What could possess a man to stand over a grill, basting chicken in 99-degree heat?
A food blog? Surely there must be a better reason ... there must.
It really wasn't all that bad. But that is what I was thinking when I decided to start this dish in an unseasonably (and unreasonably) hot September evening in Iowa. But the recipe looked really good, and I had already planned to make that for dinner for me & my wife.
Start by making a marinade of 1/4 cup rice vinegar, 1/4 cup brown sugar, 1/8 cup fish sauce, 2 tsp ginger (or 1 tsp dried ginger), and quite a lot of Thai chili paste and/or Sriracha sauce. I like the paste because it is really flavorful without being over the top hot.
Whisk that all together and toss in boneless, skinless chicken breasts cut into bite-sized pieces. Let them chill out for a little while to soak up some of the marinade. Then skewer them.
If you are going to use wood skewers, you'll need to soak them in water for up to an hour so they don't catch fire and burn. If you use metal ones like I did -- tell yourself about 100 times not to grab them with your bare hands. They will be crazy hot. I used tongs on one side and an oven mitt on the other.
Heat your marinade up over the stove until boiling, and then simmer until it reduces by half. This will bring out a lot of sweetness, while still maintaining some heat from the chiles.
Throw them over a high heat grill and baste both sides with your sauce, flipping occasionally. They should cook pretty quickly because they're such small pieces. Be careful not to over cook them or they will dry out.
Yum. The fish sauce is tangy and rich, and the brown sugar will help make your sauce sweet & sticky. Then the ginger and chiles will really add a lot of depth of flavor. There are these great ginger & soy chicken wings at Red's Alehouse in North Liberty that I love. These aren't too far off that flavor.
...and I threw in some vegetables too because my wife would have been really upset if I didn't. ;-)
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