This grilled chicken with rice and cilantro is a great way to enjoy an everyday recipe but with a great addition to texture and flavor. The brine , beyond a centuries-old technique for food preservation, is a culinary technique with which to enjoy new flavors and textures , since it provides not only saltiness, but also great juiciness . It is the secret of many chefs to offer totally different flavors to the usual ones in the most common meats and fish, and today we take advantage of it.

About this grilled chicken recipe

I hope that with this recipe you will discover a different but very simple way to offer a delicious grilled chicken: sweet and most tasty, this is how the chicken in salt and spice brine that we propose will be.

This grilled chicken is a delicious alternative to classic rotisserie chicken. In addition, we accompany it with a delicious and typical Brazilian rice recipe.

What is the technique of cooking in brine?

The brine, beyond a conservation method that is already hundreds of years old, is a way of seasoning food and giving it juiciness, while greatly enhancing the flavors.

It is a very simple way to completely change a recipe, since the result on the palate of meat and fish is very different if you have had them in brine for a few hours.

Brine cooking is nothing more than immersing food in a solution of water and salt . The most common thing in cooking is to talk about a concentration of salt in water between 3% and 10%. It will depend on what you are looking for and the size of the pieces that you more or less concentrate that water, as well as the time that you are going to have the food in that salting (the more concentrated the water and salt solution is, the less time you will require).

The benefits of putting the food in brine are further increased when the hours of rest in brine are also used to provide other flavors: you can season the water with spices and aromas, so that the meat takes on those flavors. The end result is dramatically different from food without that brine.

There are two types of brine:

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

How to make liquid brine?

  1. Prepare a mixture of 10% concentration of salt - that is, for every liter of water (1,000 ml of water), apply 100 grams of salt. Heat the water slightly and mix until dissolved (it is heated to make it easier to dissolve, but it is not necessary to do so... and you must make sure that the water does not evaporate or the salt concentration will increase).
  2. Once the salt is dissolved, you can submerge the food you want in that saline salt, and let it cool in the fridge for the convenient hours (it will depend on the food and thickness, it will normally be from one hour to overnight, but follow the indicator tables for the recipes you follow).

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

It is not necessary that there is water in quantity, but enough so that the pieces of food are completely submerged.

What are the advantages of brine in meat and fish

  1. The volume of the food is increased, since part of that water with salt is absorbed by it.
  2. The piece is hydrated, thus being much juicier (it is more difficult for it to become dry when cooking).
  3. Given the two points above, it reduces less during cooking.
  4. The meats have a less fibrous texture, are softer and are more pleasant to chew.
  5. Red meats intensify their color and take on more flavor, and fish and white meats are more tender and juicy.

Chicken in brine, Le Creuset grill recipe Le Creuset Nonstick Grill , Le Creuset Damascus Steel Knife , Le Creuset Grill , Le Creuset Evolution Round Cocotte , and Le Creuset Ramequin.

Ingredients (for 4 people)

  • A whole chicken between 1 and 1.2 kg.

For the brine (optional):

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

For the rice:

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

Preparation

Preparation of chicken and brine:

  1. Ask the butcher to prepare the chicken without the central spine and fully open, so you can grill it. If not, open it at home, with the help of a cutting board and a sharp knife .
  2. For the brine, in a large bowl where the chicken fits well, mix the salt and sugar with hot water until dissolved. Add the rest of the ingredients and submerge the chicken.
  3. Leave it submerged and for at least 4 hours in the fridge (you can leave it overnight if you want).

We cook the chicken and rice:

  1. Preheat the oven to 180ºC (or 160ºC with air).
  2. Remove the chicken from the brine and dry it with kitchen paper.
  3. Using a kitchen brush, brush it with olive oil.
  4. Heat the Le Creuset grill over medium heat. As soon as it is hot, place the chicken skin side down first, pressing down to maximize contact with the grill. Cook it for about 12-15 minutes, turn it over and cook it for another 12 minutes on the other side (it will be a little less if you use an iron grill, since it gets very hot).
  5. Place the rack in the oven and cook it for about 15 more minutes. Then remove the rack from the oven and let the chicken rest on the rack for about 20-30 minutes.
  6. While you let the chicken rest, heat olive oil in a Le Creuset cocotte over medium heat and fry the chopped onion for about 5 minutes, without allowing it to colour. Add the garlic powder and rice and cook for 3 minutes, stirring regularly to prevent the rice from sticking to the bottom.
  7. Sauté the rice for a few minutes, quickly add the water and salt and bring to a boil. Lower the heat a little, put the lid on and cook over low heat for about 15 to 20 minutes, until the rice is cooked. Remove it from the heat and let it rest for 5 minutes. Add the cilantro and ready to serve.
  8. Serve the chicken accompanied by rice.

Grades

  • The brine provides a great juiciness to the meat, but if you want to make the recipe without making the brine you can also: enjoy a good grilled meat with rice, it is ideal any day of the week!
  • In this case, we have cooked a whole chicken open in half, but if you want you can do it in quarters, or cook the parts you want in exactly the same way (cook thighs, make breasts...). The same technique will apply equally.

Comments

Concepcion said:

Enhorabuena por esa facilidad de explicarte que tienes, lo haces todo muy ameno y nos entran verdaderas ganas de ir corriendo a la cocina para probarlo!

Carme said:

¡Muchas gracias por todas las explicaciones! Me han entrado unas ganas locas de probarlo, ¡Qué fácil es! Tanto escuchar hablar de aceitunas en salmuera, no sabía que podía también aplicarse en carnes y se ve espectacular. ¡Gracias!

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