Best Chicken Ever aka Roasted Buttermilk Chicken aka YOU NEED TO MAKE THIS!

This chicken was really good! Even the kids loved it! It’s pretty simple too.

Ingredients
3 lbs of bone-in chicken (I used 10 chicken leg quarters and tripled the recipe.)
2 cups buttermilk
2 cloves garlic, bruised and skins removed
1 tablespoon crushed peppercorns
1 tablespoon of sea salt or 1 1/2 teaspoons table salt
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 tablespoon maple syrup or honey
1/2 stick of butter

Directions
Place the chicken in a large freezer bag, and add the buttermilk.
Add the bruised garlic cloves to the bag with the crushed peppercorns and salt.
Sprinkle in the ground cumin and finally add the maple syrup, and then squish everything in the freezer bag around to mix the marinade and coat the chicken.
Leave the buttermilk marinated chicken in the fridge ideally overnight or out of the fridge for at least 30 minutes and up to 2 hours.
Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F. Take the chicken pieces out of the bag shaking off the excess marinade, and then arrange them in a roasting tin lined with foil. Lightly sprinkle the chicken with salt, pepper and cumin.
Drizzle butter over chicken and then roast in the oven for about 40-50 minutes, or until brown, even scorched in parts, and juicily cooked through.

So there ya go. Now go get some chicken and get cookin!

Food Pics

This is the Caribbean Jerk Rib recipe that I posted here from PaleOMG.

This is a sweet potato pie from Paleo Comfort Foods. Great cookbook. You can get it on amazon. The book not the pie.

These are Kale Chips.

Ingredients
1 bunch kale
1 tablespoon coconut oil or bacon grease
1 teaspoon seasoned salt

Directions
Preheat an oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Line a non insulated cookie sheet with parchment paper or foil.
With a knife or kitchen shears carefully remove the leaves from the thick stems and tear into bite size pieces. Wash and thoroughly dry kale with a salad spinner. Drizzle kale with oil and sprinkle with seasoning salt.
Bake until the edges brown but are not burnt, 10 to 15 minutes.

Today is Thanksgiving……right?

Ok, not really! BUT since we are supposed to be thankful everyday we can technically call it Thanksgiving!

oh and I AM MAKING AN ENTIRE THANKSGIVING SPREAD! (Paleo, of course!)

Eat your heart out, Martha!

I will post my recipes later.

WE INTERRUPT THIS POST FOR A DISASTER OF MONUMENTAL PROPORTIONS!

So as the turkey was getting done I began to take its temperature with a meat thermometer. When the thermometer stated the temperature of the turkey was a safe 170ish, I foolishly believed it. The mashed potatoes, gravy,and sweet potato pie were all done and waiting patiently to be devoured. The broccoli was in the oven getting roasted to perfection. Clayton (the husband) began to cut into the perfectly golden, juicy bird. He carved one side…mmmmm it smelled (and looked) heavenly. As he cut into the 2nd side he began to look slightly worried. Instead of cutting with confidence he was staring at the bird with a look of anguish.

The.turkey.was.not.done.

We examined the meat we thought was done but couldn’t come to a conclusion as to whether it was fully cooked. We decide that even though it’s fun to live dangerously, eating raw poultry was not the way. Sooooooo we stuck it back in the oven with the roasting broccoli to finish cooking. One problem though, you don’t cook a turkey at the same temperature you roast broccoli at…..

By this time we were all starving. We had fluffy potatoes, rich gravy, a mouth-watering sweet potato pie, broccoli roasted to perfection and partially raw, partially burnt turkey.

So we sat down for a Paleo nightmare…..a meatless meal. We ate our sides (that were awesome, by the way) and waited for the turkey to be done. The whole time we ate I kept replaying the scene from National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation where they are all chewing the over cooked turkey. If you’ve seen it you know what I mean and if you haven’t, shame on you, it’s a classic!

By the time we took the turkey out of the oven the kids had moved on but Clayton and I faithfully ate our dry turkey, covered it gravy, of course!

Moral of the story: A meat thermometer might not be the best item to skimp on.

I am just happy to say that I kept my cool during the entire fiasco. There were no tears, foot stomping or yelling at all. However, please do not ask my husband to confirm the last statement….

Recipes to be shared later but don’t worry I will not be instructing anyone on how to cook a turkey.

Crock Pot Chicken Tacos

Another crock pot recipe! Yay! I love throwing a hunch of stuff in the crock pot and knowing that my next meal is taking care of itself! Hmmm I wonder if this concept would work on cleaning my house? Throw the cleaning supplies in, shut the door, walk away and 8 hours later violà, a clean house! Maybe I’ll try it…..

This recipe is super easy, I mean ridiculously easy.

Ingredients

3 lb bag of Chicken breasts

2 packets of taco seasoning Taco Seasoning (I use 1 batch of homemade seasoning found at http://allrecipes.com/recipe/taco-seasoning-i/)

1. Put fresh or frozen (Yes, you can put in frozen chicken in! Try it, I dare you!) chicken breasts in the crock pot.

2. Dump on seasoning

3. Cook 4-5  hrs on high or 6-8 on low. If you are using frozen chicken it will need to cook longer. My crock pot cooks very hot! My high setting is like super high and my low setting is like high! (Got that?) Basically cook it until you can shred it with two forks.

4. I like to serve this with sautéed peppers and onions, cheese, sour cream and salsa. My kids like to eat it in quesadillas made with corn tortillas.

My touchpad auto correct keeps changing crock pot into crackpot when I forget to add a space in between crock and pot. It’s kind of funny.

Dad’s Pork Chops from Everyday Paleo

We tried this recipe with pork steak and it was amazing! I’m always afraid that pork chops or pork steak in the oven will be dry. These were tender and juicy. I didn’t have Dijon mustard or French thyme so I used regular yellow mustard and dried thyme. It took a little longer for mine to be done. I cooked them for about 20 minutes in the oven.

Dad’s Pork Chops
4 pork chops, 1/4-inch thick
Salt and pepper, to taste
½ cup Dijon mustard
1 teaspoon mustard powder
1 teaspoon dried french thyme
1 teaspoon crushed garlic
1 tablespoon coconut oil
Preheat oven to 425°F. Season pork chops lightly with salt and pepper. In a small bowl, combine mustard, mustard powder, French thyme, and garlic; mix well and spread evenly over both sides of the chops. Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium-high. Add the chops and brown for 2 minutes per side. Transfer your skillet to the oven and cook for an additional 5-8 minutes, until no longer pink and cooked through.

I served collard greens and ham hocks with it. I’ll post my collard greens recipe later.

Here is the link to the original recipe

http://everydaypaleo.com/2011/03/15/dads-pork-chops/