Summer of Meat: Chicken Tikka Masala

People are always saying behind my back, "Max doesn't seem like the kind of guy who'd like Indian cuisine." It's true, I have all the sophisticated palette and appetites of a 10-year-old trailer trash brat who subsides on a diet of Chee-tos and Slurpees from the 7-11 next door, plus the occasional Taco Bell burrito when mom comes home strung out from that guy Derek's house. My parents tried their best to diversify my menu; hell, I spent several of my formative years within walking distance of Berkeley's Gourmet Ghetto. But if it doesn't come from Mexico or Italy, I probably dismiss it out of hand as "gross" or "nasty" or "cooked by, and for, savages".

But Indian restaurants are a different story. I can't say I've tried everything, but what I have I've liked. You've got chicken or lamb, which they'll put in some sauce spicy enough to make you cry giant anime tears. You've got naan, which is like a tortilla and a focaccia had a one night stand and ended up with a crispy, puffy bastard child. There's some veggies in there somewhere, but nothing too offensive. And hey, Indian beer. Nothing wrong with any of that.

Now, I know precisely dick about making curries from scratch, but Costco has come to my rescue. They're stocking quarts of tikka masala and korma sauces now, and they're excellent.

First, I marinate a pound and a half of chicken tenders in the tikka masala overnight.



Mmm, doesn't that look good? Keep in mind that I used to disembowel pigs at a slaughterhouse.

Time for the grill to be en fuego. Most grilled chicken recipes tell you to use indirect heat, but I often leave the burner directly under where the chicken will go at a low flame, and the others on medium. It cooks the chicken a little faster, gives it some nice grill marks, and doesn't seem to dry it out.



Then I shut the lid and wait ten minutes. Oooh, I think Final Jeopardy's on.



Now I've given 'em a flip. What'd I tell you folks? GRILL MARKS UP IN YO GRILL. My lovely assistant can be seen adding veggies to what was until now a perfect meal.

I give it another eight to ten minutes, then I take the chicken off. On goes some naan from Trader Joe's that I've brushed with butter.



The naan goes over a medium flame for a couple minutes a side, just enough to brown them a bit but still keep them soft and chewy in the center.



And there you have it. We heated up some extra sauce on the stove to drizzle over the chicken and to give the naan something to sop up (otherwise the naan would be overcome with feelings of uselessness). I know there should be some rice there, but I am diabetic and, more importantly, we didn't have any basmati lying around.

NEXT TIME ON SUMMER OF MEAT: Beer Can Chicken.

Summer of Meat: Carne Asada

In an effort to bridge his love of the grill with his love of excruciating minutiae, the writer has begun an occasional series on his summer grilling. With pictures!

I decided to start the Summer of Meat with Carne Asada tacos. They require a ridiculously low amount of effort, but they're mouthwatering. Low cost, high payoff? Sounds perfect for me.



First the meat. I bought a couple pacakges of carne asada cut steaks. This is sort of new for me; I normally make this with flank or skirt steak.

The marinade is a mixture of an off-the-shelf fajita sauce (which I found to be too sweet by itself), equal parts lime juice and soy sauce, several shakes of garlic Tabasco, and a couple teaspoons of cumin. It came out to about one part of fajita marinade to one part rest-of-the-junk-combined.

I let the meat soak overnight, then fired up the grill.



This stuff is paper thin, so at medium heat it cooks in the blink of an eye. I gave it about a minute per side.

When they were done, I threw some corn tortillas on the grill to crisp them up a little.



You got yer frijoles, chopped up steak, sour cream and Cholula. It's taco time!

For dessert I made grilled peaches.



Slice a couple ripe peaches in half, scoop out the pit, and dust the flat sides with sugar. Then throw it face down on a hot grill for 5 minutes or so.

RESULTS: The steak was exceedingly tasty, but the cut's pretty chewy. Next time I'll stick to skirt or flank.

The peaches were the BOMB. The sugar caramelizes on the grill, and the whole thing is like a warm peach pie without the crust. Like pie, it could have used some vanilla ice cream or some fresh whipped cream, but still, fantastic and easy.

NEXT TIME ON SUMMER OF MEAT: Grilled chicken tikka masala.