Mango-Chipotle BBQ Chicken:

To celebrate the beginning of football season, I decided to experiment with a new BBQ sauce and grill up some chicken. I've been experimenting with BBQ sauces using bourbon lately as I think it has a deep, smoky flavor that adds some complexity. I thought that some fruit would temper the spice of chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, and so came up with this idea.

To make this sauce, I sweated about a quarter of a finely diced onion and two pressed cloves of garlic in a little olive oil. Next, I added a quarter of a large mango that I had cut into a small dice, one diced chipotle pepper in adobo sauce, 1/8 cup of bourbon, and 1/8 cup of cider vinegar and let this simmer until the mango was softened and the alcohol had time to burn off (roughly 15 minutes). Using an immersion blender, I pureed this into a thick, spicy, sweet paste. Next, I made a BBQ sauce base of catsup, worcestershire sauce, molasses, brown sugar, and cider vinegar. Once these flavors had come together, I added the mango paste in 1-2 tablespoon increments until the sauce had reached the level of sweetness/spiciness that I was after.

I had seasoned up some chicken thighs and brumsticks with garlic powder and chili powder and grilled them up, slathering on the sauce as the chicken cooked. I served this with a nice clean salad with some pistachios and feta cheese and an ice cold beer.