A few good recipes

I have made some YUMMY stuff lately. I love the past few recipes that I have tried from my favorite blogs. First of all I made Coconut Candy. I didn't take a picture because it was gone REALLY fast. My daughters LOVED it. Here is the recipe from Tropical Traditions.

1 cup of coconut cream concentrate or coconut butter
1/2 cup of raw honey (I didn't have nearly this much honey on hand, so I only added like 2 Tbls. And it was still yummy!)
1 tsp lemon zest
juice of 1 lemon
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
shredded unsweetened coconut (optional)

Mix the first 5 ingredients together until smooth. Form into balls. I made them about an inch around. Then roll them in the shredded coconut. Place on a baking sheet and put in the fridge. They will harden a bit as they are chilled. Then eat em'!

Next up was stovetop carnitas from www.theclothesmakethegirl.com

These were very easy to make and they had good flavor. But the flavor was VERY strong for me. For some reason though, when I ate some the next day it seemed to be more tame. Either that, or I was just famished and didn't really care. I thought since the flavor was so bold that it would be good in a salad. So that's just what I did. My husband really like this as well.

I just chopped some lettuce and topped it with cucumber, red onion and shredded carrots. Added salsa, carnitas and guac. It was really tasty!!

Another awesome recipe, which I will be taking to my box tomorrow, is these bluebery espresso brownies by www.civilizedcookingcaveman.com 

I think the pic speaks for itself, but incase it doesn't...........OH MY WORD THESE ARE FANTASTIC! That should do it! Very easy recipe. Even my husband LOVED these, and he usually thinks that paleo baked goods are "weird".  Go make these........now!

Now, I get lots of questions about eating out while Paleo and even though there are some down sides.....it is still doable. More than likely you are going to be eating some canola oil, or vegetable oil, or some other yucky oil that you wouldn't use at home. But the other stuff you can control. One very important thing is Gluten. Make sure you let your waiter know that you are avoiding gluten. That is the one thing that we want to avoid at all costs. We just went to dinner at Texas Roadhouse the other night and this is my dinner. I've got 2/3's of that sweet potato in my fridge for after my CFN workout tomorrow. That sucka was HUGE!

I've got 3 new recipes coming up to try in the next couple of weeks and I will let you know how they turned out!! Have a great week!!

How's it going?

Well It's going great actually! I'm completing my challenge requirements set by my husband and even exceeding them! HUMPH to you hubby, who said I couldn't do it!! :) I haven't been putting my WOD info on here that I have been doing so here is what we did today at CFN!!

Strength:

7 x 1 Shoulder Press (Still can only do 55#) But Julie was awesome and PR'd I believe!! WHOO HOO! AND the Warrior Sista's :) were working it out to my right today!! I'm not sure what their #'s were, but I must find out! They were rocking' it! 

-then-

12 minute AMRAP of:

3 Snatches (any style) 135/95# (my form still sucks, this is the hardest movement for me to get down)
20 Double-Unders (I did 60 singles)

So the final result was 8 rounds in 12 minutes.

I've tried a couple new recipes this week. One was 5 spice short ribs by www.theclothesmakethegirl.com  They were yummy and very easy since it was a crock pot meal.

The other one was called kitchen sink hash from www.paleomg.com It was AWESOME!!!

I would add a picture but something is funky and I can't this morning. Hmmm....mental note.....must get hubby to fix this.....

Have a great day everyone.....Eat Clean, Work Hard, Don't Give Up, and Don't Give In!! 

Food Journal

So I have been asked from quit a few people lately…"what exactly do you eat all day?" Well, I have been keeping a food journal lately (which I HIGHLY recommend) and decided I will share with you EXACTLY what I have eaten over the last 9 days.

6\10\12
B: 2 eggs and 2 pc of bacon
L: Grilled chicken and steak over lettuce, sauteed onions and peppers with salsa and guacamole
S: unsweetened coconut and 1 tb of almond butter
D: tuna and a hard boiled egg on a bed of greens, onion and cucumbers

6/11/12
B: hard boiled egg (shoulda had more, running late)
L: grilled chicken salad
S: a bit of pineapple and 1/4 sweet potato
D: grass fed beef, grilled veggies (onion, asparagus, broccoli) and guacamole

6/12/12
B: 1/2 sweet potato, roasted asparagus
L: grilled chicken salad
S: small amount of pineapple
D: left over grass fed beef, veggies and guac from yesterday

6/13/12
B: 2 eggs, 2 pc of bacon, asparagus
L: grilled chicken salad
S: 1/4 sweet potato
D: last of the grass fed beef, veggies and guac on a bed of lettuce

6/14/12
B: deviled eggs, but filled with guacamole instead of mayo
L: side salad, burger patty
S: coconut milk, unsweetened coconut, pecans (refrigerated like my chocolate pudding. see previous post)
D: Lemon pepper chicken and roasted broccoli

6/15/12
B: left over lemon pepper chicken
L: Huge green salad with bacon
S: same coconut milk concoction from yesterday
D: Steak stir fry

6/16/12
B: 2 pc of turkey sausage, 2 eggs
L: left over steak stir fry
S: side salad
D: grilled chicken salad

6/17/12
B: only ate 1/2 hard boiled egg for some reason I wasn't hungry
L: Salad, broccoli, and grilled chicken
D: 1/2 burger patty and salad with bacon

6/18/12
B: 2 eggs and turkey sausage
L: Salad and grass fed beef patty
D: chicken salad on top of greens, and tomato


I notice I have lots of salad in here. But I change it up. Sometimes it is traditional oil and vinegar, sometimes there is fruit in the salad and I make a vinaigrette with citrus, sometimes I like more of a mexican feel so I add spicy salsa and guac.

Note to self…. get more sweet potatoes….YUM!

New Challenges, Sweet Potatoes and CHOCOLATE PUDDING!!?!??!?

Well, I have to admit that I have been a little lenient on my dark chocolate lately. SO, to regain my control I asked my husband to give me a challenge. And boy did he ever. He made me a chart of things to accomplish for the month and also a chart of rewards!! Among the list of things to do for 31 days is Cross Fit 2x's a week (obviously), NO SUGAR, keeping a food journal and turn it into him at the end of the month, running for 20 minutes 3x's a week. I HATE running!! I would rather lift all day than run for 20 minutes. I'm not even sure if I can without stopping. Anyway, I'm going for it all!! Wish me luck!!

Speaking of my chocolate obsession.....I have a wonderful chocolate pudding recipe for ya! I really wanted pudding one night so I scoured the pantry and spied a can of coconut milk. A-HA! I think I might know how to make what I'm craving. I had no idea if the coconut milk would get thick in the fridge so I added some coconut oil for good measure.

one can of full fat coconut milk
1-2 T of coconut oil
2 oz of dark chocolate (more or less depending on your goals)

I melted the oil and chocolate and then added the coconut milk. I wisked it till it was smooth, placed plastic wrap on top and put it in the fridge overnight. The next morning my daughter was so excited to see if it had turned out like we expected so she right right to the fridge first thing. We tasted it and....well.... I'll put it like this....I had to put my foot down and declare that we could NOT eat pudding for breakfast. It was really good and the consistency was perfect. I figure next time I can add some vanilla and cinnamon, or maybe coconut and almond extract and some shredded coconut. The possibilities are endless!! If you try a different flavor let me know how it turned out.

O.k. I love sweet potatoes, but I don't like baking them. So I saw on pinterest where you can bake potatoes in a crock pot and thought I would give it a try. But I made a few adjustments and I think they are important. I first placed 2 cups of water in the bottom of my crock pot, then inserted a steamer basket, and then put my sweet potatoes in. I also wrapped the washed and still damp potatoes in aluminum foil before placing them in the crock pot. I put them on high for 4 hours and off I went to run errands.

I only cooked two cause this will last me for four days. I can't eat too much of this, well I CAN but, ya know... Just like the chocolate, I can get carried away with some sweet potatoes. Anyway, they turned out perfect!! I was very pleasantly surprised!

I put in some grass fed butter, cinnamon, nutmeg, unsweetened coconut and ate it up!! Well, 1/2 of it. YUMMY! If you just happen to want a good read on the sweet potato, here is a book to try... It is called Sweet Potato Power and it is awesome! I'm a nerd....I know...

How do you find the time?

I get asked A LOT.... how do you find time to cook healthy meals? And the key, my friend, is PREPARATION! And that preparation starts before you even take your trip to the grocery store.

1. Plan out a menu.
I make a menu for breakfast (hubby doesn't eat breakfast), lunch, dinner and snacks for the girls. I usually make the menu in two week increments since that's how we get paid. I usually buy all my groceries for the two weeks except for veggies. I buy those only one week at a time. Obviously if you buy your veggies and aren't planning on using some till two weeks from now you will have a lot of waste. And that might as well be money thrown in the trash.

2. Have a preparation day.
Wash all those veggies, slice what needs to be sliced, chop what needs to be chopped. Separate the meat and marinate the meat that needs to be marinated to place in the freezer for future use. Make a huge salad, without dressing, that you can pull from throughout the week. Bake up sweet potatoes, and hard boil a dozen eggs to use throughout the week as well.

2. Choose menu items that can be transformed into another meal.
For example.... crock pot carnitas. There is a lot of meat in a pork shoulder. Use it to make taco's one night, (lettuce taco's in my case), and then serve it over a cauliflower mash with a side salad on another night. In the case of the pork shoulder there is usually enough for a couple of leftover lunches in there as well. Roast a chicken. For our family we would eat a thigh and leg each for hubby and I and a half of one breast for the girls. The rest of the chicken is shredded for chicken salad for lunch the next day.

3. Precook easily frozen items.
Almond flour pancakes, almond blueberry muffins, waffles, meatballs, and soups. All of these things can be prepared in one day (preparation day) and stored in the freezer until you need them. In the case of the pancakes, muffins, meatballs and waffles (if you have a waffle maker) Cook them up and place them on a parchment lined baking sheet and place them in the freezer until frozen then you can store them in your favorite freezer ready container. In the same day cook up a batch of soup and store them in individual serving freezer containers. That way you know how many servings you have or if you need a lunch....grab it and take it to work. All of these things taste just as good when they are reheated from frozen. With this method a breakfast would look like this.....four silver dollar almond pancakes in the microwave, put them on a plate with a drizzle of raw honey (most of the time they just eat them plain), sliced banana, and some greek yogurt for the girls. That takes about 2 minutes to get ready and serve.

4. Take advantage of your crock pot.
Not only does it cook for you, but you can prepare and store multiple crockpot meals in gallon freezer bag and just dump them into your crockpot when you are ready.

5. Prepare snacks
Use and reuse snack bags for some almonds, walnuts, jerky, veggie sticks, grapes etc. If you prepare these bags on your preparation day then it is so easy to just grab them when the kids or you need a snack. I also make up some kind a bars for the girls and just wrap them individually in plastic wrap for easy access.

Here is an example of a weekday menu
Mon
B: turkey sausage, hard boiled egg
L: roast chicken with salad
D: carnita's
S: almonds, sliced apple

Tue
B: egg cupcake, banana
L: chicken chili soup
D: pasture pork chops with roasted broccoli and carrots
S: veggie sticks with eggplant dip

Wed
B: turkey sausage, hard boiled egg
L: chicken salad with cranberries and walnuts (made from left over chicken) with a side salad
D: Left over carnita's over cauliflower mash, roasted asparagus

Thurs
B: egg cupcakes, cantelope
L: chicken chili soup
D: crock pot mongolian beef with side of sweet potato and left over roasted asparagus

Fri
B: pancakes, banana, yogurt
L: Left over mongolian beef, side salad
D: crock pot teriyaki chicken over cauliflower rice


On preparation day I would have...
made and frozen the turkey sausage, pancakes and soup
washed and chopped or sliced the broccoli, carrots, veggie sticks, huge salad, asparagus, cauliflower, cantalope
riced the cauliflower
made egg cupcakes to store in the fridge
assembled the crock pot teriyaki meal for the freezer
prepared snack bags and/or bars
marinate pork chops for the freezer
Boil some eggs

With this menu, I would still have left over turkey sausage, chicken chili soup, and pancakes in the freezer for the next week.

Keep in mind. I LOVE this stuff. I love to cook, I love to make menu's and go grocery shopping. Now, I don't love to clean. So if someone has a solution to that problem, please share! :) It does make it so much easier when everything is prepared for you. It helps to avoid the "oh, I forgot to defrost the chicken, we must go out to eat" situation. And it TOTALLY helps the little ones get a quick and healthy snack, with little to no effort from me. E usually runs to pantry and picks out a bag of nuts or opens the fridge and get a snack pack of fruit or veggies for her and her sister. I really hope this helps and that you can implement some of these ideas into your weekly planning. Click on the links for all the recipes. I hope you try and like some of those as well. Happy Eating!!

Do Ya Miss Mashed Potatoes???

I have found a wonderful mashed cauliflower recipe and it comes straight from www.easypaleo.com

http://www.easypaleo.com/2012/05/23/food-diary-easy-mashed-cauliflower/

I altered this recipe a bit though..... instead of just steaming the cauliflower...I put a couple of cups of chicken stock in a pot and threw the cauliflower in there with the lid on and let them cook like that. It added some great flavor and I used some of the stock when processing the cauliflower. I haven't had mashed potatoes in almost 10 months, and these were very yummy. Oh, I didn't use quite as much grass fed butter. Everyone's taste is different. You have to taste as you go, ya know!!? I also added some garlic powder, about a 1/2 teaspoon of dried thyme and a pinch of dried rosemary. Tip: Rub the dried spices in your palms to kinda wake them up bit as you put them in the dish. Rachel Ray tip: didn't think it would make much of a difference but it does. Anyway I hope ya'll try this one....I thought it was delicious. Oh one more thing. These weren't my favorite thing to eat as left overs. In my opinion they were much better when they were eaten right after they were made.

Calling all zucchini lovers.....

If you LOVE zucchini then I have a recipe for you. I don't have a name for it but the ingredients consist of only....
2 good sized zucchini
1 can of fire roasted tomatoes
2-3 cloves of minced garlic
red pepper flakes
2 tbls of olive oil

First things first. Peel and cut the zucchini into thin noodles. There is a special kitchen tool you can buy to do this but I'm not sure what it is called and I don't have one. So I use my trusty knife. Next, place your zucchini noodles in a strainer and salt them. Set the strainer in a bowl.

The salt will draw some of the liquid out of the zucchini. Let it set in the fridge for at least 20 minutes. If you skip this step the finished product will be WAY to watery. Rinse of and wring out your zucchini with a clean kitchen towel after the 20 minutes is over. You will be amazed at how much liquid come out of those things.

Over medium heat add a couple TBL of olive oil to medium sized pan. Once hot, sprinkle in some red pepper flakes. The amount will depend on the heat level you want. I added about a teaspoon. I like it spicy!! Also add about 2-3 cloves of minced garlic to the oil.

Let it cook till it is fragrant, but make sure to not burn the garlic, about a minute or so. Add your zucchini and can of fire roasted tomatoes. Crank the heat up and brink it to a bubble. Once that happens lower the heat and let it simmer covered for about 10 minutes. You want your zucchini to be cooked but not mushy.

I had some of this this morning for breakfast. I have also made some grass fed meatballs and put them in there. If you are not Paleo and cheese agrees with you, I bet some grated parm would be awesome!