The stars finally aligned, and I had a whole chicken in the house and the weather cooperated. I also had the critical element of motivation to cook the chicken outside over fire. I was really looking forward to cooking over mesquite wood that @Smithytalked about when she was in Texas sampling their great barbecue. I think it was winter before last, so you can see how long I have been looking forward to this. I just wish I had a better report instead of a cautionary tale on how not to do a cookout. 
I started at 6:00 PM, knowing that sunset comes around 8:00 here, and confident that it would give me plenty of time for everything. I cleaned out the grill, and laid a fire with Kingsford charcoal in a layer on the bottom, mesquite chunks in the middle of the pyramid and more charcoal at the apex. Then I started it as usual with lighter fluid and went in to scrub and pierce a couple baking potatoes, and make a salad. All I had to do was mix up Sadaf pomegranate molasses, white vinegar, canola oil, soy sauce and a little sesame oil for the dressing. Then I cleaned, capped and sliced some strawberries to macerate in the dressing in the fridge while I went on with prep. Well, by the time I had washed, split and dug the kidneys out of the chicken and seasoned it, and was ready to grill, my mesquite and most of the charcoal was too far gone to have enough heat left to cook a raw chicken, I thought. It was now 7:00 PM. What could I do but put on more charcoal and let it catch and go ashy?
While this was happening, I put the chicken halves on a large glass serving platter and nuked them at intervals on 40% power to get them going while the fire came back up to speed. At 7:30, the chicken was beginning to exude juices and had warmed up, but the platter was still not too hot to carry outside with bare hands. So out I went and plunked her on the grill where the added charcoal was ready to cook.
It has been many years since I cooked a chicken over fire, and it was immediately obvious I needed a squirt bottle to put out flare-ups, so went in and rinsed one out and filled it with fresh cold water. I cooked the chicken for twenty minutes on the bone side and ten on the skin side, and lost my daylight. By flashlight it was obvious that I was burning my chicken and it was not cooking evenly. Maybe I would have been better off just going with my initial fire I thought was too far gone? I pulled the chicken off onto a baking sheet and put it in the oven for another thirty minutes. Chicken cooked three ways anyone? 
It came out better than I expected, and was much more than edible, but made me remember why I haven't cooked chicken over fire in long time. You pretty much have to babysit it every single minute. You could definitely tell there was mesquite in the fire, and it was a good flavor. I liked it a lot better than my attempts to smoke with soaked chunks of this wood.
The salad dressing was my first attempt with pomegranate molasses and it was a hit. There's citric acid in it which is a very nice balance to the sweetness from the real sugar. Oh, after I came in, I added spinach to the macerated strawberries and tossed just before plating.
The husband was pleased and asked to take a chicken leg and half of one of the huge potatoes I baked for lunch tomorrow, so that's a good thing. He really liked the salad too, so that dressing is definitely a keeper, but I will probably add grated ginger next time, and maybe a little scallion or garlic. I wanted a simpler dressing this time so I could see how the pomegranate molasses did, as it was my first time working with this ingredient.
