Brined chicken on the grill, with rice and cilantro

This grilled chicken with rice and cilantro is a great way to enjoy an everyday recipe but with a big boost of texture and flavor. Brine, beyond a centuries-old food preservation technique, is a culinary method with which to enjoy new flavors and textures, since it provides not only salting but great juiciness. It is the secret of many chefs to offer flavors completely different from the usual in the most common meats and fish, and today we take advantage of it.

About this grilled chicken recipe

I hope with this recipe you discover a different yet very simple way to serve delicious grilled chicken: tender and very tasty, this is how the salt-and-spice brined chicken we propose will be.

This grilled chicken is a delicious alternative to classic roast chicken. Plus, we serve it with a delicious, typical Brazilian rice recipe.

What is the technique of cooking in brine?

Brine, beyond a method of preservation that is already hundreds of years old, is a way to season foods and give them juiciness, while also greatly enhancing flavors.

It is an extremely simple way to completely change a recipe, since the taste result of meats and fish is very different if you have kept them for a few hours in brine.

Cooking in brine is nothing more than immersing foods in a solution of water and salt. The most common in cooking is to talk about a salt concentration in water of 3% to 10%. It will depend on what you’re looking for and the size of the pieces whether you concentrate that water more or less, as well as the time you will keep the food in that salting (the more concentrated the water-and-salt solution, the less time you will require).

The benefits of putting the food in brine increase even more when you also use the brining hours to add other flavors: you can season the water with spices and aromatics so the meat absorbs those flavors. The final result is spectacularly different from food without that brine.

There are two types of brine:

• Dry brine: you’ve surely heard of salt-baked fish. It basically consists of covering the food with salt for a few hours, so you remove the moisture from the food.
• Liquidbrine: this is the brine we will apply in today’s recipe, the most common way to brine meats and olives. It basically requires submerging the food in that saline mixture.

How to make liquid brine?

1. Prepare a mixture with a 10% salt concentration — that is, for every liter of water (1,000 ml of water), add 100 gr of salt. Heat the water slightly and mix until dissolved (it is heated so the dissolution is easier, but it is not necessary... and you should make sure the water does not evaporate or the salt concentration will increase).
2. Once the salt is dissolved, you can immerse whatever food you want in that saline solution, and let it cool in the refrigerator for the appropriate hours (it will depend on the food and thickness; normally it will be from one hour to overnight, but follow the guideline tables of the recipes you follow).

For convenience, prepare the water mixture in a wide bowl with a lid that can fit all the meat or fish you are going to prepare. In the case of long fish pieces, you can use a rectangular roasting pan with some height.

You don’t need a large amount of water, but enough so the food pieces are completely submerged.

What advantages does brining have for meats and fish

1. The volume of the food increases, since part of that salt water is absorbed by it.
2. The piece is hydrated, becoming much juicier (it is less likely to be dry when cooked).
3. Given the two previous points, it reduces less during cooking.
4. Meats have a less fibrous texture, becoming more tender and more pleasant to chew.
5. Red meats intensify their color and gain more flavor, and fish and white meats become more tender and juicy.

Le Creuset nonstick grill, Le Creuset Damascus steel knife, Le Creuset grill, round Evolution casserole Le Creuset and Le Creuset ramekin.

Ingredients (for 4 people)

• A whole chicken between 1 and 1.2 Kg.

For the brine (optional):

• 100 g brown sugar
• 100 g coarse sea salt
• 1 liter hot water
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 2 tsp of chili
• 2 tsp of garlic powder
• ½ tsp of dried oregano
• 150 ml Cachaça (traditional Brazilian alcoholic beverage)
• Juice and zest of 1 lemon
• 1 tsp black peppercorns

For the rice:

• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 onion, finely chopped
• 2 tsp of garlic powder
• 1 cup white rice
• 2 cups boiling water
• 1 tsp of salt
• A handful of chopped fresh cilantro

Preparation

Preparation of the chicken and the brine:

1. Ask the butcher to prepare the chicken without the central backbone and completely butterflied, so you can cook it on the grill. Otherwise, open it at home with the help of a cutting board and a sharp knife.
2. For the brine, in a large bowl that fits the chicken well, mix the salt and sugar with hot water until dissolved. Add the remaining ingredients and submerge the chicken.
3. Leave it submerged for at least 4 hours in the refrigerator (you can leave it overnight if you wish).

We cook the chicken and the rice:

1. Preheat the oven to 180ºC (or 160ºC with fan).
2. Remove the chicken from the brine and pat it dry with paper towels.
3. With a kitchen brush, coat it with olive oil.
4. While you let the chicken rest, heat olive oil in a Le Creuset grill over medium heat. As soon as it's hot, place the chicken skin-side down first, pressing to maximize contact with the grill. Cook it for about 12-15 minutes, flip it, and cook about 12 more minutes on the other side (it will be a bit less if you use an iron grill, since it gets very hot).
5. Place the grill in the oven and cook it for about 15 more minutes. Then remove the grill from the oven and let the chicken rest on the grill for about 20-30 minutes.
6. pancasserole Le Creuset over medium heat and sauté the chopped onion about 5 minutes, without letting it color. Add the garlic powder and the rice and cook it for 3 minutes, stirring regularly to prevent the rice from sticking to the bottom.
7. After sautéing the rice for a few minutes, quickly add the water and salt and bring to a boil. Lower the heat a bit, place the lid on and simmer for about 15 to 20 minutes, until the rice is cooked. Remove from heat and let it rest for 5 minutes. Add the cilantro and it’s ready to serve.
8. Serve the chicken accompanied by the rice.

Notes

• Brining adds great juiciness to the meat, but if you want to make the recipe without brining you can too: enjoy good meat on the grill with rice; it's ideal any day of the week!
• In this case, we cooked a whole chicken split in half, but if you want you can do it in quarters, or cook exactly the same way whichever parts you want (cook drumsticks, make breasts...). The same technique applies in the same way.