I'd like to start off by saying -- sorry I've been away so long. While others have done their fair share of heavy lifting (Ubelmann, Big Mak, Andrew, BrianS, E-6, The Wig, Zoomx, GreekHouse and others who I may have missed) I've been freeloading. I had big plans last summer for "OTG" and like a few other things it just sort of slid off the plate, so to speak. I'll be honest too, it's not like "The Grill" has been out too often since last fall. Less one skating party where hot dogs were grilled, my grill sadly is still disassembled in the garage and thoughts of selling the gas grill via Craigslist have danced through my head since last fall. But I digress.

In order to try and keep things rolling with more regularity, I'm going to ditch some of the baseball musings and stick with the cooking. I plan to mix it up a bit and perhaps from time to time will deviate from the grill, or like in this case, give you some options. This week's entry is focused on a quick and easy appetizer --perfect for a snack, or maybe even as lunch while watching a day game.

Inspiration comes from strange places. For the past couple of months I have been focused on a 3-4 big projects and I haven't had a whole lot of time for cooking or even shopping for that matter and more often than not, the cupboard and freezer, while not bare, are not exactly stocked with the optimum ingredients. And as I've abdicated some control over the shopping, I've found the resources I have on-hand have also changed. All that said, I've started to make a game of it by seeing how long I can avoid going to the market by using only the ingredients on hand. The exercise reminds me of a story I heard sometime back on NPR about creative dorm room cooking where someone devised a series of recipes using excess condiment packages. I'm generally not striving that low - but I must say kids today are darn creative.

So, a couple of weeks ago, I agreed to help a friend launch a new personal website and the work was to commence at my house. Because it was a last minute decision to work at my house and I only had a couple of hours to prep for the project, I quickly scrambled to assemble something presentable for my guest. A quick scan of the pantry was fruitless, so I turned to the freezer. Aha - one packaged of frozen, boneless, skinless chicken thighs from Trader Joe's, check. One hunk of frozen ginger, check. Hey, 20 skewers soaked in water, frozen in a ziplock bag. It must be time for Chicken Satay.

For those unfamiliar, Satay or Sate, is basically a generic term for grilled, bite-sized meat served on a stick and served with spicy seasonings. The origins are Indonesian or perhaps Chinese, but the dish is popular throughout SE Asia and uses a wide variety of meats from beef, lamb, pork, fish, shrimp, chicken and tripe. I think it's a pretty good home appetizer. It's reasonably healthy and it goes well with beer.

I started by taking 5 of the chicken thighs from the freezer and I defrosted them just a bit - about 3 minutes in the microwave just to soften them a bit. The slightly frozen meat is easer to cut into the roughly 1/8" strips. Once all the meat was cut, I defrosted for 3 more minutes then put the meat in the fridge while I mixed up the marinade.

The Marinade

In a small bowl mix the following:

• 1/2 cup soy sauce
• 1/2 cup of water
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1 tsp ground coriander
• 1 tbsp creamy peanut butter or tahini paste
• 1 tsp minced ginger * you can use fresh or bottled ginger, but try and avoid the powdered spice unless you are in a jam
• 1 tbsp minced garlic
• 1 tbsp sugar
• 1 tbsp lime juice, lemon juice or vinegar

Dry off the chicken pieces and dump the marinade over the meat in a non-reactive dish, cover and marinade for 30 minutes to 24 hours.

• 1 1/2" tbsp creamy butter
• 2 tbsp vegetable oil
• 2 tbsp soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 2 teaspoons rice wine vinegar or distilled white vinegar
• 1/8 tsp ground cayenne or to taste or you can also use Siracha
  

If you're grilling, you should start the fire after you cut the meat and the fire should be hot and the grate close to the coals. The grilling is only going to take 5-8 minutes. In my case, I did not grill, but rather I chose to broil the chicken. I put a cast iron grill pan in the oven and preheated to 500 degrees and then turned on the broiler on "hi" five minutes before I was ready to cook. About 20 minutes before my guest arrived, I skewered up the meat and put the skewers in the oven onto the hot grill pan. Cook for 4 minutes on one side, rotate and finish for 4 minutes, watching carefully so that you don't burn the meat. If you are grilling, due to the high-heat you'll want to be around the grill at all times while they cook When the meat is done, cover with foil to keep hot, dump the marinate into a saucepan and bring to boiling over high heat, boil for a couple of minutes to reduce slightly and serve with skewers.