Jerk Chicken

We've been enjoying a bit of home cooking recently or should we say home eating! On Easter Sunday my Mum, Lynn cooked a gorgeous roast beef lunch with all the trimmings including massive Yorkshire puddings. The beef was a beautiful cut of meat cooked perfectly rare.

For pudding we had miniature Victoria sponge cakes with chocolate eggs on top. This was a Mary Berry recipe from the Sainsbury’s magazine which were deliciously light, a perfect complement to a filling Sunday roast.

I’d promised Mum and Dad that I would cook Jerk Chicken while I was at home. Jerk chicken has become a regular dish that I love to cook and eat whilst at University, and luckily the shops in my area are very cultural and have great scotch bonnets!

We decided to make an evening of it so had the family as well as a few friends round, 8 of us in total.  We had Jerk chicken thighs and drumsticks, rice and peas and we also made some coleslaw as it’s a nice cooling crunchy accompaniment.

For the chicken you need to make the paste and ideally marinade it for 24 hours. I’ve tried various time frames on this and the longer the better. I left it for 2 days once and the result was succulent juicy chicken! I’ve also tried different cuts of chicken, thighs are best, drumsticks are okay but often don’t have enough meat on. Chicken breast works but is a bit too lean for grilling and you don’t get the proper authentic taste.

The recipe for the paste is as follows:

4 Scotch Bonnets (seeds in or out depending on how hot you like it)

4 Spring Onions

1 Tbsp Dried Thyme

2 Tsp Ground Allspice

1 Tsp Cinnamon

1 inch of Ginger

1 Tbsp Soy Sauce

1 Tbsp Ketchup

6-8 Garlic Cloves

Dash of Honey

2-3 pieces of Chicken per person

Blitz these ingredients up in a processor until smooth. If it’s not coming together add just a dash of water to combine, then smother all over your chicken pieces and let it marinade for a day. Make sure you wash your hands thoroughly if handling without gloves!

 Cooking times for the chicken depend on the size of the pieces but I find putting them in the oven for 20 minutes and then grilling for 10 minutes works well, turning frequently to ensure caramelisation all over.

Meanwhile cook the rice. This recipe is for 8 people.

600g Basmati Rice

1 Tin of Coconut Milk

2 Tins of Red Kidney Beans

2 Cloves of Garlic

4 Sprigs of fresh Thyme or 1 level tsp of dried Thyme

6 Spring Onions

Firstly fry the garlic in a little oil, just to soften, then add the rice and coconut milk. Fill up the empty coconut milk tin with water and add to the pan and also add the water from the kidney beans. Bring to the boil. Cook according to instructions, when there is 5 minutes left of cooking time add the kidney beans and the thyme. All the liquid should be absorbed once the rice is cooked, all it needs is the chopped spring onions folding through to give a fresh crunch.

The coleslaw was a simple recipe of carrots, white onions and white cabbage all grated and mixed with mayonnaise, crème fraiche and a touch of horseradish.

 Jerk chicken is best served with a wedge of lime and some reggae.

 Our very kind guests offered to bring pudding, which took the form of a Key Lime Pie and a Lemon Tart. These were perfect zingy accompaniments to the spicy main course. We were enjoying them so much that we took a bite before I remembered to take a photo!

Overall we had a really great night with delicious food and fun company.