Another attempt ar "tocino" marinade for poultry

gdenby · November 2015

Mentioned a few weeks ago about the Filipino marinade, called "tocino," as used for poultry. Started as a sugar based bacon cure.

This time around, I tried it with bits of turkey leg meat.

There are lots of variations on the recipe. All I've seen have pineapple juice. Most have soy sauce and some sort of liquid filled w. anchiote. Salt, pepper, garlic, and some sort of citrus acid. The mix I made had all those, and a little extra brown sugar. Soaked the meat for 2 days, turning several times.

Skewered them, and cooked raised, direct, at 400 - 500F, turning a few times.

Image: https://us.v-cdn.net/5017260/uploads/editor/fc/ra4bsfumm1x4.jpg

The results were good. Had a vague bacon flavor. Mostly salty but not too much, and a good savory flavor. Most of the meat pieces were fairly tender;

Better than average poultry. Most of the fuss was slicing the meat away from all the tendons in the leg.

Botch · November 2015

Agree with you 100% about slicing turkey meat away from the drums; tried that in college and haven't had them since.
That marinade sounds fantastic, and I have a turkey breast in the freezer....

D1105 · November 2015

My kids love Tocino! I never thought of grilling it till I saw this post. I definitely need to try this for breakfast -> "Tocilog".

hondabbq · November 2015

Wait till smokin sees this.

Chef_Hobo · November 2015

Try using Sprite or 7-Up (citric acid) next time. It also works well with sliced up pork tenderloin. (I'm half Filipino and got the suggestion from my mother)

NDG · November 2015

looks good & sounds tasty . . never heard of tocino before.

gdenby · November 2015

Chef_Hobo said:

Try using Sprite or 7-Up (citric acid) next time. It also works well with sliced up pork tenderloin. (I'm half Filipino and got the suggestion from my mother)

I'd hoped there was enough citric acid between the pineapple juicer and the cap of lime juice I put in. And now it occurs to me I have a bottle of citric acid buried somewhere in my cupboards.

In some respects, the recipe just seems too easy for how good it tastes. Pounded or thin sliced poultry, some soy, pineapple, some lemon-lime soda, touch of pepper. Plus some other good stuff if desired. May have to make some of the marinade and keep it in the fridge just to see how it works for various things.

The Cen-Tex Smoker · November 2015

Chef_Hobo said:

Try using Sprite or 7-Up (citric acid) next time. It also works well with sliced up pork tenderloin. (I'm half Filipino and got the suggestion from my mother)

nice! I had seen that before but had forgotten. Thanks for the reminder.

YYZegger · November 2015

It looks great, nice color!

Richard Fl · November 2015

Here is a pork variation I gathered a few years back. When I was there in the late sixtys ate some but forgot the flavor.

Monkey, Meat, Philippine Street Vendor Style "Monkey Meat"

I was stationed at Subic Bay from 1983-86, and luckily was able to gather a little info on Philippino cooking. The marinade you're looking for is 7-Up, believe it or not. Usually the meat is pork sliced thinly, "woven" onto a wooden skewer and marinated overnight in 7-Up, garlic, soy sauce or what ever other spice suits your taste. I personally like to add a little cayenne pepper to give a little "hot" to the meat. You can use monkey if you like, but it's a darker meat and you need to marinate longer to get rid of the wild taste. Barbequed monitor lizard or fruit bat wasn't too bad either. ****** Norm Corley, Athens, Greece**** It was my mother-in-law who happened to be visiting at the time. After telling me all about it, she got in the mood to do some. She used 7-up, garlic, soy, vinegar (and possibly some sliced onion--I don't remember). She put it on skewers and I grilled it. Good stuff. Just make sure your grill is hot enough to brown them quickly, and get them off before they dry out.

INGREDIENTS:

Recipe Type: Appetizer, Side Dish, Snack

Source

Source: Phillippines, 2005/12/23

Web Page: http://www.filipino-food-lovers.com/filipino-pork-bbq/

Author Notes

BGE Forum, Michael B, 2007/12/26

A friend at work says his wife, who is from Baguio, uses 7-Up, coconut and palm vinegars, soy sauce, kalamansi ( Calamondin ) when she can get it or lemons when she can't, and garlic.

BGE Forum, 2008/03/02---Filipino BBQ Beanie-Bean

Actually, it's pork country cut ribs sliced very thinly. The secret marinade sauce we use on it is Mama Sita's barbecue marinade, some crushed garlic, and some beer.

Oh yeah, be sure to soak your bamboo skewers in water a bit before you put the meat on so that they don't turn into smoking wood on the BGE. Cook temp was 350 deg before I put the foil shield in just under where the thermo is located. Kinda have to do it by time/feel for this one--lots of rotating of the skewers to prevent the meat from turning into charcoal.

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EggSmokeVa · November 2015

This sounds awesome! I might give it a try.. I love trying different flavor combos.. Looks good!

gdenby · November 2015

EggSmokeVa said:

This sounds awesome! I might give it a try.. I love trying different flavor combos.. Looks good!

Looking over a bunch of online recipes, I see that there is a lot of variation. Definitely the sort of dish that would vary from town to town, and even cook to cook.

The things I find in common are:

pineapple juice, which is basically sweet, w. a touch of tartness
soy sauce, which is salty and savory
lemon and or lime for sour citric acid flavor

So basically, its sweet, sour and salty, w. some savory. Pretty basic, but from sources that are a little unusual. and because it is always used w. thin sliced or pounded meat, they act like sponges and soak up the flavors quickly.

Another attempt ar "tocino" marinade for poultry

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