Sign up to CraftBoxGirls

Tasty Dry Rubs For Your Grill

Have you guys ever heard of tasty dry rubs for your grill? They are the latest craze at the moment, and I do like to work with them as well. They’re easy to mix and easy to handle, and you don’t have to marinate your meat or fish for ages. Plus: A marinate may cover up the natural flavour of the meat, a dry rub only works in the background. And a rub is wonderful to store! What do you think?

 A rub mostly consists of dry ingredients that you ‘rub’ into the meat (hence the name ‘dry rub’).  While the rub above all marinates the grillables, it also makes a nice crust when being grilled. A good usually consists of the four ‘S’: Sugar, savory, spices and herbs, and spicy. While Sugar usually functions as flavour enhancer and browns the meat, savory refers to all the spices creating savory flavours.

Spices and herbs are obviously an important factor for a dry rub, and since there are so many, the possibilities are endless. In addition to that a spicy element in a dry rub can really excite your taste buds! Maybe in form of black pepper, or chilli flakes, or ginger.

The Recipes

Nori Sesame Rub

• 2½ tbsp. of sesame seeds
• 2 nori leaves
• 1 tbsp. coarse sea salt
• 1½ tbsp. black peppercorns
• 2 tbsp. brown sugar
• ½ tbsp. garlic powder

1. Toast the sesame seeds in a pan without oil, then remove them from the pan and let them cool a bit.
2. Chaff the nori leaves in your blender until you have fine flakes.
3. Crush salt, pepper, sugar, nori flakes and sesame seeds in a mortar.
4. Then mix in the garlic powder.

Although this mix smells a little bit like fish food because of the nori leaves, don’t worry! Its tart flavour is perfect for grilled fish. The rub is for about 500-600 g of grillables.

Coffee Chilli Rub

• 2 tsp. coarse sea salt
• 2 tsp. brown sugar
• 1 tbsp. black peppercorns
• 1 tbsp. chilli flakes
• ½ tbsp. garlic powder
• 1 tbsp. coffee powder

1. Crush the salt, sugar and pepper in your mortar.
2. Add the chilli flakes and the garlic powder and continue crushing the mixture.
3. At the end mix in the coffee powder.

 This rub is pretty spicy and aromatic and makes a nice crust while the meat remains nice and juicy. It fits wonderfully to steak or other beef. The rub is for about 500-600 g of grillables.

Cajun Rub

• 2 tsp. coarse sea salt
• 1 tsp. black peppercorns
• 1 tsp. brown sugar
• ½ tsp. cumin
• 1 mace
• 1 tsp. garlic powder
• 1 tsp. paprika powder
• 1 tsp. dried thyme
• 2 tsp. dried oregano
• A pinch of cayenne pepper

1. Grind the salt, pepper, sugar, cumin and the mace in a mortar.
2. Then add garlic powder, paprika, thyme, oregano and cayenne pepper.
3. Mix and grind again.

 This rub is quite sweet and spicy (nice mix) and is an exotic addition to chicken or classic surf and turf recipes. Prawns would taste amazing with this, too! The rub is for about 500-600 g of grillables.

I am already really looking forward to tasting these rubs on the meat/fish/etc., I bet they taste wonderful! Although I think the best part is that the rub makes a perfect little gift for someone, especially in such a cute container. For more recipes like these spice blends for example, head over to makeandmess.com, or follow me on Facebook, Pinterest or Bloglovin!

About Michelle!

My name is Michelle, I’m a business student from Germany and I own the blog‚ Make&Mess’. I’m a kind of person who delves into a magazine and the moment an interesting piece of cloth, jewellery or decoration hits my eye, the wheels start turning and I think ‘How can I do that myself and for a fraction of that prize?’. I really like to experiment with everything I can lay my hands on, and I think you can see that on my blog. And although I’m mostly interested in crafting, cooking and fashion, what I really want is for my blog to reflect all the beautiful things you can find in life!