Jarateng ready to set 'birds' ablaze
Katlego Isaacs | Friday June 24, 2022 14:45
Slated for June 25, Chicks on Fire will be reinventing the wheel with a few innovative twists inspired by American BBQ techniques in much the style that its predecessor event Pigs on Fire accomplished.
While the main objective of Pigs on Fire was towards changing the negative connotations often associated with pork in Botswana, Chicks on Fire aims to take an already infamous bird and demonstrate to the public that there’s more than one way to roast a chicken.
Beyond just chicken, the event is expected to feature rather unusual feathered additions to a standard outdoor braai including the likes of turkey, duck, and hard body chicken (locally known as Tswana chicken).
Turning up the heat for the event, all of the birds will also be cooked by competing pit masters in Jarateng’s first ever “Meat on Fire” braai competition in the hopes of one lucky grill expert walking away with a personal reverse flow smoker sized to cook two full chickens at once. Adding yet another degree of heat to Chicks on Fire will also be Jarateng’s first-ever hot wings eating contests in which an undisclosed grand prize will be handed off to the winner that can eat the most hot wings in the shortest amount of time.
Easing the rest of the public in, Chicks on Fire will feature succulently marinated grilled wings and chicken quarters for a taste of familiarity before showing off a few unique styles of braaing chicken such as spit roasting, drum smoking, and beer-can chicken. Beer-can chicken being a popular BBQ technique in which a chicken is smoked sitting upright with a large can of beer bubbling in its centre cavity cooking the chicken from the inside out while retaining as much juicy moisture in the bird as possible.
Professional chef and Chicks on Fire Pit Master, Kaboyaone Magapa, popularly known as Chef Gibson, expressed that beer-can chicken and other types of chicken smoking are a part of a cooking culture that the Chicks on Fire team is aiming to bestow onto the public. “Smoking is not just a fashion or anything, it’s a culture. It’s a culture that we want to promote and we want people to understand,” Magapa said. Founder and owner of Jarateng, Kaelo Sabone, views Chicks on Fire as a way to let people come and enjoy every way there is to braai and smoke a chicken departing from the commonly grilled chicken that we monotonously consume at standard braais.
During a press conference for Chicks on Fire, Sabone demonstrated the wide variety of smoking equipment Jarateng has currently available to offer different smoking techniques for various meats including cold smoked pork sausages, spit roasted pork and chicken, and more. All of these smoking techniques are expected to be demonstrated on June 25 for Chicks on Fire blending food education with an upbeat food based social gathering atmosphere.