- 10 minutes ago
Chef Niki Gordon of Irie Jerk in Brooklyn shares how to make authentic Jamaican jerk chicken. From a 48-hour marinade packed with Scotch bonnet peppers to slow cooking over lump charcoal and smoke, learn the flavors and techniques behind one of Jamaica's most iconic dishes.
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00:08Nicky from Irish Jerk, one Spanish town, about to make you guys the best jerk chicken you ever eat.
00:14Our style, Jamaican style.
00:19When you come to Irish Jerk, you're their own family.
00:21Like when you come and be your own authentic self like we are.
00:25You don't need to be nobody special for coming to Irish Jerk.
00:28Perfect Jerk chicken to me. You have to do it with love.
00:31It is not just about spice and pepper.
00:33You got to make sure your chicken is marinated.
00:35The smoke gives it the charcoal taste, you know, the charcoal flavor.
00:39And don't rush it. Take your time.
00:41Irish means cool. Everything is good.
00:44Keep it calm. It's a Jamaican thing. It's Irish man.
00:50I know you guys want to see the fire and the smoke. Me too.
00:53But before we get out there, you got to season up this chicken.
00:57Who is that behind me? Right here?
00:59Yeah.
00:59That's my wife. That's my life.
01:01That's my wife Kaye. My better half.
01:04Without her, Irish Jerk ain't possible.
01:06These are the small chicken leg quarters.
01:08You have to clean out the guts. A lot of people don't do that.
01:11You can't eat chicken and you just eat liver and kidneys.
01:13When you use vinegar and lime, and that's what we use,
01:16whether we have vinegar or lime, one of them has to be used.
01:19This is going inside of you.
01:20So now that we washed the chicken and it's clean,
01:23so now we're going to add our powder seasoning to it.
01:26We do dry seasoning and wet seasoning just to give the Jerk the full flavor of it.
01:31Because the things that we use in the dry seasoning is different from the things that we do in the
01:36wet seasoning.
01:36First thing we do, we add the allspice seasoning.
01:40Allspice is vital. This is the pimento. We need this.
01:44We usually use the wood itself as the fire in Jamaica.
01:48But we're in New York, so we're using the ground allspice right now.
01:52So we're going to pour a little ground sauce in here.
01:55We want to add some ginger.
01:57You understand me? We're also going to blend some up in the wet jar.
02:00You're done with the ginger. For me, we use a little mix-up blend.
02:04You can call it sazon mixing, whatever. This is my little blend.
02:08This is the garlic, the ground garlic. So you want to add your garlic.
02:12And this is your dry jerk seasoning. Just a little bit.
02:15It don't have to be too much because it's spicy.
02:17Jerk is just, listen, I was born hearing the name jerk.
02:20I can't tell you the full definition. I just go along with what the world does.
02:23So you want to pour some chicken seasoning on it.
02:25So you don't want to add salt because you have all these other dry seasonings that contain salt.
02:30So now you've got all your powder seasoning, all your dry seasoning on it.
02:34You want to go ahead now and start making the wet one.
02:36To start your wet marinade, you want to have the real, real, real life taste of these ingredients.
02:43Coming from the earth, you need this. We have the raw ginger in there.
02:47You need that in the chicken. Mix with the powdered one.
02:51Comes together. Good combination.
02:53This is our base for our wet marinade. It's Juices International Sorrent Drink.
02:58Tastes wonderful.
02:59A lot of people know what is hibiscus.
03:01Everybody makes it. Trinidad, Jamam, Cam, Cayena.
03:05Everybody makes it. Everybody tastes different.
03:07It has a nice tank to it. Mix with the other ingredients.
03:11The sorrent just brings out something in the chicken.
03:13So we want to start the blender up.
03:17First thing first, the spring onions.
03:20Yeah, you see this now? This is what we call the scotchie.
03:24This is a scotch bonnet pepper. Very hot.
03:26I don't take the stem out of my pepper.
03:29Now you want to add some pimento pepper.
03:30Pimento pepper, it's not hot. It just gives you flavor.
03:35Allspice grounded. I have allspice whole.
03:37And I even have allspice in my grill.
03:40Because we use the pimento wood in Jamaica.
03:43So we got to improvise here in America.
03:45We don't have it. So everything pimento, we're doing it.
03:48Beautiful. See the garlic? Real garlic pegs.
03:53Needed. Shared spirits away.
03:55Now you see this? This is what we call the thyme.
03:58Very, very essential in the flavoring of your food.
04:02God made this plant. I don't know what he was thinking of.
04:05We're going all in. Nothing is going to waste.
04:07We're going to cut some onions up now.
04:09And we're going to put them in.
04:11We need raw ginger.
04:14So now, we're going to leave some of this marinade.
04:19See that? See that?
04:20Now we're going to put it all up in our chicken now.
04:23Cover your chicken completely with it.
04:25Set the seasoning. You see it behind the chicken?
04:28I'll stuff it behind here.
04:30When they're jerking it on the grill, you know.
04:32You want to make sure to season the all in your chicken.
04:34So when you bite the chicken, when you eat the chicken,
04:36you're supposed to taste everywhere I'm going to put the seasoning.
04:39So even if the skin should fall off in the fire,
04:42you're having to marinate right here.
04:44And I'll let this marinate for 24, 48 hours.
04:47If you've got to make it right away, like throw it on the grill
04:49right after seasoning it, choosing what I just told you to use,
04:52it'll still be good.
04:54We're going to drop this on the grill and get ready to eat.
04:57We're going to make the sweet onion jerk sauce.
05:00So the wet marinade that we had earlier,
05:02some left in here.
05:04And so we're going to add some more of the juices,
05:06international sorrel.
05:08And we're going to add our onion sauce in there.
05:10No, man.
05:11You make the sauce because it tastes good on top of the chicken
05:13when the food is done.
05:14I'm scared of the pepper as much as I'm Jamaican.
05:17So I've got to add some onion in there.
05:19We're going to make it blend a little bit longer.
05:22It's got the spice.
05:24You can just add it on top of your chicken when you're ready, man.
05:30So guys, we did all the hard work in the kitchen.
05:33Now it's time to hit the streets.
05:35Made it outside, guys.
05:37Chicken is ready to hit the fire.
05:39So we're going to put them in order.
05:41You know, make it nice and neat.
05:43And we're going to give it like 15, 20 minutes on each side
05:46to make sure that it's cooked thoroughly.
05:48It doesn't matter if you put a skin up or a skin down.
05:51It's whichever way it comes up on the tongue.
05:53It's going to cook the same way.
05:55Sometimes you do it and the skin might, you know, fall off.
05:58Nothing is wrong with that.
06:00All right?
06:00So in like 20 minutes, like I said, we keep flipping it
06:02and make sure it's cooked thoroughly.
06:04We call these grills the barrel grills.
06:07They're not like the authentic ones in Jamaica
06:09because the authentic ones in Jamaica,
06:11we don't have to have a rack on the grill.
06:14The rack is already made in the grill.
06:16In Jamaica, we use the nutmeg wood or the pimento wood.
06:20In New York, I don't have that.
06:22So I have to improvise.
06:23So what I do, use lump charcoal.
06:27No briquettes, no match-like.
06:29I have my nutmeg and my pimento seeds in there.
06:32Give me that home flavor.
06:33I feel like I'm in Jamaica right now.
06:35We started very early this morning.
06:37This is like our third batch.
06:38We started since 6 a.m. this morning.
06:40When the line starts, we got to make sure we have it on hand.
06:44And people still got to wait, but we do it as fast as we can.
06:47Even though you don't see the big fire underneath it,
06:50it's being slow cooked on top.
06:52You're closing the lids.
06:53We don't want too much fire.
06:54Too much oxygen going in here
06:56because we don't want this chicken to dry out.
06:57This one is the fire.
06:59So I'm going to close it right now.
07:00I have the smoke and the fire.
07:02The fire is at the bottom.
07:04The smoke is cooking at the top.
07:05I might have to hold this side down.
07:07Because like I tell you, I feel this side cooking real fast.
07:11You see right now, the chicken just got to cook a little bit faster just now.
07:18Prepare for this.
07:21This side of the chicken is almost cooked.
07:2430, 45 minutes to most and you have your jerk chicken.
07:27Once you put it on the grill, the hard work is done.
07:30The fire does it for you.
07:31Every day I cook about five, six hundred pounds.
07:34You know, more on weekends.
07:36We're open six days a week.
07:38We're getting ready to start opening seven days now because of the demand.
07:41I have people throwing rocks upstairs at windows.
07:44I got to please my people, you know.
07:46That's a lot of work.
07:47We are hiring.
07:49Chicken is coming along.
07:50You can hear the fire.
07:52It's coming along.
07:53We want to turn them.
07:54We want to stick it to make sure that the heat goes through your chicken.
07:58You don't want this side cooking and that side not cooking.
08:01By sticking it with the fork, you're letting all the heat get in the chicken
08:05so the chicken can cook thoroughly all through.
08:08You don't want one half cooking and the other half not cooking.
08:12You understand what I'm saying?
08:13And you can tell when your chicken is cooked because this one is not cooked.
08:16It's heavy.
08:18It's heavy.
08:18This one is almost there.
08:20Not because it's smaller.
08:21I can get a bigger piece.
08:23It's almost there.
08:23It's lighter because the excess water or all the excess whatever it is
08:27that's in there, it's gone.
08:29Before, even by using the tongue, you can feel the weight.
08:32There's no weight on it anymore.
08:34So even though we're taking it off the high fire,
08:37it's still being cooked slowly over here.
08:40All right?
08:41So, you know, that way you get your chicken moist and ready to eat.
08:45All right?
08:46So, I want to shove some chicken up.
08:48I cut it in three pieces, right?
08:50One, two, three.
08:52All the black you're seeing is all those marinade we did.
08:55Look at this.
08:55We have the pigeon peas, rice and peas, the gunga peas.
08:59We have the escuvij sauce ready right here.
09:01And we have a nice festival lineup of the chicken.
09:04As much as you want.
09:05So, I'm going to add a little sauce on my chicken.
09:08All right?
09:10Just a little.
09:11You see the scotch bonnet?
09:13Just a little for me.
09:14Just a little.
09:15Guys, we've been waiting all day.
09:17Starving.
09:24Right now, I can taste the pimento.
09:28I'm tasting the ginger.
09:29I'm tasting the spring onions.
09:30I'm tasting the scotch bonnet.
09:32Just enough.
09:33My mouth is having a party right now.
09:35See your rice and peas?
09:37Coconut milk, everything.
09:41Mmmmmmmm.
09:42Yeah.
09:43It's a little bit, American.
09:44This is not too much.
09:46I'm in Jamaica right now.
09:48Everything is perfect.
09:50I'm at home.
09:50In Jamaica, we said, use our hands to make fashion.
09:54That means you might not have what everyone else has, but we're going to use these two hands and make
09:59it beautiful.
10:00And that's what we've done today.
10:01It's more than an honor, it's more than a privilege to be able to share my culture.
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