GRILLED CHICKEN OR RIBS

PURISTS AMONG YOU WOULD HAVE SCOFFED HAD I TITLED THIS BARBECUED CHICKEN AND RIBS. Technically, they’re not. True barbecue is meat cooked by the smoke of a hardwood fire at low temperatures, usually under 210°F. My chicken and ribs are just meats massaged the night before with a spicy rub, then grilled slowly over indirect heat at about 275° for four hours or so, before being slathered with a really good sauce.

I’ve tried my hand at true barbecue and have a smoker sitting in my garage to prove it. But I just don’t seem to have the patience it takes. Come midnight, I really would rather go to bed than spend the next several hours awake and stoking a smoldering fire. The last time I tried true barbecuing, I found myself staring bleary eyed at the smoker in my back yard at 1 a.m. trying to stay awake, when I heard my son, Brian, and a few of his friends arrive home.

My saviors.

Since I knew they were going to sit out by the pool (and thus the smoker) for a few more hours talking, why not enlist their help? Bad idea. Teenage boys live in a world where responsibility lasts only as long as a parental glare. When I awoke next morning, I discovered they let the fire go out too soon and forgot to take the chickens off the grill, let alone wrap them and put them in the refrigerator. Thus ended my attempts at authentic barbecue.

Ever since, I’ve been trying to give my smoker to my son-in-law, Todd, but his wife, Kim, who learned her stubborn ways from mine, will have none of it. She knows that once Todd gains possession of an item, he never lets it go; a fact born out by the countless storage rooms he rented in the years preceding his marriage to keep his “stuff.” So the smoker remains in my possession waiting for a garage sale or a weakening in my daughter’s resolve.

What I evolved instead of barbecuing was a way to slow cook over an indirect fire on a covered grill that keeps the meats tender and juicy while using a rub and my liquid-smoke infused sauce to hint at the real thing.

I found the basic recipe for this sauce in an in-flight magazine some years ago in an ad that was touting one of the ingredients. I can’t remember which one. Over time, like all good things, it has evolved.

I use the sauce in conjunction with a dry rub that I developed by stealing from various other rubs I tried. The rub works best if you coat the meat the day before you’re going to cook, then wrap the meat in plastic wrap and let it sit in the refrigerator overnight.

Grilled Chicken or Ribs: The Recipe

Makes enough to serve 8 people

Ingredients

FOR THE MEAT

16 pieces of mixed bone-in, dark and white pieces of chicken and/or three slabs of ribs. Cut the breasts in half so the pieces are all about the same size. If you want to do both chicken and ribs at the same time, you’ll need to double the rub and sauce recipes and get a really big grill.

FOR THE RUB (Makes ¼ cup)

Combine the spices in a bowl and mix together thoroughly:

1 tablespoon paprika

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon sugar

1 teaspoon black pepper

½ teaspoon garlic powder

½ teaspoon onion salt

1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1/8 teaspoon thyme

FOR THE SAUCE (Makes two cups of sauce)

1 medium onion,finely minced

3 tablespoons olive oil

1 large clove garlic, finely minced or crushed

1 cup beef stock, home made or store variety

3-4 ounces tomato paste (Adjust up or down depending on how strong you like the tomato taste. The recipe started out with a six-ounce can, but I cut it back to about half that.)

½ cup red wine. The original recipe called for vinegar. I like the softness the wine imparts.

¼ cup Worcestershire sauce

¼ cup soy sauce

2 tablespoons honey (A trick: dip the measuring spoon into olive oil first. The honey slides off easily.)

2 teaspoons Tabasco

2 teaspoons of salt

1 ½ teaspoon liquid smoke

1 teaspoon dry mustard

First, prepare the meat: The evening before, prepare the rub by simply combining all the ingredients. Then liberally smear the rub over the meat. If you’re doing ribs, don’t forget to pull off the thin sheet of fat that covers the back before you rub on the dry rub. Use a knife to slice into the membrane at one of the ends and grab it with a paper towel. It should peel off in strips relatively easily. For the chicken, keep the skin on and smear the rub over and under it as much as possible. Wrap the meat in plastic or put it in plastic bags and refrigerate overnight.

Second: About four hours before you want to eat, heat up the grill so it’s hot enough to quickly brown the meat or chicken. I use a gas grill, but charcoal will work as well (and some say with much more flavor). It’s just trickier to regulate the heat.

Third: Sear the meat on both sides, then turn off all but one burner and move the meat to the side so it’s not over the flame. If you’re doing charcoal, shovel the coals to one side.

Fourth: Adjust the flame so that the temperature when the cover is down stays between 250°F and 275°F. Turn the meat about every 30 minutes, basting with olive oil as needed to keep it moist.

Fifth: Prepare the sauce. (This can be done a day ahead and refrigerated. You can also freeze the sauce.) Heat the oil in a two-quart pan. Add the minced onions to the oil. Reduce the heat to a simmer and sweat the onions, covered, over low heat for about 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Sixth: While the onions are cooking, dissolve the bullion in the ½ cup of water and line up the other ingredients. You’ll be adding them one after the other when the onions are done.

Seventh: Add the garlic to the onions and stir for a few minutes until you can smell the garlic aroma. Be careful not to burn the garlic. Add the water and dissolved bouillon cube and stir. Then add the rest of the sauce ingredients in order, stirring after each addition to incorporate them evenly.

Eighth: Simmer for at least 30 minutes. The sauce should be thick. If you’re not using it for dinner the same day or if the meat is still a few hours from being done, refrigerate the sauce.

Ninth: After about three-and-a-half hours, check the meat with a thermometer. It should be at about 170°F, which should give you moist chicken and fall-off-the-bone pork.

Tenth: Crank up the heat to 325°F for the last 15 minutes or so and baste with the sauce. If you baste it much earlier than that, the honey in the sauce will burn.

And finally: Serve with the sauce on the side, warmed, a stack of napkins or a roll of paper towels and your favorite beverage.