The Skagit Barbecue Part Deux

I grill at least once or twice a week this time of year. Fewer dishes to wash, more time spent outside, and so much Maillard reaction! That’s a ten-cent word for caramelization if you didn’t know. Last year I wrote an article for the Enquirer about barbecue basics, and I thought that this summer I’d follow up with some more advanced techniques. Let’s get grilling!

Papaya makes an incredible meat tenderizer.

Remove the seeds and skin from papaya and blend to liquify. You can add salt and pepper, soy sauce, hot sauce, or anything else you might like in a marinade, or you can leave it plain and rinse it off before cooking. Use a tough cut of meat, one that you might normally cook very slowly. Brisket, eye of round, or short ribs are all good choices. Leave the meat in the marinade for 6 hours, then rinse and dry. You can now season and cook it as though it weren’t a tough cut. Cook on a hot grill to your preferred doneness and char level, and your tough cut will transform into a fork-tender masterpiece. Great for beef, but I don’t recommend using this technique for poultry or pork, as the papaya enzymes will break them down too much and too quickly.

Foolproof Grilled Salmon

Next up: there’s a foolproof formula for grilling salmon fillets that I follow. Put the salmon skin-side down on a piece of foil, and top with a fat, something acidic, a spice or herb (or two or three), a sweet ingredient, and a salty ingredient.

A combination I often use is salt, pepper, thin slices of butter, thin slices of whole lemon, onions or garlic, tarragon, brown sugar, and capers. Try sesame oil, soy sauce, other fruits, ginger, hoisin sauce…get creative! I’ve used blueberries on salmon to excellent effect. Close the foil when you have your perfect combo and put it skin-side down on a very hot grill. The fish will cook in 14-18 minutes.

A real winner: grilled chicken can be a gourmet affair!

Make a marinade with plenty of fat, acid, and flavor. I love to use a recipe I adapted from the now-closed Mediterranean Kitchen restaurant near Seattle Center. Their recipe used wings, but I don’t follow the recipe to the letter, and I’m a thigh guy anyway. The Med Kitchen recipe calls for quite a lot of lemon juice, a gratuitous amount of pureed garlic, olive oil, salt, and curry powder. Marinate the chicken, overnight if possible.

Turn your oven to 350 degrees and transfer the chicken to a casserole dish. Cover with marinade. Bake for 20 or 30 minutes, until the chicken is nearly or just cooked through. Blend up some more garlic with a little lemon juice, salt, and a glug of vegetable oil to baste the chicken with. Drain the liquid from the partly cooked chicken. Grill at medium-high heat, turning and basting often, until crisped. You can use this method with any sort of marinade. If you try the Med Kitchen style, pair it with tzatziki, pita, saffron rice, hummus, and a Greek salad for a memorable meal.

Go meatless: try a grilled salad!

Grilled Caesar is a delicious and impressive-looking dish, and fairly easy to make. Slice romaine hearts in half vertically and dress lightly with oil and lemon juice. Cut some crusty bread into fairly thin slices, then crush a couple cloves of garlic into some olive oil and brush it onto both sides of the bread slices. Grill the lettuce briefly on the hottest part of the grill- you mostly want to give it some char marks. On the cooler side, grill the bread until toasty. Serve half of a romaine heart drizzled with Caesar salad dressing and a couple of toasts on the side.

You can apply this technique to various chicories or maybe iceberg lettuce, but you won’t want to subject more delicate greens to this sort of treatment. You could also serve it with grilled lemon slices. No reason to stick with Caesar, either! Try other dressings, grilled vegetables, and grilled fruits in salads.

Stick with hardwood charcoal, disdain the lighter fluid, and enjoy a lovely and delicious Skagit summer.