chicken under a brick

First – you’d surrender too when pinned to a hot grill under a couple of bricks, only to be finished off in a hot oven! That said – it’s just as much where the chicken hangs before the trip to the hot grill, that seals the juicy deal once on the hot grill. Treat your chicken right from the very first date and it’ll reward you every single time – succulent, smoky & sensational!

After a quick butterfly, marinate the chicken halves, prep the bricks and get ready to grill – let it rest, break it down into manageable pieces, spread it on a platter and pray some of your guests couldn’t make it, or you prepped more than one bird – talk about a disappearing act – now you see it, now you don’t, where the heck is the chicken, seriously, it was right here! So on that note, get a bird, get a brick and make some magic.

click here to jump down to the chicken under a brick recipe

1. Get a bird on your board – breast side down.

2. Using kitchen shears or scissors, cut down each side of the back, as close to the bone as possible. You know what they say about the meat that’s closer to the bone –  and they must’ve been talkin’ about this chicken!

3. Remove the backbone just like this. Toss it in a pot with a few other ingredients and in an hour or 2 you’ll have a gorgeous homemade stock – waste not, want not! Or bag it and freeze it for later.

4. Open up the bird and look for a little white area at the top of that opaque spear-like cartilage – using your scissors, make a slit, just like this.

5. Run your fingers down either side of the spear-like piece of cartilage – which will now be referred to as the “keel bone“.

6. Grab the white tip of the keel bone and lift it up and out of the chicken.

7. Easy, peasy, just like this.

8. Press down on the chicken to flatten.

9. Turn it over and there you have your butterflied bird ready to go. You can either leave it whole or simply run a knife down the centre to cut it in half.

10. Throw together your marinade.

11. Get your chicken in the bowl.

12. Turn it all around to coat thoroughly.

13. When it looks like this, cover it and put it in the fridge until you’re ready to cook.

14. Time to turn your attention to the bricks – any bricks will do. Tear off a large piece of aluminum foil and lay your brick in the centre.

15. And wrap it up like a present.

16. Do that twice – a brick for each half of the chicken whether they’re attached or not.

17. Time to cook – get your grill, griddle, flat or stove top screamin’ hot – any cast iron pan will work, whether it has a griddle grid or not.

18. Lay the chicken skin-side down.

19. Get your bricks on top and let ‘er rip for 5-8 minutes.

20. That’s the chicken rippin’ on my outside grill!

21. And that’s the chicken rippin’ on the stove top.

22. Same bricks go down no matter where you’re cooking.

23. Flip and place the bricks back on the chicken before heading to the oven.

24. Into a preheated oven it goes to finish cooking.

25. You can flip it over if you like. Be sure to let it rest before serving

26. Break it down into servable-size pieces, move it to a platter and dig in.

27. Have a good look ’cause it won’t last long – you’ll wish you cooked 2 birds (I did). Why?

28. That’s why.