Grilled chicken

Tonight's Menu

• grilled chicken drumsticks & thighs
  
• rosemary-onion focaccia
• summer squash with bacon & onion
  
• green salad "bar"
  

This is how I make my grilled chicken. I'm not saying this is how YOU should do it, but this is what works for me with my grill setup. All I do is take some bone-in, skin-on thighs and drumsticks, give them a rinse, dry them with paper towels and then sprinkle them with Jane's Krazy Salt and garlic pepper. Then I set up my three-burner gas grill for slightly indirect grilling, turning two burners up to medium-high and leaving the other one off. I put the chicken skin-side-down over the two lit burners for about five minutes or until the skins have picked up some color (sometimes the color they pick up is BLACK, but that's okay). Then I turn them over and move them to the unlit burner, leaving them to cook for about 30 minutes or until done. I have to babysit them quite a bit because I'm still getting used to this new grill, but so far I've managed not to dry them out or undercook them with this method. Feel free to use an instant-read meat thermometer to make sure they're done (around 170 degrees F or so).

I am so excited about this focaccia, because it came from a recent cookbook purchase, Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoe Francois. I can't reproduce the recipe here because of copyright issues, but they also have a blog that, if you scroll down far enough, lists the master recipe (for boule bread). That's the dough I used, for those who have the book. I just whomped off a canteloupe-sized hunk of dough as instructed, stretched it into a focaccia shape on a silpat-covered baking sheet, layered on some red onions (from the CSA) sliced paper-thin along with some snipped fresh rosemary (from my herb garden), kosher salt, freshly ground pepper and a drizzle of EVOO. Then I baked it at 425 degrees F for about 30 minutes or until it turned golden. (In the book, you bake most of the breads over a broiler pan into which you pour some hot tap water, so the bread steams. I TOTALLY forgot that step until the bread had been in the oven for a full 20 minutes. It still came out great, just took a little longer to cook!)

Everyone LOVED this focaccia! So far we give this particular bread cookbook a HUGE thumbs up. I made a loaf of plain boule from it the other day and that was awesome, too. I plan to post a full review of this book pretty soon, so check back for that!

ANYWAY, again with the squash, bacon and onions, I KNOW! I can't help it. I love it like that. This time I made it with crookneck bi-color summer squash from the CSA, a red onion that was NOT from the CSA but from a local farmstand (and did not include the green tops, more's the pity) and some random applewood-smoked bacon I had in the freezer. And I didn't bother with any herbs, just salt and pepper. YUM!

Tonight's salad bar was just there for the people who don't like squash (read: everyone but me) and included purchased mixed lettuce, sliced cukes from the CSA, and chopped baby carrots. BORING. But whatever.