Initial attempt at Jerk Chicken!

John and I had a funny conversation watching (on TV) the track world championships going on in Berlin this year... since in essentially every sprinting discipline, the Jamaicans were cleaning up! So he was pondering "what it is in that country-- good water, good air? good food? or is everyone just sporty so they really get to pick the cream of the crop?"

Well, I ran with the "Good food" and decided to try my hand at Jamaican jerk chicken, and see if it made John run any faster than his already break-neck speed.
Not sure about that, but it was a damn good marinade, which I'll use again many times for sure!
A hodge-podge of jerk marinade recipes from the internet of:

Ingredients (all into the blender or food processor):
- one small onion
- a big bundle of green onions
- a half-thumb size of ginger root
- a few spoonfulls of fresh thyme
- 3 cloves of garlic (okay, I put in 6... i love garlic!)
- some *HOT* peppers to your heat-preference
- 2 spoonfuls of soy sauce
- 2 spoonfuls of olive oil
- 1-2 spoonfuls of molasses
- juice of one lime
- 1-2 teaspoons salt
- ground pepper
- a teaspoon of something like allspice
...I can't find allspice here, so whenever that happens (also like in carrot cake or spice cake recipes) I make a mix of nutmeg, cinnamon, ground cloves and maybe come ground corriander.
It tends to get the 'right idea' of spicing :)

Then blend--yes it's fairly 'dry' so in a blender would require some coaxing to get it to become a paste. But the higher the concentration (ie, not diluted with watery things) of the paste, the more flavor it will infuse into the meat.

I rubbed it in, some under the skin, and left it to marinate with the chicken for a good 6-8 hours or something. I just baked it in the oven for convenience-- hot enough to get it all crispy! so 200˚C for about 45 min- 1 hr 15 min depending on how big your pieces of chicken are :)
Mmmmm....
Really tasty marinade I have to say, but for some reason I don't feel it was fully Jamaican-style jerk chicken. Maybe cause I didn't slow-smoke grill it, or whatever else, so I'll still play around with other ways of doing it, too.