Alton Brown's Chicken Dinner

I discovered Alton Brown from The Food Network, OK I suppose you all have heard of him and some may even follow him, but I do not get the Food Network and had never heard of him. He made a series of YouTube videos answering questions about Thanksgiving feast planning and preparation. Funny guy with lots of good sense, one thing he pointed out was that raw does not necessarily mean fresh when it comes to turkey frozen can mean fresher and they usually have a less traumatic – temperature wise – trip to market. Maybe that is why I think he is so clever, I have been using frozen birds for years for the same reason. The cleverest people in the world are the ones that agree with us!

I watched an episode of show that airs on The Food Network called Best Thing I Ever Made and he made what looked like a tasty dish called Smoked Paprika Chicken Thighs with Potato and Onion. If you go to BTIEM - Chicken Dinner (Alton Brown) on YouTube you will find it. The show was interesting and the chicken dinner looked fabulous, so I thought I would try it out on my family.

Smoked Paprika Chicken Thighs with Potato and Onion

Alton Brown Food Network

Prep time: 40 minutes – Cook time: 60 minutes – Level: Easy – Serves 6-8

Ingredients

6oz	pimento stuffed green olives, chopped
2 t	lemon zest
2 cloves	garlic, grated
3 T	smoked paprika
1 t	olive oil
1 1/2 t	kosher salt
1/4 t	black pepper, freshly ground
8 each	bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs
2 pounds	Yukon gold potatoes, unpeeled
1 medium	yellow onion, frenched (see the video)

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

Combine the olives, lemon zest and garlic in a small bowl. Set aside.

Mix the smoked paprika, olive oil, 3/4 teaspoon of the salt and pepper into a paste in a large bowl.

Lay the chicken thighs skin-side down. Using a pair of kitchen shears, make a cut down the length of the bone to expose it, then cut the meat away from the bone. Discard the bone. Add the boned chicken thighs to the paste and massage to coat.

Thinly slice the potatoes on a mandolin, about 1/4-inch thick. Arrange the potato slices and onion pieces in an even layer on a foil-lined half sheet pan and sprinkle with the remaining 3/4 teaspoon salt.

Stuff about 2 tablespoons of the olive mixture under the skin of each chicken thigh. Arrange the chicken thighs, skin-side up, on a cooling rack and set the rack over the potatoes and onion in the half sheet pan. Bake until the skin is crispy and the potatoes are tender, 55 to 60 minutes. If you prefer the potatoes crispy, remove the rack with the chicken and return to the oven for an additional 5 to 10 minutes. Serve immediately.

What a fun recipe! I had never used shears to bone chicken thighs before, I usually either make a big mess of it or buy the skinned, boned variety, but I was forced into the shears because I needed the skin on. If you have never cooked chicken on a rack over a pan before, this is the BEST, it makes for crispier chicken (love that) and I have changed recipes that call for placing the chicken in the bottom of a casserole dish because the meat is not just soggy and limp, but all the fat just hangs with it and that is just not the best for you.

It turned out to be a little richer than I thought it would be and the olives were overpowering the chicken flavor, but it was enjoyable. I think, and The Wife O’ My Life concurs, that it would be better as a part of the mean rather than the whole meal. We served it as a dinner and it would have been better after a salad and perhaps some crusty bread and accompanied by a green vegetable like asparagus. Or even as part of a more varietal main dish that included a small beef steak. The potatoes and onions were excellent, I enjoy simple tastes and they were seasoned with the juice of the chicken and paprika and a little bit of salt; you could taste the potato unlike many complicated recipes that have you wonder how the potatoes actually taste.

This blog is supposed to be all about improving the healthy aspects of recipes, but this could stand no improvement.

I am going to work on remembering to photograph my cooking so you can feast with your eyes – sorry.