Kabob's

Kabobs are one of the most interesting meals to create in my current skill set. Dicing and cutting tons of vegetables and protein to delicately align them on a skewer to cook to perfection on a grill or Green Egg is a solid amount of work.

One thing I quickly learned in this journey is the more things you mix on one skewer the harder it is. Unfortunately some of my first few skewers mixed chicken and beef which was a grand ole mistake due to the massive difference in cooking time. Pictured above was a hectic creation for a larger dinner party that had the following:

• Green, Yellow, Orange and Red Peppers
• White and Red Onions
• Pineapple
• Tomatoes
• Mushrooms
• Shrimp
• Beef
• Chicken

Even mixing a ton of veggies on a skewer is a dice roll, because the mushrooms or pineapple may cook too much alongside a protein until they fall off the skewer into the abyss of the grill.

So while the mixed protein and veggie skewer may look the best it isn't the easiest to evenly cook all the different items at their preferred temperature. Even if combining all proteins onto a single skewer is better for the cook job it sure is more boring color wise.

Above we have a kabob cook where we split all the veggies into a tray, with exception of skewered baby tomatoes. This meant we could skewer all the chicken and beef on their own with just a bit of oil and salt & pepper for flavoring. On the other side we have a more classic kabob with all the veggies mixed among a protein, but ensuring each skewer is consistent with the type of protein on each one. This means sometimes we have to get creative and do like 10 veggies in a row if we ran out of beef.

Above we have the split kabobs being cooked and just throwing all the veggies into a basket. With direct heat and indirect heat you can mix up the veggies between heat sources and then keep them cooking as you mix around the basket. On the other side the protein under direct heat just needs a few rotations and depending on the cut of the meat may be a short cook in under 10 minutes.

One thing we learned is the metal vs wood skewer - we first did wood skewers and they didn't work too well so we bought metal skewers. The wood skewer got too hot and basically snapped when flipping or rotating the skewer. The new metal skewer worked great, but they came out of the dishwasher all rusted up. So we figured we got cheap skewers and went back to wood, this time soaking the skewers in water prior to use. With water soaked wood skewers we had no issues and things worked out well.

Regardless of the method or skewers type when they are done and plated the flavors are amazing. A mixture of veggies and protein that gives every bite a unique combination of a marinade or veggie. This is a meal that takes a minute to produce, but is worth every effort.