[BBQ Recipe] Honey and Mustard Glazed Chicken

Honey and Mustard Glazed Chicken on the BBQ

The English summer weather is unpredictable to say the least. As I’m writing this, we’ve have torrential rain, glorious sunshine, and a lot of cloud cover over the space of just 7 days.

It’s no surprise that the English folk react so crazily when the cloud breaks and we finally get to see a bit of the sun.

When the sun comes out to play where I live the smell of BBQ’s begins to fill the air. And I must admit my family are no different.

The beauty of a BBQ is that you can cook almost anything on it. This summer I’ve already shown you sizzling summer prawns, char grilled tuna, as well as barbequed courgette and bulgur wheat salad. This particular weekend however we didn’t have any special food in.

Key ingredients for Honey and Mustard Glazed Chicken

The sun had come as a bit of a shock. The weather man had been saying for days we should expect the hottest weekend yet, but Saturday came and went and it remained overcast though a little warmer than usual. With the clouds overhead we assumed there was no point getting the BBQ out, but by Sunday afternoon the sun was shining brightly and it was time for me to raid the cupboards!

We’d got chicken breasts in the fridge that we intended to use later in the week so this was where my inspiration started. I butterflied the breast, making the surface area larger and the fillet thinner so it would cook quicker on the BBQ.

I didn’t just want grilled chicken for dinner though. I wanted to jazz it up a bit!

Out of the cupboard came mustard, honey, Worcestershire sauce, red wine vinegar, pepper and garlic – and so my honey and mustard glazed chicken was born!

Spiced Cranberry Chutney

An extra large jar of Spiced Cranberry Chutney
ready for some cheese!

This is my second venture into the Christmas kitchen this year and yet again it involves a couple of jars!
I’ve been thinking about “dabbling” in preserves since the summer. In the past we’ve ended up with a huge glut of fruit and I was looking forward to attempting to make jam for the first time. But, summer came and went, and in true British style the weather was disappointing. We had hardly any raspberries on our canes this year so my new jam thermometer never got a look in.

But, as we get ever closer to Christmas, I’ve begun to find festive uses for the jam jars I have collected.

First I attempted my own mincemeat perfect for mince pies and other festive favourites. The recipe was super simple, and I managed to get an airtight seal! Woo hoo! Not too bad for a first attempt.

This time I thought I’d try something a little bit different.

At Christmas my family gets through an UNHOLY amount of Cheese; cheeses of all kinds, from soft to smelly, sheep to goat. Last year my Dad’s present from my sister and I was actually a Cheese hamper complete with 5 types of cheese 2 chutneys and a plumb bread. You can buy these hampers from farmers markets and supermarkets alike but I started to think...how hard can it REALLY be to make chutney?! As it turns out, it’s not very hard at all.

When coming up for the flavour combination, I wanted something that didn’t just go well with cheese, but something that well and truly said CHRISTMAS! So my starting point was cranberries. As I searched the internet for basic cranberry chutney I was a bit concerned about how I would actually find fresh cranberries. Turns out...that’s also pretty damn easy! Who would’ve thought they can found in the fresh fruit isle of Sainsbury’s in a plastic bag by the nuts.

Well that was the first hurdle overcome. Next I had to decide what else I would but in the chutney. For a truly festive flavour it had to be cinnamon, nutmeg and a touch of ginger. This combined with the basic chutney mix (the fruit, red wine vinegar, a little onion) seemed like a good place to start, but I didn’t want to play it too safe. So, to give the chutney an extra kick, you can also find a red chilli in the ingredients list. This works really well to give the chutney a bit of excitement without drowning out the mellow Christmas spices.