This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is Peri-Peri-drumsticks.jpg

Peri-Peri chicken is one of the great exports from Africa. Many will know it as Nando’s chicken. Something magical happened a few centuries ago when Portuguese explorers returned from South American with chilies and settled in Africa. Africans took one look at the herbs and spices brought by the explorers and zeroed in on the one item that packs the biggest punch – chili! Peri-peri can be a very specific African chili or just a generic name for “spicy”, but the end result, when mixed with lemon juice and garlic is so comforting that the flavour bomb is accepted by all cultures as their own.

If you do not have a barbecue or the weather is inclement – no problem – place the chicken in the oven and roast it as a normal dish – you will lose the smokiness of the barbecue but the result will still be delightful. Just make sure to put it under the grill for 5 minutes at the end to crisp up the skin.

Table of Contents

Perfect accompaniments

Barbecued chicken, especially the white meat, can sometimes be a bit dry, which is where a perfect sauce, dip, or dressing can make all of the difference. Our current two favorites are fresh chimichurri and perinaise or spicy mayo, the latter being perfect for the days when you simply want to stuff the chicken into a bun with some coleslaw on the side.

Speaking of coleslaw, many recipes use salad cream or mayonnaise to make coleslaw. Why not try a green-cabbage-based version with apples and vinegar instead? The acidity will lift the chicken and enhance its flavor.

For a typical chicken barbecue, we always recommend to have:

Bread rolls
Fries
Coleslaw
Chimichurri
Perinaise
Hot sauce for those who like it hotter!
Thai Sweet Chili sauce for those who prefer a milder, sweeter chicken

Cooking tips for barbecued chicken:

The main challenge for any barbecue is that chicken has an odd shape, making it hard to cook each side evenly as it will tend to fall over. No matter what one tries, one part of the chicken always seems to cook more than another, drying some of the meat to the point where it is unappealing or adding too much char, ruining the dish.

Use a rotiserrie attachment for an even cook
Use skewers to prevent the chicken from rolling around on the grill
Spatchcock the chicken to make it 2-sided.
Chicken pieces: Reducing a chicken into smaller pieces prior to cooking

A whole chicken can be tricky to cook without a rotisserie attachment to keep the cooking even. The rotisserie attachment helps by gripping the chicken in place and constantly exposing a new surface of the chicken to the fire.

Where the rotisserie attachment is not available, a simple trick here is to insert a few long metal skewers to prevent the chicken from just rolling around. Essentially, the skewers act as long supports for each side of the chicken, keeping it in place while it cooks. Turning the chicken over can be more complex as the skewers can catch in the grill, making the process more tedious. This approach is great as it allows you to let the chicken cook more on thicker, meatier sides.

Spatchcocking the chicken has become more popular recently. This process transforms the chicken into a flat surface by breaking the back of the chicken and prising it open from that point. This is a great approach as you then have 2 sides – one with mostly bones, the other with mostly meat. This means that you can leave the chicken to cook bone-side down for longer without risking drying out the meat, thereby ensuring that the meat near the bones cooks through.

Breaking up the chicken into pieces prior to barbecuing is also very popular, especially where the meal will be eaten as a casual picknic, where guests are expected to use their hands. Chicken pieces can be wings, thighs, breasts or legs. they could even be quarter-chicken pieces such as a leg-and-thigh or breast-and-wing. In more extreme cases, these pieces are half-chicken pieces, in which case they should be treated like a spatchcock chicken. The advantage of chicken pieces is that you can buy them pre-prepared and all of the same type. So for a finger party, selecting only chicken legs or chicken wings is ideal. Due to the uniformness of the pieces, it is also easy to cook each type of piece perfectly.