Friday, May 17, 2013

Food Coma, Meet Food Baby...

If you don't hear from me for the next month or so, don't worry. I'm just in a sugar coma from the amazing red velvet cupcake I had for breakfast. (Yes, I said breakfast. Don't judge me!) It's a coworker's birthday, so we have fruit (I had some of that too) and cupcakes to celebrate, and red velvet is my downfall. I need for PaleOMG or Civilized Caveman or someone to come up with a red velvet creation that won't make me feel like crap within 30 seconds.

Thankfully, we're already planning on grilling tonight, so for dinner we'll have steak and grilled vegetables, and for dessert, grilled pineapple. A nice Paleo way to end my day that started off so horribly.

In other news, I've made those Greek-style lamb meatballs again, and since I actually had lemons to zest and oregano in the house, they tasted a million times better this time. I also took a blogger's advice and brought guacamole to work with me as a dipping sauce for vegetables. I like carrots well enough on their own, but add avocado to just about anything and I'm an even happier camper.

I bought prosciutto at the grocery store earlier this week and I'm looking forward to incorporating it into some salad recipes, but then I found this recipe for breakfast cups and I can't wait to give it a shot!

Wednesday, May 8, 2013

Weigh-In Wednesday

I completely forgot to weigh in this morning, so I don't really have an official update to give you this week, except holy smokes, Batman! When you cheat for a few meals sporadically, your body sure does let you know.

My baby sister graduated on Friday night with her Masters in Art Education, and I don't think there is a prouder big sister on the planet right now! She absolutely amazes me in everything she does. She is intelligent, hard-working, kind, compassionate, hilarious, and fiercely loyal. Congratulations, Leah!


In other news, my husband and I are still raising money to help offset costs for our mission trip to Jamaica this summer, and appreciate your prayers and any financial support you feel led to contribute. You can make donations here. Thanks for thinking of us!

In getting ready for the mission trip, even though our countdown is still two months out, I'm starting to consider snacks that I can make ahead of time and pack in our luggage to keep me mostly-Paleo while we're there. I'm not sure what meals will be prepared for us, I just know that I don't have any control over them, so it's important to make sure that I'll be able to supplement with food that's not going to wreck my system completely. Any snack ideas that will keep well in a suitcase? (i.e. not kale chips!)

I tried making apple chips last week, and while they were tasty, they didn't exactly bake evenly and some ended up super-caramelized (aka burnt) and others were mostly raw and chewy. I'll try a redo soon. I also made avocado chocolate chip ice cream on Cinco de Mayo as my nod to festivities. It was fairly neutral--I tasted the coconut milk more than the avocado, so probably not worth making again, but oh well. I've also made mocha coffee ice cream and it was delicious, so that makes up for the avocado falling flat on its face. I'm pretty sure I've eaten more ice cream since going Paleo than I did in the last 3 years combined, but at least it's healthy-ish!

Avocado Chocolate Chip ice cream

Other recipe attempts (and several excellent results) lately have been fried bananas, chicken coated in nutritional yeast, Greek-style meatballs, and dill pickles. Each time I've taste-tested the pickles so far, I've been disappointed, and now that I'm reading the recipe more closely, it's probably because I forgot the "put it in the fridge" step. Good thing I bought lots of cucumber and can try again!

Chicken tossed in nutritional yeast served with sautéed zucchini and boiled carrots.
 
Frying the bananas--the final result picture looked boring, so I'm not including it.
 
Greek-style meatballs, served with stewed tomatoes and sweet potato fries (we cheated and used frozen instead of wrestling with an actual sweet potato).

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Weigh-In Wednesday

Considering that I cheated quite a bit last week, and especially Saturday night at a wonderful homebrewing party, I think it's pretty impressive that I still lost a little over a pound this week. Like I've said before, weight loss isn't my primary motivation for going Paleo, but it's a great way to measure my success. Of course, the fact that my face has broken out like a 13-year-old after having dairy is also a pretty good indicator.

Since getting back on track, I've had salads (thank you very much, SaladWorks, for making delicious and healthy salads), chicken and apple sausage, lots of grapefruit, and carrots galore. I finally went grocery shopping again Monday night, so the fridge is restocked with yummy treats waiting for good recipes and the time to make them.

Monday for dinner we had pistachio crusted chicken strips with a strawberry rhubarb sauce, and it was pretty epic. The sauce had more heat than I like and not enough for Adam, but that's one of the dangers of marrying a man born in Louisiana. I also made banana chocolate ice cream, recipe made up fairly on the fly, and it ended up being very banana-y and chunky, which wasn't exactly my intention, but still delicious. I also started some pickles based on this recipe, and I'm a little nervous but very excited to see how they turn out.


I'm back at the library again tonight, so I'll be brainstorming quick dinner ideas all day long. Any suggestions?