I thought I may have overwhelmed you with my superbowl madness from last weekend. I even held back I bit!! So here I am...Friday night...Cheating. With a fat ass glass of wine. It's been that kind of week. For how much I've said this diet is easy, I've wanted to cheat...alllllll week. I had Starbucks twice. I'm currently consuming alcohol. But you know what's great? I'm still eating the way I'm supposed to. Why? F if I know. Kidding. Because I have a goal. I now weigh (have I shared this with everyone???) 140 lbs. Forever, my longterm goal has been 137 because that was my pre-preggo weight with my daughter. Now? 135 is my goal. It's been 15 years. 15 YEARS. Not ok. Mind you, I'm only 5'2" (on a good day) and could probably be as small as 115 and be healthy and was considered overweight at 145. So now, I'm 5 lbs from a goal I've had for 15 years. I have to hit this. I do. Crossfit has done great things for my competitive side. My husband of almost 10 years says he didn't even know I had this side (except when playing card games). So now I'm competing with me. And my butt, and my waistline.
Anyhoo. We're ordering from our favorite sushi place tonight. The menu is as follows:
Sashimi: 2 pieces yellowtail, 2 pieces seared tuna, 2 pieces New England king salmon
Steamed Chicken and Veggies and a Side of steamed Bok Choy. Yummmmmm.....
Who says you can't get take out on Paleo??
Friday, February 10, 2012
Monday, February 6, 2012
Paleo Cupcakes AND Frosting
It's next to impossible to find good recipes for both cupcakes and frosting on the same blog page. Either the cupcake sucks, or the frosting sucks. I'm here to give you pretty darn good recipes for both.
Coconut Vanilla Cupcakes
(I add the coconut in the title because you really can taste it in there. It's a really smooth and delicious combination!)
Cupcake Ingredients:
1/2 Cup plus 2 Tablespoons Coconut Flour
4 eggs
2 egg whites
1/2 Cup Cane Sugar
1 Cup Coconut Milk (I used canned)
2 tsp Vanilla extract
1/2 tsp baking soda
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 and line cupcake pan with liners. (This recipe makes a dozen short cupcakes, or about 9 that are raised like normal cupcakes.) Combine all ingredients in a bowl and whisk until you get a nice even batter. Scoop batter into each cupcake well. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until tops are firm to the touch. Remove from oven and let cool completely before frosting.
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Frosting Ingredients:
1 Cup dark chocolate
1/2 grapeseed oil
2 Tablespoons agave nectar or raw organic honey
1 Tablespoon vanilla extract (or almond, or whatever you like)
Pinch sea salt
Frosting Directions:
In small saucepan, melt and combine chocolate and oil. Add agave, vanilla and pinch of salt. Stir until combined. Remove from heat and put into freezer for 10 minutes to force cool. After 10 minutes, remove frosting and whip with a hand mixer on low speed. Let stand on counter for 10 minutes before frosting.
Frost cupcakes and devour.
Coconut Vanilla Cupcakes
(I add the coconut in the title because you really can taste it in there. It's a really smooth and delicious combination!)
Cupcake Ingredients:
1/2 Cup plus 2 Tablespoons Coconut Flour
4 eggs
2 egg whites
1/2 Cup Cane Sugar
1 Cup Coconut Milk (I used canned)
2 tsp Vanilla extract
1/2 tsp baking soda
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 and line cupcake pan with liners. (This recipe makes a dozen short cupcakes, or about 9 that are raised like normal cupcakes.) Combine all ingredients in a bowl and whisk until you get a nice even batter. Scoop batter into each cupcake well. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until tops are firm to the touch. Remove from oven and let cool completely before frosting.
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Frosting Ingredients:
1 Cup dark chocolate
1/2 grapeseed oil
2 Tablespoons agave nectar or raw organic honey
1 Tablespoon vanilla extract (or almond, or whatever you like)
Pinch sea salt
Frosting Directions:
In small saucepan, melt and combine chocolate and oil. Add agave, vanilla and pinch of salt. Stir until combined. Remove from heat and put into freezer for 10 minutes to force cool. After 10 minutes, remove frosting and whip with a hand mixer on low speed. Let stand on counter for 10 minutes before frosting.
Frost cupcakes and devour.
Chocolate Covered Bacon. Yes. It's on the diet.
O.M.G. I found a Paleo friendly snack my daughter will eat. Not that she should be snacking on these regularly, but hey, I'm counting it as a success.
Ingredients:
1 Tbsp coconut oil
2 lbs lean bacon-Sliced however you like
1 lb good quality organic chocolate. I don't love the 100% cacao, but the bars that are 70%+ are good.
4 Tbsp Irish Butter
Directions:
Drop coconut oil in frying pan. Just enough to keep the bacon from sticking before it starts leaking juices. Fry up bacon in batches-don't clear out the juices in between. Just let it spatter baby.
Pat bacon between paper towels to get the grease off. Let the bacon cool to room temp. While you're letting it cool, put butter and chocolate in a small saucepan and melt on low, stirring constantly to keep it from burning.
Once chocolate is melted and smooth, remove from heat. Proceed with dipping bacon halfway into the melted chocolate and put on a rack to cool. I put mine in the fridge to speed up the process.
Eat up!! This is seriously awesome.
Ingredients:
1 Tbsp coconut oil
2 lbs lean bacon-Sliced however you like
1 lb good quality organic chocolate. I don't love the 100% cacao, but the bars that are 70%+ are good.
4 Tbsp Irish Butter
Directions:
Drop coconut oil in frying pan. Just enough to keep the bacon from sticking before it starts leaking juices. Fry up bacon in batches-don't clear out the juices in between. Just let it spatter baby.
Once chocolate is melted and smooth, remove from heat. Proceed with dipping bacon halfway into the melted chocolate and put on a rack to cool. I put mine in the fridge to speed up the process.
Superbowl Sunday Sunday Sunday
I was a cooking MACHINE this weekend. My best friend threw a Super Bowl shindig and I was charged with bringing the Paleo friendly snacks. I googled and cooked and experimented and tweaked and I'm proud to say everything I brought was devoured. I have a few photos and some quickie recipes that I'll add on as individual threads. It gave me hope for my daughter's birthday party that is later this month. I was thinking it was going to be a giant cheat day but now I don't think it'll have to be! Even the Paleo Cupcakes were a hit. Who would've thought???
A note on the kid front. My almost 6 year old is really getting good at eating my Paleo food. But my almost 3 year old is not. I'm starting to wonder if it's just a palette thing. She's still maybe a bit to sensitive to the spices, flavors and textures that I'm putting before her. I did find a new crust recipe for paleo pizza that I'd like to try. Our first attempt with that was a giant disaster. She did really like my chocolate covered bacon that I made for the Super Bowl party, but hey, who wouldn't??
A note on the kid front. My almost 6 year old is really getting good at eating my Paleo food. But my almost 3 year old is not. I'm starting to wonder if it's just a palette thing. She's still maybe a bit to sensitive to the spices, flavors and textures that I'm putting before her. I did find a new crust recipe for paleo pizza that I'd like to try. Our first attempt with that was a giant disaster. She did really like my chocolate covered bacon that I made for the Super Bowl party, but hey, who wouldn't??
Friday, February 3, 2012
Day 15/30
5 lbs. I've lost 5 lbs in 15 days. Holy f. And I feel good. I mean, really good. I'm sleeping better, I'm not getting sore after workouts, and F!! I can deadlift 125 lbs!! I'm about 70% ready to change this challenge from 30 days to 356. Come on. I need some encouragement.
Stuff the Pork with Pork Crock Pot Pork Tenderloin (Get it? it's Pork).
I've owned a crock pot for 10 years and used it maybe 5 times. But I've been looking up crockpot recipes lately in anticipation of some spring time snow days. Since we're getting buried up to our eyelids today, I thought today would be a good day to start. I didn't find anything I loved, so I'm tweaking one for pork chops. This recipe starts with about 20 minutes of prep, but it's totally worth it. My house has smelled BEYOND delicious all day. For some reason I didn't think to take photos until just now, so I'll be as descriptive as possible to make this extra easy. This was also a total win on the kids friendly paleo menu. Both kids LOVED this and even asked for seconds. (I may or may not have told them it was chicken....)
Ingredients:
1 trimmed pork tenderloin: 2-3 lbs
1 tablespoon of your favorite cooking oil
6 large strips of bacon cut into bite sized chunks
3 granny smith apples, peeled and cut into bite sized chunks
1 medium whole head of garlic (It's annoying but again, so worth it) peeled, crushed and cut into large bits)
1 cup of raw, unsalted pecans
10 green onions, chopped
1 lemon (for zesting at the end)
cooking string or twine cut into 5-6 15 inch pieces for binding loin (that sounds dirty).
Directions:
Pre-prep: toss a tablespoon of your favorite cooking oil (I used coconut) into a skillet. Put bacon in and cook until it's about 80% cooked and browning. Toss in the apples and garlic. Cook until bacon is about 90% cooked. Use a slotted spoon and stuffing mix from pan and let cool. Keep the bacon grease in the pan and turn off the heat. Throw the onions into the pan but don't cook them. Just toss them and coat them in the bacony fatty goodness.
On a cutting board, lay out your cut pieces of twine about 2 inches apart from each other. Most tenderloins are already cut down the center and fall into two pieces. Hold them together and center tenderloin on twine pieces. Stuff the center of the tenderloin with the half of bacon-apple-pecan stuffing, and then tie the pieces of twine individually around the tenderloin so it's completely bound with stuffing cascading out the top.
Line the bottom of your crock pot with half of the onion/bacon grease goodness. Place bound tenderloin on top. Dump the rest of the stuffing on top of the tenderloin and let it fall and fill the bottom portion of the pot. Cover and cook. All. Day.
You can cook this either on Low for 8 hours, or for the first two hours on high, and then 3-4 hours on low. Pork's internal temp needs to be 145 degrees to be servable. There is no broth or anything in this recipe, but the pork will ooze juices all day. For the last hour, I scooped the juices and poured them back over the pork just to let it marinate even more. Remove tenderloin and let it stand 10 minutes before serving (it will continue to cook while you do this). You can serve it with some of the filling from the bottom of the pan the way it is, or smash it up in a bowl to make it more like applesauce and line the tenderloin with it when you serve it. Be sure to cut off twine before serving.
I'm planning on serving this on a bed of spinach, so that I have a spinach-bacon-apple salad along with my tenderloin. Plus it's pretty.
Makes 5-6 servings.
Ingredients:
1 trimmed pork tenderloin: 2-3 lbs
1 tablespoon of your favorite cooking oil
6 large strips of bacon cut into bite sized chunks
3 granny smith apples, peeled and cut into bite sized chunks
1 medium whole head of garlic (It's annoying but again, so worth it) peeled, crushed and cut into large bits)
1 cup of raw, unsalted pecans
10 green onions, chopped
1 lemon (for zesting at the end)
cooking string or twine cut into 5-6 15 inch pieces for binding loin (that sounds dirty).
Directions:
Pre-prep: toss a tablespoon of your favorite cooking oil (I used coconut) into a skillet. Put bacon in and cook until it's about 80% cooked and browning. Toss in the apples and garlic. Cook until bacon is about 90% cooked. Use a slotted spoon and stuffing mix from pan and let cool. Keep the bacon grease in the pan and turn off the heat. Throw the onions into the pan but don't cook them. Just toss them and coat them in the bacony fatty goodness.
On a cutting board, lay out your cut pieces of twine about 2 inches apart from each other. Most tenderloins are already cut down the center and fall into two pieces. Hold them together and center tenderloin on twine pieces. Stuff the center of the tenderloin with the half of bacon-apple-pecan stuffing, and then tie the pieces of twine individually around the tenderloin so it's completely bound with stuffing cascading out the top.
Line the bottom of your crock pot with half of the onion/bacon grease goodness. Place bound tenderloin on top. Dump the rest of the stuffing on top of the tenderloin and let it fall and fill the bottom portion of the pot. Cover and cook. All. Day.
You can cook this either on Low for 8 hours, or for the first two hours on high, and then 3-4 hours on low. Pork's internal temp needs to be 145 degrees to be servable. There is no broth or anything in this recipe, but the pork will ooze juices all day. For the last hour, I scooped the juices and poured them back over the pork just to let it marinate even more. Remove tenderloin and let it stand 10 minutes before serving (it will continue to cook while you do this). You can serve it with some of the filling from the bottom of the pan the way it is, or smash it up in a bowl to make it more like applesauce and line the tenderloin with it when you serve it. Be sure to cut off twine before serving.
I'm planning on serving this on a bed of spinach, so that I have a spinach-bacon-apple salad along with my tenderloin. Plus it's pretty.
Makes 5-6 servings.