Jerk Chicken

Ingredients

• 8 chicken thighs and drumsticks, bone in
• 2 scotch bonnets, seeds in or out to taste
• 1 bunch of spring onions
• 1 tbsp ground allspice
• a small bunch of thyme
• 30 g ginger
• 5 garlic cloves
• 3 tbsp soy sauce
• 30 g brown sugar
• juice of 2 limes
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp grated nutmeg
• 3 tbsp vegetable oil

Method

1. Blend the jerk paste

   Blitz everything except the chicken into a thick, dark paste. Allspice — pimento, as it is called in Jamaica — is the backbone, not the chilli; a jerk without enough of it just tastes hot.

2. Score and marinate long

   Cut deep slashes through to the bone and rub the paste in, working it into the cuts. Marinate overnight if you possibly can; four hours is the minimum for it to reach past the surface.

   4 h

3. Cook it slowly first

   Roast at 180°C for 35 minutes, or set it over indirect heat on a covered barbecue. Straight onto fierce heat, the sugar in the marinade blackens long before the bone is cooked.

   35 min

4. Then char it

   Move it over direct heat, or turn the oven to maximum, and cook 10 minutes more, turning, until the edges are properly blackened in patches. That char is the point of jerk.

   10 min

5. Rest and serve

   Rest 5 minutes and serve with rice and peas. Any leftover marinade should be boiled hard for a few minutes before it goes anywhere near the table.

   5 min