Mrs Grail doesn’t always appreciate “smoke” as much as I do. So last night when it came time to prepare the chicken she requested she requested it be grilled. I didn’t want to just do the normal grilled chicken with just a seasoning one it so I decided to brine it.
We don’t shop on Sunday so I was limited to what I had in the pantry for the brine. Thankfully, we always have plenty of Kosher salt and brown sugar. But what was I going to add to the brine to give it a little POP? This is what I came up with:
BBQ Grail’s Smokey Pepper Poultry Brine
Ingredients:
- 2 quarts water
- 3/4 cup Morton’s Kosher salt (if you use Diamond Crystal Salt use 1 cup)
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 2 tablespoons McCormick Sweet & Smokey Pepper Blend
- 1 whole chicken, cut into 8 pieces
Heat the water and add all the brine ingredients. Stir until salt and sugar is dissolved. Cool brine mixture to at least room temperature. Place brine mixture and chicken in a container. Make sure all the chicken pieces are submerged. Brine in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours but not more than 8 hours.
Remove chicken and rinse well. It’s important to make sure you remove as much of the salt as possible.
Grill on a medium/hot grill until 165 degrees internal.
Rest for five minutes. Serve.
The McCormick’s Sweet & Smokey Pepper Blend added a great little bite to the brine. Combine with the brown sugar it gave the chicken a nice flavor. I got some of the ‘smoke’ flavor I wanted while giving the family the grilled chicken they wanted.
Larry,
Used this basic recipe this weekend at my comp.
I could not find the McCormicks pepper blend you listed, so I improvised with a teaspoon of chipotle, a teaspoon of smoked paprika, and a teaspoon of cayenne. It seemed to work real well.
Thanks for the recipe.
Great brine recipe, Larry! I have started making brine for poultry/shrimp/etc. with as little water as possible, as little as 2 cups. The reason I do this is the brine can be combined with a combination of cold water and ice cubes after boiling to dissolve any granulated ingredients like salt or sugar. This gets the brine temperature down as quickly as possible so I can begin the brining process faster. Sometimes I want to brine something on short notice and I don’t have time to wait for the brine to cool.
I like McCormicks Smokehouse pepper but haven’t seen this Sweet and Smokey blend. I’ll have to try it.
The chicken looks very good, nice way to boost the flavor.
It’s sounds and looks just great Grail.
5 ingredients or less! Absolutely perfect!