Category: Health & Fitness

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Another week of Paleo meals

heather

We didn’t do quite as well on our week of meal planning this week.  On Sunday we neglected to go to the store, which got us off kilter for the whole week.  We learned our lesson this week, however, and went to both HyVee AND Target on Sunday, despite shopping the whole day in Iowa City and Tanger.  We really didn’t feel like going out again once we got home, but I knew if we didn’t we would regret it!

I also hit the Farmer’s Market on Saturday and got lots of tasty stuff – chicken wings and thighs, ground pork, beef brats, a big, fat watermelon, peppers, and zucchini.  All of it is or will be delicious.

Despite our poor planning, we did make a few good meals this week.

Sweet Potato Chili Fries – I tweaked this recipe a little because the amount of spicy seasonings for the amount of meat seemed a little crazy to me.  I used a full pound of meat, and the chili was still as spicy as hell!  It still tasted good over the sweet potato fries, but it was intense.  We had the leftovers tonight.  Tim added a 28 ounce can of tomatoes to thin it out, and it was still spicy!  I didn’t feel like going to the work of making fries, so we just baked the sweet potatoes in the roaster oven, mashed them, poured the chili over them, and then garnished it with avocado.  I ate a HUGE bowl – my excuse being all I had for lunch was a wimpy lettuce wrap from Jimmy Johns.  Plus I’m in training for this week’s 5K!  Oh, by the way, I got a PR in the mile on Sunday – 8 minutes, 29 seconds!  My legs hurt like a mother today, but it was totally worth it.

Spicy Bison and Sausage Meat Muffins – This recipe made little, tiny meat loaves in the shape of muffins.  Tim really liked them.  I thought they tasted good, but they hurt my stomach for some reason.  I’m not a fan of garlic powder; I prefer to use fresh garlic.  Also, a meal that makes 2.5 pounds of meat for us is a little much.  If I were to make this recipe again, I think I would cut it in half and use fresh garlic.

And….that’s pretty much it for the week!  I told you – we slacked off this week.  BUT!  BUT!  We have tons of tasty recipes on tap for this week – lots of chicken, actually.  I’ll circle back with you all next week and let you know how they turned out.  I bought a new mandoline from Amazon, and I’m going to make beet chips.  I can’t wait!!!!!!!!!

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Four Days In

heather

The “no eating out” thing is going well so far, no thanks to me.  I tried to convince the Timsy Tee to go out for supper on Friday night.  It just seemed wrong to stay at home on a Friday night!  He held firm, however, good man that he is, and we had a great supper at home.

I tried a few new recipes this week.  Here is a rundown:

Roasted Eggplant Stacks – This recipe actually turned out pretty tasty!  It was the first time I have cooked with eggplant.  Next time I think I will remove the skin before cooking the slices, as they were really tough.  I ended up cutting the skins off after the slices were cooked, and that was a hot, messy job.  I also found that fresh eggplant is very spongelike.  I poured olive oil (Tim is not a big fan of coconut oil, so I used olive oil instead) over all the slices and went back to rub it in, but it was all soaked in already!  You have to pour and spread each one individually.   I also put a fried egg (fried in copious amounts of ghee) on top instead of a poached egg, and that was delicious.  I did have a lot of eggplant leftover, however.  I wasn’t sure what to do with it.  It did not look very appetizing the next day.  I’m not sure I would make this recipe again, for that reason.

Too Easy Chicken Adobo – This recipe turned out OK.  I think I overcooked the chicken a bit.  It seemed dry.  I also used chicken breasts instead of chicken thighs (because that’s what I had in stock), so I’m sure that contributed to the dryness.  At $7/lb for chicken breasts, I was a little disappointed.  That’s crazy expensive for chicken.  I went to the Farmers Market yesterday and got a whole chicken instead of the breast, and that was only $2.50/lb!  Another thing – you cook this recipe with onions, and for some reason I do not like the smell of onions cooking in a sauce.  Overall, the chicken turned out good, and we ate it all, but I don’t think I would make this again.

Sweet Potato Salad – Again, I had to modify this recipe.  I have never seen purple Okinawan potatoes here in Davenport, IA, so I used regular old sweet potatoes.  I added in all the fixings he mentioned (jalapenos, pickles and green onions instead of chives), and it turned out delicious!  I struggled with the homemade mayo though.  I swear I’ve read you can make mayo in the food processor, so I tried it.  I added everything to the processor, less the oil, and then used the oil drizzler topper to pour in the oil.  I didn’t let the egg yolk come completely to room temperature, so that may have affected it too, but the mayo just wouldn’t thicken up!  I poured the whole, ultra-liquidy mess into a container and whisked the heck out of it, but I think it was too late.  It tasted OK, however, so I added it to the potato salad, and once it was in there, you couldn’t tell there was anything wrong with it.  I used 1/2 a cup of olive oil and 1/4 cup of avocado oil.  I didn’t have any dijon mustard, so I used a little Boetjes.  I have a lot of oil left over though, which is the issue with making homemade mayo – it only lasts about 3 days.  Maybe I’ll make egg salad for lunch with it today.  Anyway, this salad was delicious, and I’ll definitely make it again.

Grilled Eggs with Mexican Chorizo – To use an overused meme, NOM NOM!!  I had no idea that it is so easy to make your own chorizo!  This recipe turned out fantastic.  I have a huge bag of ancho chiles from my foray into carnitas territory, so I was all set on that front.  The chorizo turned out super tasty.  We are actually going to have the leftovers with eggs and avocado for breakfast this morning.  It was stormy, so we didn’t want to grill.  Instead, we turned on the Nesco roaster at 400 degrees, let it heat up, and then cooked the peppers/eggs/chorizo for about 13 minutes.  The peppers were perfectly cooked.  I would definitely make this again.  However, I cut the entire stem out of the peppers this time; whereas, next time I will leave it in, just cutting out the white parts of the ribs.  My eggs kept wanting to slide out the ends!

Overall, it was a good week for new recipes.  It am proud that we ate delicious food at home instead of mysterious food out.  This morning I need to make my list for next week, so we can keep up the momentum.  I hit up the Farmers Market yesterday and got a whole chicken, pork chops, 3 dozen eggs, kale, nectarines, and cherries, and we still have ground pork and beef in the freezer, so we are pretty well stocked.

Hope you had a great week too!

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Gluten – You are my enemy, I think

heather

We spent 5 days in NYC, eating and drinking our way through the city.  I did what I knew I shouldn’t do and ate whatever I wanted to – the justification being that “I’m on vacation!!  It’s NYC!  I should take advantage!”

As a result, I went from 128 to 131.6.  I’m ok with being 131.6, but I’m not OK with feeling bad from eating all the not-good-for-me food. So, to get back on the wagon again, in August I have 2 goals:

1.  Eat breakfast and supper at home every day.

2.  Absolutely no gluten.  No beer, no mysterious dressings, no ice cream.  Nothing.  No gluten.  I’m going to try to cut it out completely and see how my allergies are affected.

Wish us luck!

Health & Fitness, Uncategorized

Vacation from Paleo

heather

We returned from Ocracoke late last night. The drive home was wrought with annoyances and delays, but it did have two positive results.  1.  I think I might be able to convince Tim to fly next time we want to go someplace 1000+ miles away.  2.  We discovered another vacation destination – the Kentucky Bourbon Trail.  Who wants to be our DD??

Since we were on vacation, subject to the whims and offerings of the local restuarants and grocery stores, I decided to relax a bit on my diet while in Ocracoke.  Well, actually, I relaxed it a lot.  As I mentioned in the previous post, whiskey was hard to find on Ocracoke, but you can’t not drink on vacation, so I beered it up.  I also ate hushpuppies, onions rings, chicken strips, clam chowder, fried clams, pizza, amazing tacos, bagel with lox and cream cheese, cream in my coffee, etc. etc. etc.   Keep in mind I ingested all this while wearing a bikini for 6-8 hours a day.  Not a good combo.  I was positive I would weigh 7 lbs more on my return to Iowa.  Maybe it was the steady homeward-bound diet of prunes, apricots, and walnuts, but I actually only gained 3 lbs.  I guess all the biking and swimming and running on the island mitigated some of the effects of the bad diet.

I did notice other ramifications, however.  My general appetite has increased, and my appetite for sweets has skyrocketed.  I want CANDY, and I want it now, and I want A LOT of it!!

Hopefully a week of getting back on track will curb the cravings.  I got off to a good start this morning by making us eggs fried in ghee and sauteed red & green peppers with onions and garlic, garnished with 1/2 an avocado.  After my morning 3 mile walk, I snacked on beef jerky and a date.  I kinda fell off the wagon for lunch though.  Tim’s birthday was yesterday, and since we were on the road for 22 hours, we didn’t have a chance to do much for it.  So today we got a late lunch at Granite City.  You can’t go to GC and NOT get beer, so I got a beer.  A huge beer.  I’m a member of the mug club, so the huge beer was only $3.50.  We’ve been members for a year, so we got a coupon for a free appetizer, so we split the boneless chicken wings (with ranch).  My supper was actually pretty paleo – the Napa Valley Burger with no bun and a side of deeeeelicious steamed broccoli.  I figure we are technically still on vacation since we haven’t gone back to work yet, so I can still cheat.

It’s supposed to be wicked hot this week, so exercising will be a challenge.  Right now, my goal is to wake up at 5AM and jog.  Tim says he’ll do it with me, so we’ll see.  I only got about 4 hours of sleep last night, so who knows how I’ll feel tomorrow.

Tim and I are going on another trip in a few weeks – this one to visit my bros in NYC.  I think eating well will be easier there than on the island of Ocracoke.  Plus, I’m sure we’re going to be doing a ton of walking, biking, and hiking, so things shouldn’t get too OOC.

I’m kind of looking forward to August, when our schedule will normalize.

Take care, and have a wonderful evening!

Health & Fitness

Two PRs in One Weekend

heather

The Timmy Tee and I ran the Race for the Cure yesterday.  We’ve both been exercising more than normal, so we were hoping to have good times.  My time from last year was going to be easy to beat, since I mistook where the finish line was and stopped running about 50 feet too early.  However, I was still hoping to beat previous years’ times (around 33 minutes).

We both did pretty well!  My time was 29:06, a personal best.  Tim’s time was 26:01, a personal best for him as well.  You can check our progress here, if you’re interested.  We’re solidly beating our 2009 selves, which supposedly were younger and faster, so that’s awesome!

It was a HOT race too, especially on the eastward loop.  So much sun.  So much heat.  Bah!     But we did it.  And to top it all off, after breakfast at Village Inn and a little putzing around the house, we went out for a 20 mile bike ride.  And, yes, it was still HOT.  It was a good ride, though.  I was utterly exhausted afterwards.  Today I am wicked sore in my hamstrings.  But, it’s a good sore – a sore that reeks of success.  Reeks.

Today was supposed to be a rest day.  Tim has been training really steadfastly for the West Lake Triathlon next weekend, and we figured he needed to take a break to give his body time to recoup.  Well, we ended up doing some of our floor exercises – planks, push-ups, leg and arm exercises, etc.  I also attempted and succeeded in doing a real pull-up!!  I’ve just been doing the flexed arm hang for the past month, but I figured I would try one today and see what happened.  Admittedly, I stood on the bottom run of the later (about 6 inches off the ground), so I had a little boost.  But I did it!  I was able to lift my chin up and over the bar.  I was so happy!! I didn’t think I would ever be able to do that!  I couldn’t complete a second one, but I’m sure that will come in time.  It’s just so nice to see some progress.  Time to start selling tickets to the gunshow!

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Tasty, Easy Sunday Supper

heather

Sundays have a way of getting away from you.  We woke up today at 5:50 AM and now, all-of-the-sudden, it’s 6:46 PM.  Where did the day go?  We got some cleaning done, lawn mowed, checkbook updated, lunch at Bent River, and poof!  It’s gone!

But we’ve been eating out quite a bit lately, so I really wanted to make supper at home tonight, so I picked a quick and easy recipe I’ve made before – Asian Pork Meatballs with Dipping Sauce.  They are super easy to make and very delicious.  The recipe calls for mayo, and I know the Hellmans has all sorts of badness in it for you.  But it is oh, so tasty!  Plus, the recipe called for 1/3 a cup, which is all I had left.  So now I have no mayo in the house, which is a good thing.  Next time a recipe calls for it, I’ll make to make it from scratch from avocado oil, which I hear is ultra tasty.  I’ll have to search for a good recipe.

Anyway, I digress.  To accompany the meatballs, I baked some sweet potatoes in our roaster oven.  I made an extra one for breakfast tomorrow.  I’m getting to be so resourceful and foresightful!

The combo of the meatballs, sweet potatoes (and a little sliced avocado) was delicious.  I’m looking forward to sauteeing up the leftovers tomorrow for breakfast with some fresh herbs from my mini herb garden, along with some broccoli, cabbage, and red pepper.  I’m eating out for lunch and supper, so I have to be sure to get a good breakfast in.  I love meals that produce awesome, tasty, healthly leftovers.  Thanks, Health-Bent!

Health & Fitness, Uncategorized

A Primal Primer

heather

I’ve had a couple of friends who are interested in this whole primal/paleo thing.  So I thought I would write a quick post about how to get started, based on my 5 months of experience.  Here are my favorite books, sites, and primal/paleo products.

Good books

  • The Primal Blueprint 21 Day Total Body Transformation – This is the first book I read, and it was a great, simple introduction to the primal lifestyle.  The author, Mark Sisson, doesn’t just talk about how to change your diet.  He talks about how to re-approach your life – get outside more, disconnect from technology, play, focus on the present, etc.  He also lays out a 21-day plan to help you get on the primal path.  I keep promising to send this book to my brothers, but I just can’t let it go.
  • The Paleo Solution:  The Original Human Diet – I just finished this book by Robb Wolf last week.  It’s a more technical, in-depth book on paleo.  If you want to understand the science behind why the paleo diet works, this is the book to read.  Robb also provides meal plans for 30 days and a pretty detailed weight lifting section.  It’s also a pretty funny read.

Blogs:

  • www.marksdailyapple.com – Mark Sisson’s blog – chock full of health information and good recipes.
  • www.robbwolf.com – Robb Wolf’s blog – also chock full of great information and resources.

Recipe Blogs:

Ingredients

Here is a list of the stuff I always like to have in the fridge or freezer:

  • Grass-fed ground hamburger (from our Farmer’s Market.  If you don’t have a local producer, you can buy it online from US Wellness Meats)
  • Frozen wild-caught salmon (from Target)
  • Canned tuna or sardines
  • Fresh veggies – spinach, kale, avocado, carrots, broccoli, cabbage, peppers
  • Frozen fruit – excellent defrosted with some coconut milk drizzled over them
  • Pastured eggs
  • Thai Kitchen Coconut Milk
  • Nuts – Macademia nuts supposedly have the best omega 3 profile, but I find them a little rich.  I eat a lot of pistachios, almonds and walnuts.
  • Gerolsteiner Mineral water – good source of magnesium.
  • Avocado oil
  • Coconut oil – I LOVE this stuff.  I put it in my coffee and cook with it all the time, and it’s the bees knees.
  • Dark chocolate – I love the Ghiradelli Dark Chocolate Chips.  They don’t have a great cocoa content, but they are perfect for snacking.
  • Carlson Super D Omega 3 Cod Liver Oil
  • Magnesium Lactate

Keep all this stuff on hand, and you’ll have everything you need to make a tasty primal meal.

So, that’s an introduction in a nutshell!  Hopefully you found it somewhat helpful.

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Primal Tasty Dessert – Coconut milk with berries

heather

As I mentioned in my last post, I have the occasional ice cream cravings.  I AM a hot-blooded American woman for crissake.  Well, I’ve discovered a pretty tasty, primal-aligned alternative.  I’ve been defrosting frozen organic berries, mixing them with fresh-sliced kiwi and copious amounts of coconut milk, freezing it until it’s slushy, and then eating the heck out of it.  It’s SUPER delicious, at least if you love coconut milk and berries.  If you don’t like those things, you will not like this dessert.  I really, really love coconut milk.  I need to move to Hawaii so I have access to more coconut products.

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Ad Hoc Veggie Salad

heather

I bought a bum bag of organic salad mix this week.  It did not look appetizing for lunch, so I just pulled everything tasty looking out of the fridge and chopped it up.  Here’s what went into the lunch salad:

Half-can of tuna, 1 hard boiled egg, a couple pieces of cauliflower, a few broccoli florets, a carrot, 1/2 a stick of celery, 1/3rd an avocado. I diced up all of that and added some avocado oil, 1/2 T of apple cider vinegar, copious amounts of salt and pepper and turmeric, stirred it all up and nom nom nom.  You can see a picture in my Instagram feed to the right.

In fact, it was so tasty that I repeated it for supper, less the tuna & egg and plus grilled chicken.  Very delicious.  I couldn’t eat it all, and I’m already looking forward to tossing the whole leftover mess into the frying pan tomorrow morning with some coconut oil for breakfast.

On Sunday I spent maybe 45 minutes cutting up cauliflower, broccoli, carrots, & celery.  I feel bad using a bunch of plastic bags for this, but it makes life sooooo much easier during the week.  Plus, as Tim says, we’ve already done our part to protect the environment by not having kids.  Anyway, I take a baggie to work with me too, and instead of hitting the vending machine for a Take 5, I hit the fridge for some carrots.  It really helps stave off the cravings.