sneakers or flip flops?

Day 3, we still had some leftover sides, but not enough for both of us. So we decided to do grilled veggies and chicken. I cant believe I didnt take a photo of this, so this is photo-less post…

Chicken - No recipe here. We used the really flat chicken breast fillets and some lemon-pepper seasoning and cooked them in olive oil in the iron skillet on the stove. Again these cooked pretty quick since they were so thin.

Grilled Vegetables – This is a side dish we always make, Paleo Diet or not. This is the first time I was allowed to put mushrooms in it though! (Kevin hates them, but he said he’d pick them out). Recipe below:

• Yellow Squash, sliced
• Zucchini, sliced
• Red Onion, chopped in large pieces
• Green Bell Pepper, chopped in large pieces
• Baby Bella Mushrooms, sliced
• Olive Oil
• Fresh Rosemary, chopped
• Garlic Powder
• Salt & Pepper

1. Move oven rack to highest position for best broiling.
2. Toss all of the above in a bowl, coating evenly.
3. Spread vegetables out on a cookie sheet (or 2) and place on the top rack. Turn oven to Broil on High, and leave the oven door cracked open.
4. Every 10 minutes, flip vegetables and move around in oven if necessary. Should take about 30 minutes total to cook. These come out looking and tasting like they were grilled!

We had plenty of Sweet Potato Casserole and Broccoli Salad leftover, so we just made Coconut Chicken to go along with it. This was really tasty to me, and I squeezed a little fresh lime juice on top just before eating. We used coconut flour instead of almond flour, just because we didnt have any. We also had really thin chicken breast fillets, so they cooked pretty fast, which was nice. Cooking with coconut oil really make the house smell nice the day after too.

I really wanted to try some baking with the coconut flour and found a recipe for Coconut Walnut Bread. I hesitate even putting a link to this recipe here because it was a disaster. I followed this recipe exactly, except I used chopped dates instead of figs and I used pecans instead of walnuts. After mixing the dry ingredients and wet ingredients separately, it was time to combine them. I think I read somewhere that coconut flour absorbs alot of liquid compared to wheat and almond flour… so the batter never became batter consistency. We added 2 cups of water to help smooth it out, and it just didnt do anything. I also noticed that the recipe never told me to put in the nuts, so we folded those in just before pouring into a loaf pan and baking. What came out was a hot, powdery mess.

What I learned was to only use recipes that have comments, and if the website looks bad, the recipe may be bad too.

Chicken Apple Sausage – We found some chicken sausages at the farmers market, and they had apple pieces in it! They were really delicious, but not a really strong or overpowering “sausagey” taste. Kevin cooked these, so I don’t know what he did and dont have a recipe. All I know is that they were done in an iron skillet on the stove top. He tried to cook them slowly so that they wouldn’t stick to the pan or break the casing, but they started to anyway, so he put some water in there to almost boil them.

Sweet Potato Casserole - We eat sweet potatoes all the time, so this was just a new way to cook them. This was really good, and made for great leftovers as well. The taste is really pure, and the first few bites are great. Then the more you eat, the blander it starts to taste. But it was good enough to make again.

Broccoli Salad – This was delicious! We ended up using organic mayonnaise with no added sugar instead of making our own, and we didnt use as much as the recipe called for. I dont like mayo, so at first I thought the mayo taste was a little strong. However, eating leftovers the next day, the mayo taste was gone, and this was actually much better tasting.

Kevin & I are going to try the Paleo Diet for 30 days. Everyone we’ve talked to so far has said things along the lines of “Diet? What for! You dont need to lose any weight!” I’m not really trying to lose weight, I just want to look more tone and lean, and this diet is going hand in hand with regular workouts that Kevin has helped me put together. We took our body fat measurements as well as other measurements, and I think it will be pretty interesting to see how things change in 30 days.

Anyway, the hardest part will be cutting out bread and cheese. I think the more exciting part is trying out new recipes and foods that fall within our guidelines. Apparently everyone who has tried, or is currently on a Paleo Diet plan has their own rules. Im probably forgetting things, but basically, we are sticking to meat, vegetables, fruits, nuts (not legumes!), no grains, no seeds, no cheese, full fat dairy is okay from grass-fed cows, unsweetened almond milk is okay, no added salt, no sugar, no agave nectar or raw honey (which some people say is okay). There are some alternatives that we’re finding that should make cooking interesting for sure. Im going to try some baking with coconut flour and coconut oil. I plan on posting the meals we cook so that I can remember which ones I like, and which ones are not so great. So… thats my next 30 days. Apparently carb-withdrawl makes you cranky and tired for the first week or two, we’ll see…