Can you imagine being in the woods for days? Well, a part of the survival history as it relates to food includes having to hunt it and later on cook it on open fire. Jerk chicken has a history that began in Jamaica when our ancestors decided to prepare their meat in a specific manner. How often do you see people jerking chicken outdoors or any other meat for that matter? Not so often, right? The word “jerk” is said to be derived from a word called “charqui”, a Spanish term for dried meat. The traditional way of cooking this meat includes a process combined with mixed spices and pimento wood. Also, the pimento wood adds to its flavor. However, overtime the method of cooking this popular meal has changed.

Are you a chicken lover? If yes, then overlooking jerked chicken is definitely not the easiest thing to do. Jamaica is known for this all-time favorite, and it is usually paired with festival, a fried wheat flour and cornmeal dough. Just seasoning the chicken with the basics is not enough to accomplish the goal of the best jerk chicken. You have to ensure you gather all the necessary ingredients to acquire the taste of Jamaican Jerk Chicken. Some of these spices include pimento, cloves, nutmeg, paprika, and salt. Seasonings is an integral part of the preparation process. It is important for you to understand that these spices must be added in moderation, do not add too much seasoning. Once you taste it, you can then decide if you need a little more. In cooking, you can always add more seasoning if needed, however, it’s a challenge at times correcting over seasoned food. For us in Jamaica, the basic seasonings we add in our recipe for this flavorful jerk chicken includes onions, escellion, garlic, thyme and of course, scotch bonnet peppers which adds to the heat level, all of these seasonings in the right quantity help to create the flavorful taste of jerk chicken. While the chicken is being jerked, another local cooking preference is to add Red Stripe Beer on it or in the sauce. Amazing!

There are numerous sides people enjoy pairing jerk chicken with, these include rice and peas, green pressed plantains, bammy or even french fries. Cooking jerk chicken on pimento wood is not the only way to prepare this world recognized dish, it can also be prepared in the oven or on the grill. Cooking is all about creativity, speaking from my personal experience, the oven jerked chicken is just as good as the jerked chicken prepared on the pimento wood.