I love Sunday mornings. If Sundays weren’t followed by Mondays I’d stretch to say they are my favorite part of the week. I love having the morning to myself while my husband sleeps in. I love taking that first sip of coffee after waking up and savoring its flavor in my mouth. I love it when Lady wakes up shortly after me and comes out of my sleeping husband’s lair in hopes of licking my empty breakfast bowl. Nope, sorry Lady, but you are welcome to snuggle in my lap while I force pictures upon you. 
Now that I have photographic proof, it is undeniably a perfect Sunday morning. I think I will just go ahead and say it is my favorite part of the week. It helps that I actually enjoy my job and don’t mind that Monday eventually arrives. There was a time that I hated a job I had so much that I would get sad it was Saturday, because I then had only less than 2 full days before I had to go back to work. Glad those days are over!
It is pretty cool in the house right now since the temperature dropped down to the 40’s overnight. Instead of turning the heat on I cloaked myself in blankets. Lady is also helping keep me warm. Today is supposed to be a high of 68, but I’m hoping it feels even warmer than that! The hints of warmer weather are really getting me excited for whats to come: afternoons on the beach, blueberry season, farmers markets, tan lines, and grilling out! Speaking of grilling out, we grilled for the second time this week.
I bought some chicken legs and chicken drumsticks on sale from Whole Foods the other day and found the perfect marinade from Nom Nom Paleo: Chile and Lime Chicken. I spent a bit of yesterday morning in the kitchen prepping everything for this evening, so by the time dinner came around it was super easy to put everything together.
I made the marinade and got my hands dirty making sure all the chicken was well coated before putting it in the fridge. I also bought a turnip root and rutabaga for my side dish. I peeled and diced the roots which probably took up the most time. Rutabagas sure are hard to slice! I think I also got in a good arm workout (even if it was just my right side!). After dicing the roots I put them in the fridge until I was ready to boil them later.
After about 5 or 6 hours, I added my diced roots to a boiling pot of water and let them simmer for a good 15 minutes or so. I then heated the grill outside and threw my chicken on.
One thing I should have done was patted the chicken dry to get the excess marinade off. The recipe stated this, but it simply left my mind when I was in the thorough of cooking. Because I didn’t do this, the outer skin of the chicken charred much faster, so it was hard to tell if the chicken was actually cooked the whole way. We played it safe though and ended up cooking the chicken a bit longer in the cast iron on the stove. It ended up being fine and the chicken still had its grilled and charred taste.
While the chicken was cooking, I took the boiled roots and emptied them into my blender after draining them. They were a really pretty peach color! I added some ghee and then pureed them.
I’ve only ever had rutabaga one other time. One my first Whole30, I added some rutabaga to a pot roast I made in the crock pot. I had no idea what they would taste like and hoped my husband wouldn’t have a bad first impression with them. They were so good! They had such a similar texture to white potatoes and were the perfect addition to a pot roast. I thought pureeing them would give a similar consistency and texture. We were not disappointed, not even Hubs! I added some salt and pepper to them and that was all it needed.
And of course, I am happily adding some extras to my leftover collection to use during the week. After dinner, we headed to Hubs’ brothers place and played Trivial Pursuit. It was such a great time. It was nice being social without worrying about explaining to people why I’m not drinking beer or eating sugar. Instead, I had to explain why I am so bad at Trivial Pursuit. In my defense, the 25th Anniversary Edition has a lot of questions pertaining to subjects that occurred before I turned 10 years old.
I can’t believe tomorrow is Day 30. Surreal! However, I’ve been grocery shopping no differently. I still have a spaghetti squash in the fridge to find a recipe for. I feel pretty damn great and don’t plan on sabotaging the way I think and feel for anything, including chocolate. Or peanut butter. But probably beer.
Project Whole 