Chicken breast slices

Ingredients for 1 servings:

• 2 tbsp seasoning mix of your choice
• 2 tbsp brown sugar
• 2 tbsp curing salt
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• 250 ml water
• some ice cubes, if necessary
• 2 chicken breasts
• 1 handful of smoking chips, e.g. cherry wood
• lots of pepper from the mill

Instructions

Working time approx. 1 hour; Rest time approx. 18 hours; Cooking/baking time approx. 3 hours; Total time approx. 22 hours

from the gas grill, lightly smoked

You’ll also need kitchen twine, aluminum foil, and an aluminum tray or ovenproof dish. A roasting pan for the grill is also useful, but a smaller warming rack will also work. The grill must also have a lid, and it’s worth having a meat thermometer. It’s important not to consider the quantities “set in stone.” You can vary them greatly, so you can double or halve them. Just don’t use too little liquid for the chicken bath—it should be about 350–400 ml. Bring the seasoning mix, brown sugar, curing salt, and garlic cloves to a boil in the water and simmer gently for 5 minutes to allow the garlic to release its flavor. I used a “chicken rub mix” and added plenty of pepper and a bay leaf. The mixture contains sea salt, celery salt, garlic powder, mustard powder, paprika powder, cayenne pepper, pepper, cumin, basil, rosemary, thyme, parsley, and chicken broth powder. While simmering, line a large bowl with ice cubes. The ice cubes are optional; you can let the liquid cool naturally and then add more water, but this significantly shortens the preparation time. Pour the still-hot liquid over the ice cubes and stir. When the liquid is at room temperature, place it in a zip-top bag with the chicken breasts and refrigerate for at least 4-24 hours. Stir occasionally to ensure even marinating. Just before preparing the meat, place the smoking chips in an aluminum tray or ovenproof dish and add enough water to moisten all the chips. Remove the chicken breasts from their bath. One fillet should now be smooth side up, the other smooth side down. Place the tapered ends of the two fillets on top of each other so that they are roughly the same thickness throughout. Using kitchen string, tie the fillets together tightly, leaving about a finger’s width between them, so that the fillets are wrapped together like a rolled roast. This ensures even cooking and allows you to cut nice, round slices later. You can now pepper the meat all over, if you like. Once the meat is prepared, place it in a roasting tin or on a warming rack. Remove the chips from the liquid and wrap them in foil packets, no more than twice. Pierce a few holes with a fork where the packets are sealed (at the top), through which the smoke will escape. You can, of course, also use a smoker box at this point, but I don’t have one. Pour the remaining liquid from the smoker chips and the liquid the chicken was cooking in into the foil tray. Now position the chicken on this tray and place everything on one side of the grill. This stack now contains the dish with the liquid, and on top of it, the grill. It doesn’t matter whether you use the roasting rack or the warming rack, as long as the chicken roulade doesn’t come into contact with the liquid. Place the makeshift smoking box with the smoking chips directly on the burner, i.e., below the grill, on the other side of the grill. Now the smoking can begin. Turn on the burner on which the wood chips are stored and heat until the first smoke appears. Now reduce the flame to 1/3 and close the grill lid, not opening it too often from now on. Check after 10 minutes if smoke is still rising and, if necessary, increase the flame a little. During the smoking phase, my grill lid showed an internal temperature of 120°C. Smoke gently until the wood chips are completely charred. The chicken roulade can be turned over once during this time. In my case, the meat was still quite raw after smoking. To save gas, I recommend placing the chicken, drip tray, and roasting pan in the oven at 120°C (250°F), inserting a meat thermometer into the thickest part of the chicken breast, and cooking the chicken for about 40 minutes until the internal temperature reaches 72°C (160°F). Now turn off the oven, remove the roulade, wrap it in aluminum foil, and return it to the oven in the “tray” while the oven is still hot. Leave the oven door slightly open so some of the heat can escape. Remove the chicken after 15 minutes and let it cool to room temperature before transferring it to the refrigerator. Let it cool completely—preferably overnight—then remove it from the aluminum foil. I peppered it all over at this point because I hadn’t done so previously. Remove the kitchen twine and cut into thin slices.