Pollo asado

Serves 8

Preparation time: 10 minutes 
Marinating time: 2 - 4 hours
Cooking time: 50 minutes 

Ingredients
8 chicken breasts or 16 chicken thighs, skin on 
1 dried habanero chilli 
120ml olive oil 
1 onion, finely chopped 
3 garlic cloves, finely chopped or minced 
100g achiote paste, chopped into chunks 
2 tsp ground cumin 
2 tsp oregano 
2 tsp tajin (optional) 
1 tsp salt 
1 tsp ground black pepper 
120ml fresh orange juice 
120ml fresh lime juice (roughly 8 limes) 

Method
About 20 minutes before you want to start, cover the habanero with 50mls of boiling water. 

Put a tbsp of oil into a pan and cook the onion on a medium heat for 3-5 minutes until soft and translucent.  Add the garlic and cook for a minute and then add the achiote paste, cumin, oregano and seasonings and cook for a couple of minuteo, stirring and crushing down the achiote paste, you want the lumps to go but you don’t want this to catch. 

You now need to blend this, you can either do this by using a food processor or a stick blender. 

Put the onion mixture into the processor, take the chillies out of the water (reserving the water) and put into the food processor, blend until smooth, slowly adding both the orange and lime juices.  You now need to slowly the add the oil while blending, this will thicken the mixture by emulsifying it.   

Into a non-metallic bowl or zip lock bag add your chicken and all of your marinade.  If you are eating half and freezing half, split the chicken and marinade now putting one into a freezer bag. Put to one side for a couple of hours. 

The chicken is best cooked outside over coals to get that authentic smoky flavour. 

Heat your coals until white hot and set your braai or bbq up for indirect heat.  Put the chicken pieces on, skin side down initially.  Cook for roughly 30-40 minutes turning from time to time to stop it burning until the juices run clear.   

If you want to cook inside then I would cook under the grill on a medium heat for 20-30 minutes turning to keep it from burning as this dish needs that char. 

While the chicken is cooking take your marinade and put it into a saucepan and over a high heat cook until steaming hot, use this to baste the chicken as it cooks but it has to be hot to avoid contamination so heat it quickly and then you can baste baste baste to get the most unbelievable flavour.