Grilled chicken teriyaki

In most barbecue stands, and even in restaurants where barbecue is the house specialty, chicken barbecue usually means skewered whole drumsticks, thighs, breasts or even chicken quarters grilled over live coals and served with fried rice and achara on the side. Because chicken fillets are more expensive, you won’t find them skewered and sold in neighborhood barbecue stands. Chicken intestines and chicken heads are more common.

If you’re a barbecue lover and you don’t mind the little extra work, boneless chicken meat are not only easier to eat, they are easier to grill too. Because they can be cut into uniform pieces, cooking them evenly doesn’t need a miracle. There is less chance too of the outside charring too much and too fast before the innermost parts are thoroughly cooked. And if your chicken barbecue experience has so far been limited to the kind that had been marinated with thick sauces and food coloring, it might be time for a little change. Try grilled chicken teriyaki.

For the teriyaki sauce, click here.

Marinate the chicken thighs without cutting them. You might think that the smaller the pieces, the faster and better they will absorb the flavors. True. BUT that also means that more surface of the meat gets coated with sugar. Sugar burns fast and you might end up with very dark chicken pieces that are still raw inside. That’s why I prefer to marinate the thigh fillets without cutting them.

After the chicken has marinated in the teriyaki sauce for several hours, cut them into uniform pieces then thread them with bamboo sticks that had been soaked in water for about 30 minutes. Grill them at least four inches from the heat to prevent the sugar from burning too fast. Chicken takes less time to cook than pork. Unless the chicken pieces are large, grilling them for eight minutes on each side should be enough.

That was what we had for lunch today — grilled chicken teriyaki. The schoolyear has almost ended and the kids are on half-days the entire week. When they got home yesterday, the skewers of chicken teriyaki were on their last few minutes of grilling. We had them with rice and egg drop soup.