Grilled Chicken with Lemongrass and Coconut Milk (ไก่ย่าง)

Towards the end of the festive season is a good time to have a nice long dinner with friends. The anxiety and stress and hypes for Christmas have long gone – people are getting mellower. The weather has been good – why not having some meat on the barbecue.

We had some friends over for Thai-ish meal with grilled chicken, carrot salad (Som-tam) and spicy pork mince salad (Larb Moo) served with sticky rice. I think every one’s gone home well fed and happy.

The star of the show was the chicken – with Thai marinade.

For 4 people you’ll need:

2 Chickens, cut in halves

1 Stem Lemongrass, chopped

2 -3 coriander roots, chopped

6 – 7 cloves of garlic

8 white pepper corns, 8 black pepper corns

½ teaspoon salt

2 tablespoon soy sauce

1 tablespoon dark soy sauce for basting

½ can (425 g can) of coconut cream + 2 tablespoons for basting

Pound lemongrass, garlic, coriander roots, peppercorn and salt with mortar and pestle into fine pulp. Add the mixture to coconut cream and soy sauce. Reserve about 3 tablespoons of the marinade for basting and pour the marinade over the chickens in plastic bag – massage the chicken pieces through the bag and leave overnight (or at least 6 hours) in the fridge.

Add 2 tablespoons of coconut milk and dark soy sauce to the marinade for basting.

Grill the chicken halves on charcoal BBQ, keep basting all the way until cooked through – serve hot with sticky rice, sweet chilli sauce or this street style sauce.