Day 8: Temptation

Hello All!
I was hit with my first real bout of temptation today. The day started off normal enough, food wise. But things took a turn for temptation island real quick once I got to work (at a restaurant). 
Immediately there was messed up food in the window and a chocolate cake on the employee snack table that someone had brought in. Delicious food, just sitting there, waiting to be eaten. Every time I walked into the kitchen there it was, looking at me. Begging for me to eat it. Normally I'd of been all over it. The pizza wouldn't of lasted longer than 10 minutes. I could of devoured multiple pieces of the cake, easy.
But I stayed strong! Even though it took over an hour for my co-workers to FINALLY eat the pizza, and that stupid cake was there ALL night long, just staring me in the face every time I walked into the kitchen, I was a good girl and refrained! That cake...you have no idea how hard that was! I really love cake. A lot. 
As if the temptation of the pizza and cake weren't enough, there was an abandoned to-go order at the end of the night. Which means it's a free for all. The only unclaimed item was a molten cake. Either I took it, or it went in the trash. I hate seeing food wasted, so wouldn't you know, I ended up bringing home a molten to the roommates. Awesome. Not tempted at all (insert sarcasm). 
But that's not all, ladies and gentlemen.... I walk through my door, and my roommates have made, guess what? Crescent rolls! Fresh, buttery, hot from the oven, crescent rolls! Seriously!?!?! Fine. Whatever. 

I'm in need of another food run, I had to get a little creative for lunch today. I made a quinoa salad, and I'm pretty happy with how it turned out! Quinoa is a seed, so you would think it's paleo, but strictly speaking it isn't. I like to call it a "gray area" food. A food that isn't paleo, but isn't really not paleo either. It's confusing, I know, sorry. I plan on writing more about these foods once I get them more figured out! 

Looks pretty good, huh? It was light and tasty. It would make a great summer time meal! Here's how you make it:

-Cook quinoa according to the directions on the box. You can buy quinoa pre-washed or not. I recommend getting it pre-washed. It's way, way easier! Buying it unwashed is cheaper, but trust me, not worth the hassle. 

-While it's cooking chop up your vegetables. I used cilantro, tomatoes, red onion, and avocado. It would of been good with some cucumber in there as well!

-When quinoa is done and has cooled down for a few minutes, mix in the vegetables and add some chicken, salt and pepper, a little olive oil, and the juice of 1 lime ( I added a little zest as well). 

BAM! Done! That's it! Easy, right? I personally like this dish after it's had time for the flavors to marinate a little in the fridge. Enjoy!

Food Log:
Breakfast: Banana and raw almonds
Snack: Walnuts
Lunch: Quinoa salad
Snack: Left over quinoa salad, couldn't eat it all in one go!
Dinner: Left over pork and sauerkraut
Snack: 1 orange, 1 piece of 85% dark chocolate, and unsalted cashews

Have a good one!

Day 7: One Week Down!

I'll start this post with a little story for you:

Sitting in church today, my stomach growling as I waited for the third hour to come to a close, a thought crossed my mind. "I can't wait to go home and eat a banana." Say what again??? A banana? We are excited to run home when church ends to eat a banana?!?!?! That's what we're craving? When did this happen? I have never sat in church thinking about how excited I was to get home to eat something healthy, and I have certainly never craved a banana! I don't even like bananas. I have to force myself to eat them. So it's happening. The switch in the brain has flipped to healthy mode! 

I have gone one whole week eating healthy! Pat on the back for me! I have been pleasantly surprised by how much I am liking this whole Paleo thing! Sure it has it's challenges, but I'm beginning to figure out how it all works and I'm getting better at making time to prepare healthy meals. 

I've been meaning to share some links I have found helpful in figuring out this diet. This first link is excellent! It explains what the Paleo diet is, and why you should consider trying it. Here you go! Happy Reading! 

These next two articles are must reads! They list all the food you can eat on the diet, and they tell you why you shouldn't eat certain foods that you would think would be okay. Here is the first article, and here is the second one. 

Recipe time! Today I am sharing with you one of my family's all-time favorite recipes! Keep in mind my dad is half German....Pork and Sauerkraut! This is one of those dishes where you are either going to hate it or love it. Sauerkraut is not for the faint of heart, but eating fermented food is good for your gut and is welcomed in the Paleo diet! 

This is the easiest recipe in the world to make! All you need are: pork chops, sauerkraut, a crock pot, and some salt, pepper, and garlic powder. 

First, start by browning the pork chops in a frying pan. You're not cooking them all the way through, just browning the top layer. This is where you add the salt, pepper, and garlic powder. 

Yes, that is the same frying pan as last night, and yes, it is still dirty from the
chicken. Why wash something twice, when you can just wash it once? ;)
You'll be happy to know it's washed now!

After your chops are browned you are going to layer them in your crock pot with the sauerkraut, starting and ending with the sauerkraut.

That's it! Easy as pie! Just put the lid on and cook on high until it's done! It'll depend on how much pork you are cooking as to when it's done. You'll know it's done when the meat is easily falling off the bone, like this.

Sorry not the best picture...I need to work on my photography skills! But you get the idea. 

The great thing about this recipe is you can easily adjust it to your needs. Have a big crowd? Make a ton! Just you? Do what I did. 3 chops with 2 cans of sauerkraut. Don't know how you feel about sauerkraut? Use less. Love it? Go crazy with it! 

I was going to make a meal of this with carrots as my side, but I wasn't hungry enough. Enjoy!

Food Log:

Breakfast: Banana

Lunch: Large salad with spinach, tomatoes, red onion, boiled egg, avocado, pecans, and a slice of bacon. I used olive oil and salt and pepper to dress it

Snacks: Nuts, boiled egg, pieces of left over grilled chicken

Dinner: Pork and Sauerkraut :)

Desert: Finally finished off those brownies! Proud of myself for not scarfing them down day one!

Happy day to you all! 

Day 6: Pizza Party!

Earlier this week my friend Lonnie sent me a text inviting me to a pizza party at his house this weekend. The premise of the party was to see which pizza place in town had the best pizza. Every store (and we live in a collage town, so there would be a lot of them!) would be represented and the guests would vote for their favorites.

I said "Hell yes I'll be there!" 

How fun! I was so excited, totally my kind of party! A couple of days later I remembered I couldn't eat pizza. I felt like a kid who just discovered that Santa, Easter Bunny, AND the Tooth Fairy were a lie. Everything I loved, ripped out from under me! No pizza for me. Not cool bro, not cool. 

Oh well, I still planned on going just to be social. I thought about taking my own pizza, there are plenty of paleo pizza recipes after all. But without cheese what's the point?

However, a few hours before the party I decided the temptation of delicious pizza would probably be too much for me to stand if I didn't go in there with a plan. And no other food was going to satisfy me if I had pizza on the brain. So paleo pizza it is. I guess I can survive without cheese, just this once. 

I looked up some recipes and found this one that looks delicious, but it just used so. much. almond flour! That stuff is pricey, and the 2 cups would clear me out. I kept looking and found this dough recipe. Sounds good to me! And I already had all the ingredients :) For the topping I decided to go with roasted red onions and red peppers with spinach and grilled chicken. 

So delicious! Sorry, forgot to take a picture before I cut into it!

It really was so, so good! The crust had this almost nutty flavor, which worked perfectly with the roasted vegetables and grilled chicken. Several people who tried it told me that if my pizza had been entered in the contest it would have ranked high, just because of how delicious the roasted red onions were. Here's how to make this deliciousness happen!

First, start by chopping up a large red onion and 1-2 red peppers. Spread them out on a foil-lined pan and drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. 

Toss them around, making sure everything is covered, then spread them out evenly on the pan again. Broil on high until the vegetables have reached the level of softness you prefer, and they have blackened a little. Don't forget to stir them a few time during the cooking process. 

Ready!

Next, grill up some chicken. Cook it up however you like it! For today I simply cooked it in a frying pan with some coconut oil and various Italian seasonings.

Now that your toppings are ready, make the dough. In case you missed it earlier, here is the link again. 

Once your pizza crust is cooked and ready for toppings, assemble! For pizza sauce I just used my left over spaghetti sauce from earlier this week. Use whatever sauce you like! Then I put on spinach, the vegetables, and chicken. Pop back in the over for another 5-7 minutes to make sure everything has warmed back up and voila! Paleo pizza!

Just look at that yumminess!

*The roasted peppers and onions are delicious on all sorts of things, or just by themselves as a side! I love them on penne pasta with Alfredo sauce and chicken :)

Food Log:

Breakfast: 1 grapefruit with 2 strips of bacon

Lunch: Leftover chicken leg with onions and sweet potatoes

Snacks: Nuts, more left over chicken

Dinner: Paleo pizza

Desert: Still munching on those brownies!

Want to throw your own pizza party? Here's how we did it! 

Assign your guests a store to purchase a pizza from.

Have one person write the name of the store on the bottom of the plate, and another put them on the table (the more you can split up the process the better, you don't want someone knowing all the pizzas, that ruins the fun!)

Assign a different color sticky note to each pizza, and place a stack of them by that pizza

Each person goes around the table, takes a sticky note and slice, then write comments about the pizza on the note. You can decide whatever criteria you want your guests to rate the pizzas on. We compared crust, taste, and texture.

Once everyone has tried all the pizzas, they put their sticky notes in the order they liked the pizzas. 

That's my name there on the end. With no votes :(
It was nice just to be included, ha!

Once everyone's votes were up we took an average too see which pizza place won. Wanna take a guess as to everyone's favorite? It was Domino's! Go figure! Haha! It's their crust, it's so good! All garlicky and yummy... Pizza Hut took second, followed by a local favorite, the Pizza Cart Guy, then Papa John's and another local favorite, Centro Pizza. (Both local places are wood fired pizzas, and they are delicious! If you ever find yourself in Cedar City, Utah, you have to check them out!)

This party was so fun! Would of been even more fun if I could of tried everything, haha! Next up we're going to try burritos from all the Mexican restaurants in town! 

Have fun!

Day 5: Plan and Prepare or You'll Starve. Seriously.

Hi All!
What a day! I don't know if it's been the actual eating vegetables for once, or the lack of gluten in my system, or just some random act of energy happening, but I was hyper, hyper, hyper today! I was alert, awake, and had energy. This is not normal for me! I always feel tired and like I am just dragging. I have to force myself to be active. I can sleep for hours, and when I'm not sleeping I'm usually wishing I was because I'm always just so dang tired! But today I was on one, and it was awesome! I can't say if this surge of energy is directly related to eating paleo, but I certainly hope so because that would be awesome! I'll let you know if this energy goodness continues as the days go on! 
One of the great yet inconvenient things about this diet is it forces you to be in the kitchen. Not to brag, but I am a dang good cook. Always have been. I grew up cooking and baking all the time, and I love it! I love cooking and baking and creating in the kitchen. I am so grateful to of been raised in a house with real food, a house that rarely dined out, and where microwave dinners were unheard of. But something has happened to me throughout the years. I got busy, and I got impatient. I stopped planning my meals ahead of time, or even buying real food for that matter. I have been living of off cereal and sandwiches and restaurant food for years now, I am ashamed to say! Whatever food can be attained by the fastest means possible is what I usually end up eating. I know I'm not alone in this battle. We have become a nation of instant gratification. Whether it's instantly feeding our bellies, or instantly finding answers to questions, or instantly knowing every intimate detail of every person on the planets life thanks to social media (well hello there irony!), we have become addicted to instant gratification. The thing about instant gratification is it not only makes you impatient, it makes you lazy, as it did with me. Cooking became something that took too much effort to do on a regular basis. It's so much easier and faster to just run out and pick up  something. Disgusting, I know. How lame of me. But that is one of the reasons I am grateful to be doing this challenge, it is forcing me to get back in the kitchen! The thing with this diet is that if you don't plan ahead and prepare your meals, you are going to starve. I mean it. I was starving for half the day, it was horrible! It's not like restaurants have a paleo menu, or grocery stores a paleo section (maybe in hipster towns, but definitely not here in small town USA). I can't just go out and grab something. I have to make time to cook. I have no one to blame my starvation on but myself, because I didn't plan and prepare well. So if I could give you any advice at all in your Paleo endeavors it would be this: PLAN AND PREPARE!!! It's not enough to just buy the food, you got to figure out when you are going to have time to prepare it as well. But be ready to be proud of me folks, I cooked in bulk tonight! There will be leftovers! Wohoo!!! I cooked up a recipe I found on pinterest, here it is. 

Don't let the simplicity of the plate deceive you, this was delicious! It was so much more than chicken with sweet potatoes and onions. The recipe calls for maple syrup, and that is what made all the difference. I didn't think that I would be able to taste it, but I could and it made this dish so so good! I was surprised too by how delicious the sweet potatoes were. I have always hated sweet potatoes but these were so yummy and amazing! This will be something I make again, and it's something you should give a whirl! 

Food Log:
Breakfast: Smoothie with peaches, raspberries, spinach, kale, and almond milk (not very good, don't make it!)
Go to snacks throughout the day: Almonds, walnuts, apple with almond butter, raspberries, and 1 hard boiled egg
Lunch: So they had Philly Cheese sandwiches for us at work, which of course are not paleo friendly. So I pulled the meat off mine and snacked on that. 
Dinner: You saw that lovely picture above! I maybe had two servings....I went I really long time between meals!
Dessert: I worked on the leftover brownies throughout the day. One small bite at a time! Still delicious as ever, and still have plenty left!

Day 4: Paleo Desert....And It Was Good!

Hello All!

Still going strong with this paleo thing, and believe me it was tough today because I had NO free time to cook. Today has been CRAZY busy!!! Taught two Tonergy classes, (starting at 6am, so NOT a morning person!) had hours of meetings with my Tonergy partners, and worked a 7 hour shift at my other job. And that is all after getting hardly any sleep the night before. Needless to say, I feel very accomplished, but totally exhausted! And I think I deserve brownies. So brownies it will be! I found this recipe for paleo brownies and decided to try it out. I've made healthy brownies before, a different recipe, and they they turned out disgusting. So my hopes weren't too high. But you know what? These brownies turned out rather delicious! Maybe because it's been 4 days since my last chocolate splurge and I'm desperate for anything, but I really truly liked them! I totally recommend you try them! This is my first baking experience with coconut oil, so I don't know if this is normal, but my batter had a really weird, chunky texture. It happened when I added the cocoa powder to the coconut oil. But the taste and texture of the finished product was fine, so I'm not too worried about it. Honestly my biggest issue has been to not eat the whole pan! Even though there's nothing bad in them, I'm sure eating all of them in one go isn't a good idea! These brownies would be so good topped with fruit; like raspberries, strawberries, or bananas! 

Yummy!

Food Log:

Breakfast: Banana

Lunch: Repeat of dinner last night, the burger with the onions, tomato, and eggs (had to use up the meat, and like I said, it was pretty good!)

Snack: Orange slices

Dinner: Repeat of Day 1 dinner because I was at work again. Grilled chicken with mushrooms, bacon, avocado, salsa, and a huge side of broccoli. Prepared with no butter, of course. 

Snack: More orange slices

Snack: Handful of raspberries, unsalted cashews, and walnuts (hand to munch on something while I baked!)

Dessert: A piece of brownie...it was kind of a big one :)

I know my food has been a little repetitive, sorry about that! I've been so busy I haven't had time to be creative. But tomorrow I will be trying out a new recipe, so stay tuned!

Day 3: Truly Commit Yourself

So sorry I got a bit behind on my posts! It's been a busy couple of days. Day 3 was my first day on the diet where I had to travel out of town for a few hours, bringing me a bit of a challenge, and later, an epiphany. The challenge was finding Paleo friendly snacks that I could eat while driving. I'll give you a bit of a background for this story. I have the absolutely wonderful job of being a personal trainer and business partner at Operation Tonergy! Tonergy is a group fitness program here in Southern Utah, we cater to small towns in the area. We are pretty awesome! You should check us out! Learn more about us here. So today I had to travel to a couple of towns to teach classes. They are an hour away from where I live, and believe me when I say there is NOTHING between Cedar (where I live) and these towns. Zip. Zilch. Nada. Nothing but rolling hills of dessert and deer who like to run out onto the road. One of the towns has a gas station. The other one actually has a Subway...and 2 gas stations! Kind of a big deal. The round trip takes a little over 4 hours, and as you can imagine, finding food is a little difficult. And I prefer to eat something every 2-3 hours, fast metabolism. Hungry person here. Typically I pick up a foot long at Subway for the journey, but that's not really an option right now-it's not exactly a Paleo friendly establishment! And being that I ate leftovers for lunch, I didn't have a Paleo meal laying around. So random snacks it is! I grabbed my trusty family-sized bag of raw almonds, a banana, some baby carrots, and blackberries and called it good. Look at me, being all healthy! While chomping on almonds as I drove to Minersville, I contemplated on what a terrible eater I have been in the past. I always buy healthy food...and it always goes bad sitting in the fridge because I never eat it. You know how it is. You search the fridge and kitchen cupboards in vain looking for something to eat. You're past the point of caring what you put in your mouth, you just need something, anything! And all you have are apples, and bananas, and all that healthy crap, and who wants to eat that when you are starved?! So Roberto's run for a breakfast burrito it is! Fail. And now there I was, actually eating the healthy food I bought! Go me! It's amazing how, when you TRULY COMMIT YOURSELF, you can overcome bad habits (light bulb moment, epiphany time!) Make up your mind that fries and burgers and pizza are not an option, and all of a sudden they won't be. My challenge to you is make make that commitment! Finally decide, once and for all, that you are going to do it! You are going to eat healthy! It's all in your mind, you just have to decide it's something you want! Good luck! 

Food Log:

Breakfast: Green smoothie with spinach, kale, banana, almond butter, almond milk, honey

Snack: Blackberries

Lunch: Spaghetti squash and meat sauce leftovers

Snack: Almonds, banana, blackberries, and carrot sticks

Dinner: 93% lean ground beef burger topped with sauteed onions (cooked with coconut oil),   tomatoes, and 2 fried eggs (so random, I know! I was STARVING when I got home                 and wanted the fastest thing possible. It was actually pretty good though!)

Dessert: 1 square of 85% dark chocolate   

Day 2: Getting Organized

Something you should know about me: I'm the worst procrastinator ever! I should of organized my recipes earlier. I should of made my shopping list days ago. And I certainly should gone shopping before today! But alas, I didn't. And all is well that ends well! So today I got myself organized! I spent a couple hours going through recipes and working on my shopping list. Thank heavens for Pinterest! Seriously though, how did we ever survive without it?! This blog was most helpful to me today. After getting organized I hit the store. I'm a fan of Wal-Mart, judge me all you want. But eating healthy ain't always cheap, and this trip was no exception. I did use my my reusable bags though. Because I care about the environment like that. And I am sick to death of plastic bags everywhere. Here's the bounty I came home with:

Limes, grapefruit, oranges, spaghetti squash, pomegranate, chicken legs,
coconut oil, almond flour, walnuts, 93% lean ground beef, 85% dark chocolate,
coconut milk (full fat), almond butter, apples, carrots, sweet potatoes, cilantro,
bananas, broccoli, and garlic

This trip cost me just over $67. That includes a few dollars for magic erasers and a pipe declogger thing. Spoiler alert: bathtub is getting cleaned tonight! The almond flour was the pricey splurge. Over $10 for that little guy! Good thing the recipe only calls for a small amount of it. I don't know how some people can afford to shop at higher end grocery stores when following this diet. Kudos to you if you can! While we are on the subject of price I should point out that, if you are strictly sticking to Paleo protocol, the produce should be organic and the meat grass fed. But I really like having money in my bank account. Unfortunately Wal-Mart didn't have everything I needed and I had to run over to the much pricier local nutrition store.  

Coconut flour, tapioca flour, and dairy-free chocolate chips

Total was $18. It might be more expensive, but I love that store, and I can tell I'm going to be spending a lot of time there this month! They were out of unsweetened coconut flakes, so it'll be sooner rather than later because they are essential to a recipe I really want to try out! 

So there you have it: All organized and ready to cook up some healthy deliciousness! 

Here's my food log:

Breakfast: 3 eggs scrambled with 1 slice of bacon, tomatoes, red onion, jalapenos, and topped                    with avocado

Snack: Handful of raspberries and blackberries

Lunch: Shake with 1 banana, spoonful of almond butter, spinach, kale, little bit of honey, and              almond milk

Dinner: Spaghetti squash* with Classico Traditional Sweet Basil tomato sauce mixed with                       some ground beef and onion. I ate a lot of it. I was hungry after teaching back to 

              back kickboxing classes!

Snack: Lots more berries and some unsalted cashews

I feel like I ate more but I can't remember. That is what I get for being lazy and not writing everything down. I'll do better tomorrow, I promise. I also took an energy supplement that is packed with B vitamins. It gave me tons of energy, and I felt great all day! Best news, no crash! My friend is the creator/developer, and I can tell you firsthand that this company makes a top quality product. Check it out here. It's the V3 supplement.  
*I'll further discuss this in a later blog, but just so you know, strictly speaking squashes are not really considered to be paleo. But they're not considered to be bad either. It's confusing.

Have a wonderful day!