March Madness

Hello all.
I'm going to apologize again, and in advance for the lack of posts in the next few days. It's been a bit of a crazy week for me. The dog has been taking up pretty much all of my attention, because I mean come on. She's adorable and ALWAYS down to play.

Look at that freakin face!

So, there's that, there's the fact I've been working out (at an actual gym I'll have you know) and going to yoga a ton. (More on that whole deal later this week, I promise)

AND there's the minor thing that mama Idiot is coming to visit on Saturday! I'm pretty stoked about it, because I haven't seen her since Christmas, BUT that means I have to do a total blitz of my house. I have a highly organized plan of execution, room by room, to get the whole place mom-approved before she gets here. 

I've also got some furniture revamping to do. We finally got around to getting a sander, so Mr. Idiot sanded down the coffee table and the dresser and it's my job to paint them. I have never painted furniture, so we'll see how they turn out. I'm pretty hopeful, because Mr. Idiot is a total handyman n00b and he did a beautiful job sanding the stuff down. Fingers crossed I can pull of my first attempt as flawlessly. 

In other news, I managed to spend less than $200 at the grocery store this week. I don't know if that's because I'm eating less, so we have more food or something, but it was nice to not cry inwardly as I watch all the money just...trickle away. I'm going to post a shopping list for all my dedicated followers (all three of you <3) Partly for me, so I can stop wasting scraps of paper, and partly for you guys, so you can get an idea what paleo shopping on a pretty tight budget looks like. I know that $200 at the grocery store sounds like a LOT of money, but that feeds two people for two weeks and change. Fifty bucks per person a week isn't bad I think. It's actually less than we were spending before we went paleo, because I'm not buying chips or oatmeal or cookies or anything. Or frozen dinners, I won't lie, I was kind of partial to those, and they add up quickly. Plus, there's normally at least two or three days left of food at the end of the two weeks if I can't get to the grocery store on payday (because it is an ungodly hellscape.)

So, stay tuned for the grocery list, a break down of my workout, my diet and how the weight loss is going (I'm down ten pounds already!!)

So, stay tuned, I promise to be more on top of the whole posting thing, because I know you all care about my little life. 

Much love,

Mrs. Idiot. 

Dogdogdog and other things but mostly DOG!

Ladies and gentlemen, readers and friends, I have some very exciting news to share with you. In fact, I have two pieces of very exciting news.
One, I AM WRITING THIS FROM A KITCHEN TABLE. That's right folks, no longer do the Idiots have to lean weirdly over a coffee table, or eat out of our laps. We have a real life, honest-to-god, motherfucking kitchen table. It is amazing what not having to eat in the living room can do for a person. I feel like an actual adult. Mr. Idiot and I had dinner at the table last night! I didn't have to pick up crumbs of eggplant off the floor, or vacuum up bits of turkey after we were done. I didn't come out this morning and see tomato squished into the couch cushions. Oh happy day.

In even better news, dear readers, the Idiots have taken in a fluffy, adorable third member, and I believe she fits right in with the two Idiots already here. Her name is Koda. I wanted to name her Laika, after the first dog in space, but she's a little too old to rename.

She's been here for a week now and she seems to be pretty well settled in. In fact, it didn't even take her a day to make herself at home. Within six hours all three of us fell asleep on the couch. Cuddle puddle style.

It's incredible how much better having a dog makes me feel. I was starting to get pretty down. I've had no luck looking for work, I've had no luck making friends and it's hard to keep your spirits and motivation up when it feels like everything sucks. I was lonely, and pretty bummed about my prospects in general. Not to say I'm unhappy, because I'm not. I've got no right to be. I have a wonderful husband and a nice house and we make enough money to pay the bills and keep the lights on, but I felt (still feel, a bit) like I was stagnating. Like I wasn't doing anything with myself. Koda has helped a lot. She needs to get walked every day, she needs to be fed and she always wants to be played with or cuddled. So it gives me things I have to do every day, and she keeps me company. The house feels less empty now, and when Mr. Idiot has to be gone for training exercises, I've got a little fuzzy girl to keep me company.

Arrrrrriba fajitas

I do like North Carolina, although I am not a huge fan of Fayetteville. I like how close the beach is, I like the weather and I love that it snows here.

What I don't like is that there is nowhere to get freaking Mexican food. Arizona is my heart, and Mexican food is the key to my heart. Amado's carne asada fries, breakfast burritos, being hungover and miserable in the parking lot of a Filliberto's while you wait for your quesadilla is perhaps what I miss the most. (Second to my besties and my parents, obvs). 

So, sometimes I get all nostalgic and I just want some damn Mexican. I cannot really recreate the greasy, beany, cheesy wonder of drive-through Mexican food, but I do what I can. 

So, here we are at fajitas. My dad makes fajitas, but his are better than this. He makes skirt steak fajitas on the mega-grill, so I'm aiming for that good and if I make it halfway, I'll be pretty pleased. 

This is a paleo diet, except for the tortillas, which you obviously can take out and still enjoy the wonder of half-decent Mexican food.  

What you'll need for a little taste of the desert:

2 stoplight bell peppers, sliced. I used red and yellow, but you can use whatever colors you want.

1 lb 'pork for fajitas' sidenote, thank you Commissary for so clearly marking your meat products. 

1 poblano pepper, sliced

1/2 yellow onion, diced

1 packet McCormick's fajita powder (so I have no idea if this is paleo, but whatever. Yolo and stuff)

2 tbsp olive oil

1/2 cup water

The 'pork for fajitas' came pre-sliced, but if you're just using a hunk of meat, cut it into strips. 

Put the olive oil in a big pot over medium high heat.

Add in the pork and let it sizzle for a minute. 

Add the peppers, bell and poblano.

Once everything is sizzling away happily, add the water and the seasoning.

Mix everything around so the seasoning doesn't clump on to anything.

Cover, lower the heat to medium and let it cook for around ten minutes.

You can serve and leave the leftovers on low to keep everything warm.

These weren't very spicy (jalapenos next time) but they were definitely what I was looking for. It had tacos and peppers and a little bit of zing. If you're like me and you can't substitute anything in the world for a good burrito, this might help.
Signed, a recovering carne asada addict.
(Jk, there is no recovering from that)

Steak is good for the soul

So, here's the belated Valentine's day post I know you've all been dying to get your eyes on.
Even if you don't care, here it is anyway, so enjoy. ENJOY I said.
Mr Idiot was lovely and went out in the morning to pick up a veritable cornucopia of deliciousness (which included tulips, awww) and we feasted upon eggs and bacon and sausages and biscuits. We also decided that if we were going to take a break day (maybe it went to the rest of the weekend) from paleo v-day seemed to be the best day to do it.
So he came home with chocolates and biscuits and champagne. Because he knows how to treat a lady.

What a charmer.

Yes guys, those are wine bottles you can see in the background. We love us some fermented grapes in this house.

Anyway, I won't bother to give you breakfast recipes, because it was pretty basic. And massive, and delicious. And full of mimosas, which is my favorite kind of breakfast. We could barely move once we'd finished, so thank god House of Cards came out as we needed several hours to deflate. (IT'S SO GOOD GUYS. WATCH IT NOW. SHAMELESS NETFLIX PLUG. I DON'T EVEN CARE)

After all the biscuits, and all the House of Cards tension, we figured we'd skip the traditional Valentine's Day candlelit dinner and go rock climbing. There's a place in downtown Fayetteville called The Climbing Place, which we love. The staff are great and friendly, and on Fridays they do $13 equipment rentals, and free pizza. Which is kind of a big deal.

So we went and climbed off some of the chocolate, and I was reminded that physics is a thing, and when Mr. Idiot, who is a fair bit heavier than me, falls off a wall, I will inevitably fly off the floor and nearly collide with his crotch. To the delight of The Climbing Place employees.

If you're clicking on this post for a recipe, you've finally made it. Though I hesitate to really call it a recipe. It's more like...here's what we ate.
But you're here, so I should share it anyway.
Steak is good for the Soul

2 (absolutely enormous) sirloin steaks
1 1/2 packs of whole button mushrooms
3 tbsp butter (but you can never really have too much)
2 tbsp olive oil
1 bundle of asparagus, with the woody ends cut off.

Season the steak with salt, pepper, red pepper, garlic and onion powder, paprika and parsley.

Cook it in a skillet over medium high heat for eight or nine minutes on each side, or until the center has reached your desired level of pinkness. Our sirloins were really and truly giant, so if your steak is smaller, you won't have to cook it as long.

Wash off your mushrooms to get the dirt off (or don't, a little dirt never hurt anyone.) and add 2 tbsp olive oil to a pan on medium high heat. Once the oil is hot, add the mushrooms and let them cook for a few minutes. Drizzle some olive oil over the top to coat and cover the pan. Let the mushrooms cook until they become fragrant and are a little soft, about ten minutes.

While the steak is going, bring a pot of water to a boil and cook your asparagus until they're about halfway done (six or seven minutes in boiling water) and then drain the pot. Melt the butter in the pot and lower the heat to med-low. Put the asparagus back in and let it absorb the butter, so another five or six minutes, or until most of the butter is gone.

That's it. Nothing complicated for v-day for the Idiots, but damn was it tasty. Opened a nice little bottle of wine and watched Kevin Spacey get all amoral on D.C.'s ass.

Perfect Valentine's day if you ask me.

Greasy bar food, paleo style

So, if you're anything like me ( and if you're reading, I assume you are) you love yourself some tasty, greasy finger food. I love dive bars, partly because the beer is always cheap, but also becasue the food is always good and spicy and extra greasy, and I can eat it with my fingers and no one will judge me.
Double win.
Sometimes when you're trying to eat clean and be healthy you get cravings for things you really cannot have. Like hot wings, fries and ranch, or cinnamon rolls. But the goal is to not give in to those cravings. Though, don't torture yourself. Mr Idiot and I have Saturdays off. We can have a little ice cream, maybe some hamburgers, and we don't get nutso over the smell of McDonald's the rest of the week. I guess the trick is to set yourself a limit--I can have a break day, or meal, or week, and then I have to stick to the plan. It helps stop binge eating on stuff you've been denying yourself and then feeling guilty about it for ages afterwords. At least, that's what works for us. There are lots of great resources on making sure you don't crack and go crazy on a diet.
But, I've gotten off point. I had a craving for the bar food I love (and can't have) so instead of caving and ordering delivery, we made an attempt to recreate the joy of wings and fries without the grease and bad fats.
So, this recipe is kind of labor intensive. There's a few recipes that I combined to get this meal, but you can swap in or out whatever you feel like eating.
I wanted something spicy, and I really wanted finger food, so we made drumsticks and fries and Caesar salad with paleo friendly ranch dressing.
So, this is probably a thing you should start early, because the drumsticks need to marinade. I only marinaded them for an hour, and they were not nearly as spicy as I wanted.

So, this is what you'll need for the drumsticks
However many drumsticks you feel like eating (we made eight)
2 jalapeno peppers, deseeded and cut into chunks
1/4 cup of coconut oil melted
2 tablespoons coconut aminos
4 cloves of garlic peeled
1 tsp ground cumin
juice of 1 lime
1/2 cup cilantro leaves

Blend all of that good stuff together in a food processor. Put the drumsticks in a freezer bag and pour in your spicy marinade. Shake the bag around to coat the drumsticks and stick them in the fridge for anywhere between one and eight hours. (I'd go for more than an hour, let that lime and jalapeno really sink in there.)

While those are marinading, you can prep the sweet potatoes and the dressing.

This dressing, by the way, is awesome. I used the leftovers to dip meatballs in, I used it as veggie dip, it's great.
So, here's the ingredients for the dip/dressing/awesome sauce

1 ripe avocado
3 garlic cloves
1 can of coconut milk
1 tbsp lemon juice
2 tbsp fresh dill
2 tbsp fresh chives
salt and pepper to taste.

Throw all of that in the food processor and blend it all up. I put a hearty squish of sriracha sauce into the mix because I'm a sucker for punishment.

I threw together a salad with some turnip greens and some lettuce that was leftover in the fridge. There were some carrots and...whatever in there, use your imagination.

So! Once your lime chicken is done marinading, make your sweet potato fries. You can get the low down on sweet potato fries from the Idiot Burgers recipe here.

The fries have to go in at 450 and the chicken cooks at 425, so make your choice which one you wanna cook first, it's no big deal.

Put the drumsticks on a wire rack over an oven tray covered in foil.
We don't have a cooling rack, so I used the rack from the toaster oven. Don't judge. Improvise, okay?

Anyway, cook the chicken at 425 for fifteen minutes, take it out, turn it and cook it for another 15. Make sure the juice runs clear when you cut into it.

That's it. You can make the fries or not, or just salad, or coleslaw or anything you like.

If you're in the mood for some really good barfood that's not nearly as bad for you as it tastes, this is the stuff for you.

Happy Saturday loooovers

Happy Valentine's day (a little late, I grant you) I hope you all had a lovely day, I know these two Idiots did. Mr. Idiot even brought champagne so we could have mimosas. But, this is not where I rub your faces in how much breakfast food I ate yesterday. (It was a LOT by the way) But, I am here to talk about this awesome baked eggplant I made last night. (Don't panic guys, Valentine's day steak dinner photos are coming soon, but I am full of leftover steak and wine, so be happy I'm posting at all.)

Anyway, one of the things I realized was missing in my new paleo delicious lifestyle was some hearty Italian food. There's plenty of awesome recipes for Asian food and burgers and all kinds, but I think Italian is hard to fake because of all that cheese and pasta and...okay, I'm drooling.
But! If you've got a hankering like I did for hearty, meaty yummy Italian goodness, this is stuff for you. And it's pretty easy. And I got to use a new vegetable so score on the experience chart for me!

Anyway, I used ground turkey in this because we didn't have any other ground beef, but you can use beef too.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

You have to slice the eggplant up and "weep" it, which is something I had never heard of until the other night. Slice it, put it in a colander and salt it. Leave it for 20 minutes and it'll leak liquid. (Put a bowl under the colander fyi)

Squish it down a little after the 20 minutes to get any leftover liquid out.

Brush the slices of eggplant with olive oil on both sides and put the eggplant in the oven for 25 minutes.

The time it takes to get the eggplant done is different depending on your oven, so make sure it's crispy on the edges.

Turn the oven down to 350 and heat a pan over medium high heat. I diced up a couple of tomatoes and added a cup of tomato juice.

Let the meat cook through, the turkey only took about ten minutes.

You can layer this however you like, I know eggplant parm isn't usually layered like lasagna, but I only have a little oven dish, so I layered it.

Once the oven is down to 350, put the eggplant in for another fifteen minutes.

I sprinkled parmesan on top (SUE ME GUYS) because it's delicious and we had a little bit still leftover.

Plate, and ta-da! Awesome, filling, Italian amazingness. So satisfying.

Breakfast of champions

Breakfast is a pretty easy meal for paleo, because it's basically bacon and eggs every morning, no sweat. Plus, that much protein in the morning means I'm not hungry again during the day until nearly three. As much as I love bacon and eggs in all its permutations (soft-boiled eggs, hard boiled eggs, scrambled, fried) sometimes it's nice to mix things up. I've been experimenting with paleo pancakes, but with zero success so far. There's tons of recipes online, but mine just turn into mushy puddles. 

So, we're sticking with egg-based recipes so far, but I'll keep experimenting with non-egg breakfast foods. 

Anyway, this Mexican inspired brekkie is an amalgamation of a few recipes I found online, and whatever the hell was in my fridge. I think I'm getting the hang of throwing things together and getting pretty solid results. 

I made this recipe again this weekend for Mr. Idiot, and improved it vastly, but...I didn't take any pictures for you, so use your damn imagination. 

Breakfast of Champions

This recipe kept me full right up until dinner last Sunday, and then again for breakfast and lunch the next day. So it will (in theory) feed four.

1 sweet potato, diced

1/2 bell pepper diced

1/2 onion, diced

2 cloves of garlic, minced (or 1 tbsp pre-minced stuff)

2 tbsp coconut oil

handful of spinach (Or any other filler you like, spring onions, broccoli, anything you like)

2 roma tomatoes (you can use any tomatoes, this is just what was in the fridge)

7 eggs

Bacon. As I've said before, you can NEVER have too much bacon, I made 4 strips each

Chop everything, all the veggies get diced up and thrown in together.

Once the veggies are chopped, add coconut oil to large skillet, and add garlic over medium heat. 

Once the pan is hot and the garlic starts to brown add in chopped vegetables. Don't add the spinach yet. 

Once the sweet potatoes are soft to the touch (Use a spoon, not your hands, dur) add in the spinach and lower the heat to medium low. 

Crack the eggs directly into the skillet and mix everything together until it's all a nice big lumpy mess. 

Serve with bacon and some sliced and salted avocado. Feel free to add salsa, hot sauce, whatever you like. 

Alternatively, substitute the bacon for pork sausage mixed in with the eggs. I added two big spoonfuls of salsa to the scramble, and it was SO MUCH better the second time around. I think the fat from the pork sausage really helped bring all the vegetable flavors out. 

So. Good. 

I'm now officially on the lookout for paleo tortillas, so I can make breakfast burritos with this lovely, delicious mess. 

Candy bacon baby

This was all Mr. Idiots idea. I take no credit, only the responsibility of writing this up.
Mr Idiot is a big fan of Epic Meal Time, as am I, though one too many videos and I get a bit of a funny tummy.
Like Harley says in the video, you've seen it in your fucking dreams, here is how to do candy bacon.

It's beautiful, isn't it...

Take two parts brown sugar and one part cinnamon and mix then together in a bowl.

.

Get your bacon (Mr. Idiot and I used a whole pack, so follow your heart. Ignore what your arteries say) and lay it in a tin-foil-covered baking tray. 

Heat your oven up to 385 fahrenheit and sprinkle the cinnamon sugar mix over the bacon. Make sure there's about an inch between each strip, or your cinnamon sugar will bubble into a giant slab. I mean, if that's what your after, please share the results. Otherwise, for ease of snacking purposes, leave a little room. 

Put the bacon in the oven for about ten minutes. 

Once your ten minutes is up, take the bacon out, drain the grease, flip over the bacon and re-sprinkle

Here you see Mr. Idiot demonstrating the correct technique. 

Mr. Idiot's beloved EMT guys say to put the bacon back in for another ten, but our first batch burned when we did that, so put it in for five and see how it's looking. Add time as you need it. 

Once the other side is cooked, put the bacon on a plate (cover the plate in tin foil so the bacony goodness doesn't stick) and put it in the fridge for a few minutes.

Mr Idiot and I used this cooling time to spike a bottle of eggnog. Use your time wisely. 

Take out of the fridge, and enjoy. 

Toffee apples

Today we're going to talk about toffee apples. For those of you looking for an update on how the meal plan is coming along, that's coming up, with a few modifications. But for now, toffee apples.

I've never made toffee apples before (or caramel or candy apples), but I love them. They're one of my favorite season-specific foods, though I don't know why they aren't widely available all year round. They should be. 

Anyway, Mr. Idiot and I attempted our very own toffee apples over the weekend, and they came out visually subpar, but very, very tasty.

I wanted to make our own toffee, but the Mister said that would be too much work, so we used toffee bits instead, which did end up being pretty easy. 

Thankfully we were gifted a little double boiler so we didn't have to rig one up out of our stuff, but if you aren't lucky enough to have generous in-laws, this is a handy article about how to make one of your very own at home, courtesy of the Unsophisticook. 

Anyway. 

We realized after we'd started the process we didn't really know what we were doing, and after some rapid Googling brought up no one specific way to do toffee apples, we just followed our hearts. 

Melt the toffee bits in the double boiler. This takes longer than you think—unless you actually know what you're doing—if you're like me and have never actually used a double boiler before (and maybe thought those metal bowls were for salad or something when you unpacked). My recommendation is get the water boiling, add the toffee bits and then go make yourself some tea. You'll have around fifteen minutes to kill. 

Somewhere in that fifteen minutes, pull the stems off your apples and stick skewers through the core. Make sure they don't come out the other end. We used bamboo kebab skewers, but we had to use four per apple because they were pretty flimsy. 

I don't know if it was the toffee bits we used, or if it's just our impatience, but we couldn't get the toffee to completely melt. There were bits of toffee bit floating around after twenty minutes of melting, so we just went ahead and started dunking. 

It melted a bit more than this, but you get the idea. Lumpy. 

Our double boiler is pretty shallow so we had to get a spoon and pour the melted toffee over the apples to get them completely covered, but to get a nice smooth coating on the apple rotate it in the toffee. While the toffee is still hot, you can dunk the apple in any toppings you want. We did two plain, two with chocolate sprinkles, two with walnuts and two with pecans.

The plain ones came out just fine, a tad lumpy because of the stubbornly unmelted toffee, but looking okay. 

Through a bit of trial and error we discovered that if you'd like your extra toppings to stay on the apple and not slide off into a puddle of melted goo, you have to put the apples directly into the fridge so the toffee hardens. 

Case in point.

We'll definitely be doing these again. They were really easy to make, really inexpensive, and really fun. It was nice to be in the kitchen together, since I do most of the cooking. Unless it's Sunday brunchtime, and then Mr. Idiot has the floor. The nice thing about these is that they'll last up for a long time in the fridge. We made these about a week ago, and the apples are still nice and crisp. And if these two idiots can do it, it's guaranteed that you and your idiot, or your kids can do these together and eat them all week (if they last that long!)

Happy cooking.