Summer in France is mechoui time. The word comes from North Africa, and used to mean an entire barbecued lamb cooked over coals on a spit, constantly basted with flavored butter until it develops a crispy exterior and is moist and tender. The technique works well for chicken, or anything else that’s grilled and basted as it cooks. It also works on eggplant and zucchini, although I’m not sure the word mechoui would still apply.
The setting is typically very informal: the back of a garden, an unused spot that can stand a bit of disturbance and the heat from the charcoal, a place where the smoke won’t asphyxiate nearby people. A few people gather around the spit and basting pot, taking turns turning the spit and basting spice-laden butter over the meat as it cooks. The meat stays high above the coals to avoid flareups – too low and the basting juices would catch fire as they dripped off the lamb.
This particular mechoui was a get-together for the town of Burcy, nestled atop a couple of low hills in the Gatinais region South of Paris. Along with the spit-roasted lamb, they served merguez and chipolate sausages. There were vegetables, bread, Sangria and wine, too. Mechoui might be North African, but this party was French after all.
The mechoui starts hours before the party as coals are readied and the lamb is placed on the spit. This is a deluxe model with a motor – the spit is often turned by hand, for hours, as the meat cooks. Someone needs to be there in any case, since the meat must be constantly basted.
This party featured a bit of grilling to go along with the lamb: chipolata sausages in the foreground, then merguez, chicken at the rear.
Note that the chicken in the back is more carbonized than it should be. It must be watched constantly, basted, turned, basted, moved around, supervised. As the French would say, “soigné”.
Eventually, everything is ready and the festival begins. This one started around eight p.m. and ran until… at least two a.m., but we’re not sure because we walked home at midnight and went to sleep. Couscous, lamb, sausage, vegetables, sangria and wine aren’t exactly stimulants.
If you’d like to try a bit of home-grown mechoui, here’s a recipe for chicken that works pretty well:
Chicken Mechoui Recipe
- Either butterfly a whole chicken, or use skin-on pieces. Use good, free-range chicken, preferably organic. Pasture raised is even better, if you know whoever raised the bird really did let it roam freely to dine on all manner of flavor-inducing foods.
- The night before, place the chicken (or parts) in a marinade of 1 large or two small grated onions (use a food processor for this), salt, pepper, garlic paste, cumin, and paprika. Mix the ingredients well and make sure the chicken is well-coated. Place everything in a bowl and refrigerate, covered.
- The day of the grill, take out the chicken, pat it dry with a paper towel, and reserve in the refrigerator until needed, covered. You can discard the marinade or sauté it, add some rice and chicken stock (or water) and make something tasty to go with your chicken. Since you’ll be simmering the rice for at least twenty minutes, this will render everything safe.
- Heat up the grill. While it’s heating, melt some butter over low heat, add salt, pepper, cumin, a dash of cinnamon and some paprika. Don’t let the butter get too hot – you want it just barely melted.
- When the grill is hot, brush some of the butter mixture on the chicken and place it basted side down on the grill. Brush some marinade over the top of the chicken.
You really, really need to be there, watching the whole thing, because the butter will flare up if the grill is too hot. Don’t answer the phone, don’t entertain guests unless they’re next to you at the grill, don’t pet the dog or the cat. Watch that chicken constantly, as though your reputation as a grill chef depended on it.
- You have some choices if it’s flaring excessively: raise the grill farther from the heat source, move the chicken to one side where it’s not over direct heat, or flip the pieces while moving them around to reduce the flames. Either way, keep basting with the marinade, applying it frequently.
- Keep cooking until the chicken is done. The time will depend on how large the pieces are (or how large the bird, if you went the butterflied bird route). An instant read thermometer should read at least 160° F in the thigh and breast.
- Let the chicken rest about 5 minutes or so, then plate. Arrange the chicken over the rice (or over couscous) and serve. Good wines for this are Grüner Veltliner, Vinho Verde, Riesling, Silvaner or Vin Gris d’Alsace. You could also opt for an off-dry rosé or even a Gamay.