Grilled Sausages with Onions

This month's issue of Cook's Illustrated (No. 93) has a couple of articles on grilling. Since Sharon came home with 2.5 pounds, 11 links, of New York pork jalapeño sausage yesterday I decided to make the Gas-Grilled Sausages with Peppers and Onions this weekend.

Chicken Thighs To warm the grill up first I cooked up a batch of chicken thighs. Brine the chicken in a hand full of Morton's Kosher salt and half gallon of water, in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes. Rinse with tap water and trim the fat and loose skin. This reduces the flare ups and charred bits. Dry the chicken. Put on a low sodium rub if you like or just use cayenne and fresh black pepper (the salt is already in the chicken). On a hot grill cook skin side down until there are good grill marks, 2 minutes. Turn over and repeat. Reduce heat to medium and cook each side 5 to 8 minutes until done. One of the articles suggested covering the chicken with loose aluminum foil to cook until almost done after the initial searing. The finish on high heat 2 minutes per side adding BBQ sauce or glaze if you like that sort of thing.

Sausages and Onions Start the onions in the microwave to get them partially cooked. In addition to the salt, black pepper and thyme I added a cap of hickory smoke. Put somewhat softened onions in a grill pan, cover with the raw sausage and quartered red bell peppers (we forgot the peppers today). Seal the disposable aluminum pan with aluminum foil and place on the grill, medium high, for 15 minutes (sausages turned pale when they cooked).

Grilled/browned the sausages and pepper with the pan pushed off to one side (still cooking the onions in their own juice and the rendered sausage fat). When the sausage is browned remove them and finish grilling the peppers. Cover the grill again and continue cooking the onions with an occasional stir until the liquid evaporates and the onions begin to brown, 5 to 10 additional minutes. It took me 35 minutes total on the grill.