As I am packing for my 2nd annual trip down south that I call “My Southern Expedition 2.0″ I was disappointed that I did not have time to write a blog post this week even though I have lots to write about I was very pressed for time.
But to my rescue comes a friend of mine Annette A. Penney who sent me this piece today which I am truly honoured to post for her.
Annette is the founder of Inspire and Acquire, a full-service social media marketing agency with a team of experienced professionals providing graphic design, website development, business and marketing consulting, content creation, and strategies to enhance online presence to businesses around the world.
Connect with Annette on LinkedIn
Inspire and Acquire’s Facebook Page
Email questions & inquiries to Annette
My Specialty is Social Media, Not Sauce!
Yesterday was an exciting day at my house. My granddaughter Faith was over for the day when FedEx left a package at my front door from Draper’s BBQ! We excitedly opened the package and Faith immediately began playing with the bottles of sauce and rub. but all I could think of was….. “I can’t wait to try these products!” – she just wants to play with the stuff!
Tonight I finally had the opportunity to try one of the great products Shane Draper sent me from Draper’s BBQ: the famous Draper’s BBQ A.P. Rub. It was only last month that I said to my good friend Fred (owner of this blog), “You know the one thing I don’t understand yet about BBQ? RUBS! What do you do with them, what’s their purpose, which ones are good??!!” Yesterday Shane mentioned that I could use Draper’s A.P. Rub on popcorn to add flavour and keep the snack low-fat. Awesome – I eat popcorn all of the time! But tonight…… tonight I was going to use it on chicken! And not in the way you would probably think. Check out what I did!
I had 4 pieces of lightly breaded butterflied chicken breasts. My plan was to sprinkle the Draper’s BBQ A.P. rub on both sides of the chicken and pan fry it. When I opened up the jar the powerful aroma of the rub really surprised me. I mean this in the best way possible. Not ‘knock you off your feet’ potent that is overpowering but powerful as in …… fresh! I thought for a few moments about what the aroma made me think of and I couldn’t quite put my finger on it and then it occurred to me. It’s what I would smell in a BBQ restaurant. Real. Genuine. Authentic. As Rachel Ray would say, “YummO!!!”
According to my plan, I sprinkled the rub over the chicken breasts while the grapeseed oil was heating in the pan. Most of my life I used olive oil for frying but I started using grapeseed oil a year ago because I was told by a chef that this is the oil you can heat to high temperatures and it doesn’t degrade the oil. I gingerly placed the chicken breasts in the pan, waited for the indicator that they were cooked on one side (the ‘cooked whiteness’ moves up the sides of the chicken), sprinkled more rub on the uncooked side, and flipped the pieces over. This is the result:
Does that look dee-lish or what? I served the chicken with baked potato with tofu sour cream (I know what you’re thinking….. yuck – it’s actually really good!) and peaches and cream corn. A good old-fashioned meal. I did make one error in judgment though: the aroma of the rub is so fresh (seriously, you have to experience this to believe it) that I underestimated how much to sprinkle on the chicken. After the chicken was cooked I did a second light sprinkling and it was just perfect! Next time I will be more generous with the rub.
Let’s face it, we all have days (most of mine) when we are pressed for time and can’t prepare gourmet meals. The Draper’s BBQ A.P. Rub is a deliciously quick way to cook chicken and your taste buds will thank you (and then you can thank me for the recommendation haha).
An enormous thank you goes out to Shane Draper of Draper’s BBQ who so promptly sent a gift package this week for Fred and I to share.
My many thanks to Annette for not only filling a void in my blog but also for showing me a way to get that BBQ taste in a meal that looks scrumptious and is easy to prepare.
I would also like to thank Shane Draper for supplying Annette and I with some of his fine product to promote and enjoy.
I previously wrote a review on Draper’s BBQ products which you can read here.
You can follow Shane on his twitter account @drapersbbq
Bacon
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