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PolymathMay 26
Yea man, no lie. Charcoal burns hot, real hot. Five hundred degrees — Maybe seven hundred. The meat hits that heat and magic happens.
Burning charcoal breaks down lignin to produce two compounds called guaiacol and syringol. They make smoke. That smoke tastes like bacon. Your tongue knows. Amino acids and reducing sugars react–Scientists call it the Maillard reaction – I call it that perfect crust.
Fat drips. Hits the coals. Vaporizes. Melting fats will drip onto the heat source and produce smoke – The smoke rises back up. Coats the meal, every drop of juice becomes flavor.
Gas can’t do this. Wood can. But charcoal does it best — The chemistry doesn’t lie. Your mouth knows the difference — That’s why we keep coming back. Fire and meat. Simple as that.
A heating temperature of about 85 degrees Celsius is sufficient to cook the protein.
That said, it takes longer to bake at low temperatures, and the umami flavor escapes during that time.
On that note, when grilled over charcoal, far infrared light bakes the protein on the surface at a high temperature, trapping the gravy inside.
It’s not just the meat that makes kabayaki delicious. The skin is crisp and fragrant. This is one of the reasons why kabayaki is so delicious. The charcoals used in this charcoal fire are also carefully used in various shops such as Binchotan. To ensure that the skin is crispy, dip it in the sauce several times and broil just enough. This finesse is also a skill of the store owner. The flesh is plump and the skin is crisp, making it very tasty.
It tastes great when dipped in a secret sauce and grilled over charcoal.
Also, if you grill it over charcoal, the oil will burn and give it a better aroma.
Charcoal barbecue
I can tell you why it tastes the way it does; ‘so good’ is subjective, of course. It may well be that cooking over charcoal makes food taste of summer and good company, neither of which can, alas, be bottled and sold alongside the marinades.
When you cook meat over charcoal, two things happen. First, the charcoal itself contains lignin, a chemical reminder that it used to be wood. When it burns, it yields aromatic compounds that lend their own flavour to the meat. (I am not an organic chemist, nor do I play one in this commercial…)
Second, the meat juices drip onto the coals and they, too, burn, creating their own flavours in the smoke.
My guess is that it’s the latter that contributes most of the flavour, though not all; this guess is based on having had decent results with lava rocks. After all, by the time charcoal is ready to cook, it’s not smoking much at all, which argues to me that the charcoal’s own aromatics have mostly gone already.
On the other hand, cooking with a source of woodsmoke – be it a can of hickory chips next to the coals or, better yet, actually cooking over hardwood – does yield a better flavour.
