill in the fridge for about an hour.

Toss the watermelon again before serving, and scatter the lemon balm leaves over the top.

Portuguese BBQ

The Portuguese have a popular charcoal grilled sardine dish called sardinhas assadas; I recreated it using whole blue mackerel to great success. The traditional accompaniment, a salad of roasted capsicums, tomatoes and onions, cut through the oily fish beautifully.

To finish we had arroz doce, or rice pudding, flavoured with lemon peel and cinnamon. Next time I may try to make this in the Webber too.

Salt Grilled Blue Mackerel with Portuguese Salad
Serves 4
Adapted from Jill Dupleix, delicious November 2008

2 large potatoes, peeled, cut into 2cm rounds
2 tbsp olive oil1 tbsp hot smoked paprika
1 red capsicum
1 green capsicum
2 tomatoes
1 red onion
Handful coriander or parsley
4 blue mackerel
1 lemon quartered

Parboil the potatoes, when cool slice into rounds 1 cm thick, coat with oil and paprika and bake in the barbecue over indirect heat with all vents open for 45 minutes.

Cook the capsicums over the coals until blistered, then put them in a bowl and cover it with cling film. Peel the capsicums when cool and slice into strips. Finely slice the tomatoes and onion and mix into the capsicums, add the herbs. Dress with a little vegetable oil if not serving immediately.

Salt the cavity of the fish and the outside, cook over indirect heat for 10 minutes a side, or until the flesh comes away from the bone easily. Serve the grilled  fish with lemon quarters, the roasted potato slices and capsicum salad.

Lebanese BBQ

Tonight we had a Lebanese inspired barbecue. I grilled the lamb kafta and served them with a fattoush salad with Shepard avocado. An appetising, light, end of summer meal.

Kafka Mikli
Serves 2-3
Adapted from New Flavours of the Lebanese Table by Nada Saleh

1 onion
Large handful of parsley or thyme
8-10 mint leaves
450 g lamb mince
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1/4 tsp ground allspice
1/2 tsp salt

Place the onion and herbs in a food processor and blend until smooth. Mix with the mince, spices and salt. Divide into six even amounts and shape each around a long soaked bamboo skewer.

Cook over direct heat in a kettle BBQ with all vents wide open for fifteen minutes, then turn and leave for a further ten minutes.

Spanish BBQ

Spanish BBQ, just prior to covering the patatas bravas in luscious sauce

BBQ season has taken us to Asia and the Americas, this week it's off to Spain. I got all my recipes for the meal from Cooking in Spain by Janet Mendel.

The meat portion of the meal was chuletón a la vasca or beef chops Basque style. The beef is marinated in lemon juice and oil, then grilled over charcoal, while grilling the meat is sprinkled with chopped garlic and parsley. It's served with grilled green peppers.

I also made Catalan speciality calçotada de valls (grilled spring onions) and tapas favourite patas bravas, roasting the potatoes in the BBQ makes this dish a bit less fatty than the regular deep fried preparation. So good.

Patatas Bravas
Serves 4
Adapted from Cooking in Spain by Janet Mendel

800 g waxy potatoes
4 tbsp olive oil
90 ml tomato sauce
2 tablespoons mayonnaise
1 clove of garlic, crushed
2 tsp red wine vinegar
1 tsp smoked Spanish paprika
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp cayenne

Parboil the potatoes. Drain and cut into 3 cm tubes, coat in oil. Place the potatoes in foil tray and bake in a covered BBQ for 40 minutes or until crispy and golden. Drain, salt and serve with the following sauce.

To make the sauce mix the tomato sauce, mayonnaise, garlic, vinegar, paprika, cumin and enough cayenne to make the sauce picante - spicy hot.

Indian BBQ

Last weekend we had Indian BBQ. I cooked from The Food of India by Priya Wickramasinghe, making parathas, pork tikka and a delicious salad dish called kosambri.

To convert the pork tikka recipe for the BBQ I skewered the marinated pork and grilled over indirect heat. I made the sauce the recipe calls for in the food processor using red onion, garlic, ginger, green chilli, coriander, and added about 30 millilitres of vegetable oil. This was served alongside the pork like a fresh chutney, it was refreshing and complemented the lightly charred pork well.

The salad was worth repeating, make a larger batch so you also have some for lunch the next day. For the coconut I used McKenzie's moist flakes, which worked really well here.

Kosambri
Serves 4
Adapted from The Food of India by Priya Wickramasinghe

50 g moong dal
200 g carrot or white radish
25 g grated coconut
25 g coriander leaves
1/2 tbsp oil
1/2 tsp yellow mustard seed
1 tsp dried chilli flakes
2 tbsp lemon juice

Cover the dal in boiling water and leave to soak for at least 3 hours. Rinse well and drain.

Finely grate the carrot or radish in to a bowl and add the coconut, dal and coriander. Heat the oil in a small fry pan over a medium heat and add the mustard seed. When the seed begins to pop add the chilli and remove from the heat. Add the lemon juice and stir, pour over the salad once cold and toss well.

Asado!

Asado is a South American variety of barbecue. To accompany some slow cooked barbecue veal ribs and chorizo I made chimichurri. Chimchurri is a hot vinegar sauce, this version is from Argentina and is really invigoratingly intense. To serve it with the grilled meats I shredded some fresh coriander and spooned over some chimichurri so that the leaves were coated and just suspended in the sauce, leaving a lot more sauce for later use.

As usual dinner was ready too late for photos.

Chumchurri
Makes about 300 ml
Adapted from The Book of Latin American Cooking by Elisabeth Lambert Ortiz

3 tbsp olive oil
240 ml red wine vinegar
2 tbsp cayenne pepper
1 tbsp hot Spanish paprika
4 cloves of garlic
1 tsp black peppercorns
1 tsp dried oregano
1 bay leaf
1/2 tsp salt

Mix the oil, vinegar, cayenne and paprika in a jar or bottle. In a mortar and pestle crush the garlic, peppercorns, oregano, bay leaf and salt to make a paste. Add the paste to the container and shake well to mix. Put the sauce in a cool place or refrigerate for four or five days to allow the flavours to develop.

Texas BBQ

We had a few things to celebrate, so we threw a huge BBQ before departing for summer holidays. I was keen to try out some Texan BBQ, since I still think about the brisket sandwich I had in the Fort Worth airport last September. Twenty-four people turned up for the BBQ, including several vegans and vegetarians, so the menu had to have something for everyone. I settled on the following:

Barbecued Texas Beef Brisket
Vegetarian Texas Chili (I changed the recipe a lot ans will post the modified version later)
Coleslaw
Grilled corn
Peach ice cream, vanilla ice cream with pecans, and peach sorbet

Acquiring brisket was problematic, three days before the barbecue I couldn't get one from any of the butchers in Belconnen and then my shopping patience ran out. I could get a few large pieces of silverside which in the American meat vocabulary is known as top round (and coincidently is the preferred cut for Baltimore-style barbecue). To make something with a similar texture and flavour to my recollection of to brisket from silverside I followed these instructions for barbecuing bison top round, the meat was cooked for 90 minutes per kilo with the barbecue set up for indirect heat and a tray of water placed in the centre to create some steam. The barbecue was about 135 °C for the duration, I wanted the meat cooked medium to avoid potential toughness, so left it cook until it reached and internal temperature of 63 °C, then took it out of the BBQ to rest for 30 minutes wrapped in foil. It wqs really good, but a thinner and fattier cut may have been even better.

The dessert required less experimentation. Peach ice cream is a Southern US speciality, this version comes from Texan former First Lady Ladybird Johnson; it was extremely delicious.

Mrs. Lyndon B Johnson's Peach Ice Cream
Makes about 2 liters
Adapted from The Texas Cookbook by Mary Faulk Koock

1 kg ripe peaches
1 cup water
600 ml cream
250 ml milk
1 cup sugar
1/8 tsp salt
2 egg yolks

To make peach purée halve, pit and quarter the peaches, then cut the quarters into smaller pieces. Put the peach pieces and the water into a saucepan, cover with a lid and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat and simmer until the peach skin has separated from the flesh and the flesh can easily be pierced with a knife. Let the peaches cool then process into a purée with a blender, pass the blended mix though a sieve for a very fine purée.

To make the custard, mix the cream, milk, sugar, and salt in a medium-sized saucepan and heat gently. Whisk the egg yolks in a small bowl, remove the cream mixture from the stove and gradually whisk in half of the warm milk. Return the mixture to the saucepan and cook over a moderate heat, stirring constantly, until the custard has thickened.

Strain the hot custard into the puréed peaches and stir until well mixed. Chill thoroughly in the refrigerator, then freeze in your ice cream machine according to the manufacturer's instructions, for a standard ice cream machine with a 1L bowl divide the mixture into two portions .

December Leftovers

Roasted sweet potato salad

Cooking in December was unpredictable, these are the recipes I made from the internet:

*I made Spanish-style grilled fish using whole whiting. It was good, but not notably Spanish.

*To accompany our Jamaican barbecue we had a roasted sweet potato salad based loosely on this recipe from Mark Bittman. I roasted the sweet potato on the barbecue sprinkled with some chilli flakes and raw sugar, once cooked I left them to cool. I added a can of drained and washed kidney beans, some diced red onion, young rocket and some finely sliced radish. The salad was dressed with olive oil, lemon juice and seasoned with salt and black pepper. It was really tasty and made a great accompaniment to the jerk chicken.

*The glaze for the Christmas ham and the rub for the South Carolina barbecue. Both of these were very successful.

South Carolina BBQ

This week we moved on from the Caribbean to the USA, South Carolina to be exact. There is fierce barbecue rivalry between the states in America, which means more delicious styles of barbecue for us to try.

This barbecue was prepared without much planning, so I had to use two boneless pork shoulder roasts instead of a big bone-in shoulder. I also couldn't be bothered hiking over to Bunnings in the heat to investigate the availability of wood chips for smoking the meat. Get yourself a bigger hunk of meat and some smoking chips for a more authentic South Carolina barbecue. But if you can't be bothered doing either of those things, this barbecue still comes out rich, smoky and delicious.

To serve the cooked pork pull it or chop it into small pieces, serve it in a soft white bread roll with coleslaw and the vinegar and pepper barbecue sauce

Blackjack Barbecue Dry Rub
Makes 1 cup of rub
From here

2 tbsp black pepper
1 tbsp cayenne pepper
3 tbsp paprika
1 tbsp salt
3 tbsp chilli powder
1 tbsp garlic powder
2 tbsp dried oregano
1 tbsp brown sugar

Grind all the spices and combine.

Vinegar and Pepper Barbecue Sauce
Makes 1 cup

1 1/2 cups apple cider vinegar
2 tbsp crushed red chilli
2 tbsp black pepper, ground
2 tbsp brown sugar
Salt to taste

Combine the ingredients in a small saucepan and bring to the boil, turn down the heat and simmer until the sauce is reduced to one cup.

BBQ Pork Shoulder
Serves 8-12

3-4 kg pork shoulder
1 cup dry rub

Cover the pork with dry rub and let it sit while you light the BBQ. The Webber site has comprehensive instructions on how to barbeque the pork.

Jamaican BBQ

This week we took a detour from Asia and moved to Jamaica. Jerk isn't a style of BBQ I have come across in Australia, but with all the ingredients for the marinade readily available it's a easy style to try and recreate on a charcoal BBQ.

I marinated some whole butterflied chickens in jerk marinade for about 3 hours, then cooked the chickens over coals with the vents partially closed.

To accompany the chicken we had a roasted sweet potato salad and a cold watermelon for afters.

Jerk Marinade
Makes enough for 2kg of meat
Adapted from Jerk form Jamaica by Helen Willinsky

1 brown onion, chopped
1/2 cup spring onions, chopped
2 tsps of fresh thyme leaves
1 tsp salt
2 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp black pepper
1 tsp allspice
1 jalapeño chopped
3 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp vegetable oil
1 tbsp cider vinegar

Combine all the ingredients in a blender or food processor and process until smooth. Store leftovers in a sealed container in the fridge for up to one month.

Thai BBQ

There is something intimidating about a giant, bright pink silk-covered cookbook. The tone of David Thompson's epic Thai Food, is rigorous and reverent but also sort of discouraging, it took me a while to finally start cooking from it. Now we're properly acquainted, this weeks barbecue dish came from the book, we made gai yang (grilled chicken) for a late Sunday lunch and it was fantastic!

A large jug of freshly made sweet chilli sauce in the centre, mojitos at the front

To accompany the chicken we had cucumbers, thinly sliced carrots and a herb salad made with roughly even quantities of coriander, ginger mint and pineapple sage lightly dressed with peanut oil. The archivist maintains that he loves ayam taliwang the best, but I thought that this dish had a great balance of hot, sweet and sour and it will be on the menu again.

The only part of this dish that requires planning it the coriander root since the other ingredients can all be acquired fairly easily. Coriander roots can be stockpiled in the freezer for later use. I have included the recipe for a half quantity of sweet chilli sauce, this should be enough for at least six chickens.

Gai Yang
Serves 4
Adapted from David Thompson's Thai Food

3 coriander roots, washed and chopped
Pinch of salt
4 garlic cloves, peeled
10 white peppercorns
3 tbsp fish sauce
Large pinch palm sugar
1 small chicken

1/4 cup coriander root
Pinch of salt
1/4 cup garlic cloves, peeled
1/2 cup long red chillies
2 cups white vinegar
1 1/2 cups white sugar
2 cups water

Using a mortar and pestle, pound the coriander roots, salt, garlic and peppercorns into a fine paste. Work in the fish sauce and sugar. Butterfly the chicken, wash and pat dry and and rub in the marinade, leave to marinate in the fridge for a few hours.

For the sweet chilli sauce, process the coriander root, salt, garlic and chilli in a food processor. Combine the vinegar, sugar and water in a pot and bring to the boil, then add the chilli paste. Simmer the sauce until reduced by half, then set aside to cool.

Chargrill the chicken until it reaches at internal temperature of ~83°C. Serve with a bowl of the sweet chilli sauce.

Malaysian BBQ

Worldwide BBQ season continued this week. I wanted sate/satay and I choose to go with the Malaysian beef variant rather than any of the myriad of Indonesian options. I took my recipes from Rosemary Brisenden's book South East Asian Food and followed her serving suggestions by accompanying the satay with rice cake (nasi impit) and chunks of cucumber.

My inexperience with direct charcoal BBQ left the meat a bit overdone which meant that the flavour of the meat overwhelmed the well-balanced satay sauce. Everything was tasty, but not as delicious as last week. Oh well, practice makes perfect as they say.

Malay Satay
Serves 2 or 4 as a part of a larger meal
Adapted from South East Asian Food by Rosemary Brisenden

500g rump steak
1 stalk lemon grass, finely sliced
2 cloves of garlic
pinch of turmeric
1/2 tsp ground fennel
1/2 tsp ground cumin
Vegetable oil for basting

2 tsp coriander seed
1 tsp fennel seed
1 tsp cumin
6 dried chillies, soaked in warm water until soft
1/2 tsp shrimp paste
6 shallots
1 clove garlic
2 tbsp peanut oil
85 grams of peanuts, fried and roughly ground
250 ml coconut milk
4 tbsp tamarind water made from 1 tsp tamarind pulp
1 tsp palm sugar
salt to taste

Trim the fat from the rump and dice the steak in to 1.5 cm cubes. Make the paste by combining the lemongrass, garlic and spices in a food processor or mortar and pestle. Mix the meat and spice paste and leave to marinate for 2-3 hours; soak bamboo skewers in water at the same time to prevent them from burning on the BBQ.

To make the satay sauce, grind all the spices into a fine powder. Combine the soaked chillies, shrimp paste, shallots and garlic and ground spices in a food processor or mortar and pestle and make a paste. Heat the oil in a saucepan and fry the paste until aromatic. Add the ground peanuts, coconut milk, tamarind water and sugar and stir well. Allow to simmer for 10 minutes, stirring to prevent the sauce from sticking. Taste and adjust the seasoning. This recipe makes enough sauce for twice the amount of meat.

Thread the meat onto skewers, covering about 1/3 of the length of the skewer. Cook directly over a charcoal fire, brushing frequently with the oil. Serve the meat with the sauce on the side.

Indonesian BBQ

It was 31 degrees and sunny today, it seemed like a good idea to cook outdoors. I would like to try BBQ dishes from all over the world this summer, we started with Indonesia. According to my cookbook ayam taliwang (chicken with spicy sauce) is Lombok's most famous charcoal grilled chicken dish; it is basted with and served with a chilli-coconut sauce - which is quite delicious on it's own.

To complete the meal we had an authentic pickled cucumber - acar mentimun - and some improvised sides of spinach stir-fired with kecap manis and BBQ roasted sweet potatoes. The chicken elicited audible moans of appreciation and the vegetables provided a sweet textural counterpoint to the chook.

Next weekend, Indonesian again or Malaysian BBQ.

Ayam Taliwang
Serves 4 - 8
Adapted from The Food of Indonesia, Periplus World Cookbooks

14 bird's-eye chillies
1 medium brown onion
1 tsp dried shrimp paste, toasted
1 tsp palm sugar
1 tsp salt
2 tbsp oil
4 cups coconut milk
1 tbsp lime or lemon juice
1 whole fresh chicken (sauce will be enough for 2)
1 tsp salt

To prepare the sauce blend the chilli, onion, shrimp paste, palm sugar and salt into a smooth paste using a food processor or mortar and pestle. Heat the oil in a wok then add the paste and cook for 2-3 minutes. Add the coconut milk and reduce the heat, let the mixture simmer until the coconut milk is reduced by a quarter, then remove from the heat and add the lime/lemon juice. This makes enough sauce for up to two whole chickens, it can be stored in the fridge or frozen for longer term storage.

Butterfly the chicken by removing the backbone with a knife or kitchen shears, then place the chicken breast side up and press hard on the breast to snap the wishbone so the chicken will sit flat. Charcoal grill breast side up for 20 minutes, pour half a cup of sauce into a new container and use it to baste the chicken every 10-15 minutes until the internal temperature reaches ~83°C. Allow the chicken to rest for 10 minutes and then cut into large serving pieces. Spread some additional warmed sauce on the chicken before serving.

Lebanese BBQ

An impromptu BBQ for Archivists, partners and me on a long weekend. Forequarter lamb was on special so I decided to get the BBQ out and try some more Lebanese recipes from New Flavours of the Lebanese Table by Nada Saleh. The menu for dinner:

Hummous
Pumpkin Dip, latkin m'tabal bi-thini
Thyme Flat bread, mankoushi bi-zaatar
Tabbouleh
Cheats BBQ Shawarma and Spiced Roast Potatoes


Pumpkin Dip
Adapted from New Flavours of the Lebanese Table by Nada Saleh

650 g peeled de-seeded pumpkin
1 garlic clove
3 tbsp tahini
3 tbsp lemon juice
2 tbsp walnut oil
Salt to taste
Crushed walnuts and parsley to serve

Preheat the oven to 200°C. Cut the pumpkin into 2.5 cm wide chunks and place on a greased baking tray. Bake for 40-45 minutes or until soft and beginning to caramelise. Remove from the oven when done and allow it to cool.

Place the cooked pumpkin, garlic, tahini, lemon juice and walnut oil in a food processor and blend until smooth. Taste and add salt, then move the dip to a covered bowl. When you're ready to serve chop some parsley with some walnuts and sprinkle over the surface.

Cheats BBQ Shawarma and Spiced Roast Potatoes
Serves 8

1.6 kg lamb diced 1.5-2 cm
1 tsp whole allspice
1 tsp whole black pepper
1 tsp whole cloves
1 tsp whole fenugreek
1 tsp whole nutmeg
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tbsp Spanish paprika
2 tsp salt
Canola oil

1.5 kg chat potatoes
3 tsp rock salt
Canola oil

Soak 18 bamboo skewers for 30 minutes to prevent them burning on the BBQ. Peel and par-boil the potatoes. Prepare the BBQ for cooking with indirect heat then light it.

Using a mortar and pestle crush the allspice, black pepper, cloves and fenugreek then grate nutmeg into the mortar, add the ground ginger, cinnamon then mix; this mix is known as Sabea Bharat in Lebanon. Place the lamb in a bowl, then mix though the spice mix, paprika and salt. Tread the meat onto the bamboo skewers leaving space at either end for easy turning, this amount of meat should make at least 18 skewers. Drizzle some oil over the meat to prevent sticking to the grill and leave the meat to marinate.

Quarter the cooked potatoes the spread them out in foil trays. Crush the rock salt in the mortar and pestle, mixing the leftover spice mix with the salt. Sprinkle the spiced salt over the potatoes and toss with the oil. Cook with the lid on and vents open until the potatoes are crispy.

Once the potatoes have been cooking for 30 minutes, close the lid vent on the BBQ and add the meat. Cook the skewers for 25-30 minutes.

BBQ Tarragon Chicken

The massive tarragon looms behind the Webber

I have a French tarragon problem. This is the first year I've grown tarragon in my potted Canberra garden and my tarragon has thrived in the dry conditions. It grew massive, really truly humongous. I started to worry it might overshadow the lime tree it shares a pot with.

So I set out to find ways to use it. French tarragon has a bitter anise flavour, I tried it as a salad green but found the flavour was too powerful. I have found two other ways to use it. First I cut off a few handfuls, I carefully picked the leaves from stalks and fed them into my half-full bottle of white wine vinegar. I left the bottle of vinegar and leaves on the kitchen window sill for a couple of weeks and have been using it to make a simple vinaigrette with olive oil, it's lovely on a simple green salad.

My second successful tarragon experiment began when I bought a Webber Kettle BBQ at a charity garage sale. Now the afternoons are getting longer and it's too hot in the kitchen, it's nice to cook outdoors. I searched for recipes combining meats and tarragon and settled on a chicken tarragon combo. The tarragon and charcoal impart a delicious flavour on the meat, it's great hot or cold so it doesn't hurt to cook more than one bird at a time. We sometimes eat this chicken with BBQ baby potatoes roasted in duck fat and with thyme; plain roasted butternut pumpkin is good too.

I still have too much tarragon; but at least I'm working out what to do with it.

BBQ Tarragon Chicken
1 whole free range chicken 1-1.4 kg
1/2 cup loosely packed tarragon leaves
1 lemon
3 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp rock salt

Use kitchen shears or a knife to trim off the large deposits of fat around the chicken's cavity, then spatchcock the bird. A simple method is turn the chicken breast side down, then remove the spine by cutting down both sides of it. Flip the bird skin side up and press hard between the breasts to break the breast bone. Fold the wings in above the legs to help stop them from drying out or burning.

Peel the zest from the lemon, then cut the zest and tarragon into a rough dice. Feed about half of the tarragon and zest mixture under the skin of the chicken around the breasts and the thighs, the skin should lift away fairly easily around the edges. Make sure to pull the skin back over the meat when you are finished. Coat the skin side of the chicken with the oil, salt and the remaining tarragon/zest mixture. You can put the chicken back in the fridge for a few hours at this point if you need to.

If you're using a charcoal BBQ light it, when the coals are ashed over it's ready. Insert a meat thermometer though the leg and thigh of the chicken then place it in the centre of the BBQ and put the lid on. The chicken is cooked when the internal temperature reaches 77°C/170°F, which takes around 45-50 minutes.