Chicken me grillin’
Check me out on the grill again! So in our household I’m usually in charge of the indoor cooking, while the hubs is in charge of the outdoor cooking. However, since the weather has been so hot we’ve been grilling a lot lately so I’m trying to get my BBQ skills on point. Plus we have a Weber and it’s literally the best grill out there. It cooks so evenly and has all these burners that you can adjust separately from one another. Weber’s are a little pricey, but they are so worth it. Check out the assortment of gas, charcoal, portable, and electric grills they have.
The object of this past weekend’s warm day desire was yogurt marinated chicken. I tend to lean towards Mediterranean and Middle eastern fare when the weather is warm because it’s usually light, healthy (minus the dessert part, but we’ll get to that in another post) and full of flavor.
This is one of the simplest dishes and the yogurt marinade really keeps the chicken from drying out. If I’m thinking ahead of time I’ll marinate it the night before I’m going to cook it, but even an hour or so of marinating works too. I use chicken thighs for this dish because they have more fat content and stay nice and juicy! You can always substitute chicken breast for those of you that prefer white meat. Without further ado, onto the recipe!
Ingredients:
Chicken Thighs (I cooked six)
Yougert (I used greek yogurt, but really anything works)
3 tablespoons of chopped fresh dill
1 tablespoon of oregano
2-3 tablespoons of olive oil
Juice of on lemon
Salt and Pepper
Place chicken in a bowl and add yogurt, dill, oregano, olive oil, lemon juice and salt and pepper to taste. Mix to ensure chicken is evenly coated. You can also make this in a large zip lock plastic bag, I usually use a bag when I remember to marinate the night before. Marinate for 1 hour or up to overnight.
Heat the grill to high. Place chicken thighs in a row and cook for 3 minutes, flip over and cook for another three minutes. Lower the grill to medium and cook for an additional 3 minutes on both sides. Once you cut into the chicken and the juice runs clear you’re good to go. Make sure you check after that last 3 minutes, you don’t want to overcook it!
As I mentioned I went with a Mediterranean feel so I chopped the chicken up and plated it over a bed of Romain lettuce with tomatoes, cucumbers, black olives, pickled turnips, pickles, and topped it with Tahini (sesame seed oil) with a side of pita.
Wine to pair?
So you could go with either a white or red, but I decided to do a dry rose with this dish. The rose worked really well and was very refreshing. There are so many great dry rose wines these days so finding them is super easy. I usually go with the Cote des Roses by Gerard Bertrand. It’s a blend of Grenache, Syrah, and Cinsault and tastes like southern France to me, plus the bottom of the bottle looks like a rose, which is just so cute to me. I’m actually having a glass right now, it helps the ideas flow when I type up these posts 😊. So à votre santé (cheers) and enjoy!
http://www.gerard-bertrand.com/en/wines/tendances/cote-des-roses/cote-des-roses-rose/
