Idiot-Proof Paleo Shopping breakdown

So, here we are again dear readers with a grocery list!
This is significantly shorter than last week's, because this is my regular list, not my stock up/get started list. This is what my cart looks like most weeks. This feeds two people for just over two weeks, though I'm normally busting out the frozen veg by the very end of the fortnight.

As promised, look for a breakdown of the list and where the food actually goes below. Again, feel free to share, print an use this list for yourself!

We keep all our meet in the freezer and just defrost as needed, so every two or three shopping trips I'll need to replete my stock, but for the most part, I just replace whichever animal product is lowest. This week it was chicken breast. We only had about three left, so I bought two more packages. But I've still got tons of pork chops, ground pork, beef for stew and steak cuts that I picked up on sale, so none of those need replacing. I've only had to totally replenish the freezer maybe twice, but it's really easy to stay on top of it if you just take stock of what's stocked up before you go shopping. And I try and use things according to how old they are. We date all the food that goes in the freezer, so the newest chicken breasts will get saved for last and I'll use pork and beef mostly for the week. This means I only really ever have to restock one (maaaybe two) kinds of meat on a particular shopping trip, which saves a TON of money. 

Okay, let's get to the break down. 

Easy-peasy dinners.

Generally, I love cooking. I love experimenting with new recipes and new foods. Sometimes though, I miss the ease of chicken nuggets and frozen dinners. There are some days I can barely be bothered to eat anything, let alone cook something complicated. On those days, it's very helpful to have a few staples on standby so I can throw some stuff together in less than an hour and not have to stress. 

• Cauliflower can be used as a substitute for my pre-paleo fall backs, rice and mashed potatoes. The only real difference between cauliflower 'rice' and cauliflower 'potatoes' is the degree to which you mush them in the food processor. That seems pretty self explanatory. I also admit to putting a couple pats of butter in my mash and a sprinkling of chives. Makes it feel more authentic. Mash or rice, one other veggie (asparagus, carrots, squash, zucchini, whatever you've got around) and a meat and you have your meal. I love this because it's really hard to screw it up and I don't have to think about it. So, keep cauliflower handy. You can also use the cauliflower rice to make garbage stir fry which can be a lifesaver. Throw your 'rice in with some soy sauce, some sliced meat (pork and chicken work well) as well as some frozen vegetables and serve. 
• Carrots are my best friend if I want to stretch a meal out a little, any meal. Want to make your brekkie scramble last an extra day? Dice up four or five carrots and it'll eke things about. Carrots are great for snacking, I mash them up with sweet potatoes and parsnips to make a mash, I fry them with onions and pork chops, I julienne them into salads. They add color to your meal and they last forever. I usually buy a five pound bag once a month. 
• Sweet potatoes do the same work as carrots, they help stretch everything out, and they are really filling. I love them because I can make fries or sweet potato crisps with them, which is a better cure for my constant snacking than popcorn or potato chips. I adore them with my breakfast, sliced up with some sausage and egg and peppers. So good. 
• Leafy stuff is also a savior of mine. Whether it's lettuce, cabbage, spinach, collard greens, turnip greens, bok choy, whatever your fancy it's essential to keep this stuff handy. If I don't feel like cooking, I can roughly chop some lettuce and spinach, boil and shred some chicken, slice some carrots and throw a basic dressing together. You can find my personal favorite salad here, from Nom Nom Paleo. That particular salad takes me literally 20 minutes from prep to table. 

Everything else on that list--eggplant, asparagus, mushrooms--get used in addition to the four essentials above. I am partial to cauliflower mash, asparagus and pork chops. Or sauteed mushrooms, steak and sweet potato fries. On the nights when I look forward to getting in the kitchen, having a good selection of veggies to choose from makes coming up with dinner a whole lot easier. I am partial to eggplant parm when I'm feeling like spending a while in the kitchen, or coconut-breaded fish or chicken with some fried spinach.

Food for snacks

One of the biggest challenges when you go paleo is finding food you don't have to cook. Sometimes you just want something crunchy or sweet and you want it now. I am partial to Nut Thins. They're gluten free crackers. I don't think they're technically paleo, but they're damn close and I love crackers and ham too much to care. But what about sugar cravings? I usually keep a little stash of dark chocolate somewhere, and I'll slice up an apple, grab the almond butter and make 'smores'. I mean, they're not really smores, but it hits the spot. There's also nothing wrong with giving yourself a night off and having a Twix or something. Letting yourself go once in a while is key to actually staying on the diet.  I'm also partial to cauliflower popcorn, you can get the recipe here.

To be honest, when I was getting started on paleo, and this is true of anyone who's starting to learn how to cook, recipe lists were my saving grace. NomNomPaleo and Paleomg both have AWESOME recipe lists that are broken down by meat and veg, and for the first little while I relied on them completely. Learning how to throw together a meal is a skill. You're not going to start teaching yourself to cook by never look at recipes. So, get to know your food a little, what your skills and are what kinds of flavors you like together. Once you do that, you can start to write your own recipes. 

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)

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.

Chicken and squash coconut curry

So, I haven't made anything that I can keep in bulk, and after last weeks "what the hell are we going to eat" problems, I figured making some big quantities wouldn't be a bad idea.
It's not that we're not buying enough food, I buy enough vegetables to feed a small country, but by the time the last few days before payday rolls around we've eaten all the fresh stuff, and I never know what to do with just frozen veggies.
So I'm looking out for recipes that I can cook and freeze.
Curry ticks all of those boxes. Freezes well, can easily be made in bulk and super easy to stretch out.
This particular curry is very...orange. It's got carrots, butternut squash and sweet potatoes in it, so there's lots of filling veggies in here.
This is the one time I listened to Mr. (baby) Idiot and didn't  make something stupid spicy, and then he had the gall to complain! So, the frozen half of this will be getting a heavy scooping of curry paste next time.

Anyway, here's what you'll need

4 carrots, chopped
1 butternut squash, chopped
1 sweet potato chopped
2 chicken breasts, cubed
1 cup of coconut milk
1 cup of chicken stock
2 tbsp curry paste
3 tbsp chili garlic sauce
2 tbsp grated ginger
2 tsp cumin
3 tsp paprika

The lovely thing about this is that you kind of just...throw everything into the pot and let it simmer for a while. Super easy, and you can ignore it and go watch 30 Rock on Netflix. That's what you guys do right? Right??

Anyway, even if that's not what you do with your 25 minutes of free time, but chop all your veggies up and throw everything in the pot.

Side note. I have never peeled a squash before. Know what you're getting into before you start peeling, because your veggie peeler will not work here. The skin is like an inch thick. I just sliced the skin off and called it a day. I'm sure there are other ways to do it, but..I got frustrated so it happened.

Add in the chicken stock and bring it up to a low boil.

Add in the coconut milk, as well as all the spices and let it simmer for a while.

After about 15 minutes, check on everything and keep letting everything cook until the chicken is cooked through. Plate, and serve. Hey presto. I had TONS of this left after I'd made two servings, so this is going in the freezer for next weeks dinner.

I made cauliflower rice to serve this on, which is basically ground up cauliflower. I used my (amazing and wonderful) food processor to get this to the right consistency, but if you have a grater (and the patience of a saint) you can grate it down to rice-size. I also ground up some coconut flakes in with the cauliflower and heated it up in a pan with some coconut oil.

Garlic and spinach "spaghetti" and a month review

I have been really enjoying paleo. I was worried when we started doing this, but we're almost one month in, and although I don't think I've lost any weight, I feel a million times better. I feel more comfortable in my body because it feels like I'm actually taking care of it, feeding it what it actually craves and not carbo-loading and snacking on empty calories all day long. I don't get hungry between meals anymore, and when it is meal time, I want to eat. I enjoy the prospect of meal time so much more because I feel as though I need it, not that I'm bored and my stomach is empty. I have so much more energy. And, I'm learning so much about food through this experience. I'm learning how to bake on a restricted diet (see the banana bread, and look out for ginger and pear bread this week!) I'm learning about new vegetables, how they work with other foods, how to use different oils and spices and meats in different recipes to get different results. It's always an adventure when it comes time to cook, because I'm always trying something new. Paleo food, because the rules are so clear, has also given me the confidence to put the recipes away (not all the time mind you...) and start to venture out on my own and make things that are original (and delicious, if I do say so myself).

In keeping with that adventurous spirit, I found myself staring at my half-a-spaghetti-squash sitting in my fridge from the last time we made noodle bowls. What was I going to do with it. Not that I don't LOVE that paleomg recipe, I do (much love) but I wanted something different, and spaghetti squash is such a cool vegetable. Plus, I want to get as much of this truly excellent winter veggie before it's all gone and I have to find something else seasonal and amazing to make. 

So, here it is

Pork loin medallions and garlic and spinach spaghetti (squash)

Season the pork loin (or whatever meat you're using) with rosemary, sage, basil and liberal salt and pepper.

For the spaghetti you'll need:

½ spaghetti squash

3 cloves of garlic

3 tbsp minced garlic

½ bag of frozen spinach (If I had to guess I'd say...two cups?)

½ onion chopped

There is a two step oven process here, so start this early.

For the squash, you'll need to bake it for around 40 minutes at 375, or until the skin gives when you poke it. (Take the seeds out pre-cooking, so much easier) Everyone online says do it for 20 minutes, but maybe we're buying incredibly large squashes because ours wasn't even nearly done by 20 minutes.

Once the squash is cooked, scoop out the delicious stringy innards and stick them in a bowl.

Turn the oven heat up to 450 and put the pork loin in. This will need around 30 minutes to cook, and the rest of the recipe takes about 20 minutes, so don't wait in between putting the pork loin in and getting finished.

Heat a large (and deep!) pan over medium high heat and melt 2 tbsp coconut oil.

Put your spaghetti squash insides in the pan with three tbsp minced garlic.

Add the onions and spinach and put a lid on the pan to let it steam.

I crushed the three whole cloves, but for me that was purely aesthetic, that bit is up to you.

Once everything is cook, cut your pork loin and serve.

Yum : )

I'm still on the lookout for new ways to use spaghetti squash, so if you have some, please share below.  

Winter wonderland dinner to warm your belly

It has been COLD here in North Carolina guys. And I know that some of you must be from the ice-swept lands of Kansas or Montana where there are like ten inches of snow a day, but this is the South. It is not supposed to be snowy here. We got three inches of snow on Tuesday. Three inches! The high was like 20 degrees. Our house and my wardrobe are not equipped to handle those kind of temperatures.

We did build a tiny snowman and make snow angels though. That was pretty rad, I can't remember the last time I actually played in the snow.

So, Mr Idiot and I needed to whip up something nice and hearty to keep us toasty. And so we did. The only problem is that my go-to recipes for heart meals almost always involve potatoes or pasta, both of which we're not allowed to eat. So, we came up with a solution.

This recipe is a personal favorite because it utilizes what I think is one of the world's least recognized vegetables, the parsnip. I absolutely adore parsnips. My dad makes them at Christmas and he roasts them and they are crispy and crunchy and just the right amount of sweet and omg. So. Fricken. Good. So when I saw them on special I couldn't help but buy some. Mr. Idiot had never even heard of a parsnip before, so this was the perfect introduction.

Baked salmon and root veggie hash

This is super easy to whip up, and following the theme of most of my recipes lately, was a very efficient way to clean out some straggler vegetables in preparation for the Great Fridge Restocking of 2014.

4 parsnips, peeled

3 carrots, peeled

4 strips of bacon, diced.

3 fillets of salmon

Ground sage

salt and pepper

Dried lemon peel

I found some asparagus spears at the bottom of the crisper that look like they were about to be done, so we grilled those up as well, but you can add any other veggies to this as you like.

Line an oven tray with tin foil and preheat the oven 375 degrees.

We didn't really measure out the seasoning, just add enough until the top of the fillet is pretty well covered. If I had to guess I'd say on each fillet ½ tbsp sage, ½ tbsp lemon peel, and be liberal with the salt and pepper.

Pop in the oven and bake for 40 minutes, or until the salmon is flaky.

Peel your carrots and parsnips and then grate them into a bowl. I just used the peeler and peeled strips off until I had little nubby centers left.

In a large skillet over med-high heat, melt coconut oil and add carrots and parsnips. Stir the hash occasionally.

After about seven minutes on the heat, add in the bacon. Stir until the bacon is cooked. Once your bacon is done, lower the heat and leave the hash in the skillet to keep it warm.

Once the hash was done cooking, we grilled the asparagus with a bit of salt and pepper. 

Cut the woody ends off the asparagus. Ours were perhaps on their last legs, so we cut most of the ends off and had the spears. 

Plate, and serve. Hey presto, delicious hearty noms.

 

Monday salad: extra easy because I'm extra tired

It's nearly 9pm here at la casa des Idiots, and I'm finally sitting on my bum. FINALLY.
Today Mr Idiot had the day off, so we used our Monday much more productively than last week (in which we binge-watched Netflix and ate bacon) and ran all of the errands. ALL. THE. ERRANDS. We prayed at the alter of the Army Gods (aka the Soldier Support center) to get some of the cost of the move back, (YAY MONEY!), we visited Mr. Idiots long-ago-neglected UPS box only to find out that they only keep mail for thirty days before they return it to sender. And his has been closed for at least three months. Oh well. We also needed to pick up some groceries, but it's my least favorite time of the month, which is the time three days before payday where we have maybe a $60 buffer, and we're all out of almost everything. My fridge is a sad, mostly empty mess right now, and it gives me a big sad. But! We're trying this new thing where we space out our bills so we don't get completely drained by the 3rd of the month, so here's hoping come February we won't have these shitty three and four day periods where we've got zilch in the bank. To make that long story short, we need some more food, but we had to really scratch out what we've got left. So, thirty bucks poorer, we've got enough nosh to see us through until payday.
We even remembered to return my (shockingly) overdue library books, which I think they've written off as lost by this point.
By the time we got home, I was ready to cook dinner and just flop on the couch, but nope. Mr. Idiot has plans for his Monday and they've gotta happen. We spent almost an hour moving a couch from the spare room into the living room, and moving the pull out couch into the spare room. I know that sounds like no biggie, but the movers tried to get that sucker into the spare room and failed. The people whose job it is to make things fit through doors couldn't get it, so these two Idiots figured they'd try. Yeah, pro tip, if the movers don't do it, don't try it yourself. Eventually we got it through the door with only minimal doorframe damage. I was sweaty, grouchy, had pulled something in my back, stabbed by invisible couch nails, and had yelled at Mr. Idiot at least six times to NOT DROP THE COUCH ON ME, the last thing I wanted to do was actually cook dinner.
But, what did I do? I went and made some awesome salad thanks to Michelle Tam over at nomnompaleo and as luck would have it, it was easy as hell. I did make a few modifications to her recipe, because I'm lazy and I need to improvise sometimes...

Asian nut salad
This salad is awesome because it makes enough for both of us to be full, and to have leftovers for our lunches tomorrow. And just let me say, Mr. Idiot eats A LOT for both lunch and dinner, so the fact that there's leftovers is saying something.

For the sauce, you'll need:

2 tbsp almond butter (I used peanut, sue me)
1 tbsp fish sauce (I'm pretty sure you could sub coconut aminos for this and be okay)
1 tbsp white vinegar.
1 tbsp coconut oil
2 tbsp applesauce (unsweetened)
1/2 tbsp garlic chili paste

For the salad:
2 chicken breasts
1 whole head of romaine lettuce
3 or 4 carrots, grated/julienned/sliced however
2 apples, sliced

This salad has shredded chicken in it, and before we got a hand mixer/food processor (THANKS MUM <3 ) we had to shred chicken by hand (like savages). So, my advice is boil the chicken breasts while you're doing everything else to cook them. If you don't have a mixer or anything, you can shred by hand once the breasts are cool, or use two forks to rip it to bits. Your call. IF however you just got God's greatest invention, the food processor, you're fine.

So, put the breasts on on boil and start grating/julienning/slicing your carrots. I used four medium carrots for this, but use your judgement. Whatever ratio of carrots to lettuce to apples you want is good.

A mandoline makes your life easy

Put your carrots in a big bowl.

Chop up the apples. I didn't peel them because I love apple skins, but that's totally your call. Slice them into eighths and then in half long-wise, so they've still got some chunk to them and toss them in the bowl with the carrots.

Hopefully, your chicken is done boiling, so let it cool if you're using your hands, or cut it into quarters and process that bitch.

Wash off the lettuce and rip it into bite-sized bits. I hate the giant...spines, whatever they are on lettuce, so I just ripped off the leafy parts.

Throw that into the bowl and mix it all up.

Combine all the ingredients for the sauce and pop it in the microwave for 30 seconds to melt the coconut oil and soften the almond butter. Mix all that goodness together, pour over the salad and serve.

I was too damn tired to take any pictures after I'd added the chicken or the dressing or plated it, because I was so excited to eat and sit down.

This blog entry took longer to write than the salad took to make, so it's AWESOME when your feet hurt and you're hangry.

Idiot burgers w/ the wrong lettuce

Happy (Very, very) belated MLK day everyone! I hope you used your day off wisely like Mr Idiot and I did.

I mean, watching IT Crowd and Fringe all day on the couch is wise right? Right?

Well, whatever, judgeypants, we made some pretty damn tasty burgers too, so there.

I've been longing for a good burger for a while, and I'm going to have to seriously investigate some paleo bread options, so if you've got suggestions, send them my way. But, as I was browsing the internet wondering what the hell I was going to eat, as is my wont, I kept finding beautiful, cheesy, delicious looking pictures of burgers (thanks Tumblr, geez) and figured we could throw something together.

And so was the born Idiot Burgers With the Wrong Kind of Lettuce

We're still in the process of keeping on top of the vegetables we buy. I DETEST throwing away food, and I try really hard to use everything that we've bought (I'm looking at you slowly wrinkling apples) so I needed something that used up the tomatoes hiding on the bottom shelf, as well as the last of the mushrooms in the bottom of the crisper. I'm always nervous about mushrooms, after a few days they get a little slimy and all of a sudden, there's mushrooms in everything.

So, burgers!

1 lb ground turkey

2 Roma tomatoes

Several leaves of Romaine lettuce

However many mushrooms were left in the fridge (I think five)

1 avocado sliced

1 large sweet potato, sliced

2 tbsp coconut oil

I didn't want to defrost a whole 3-lbs of ground beef, so the little 1 pound ground turkey tubes that we found hidden in the wrong aisle at the grocery store came in handy.

We were also out of eggs, so we had no glue to hold the patties together and they were admittedly a little fragile. So next time, I'll be mixing an egg in to hold everything together better.

Anyway, roll out some patties with whatever ground meat you want to use. We made sliders, so I got nine out of one pound of turkey.

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees

I shallow fried the patties in coconut oil, they took about seven minutes to cook over medium high heat.

Cut the sweet potatoes into fry-sized bits (Mr. Idiot did that bit, and I have no idea how he cut them so you're on your own)

Coat the fries in coconut oil (I think Mr. Idiot cheated and used peanut oil, but shhhh) and a generous helping of salt and pepper.

Spread them out on a baking tray and make sure they have a little room to breathe or they'll get soggy, not crispy. Put those suckers in the oven for 15 minutes. Once the 15 minutes is up, flip them over and put them in for another ten. Check up on them, they should be getting brown, but not black. Add extra five minutes of baking as you need to.

Slice up the tomatoes, avocados and mushrooms.

I sauteed my mushrooms briefly in some coconut oil, but feel free to eat them raw if you want.

Arrange everything on your lettuce, and top.

We really should have used iceberg or something for this, because the romaine lettuce was a pain in the ass to use as a “bun”

We cut up a little sharp cheddar and put that on the patties too.

That's all, just go ahead on nom on these little burgers. They are delicious. Next time though, better lettuce.

Spaghetti squash noodle bowls aka most delicious thing on earth

Hello all. It's day 11 of the Idiots on paleo and things are going swimmingly. It's also (finally) time for Mr. Idiot to come back from training to sit in the mud and the rain and back to me, so we're very excited about that. He's not home yet and I imagine they're having him do important finishing up things like sit around, complain and waste time, so in the meantime let me tell you about perhaps the world's single most incredibly delicious food. I found this recipe on the awesome paleomg.com and if you're looking for truly good paleo fare, this is a place to check out.

One of the nicest things about eating paleo is that you're forced to get really inventive with your food, and to try out vegetables I didn't even know existed. Which is where I'm going with this Spaghetti noodle bowl.

This dish is really really easy, and so good that Mr. Idiot and I were fighting over who got the leftovers.

Now, I'll come clean here to those of you following this blog who are doing a strict paleo thing before we get to the recipe. I used regular Sriracha, not the paleo stuff, and I used soy sauce, not coconut aminos and peanut butter. Now I know none of those are paleo friendly but I cannot abide wasting perfectly good food, and I have soy and Sriracha and peanut butter at home already. I just can't bear the idea of getting rid of them and replacing them when there is really nothing wrong with them. I'm also of the school of thought that being fanatically strict about anything is a path to failure. You have to give yourself a little wiggle room or you're going to snap eventually and binge on things you miss. So, 95% of the time, what I eat is paleo. But I'm not throwing away perfectly good peanut butter, soy sauce or breadcrumbs. I just can't. /endrant.

Now, the main attraction:

Spaghetti Squash Noodle bowl with (aptly named) OMG sauce.

1 spaghetti squash cut in half with seeds and threads removed

Big handful of fresh spinach

1 head of broccoli separated into smaller bits

1 lbs of turkey

1 tbsp Sriracha

1tbsp coconut aminos

That's it for the main part of the dish. The recipe on paleomg.com uses pork, not turkey, but I had turkey in the freezer and it was bloody good anyway.

Now, arguably the most important part of this dish is the sauce.

OMG sauce

2 tbsp almond butter (I used peanut)

juice from 2 limes (I realized I didn't have any so I skipped it)

1 ½ tbsp coconut aminos (or soy sauce if you're me)

2 tbsp Sriracha

½ tbs honey

1 tsp sesame oil (I didn't have this, so I used extra coconut oil)

3 tbsp coconut oil

2 tsp ginger grated

2 cloves of garlic, minced

½ tsp crushed red pepper

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees and put the halved spaghetti squash cut side down on a baking tray. The omgpaleo recipe says to bake for 20 minutes, or until the skin gives when you poke it, but it took us almost 40 minutes to get ours to give, so start earlier than you think. I think it depends on the size of the squash, and unbeknownst to us we got a massive one. Apparently.

Once the skin gives when you poke it, take it out and scrape out the inside. If you've cooked it enough, it will come out looking like noodles. Put in a bowl and set aside.

In a big pan over med-high heat put your turkey (or pork or whatever) in with 1tbsp of Sririacha and 1tbsp soy sauce. Cook it through and then put it in the bowl with the squash and set aside.

Put the broccoli in the pan and lower the heat a bit. Once it's browned slightly, put the lid on the pan and let it steam. We added ½ a cup of water so it wouldn't burn. I think when you cook with pork there's more fat, so there's more liquid to steam the broccoli, but our pan was pretty dry. So, use your brain, don't burn your broccoli. Once the broccoli is going, add the spinach and put the lid on. 

Once the spinach wilts, lower the heat again (to low) and add the squash and the turkey.

Let that simmer while you make the sauce.

Combine all the ingredients and mix together. Because coconut oil is a solid, and peanut butter isn't much of a liquid either, you'll have to microwave the sauce to get everything to combine properly. Once that's done, pour over the noodle bowls and eat.

Watch your plate though. This stuff is so good people are likely to try and steal it.  

Easy cheesy (but not paleo) chicken and veg

So, I'm a little behind on the posts. We've been back at home for about a week now, so I've got some recipes to share from last week.

This one isn't paleo (sorry guys...). But it was pretty tasty, if that counts for anything.

This is kind of a...whatever you can get your hands on recipe. We ate this the night we got back from vacation. We drove back from Raleigh, and we were both pretty pooped, so a trip to the grocery store was definitely not happening. Before we left for AZ we'd gotten rid of pretty much all the perishable food items in the house so I threw this together with whatever we had. This was pretty damn tasty, and it'd be really easy to sub out whatever veggies you want, or whatever meat you have in the freezer to customize this however you like. The pasta and the cheese sauce are what make this non-paleo, but it would be easy to make this a paleo meal. I made a really basic bechamel sauce because I didn't have any pasta sauce handy, and I was waaaay too tired to make one from scratch, so I made a cheese sauce for the pasta. Dairy isn't exactly paleo (though it isn't exactly not paleo either) and you need a lot of milk for bechamel sauce, but I think coconut milk or almond milk would make a decent substitute, as well as almond flour instead of all purpose flour. My particular version of paleo includes dairy, but if you're stricter about it you could sub out the milk. The cheese is optional in bechamel sauce, I used sharp cheddar because I think it's a bit bland without cheese, but you can leave it out.

Easy cheesy chicken and veggies. Feeds two.

Ingredients

2 chicken breasts

½ a box of spaghetti

1 bag “California Style” frozen vegetables (broccoli, carrots and cauliflower)

For the bechamel sauce

5 tablespoons butter
4 tablespoons all-purpose (or almond) flour
4 cups milk (whole, coconut or almond, your call)
2 teaspoons salt

As much cheese as you feel is necessary. I used about two cups of grated sharp cheddar.

In a medium pan, heat the milk until it's almost boiling. DON'T let the milk boil, it gets all nasty.

In another pan melt the butter over med-low heat, add the flour and mix until all the lumps are gone. Turn the heat up to medium and let the butter and flour cook for about five minutes, or until it gets golden brown.

Add the heated milk to the butter mixture one cup at a time, whisking it constantly until smooth. Bring it to a boil and let it sit, mixing regularly for about ten minutes, adding in a handful of cheese at a time until it's all mixed in. Take it off the heat until you need it.

Cook the chicken breasts—I put them whole in the pan with the lid on over medium low heat and turned them every five minutes or so until they were cooked through. It's easy to burn them this way, but just pay attention to them

Once the breasts were pretty much cooked through, I added the frozen veggies, put the lid on and left it for a few minutes. While the veggies are going, cook the pasta, and everything should be done around the same time.

Plate and serve.

This was pretty tasty for being scrounged up out of the kitchen. And it burned through some of the pasta, which we're not allowed while we're paleo, but I'm too stingy to throw away a perfectly fine box of pasta. So it's just sitting in the cupboard, taunting me. Maybe I'll sneak it in in a few weeks. Have myself a cheat day. We'll see.

Chicken nugget spaghetti

I loved this recipe. Which really surprised me, I'm normally not a fan of cooking-out-of-a-can so to speak, but this was delicious. Not exactly very healthy, but a winner on the tasty and filling and easy fronts.

This is all the cooking you have to do. And turn the oven on. If you can't do that, you might be beyond my help.

I had a one pound bag of nuggets in the freezer and I used about half of them, but that depends on how big a pan you use.

So, step one is to cook the spaghetti and preheat the oven to 475. The recipe I posted last week said to heat to 400, but the nuggets I used needed to be cooked at 475. Nothing went catastrophically wrong by adding 75 degrees, so, just follow the cooking instructions on whatever nuggets you're using.

As in previous recipes, wine is an essential ingredient.

Once the pasta is cooked, add spaghetti sauce and pour into a baking tray.

Make a layer of nuggets on top and pop in the oven for about eight minutes.

Once the eight minutes are up, flip the nuggets over and put them in for another eight minutes.

That's it. You're done. This recipe was great because I only used two dishes and all I had to do was cook the spaghetti. So if you're starting out cooking, and you're looking for something to make for dinner that's nice and easy, pretty tasty and requires only the ability to boil water, you've got yourself a winner here.