What Are You Going to Season That With? Uhhh, Bacon!!! Duh!

It has been an incredibly long and trying week and it is only Thursday! I feel like I'm pushing my body right over the limit physically in the gym and mentally at work. And gearing up for running 10 miles, when I currently don't even run 1 at a time which is emotionally draining every single day. Did I mention I'm running a tough mudder in May? Luckily I've had some awesome support in that department, thanks Ellen and Dahlia! So the point I'm trying to get at is that I am not creating anything for you guys this week since all my energy is going into my work and workouts! I am really sorry! But that doesn't mean I'm going to leave you high and dry.

I downloaded a great App called Fast Paleo a while ago and I regularly search that for good dinner ideas. This week I made something I found on there that was posted by eileenio. It is a bacon stuffed chicken breast. Well, the decision to make that was easy enough: Did someone say bacon!?!?!? Aaaand the only thing I needed to buy for it was carrots! Imagine that! I did modify the amount of the ingredients some, but it's still the same ingredients as the original. And it's unbelievably easy!

Here's the breakdown:

2 chicken breasts
2 large carrots
3/4 to 1 small onion
1.5 cups pecans
1lb center cut bacon
pepper

Pre-heat your oven to 375 degrees. Cut each chicken breast in half horizontally to make two thin breasts/cutlets. Then cover the chicken with a gallon size Ziploc bag and pound out the pieces. Most people use a kitchen mallet, I used a hammer! You say tomato, I say tomaaaato! Anyway, get them pretty thin. Then put everything else, but the bacon, in a food processor and pulse until it is almost paste consistency. Put the "stuffing" lengthwise down the middle of each chicken piece and wrap the sides of the chicken around it. Then wrap the whole darn thing with bacon. This should take about 2-3 pieces of bacon per chicken. Place the happy meats on an oven rack on a baking sheet so that the fat from the bacon will drip off the food and onto the pan. Bake for 35 minutes. Then place the chicken under the broiler until brown/crisp on both sides (this means flip them over). I then patted off the cooked chicken on paper towel just to get rid of any extra grease.

I served this with a green salad and roasted brussel sprouts. It was a really great meal, mostly because of the bacon, but the filling was really really yummy too. In fact, I took the left over filling, added an egg, dry sage and fresh time and baked it in muffin tins. That was really yummy too!

Well, I know it's not my own creation, but it definitely wasn't disappointing! Now I guess I need to get my butt outside for a run!

Salud!

West Coast BLT Po' Boy

When I was a kid we did very little eating out. We didn't have elaborate meals every night, but we just didn't go out because there was no time or someone was tired. To be fair to all of us that work hard and have a million things going on, my mom didn't work until I was about 15 so feeding us was important to her. Again, however, it wasn't always roasts and big meals that took all day to prepare. In fact, we ate sandwiches pretty regularly. Sometimes it was because there was leftover picnic ham from a bigger meal and sometimes it was just a good old BLT! I'm not sure if you folks know how I feel about bacon, so I'll clear it up! Bacon makes EVERYTHING better. I used to feel guilty about eating it, but I've gotten over that. In my opinion a small amount of bacon is better for me than an english muffin or bowl of pasta, so I'm over beating myself up about eating it. And frankly, I don't mess with turkey bacon. It's not bacon, it's just not. You will not change my mind on that. So I had a hankerin for some bacon and a mess of leftover frozen shrimp. That's when I decided I would make a cross between a BLT and a Po' Boy. What came of it was something truly delicious but super simple! Josh and I were in bacon euphoria!

West Coast BLT Po'Boy

Here's the breakdown:

About 1lb raw shrimp, tail off
3/4 lb center cut bacon
Campari tomatoes, sliced
Romaine lettuce
Old Bay 
Coconut oil spray
1 avocado
2 Tbsp Paleo Mayo
*If you're not paleo, just use regular
2 Tbsp finely diced onion
Meyer lemon juice
*Regular lemons are fine, but Meyer lemons are in season and I adore them
garlic powder
cayenne pepper
s&p

Fry or bake your bacon until crispy. Pat off the cooked bacon with a paper towel and chop it up into large bits. While the bacon is cooking start the avocado sauce. Put one ripe avocado and the mayo in a mini food processor. Blend it until it's completely smooth. Add 1/2 a Meyer lemon's juice and blend again. Transfer that to a bowl and add onion, a sprinkle of garlic powder, s&p and a small small amount of cayenne pepper. Put plastic wrap on the surface of the sauce and store in the refrigerator until you need it. Not for days mind you, the avocado will start to oxidize and turn brown. Then make sure your shrimp are thawed completely and dried off with no tail. I like when I get good grill marks on them and that won't happen if they're a bit damp. Sprinkle them with a generous amount of Old Bay seasoning. Get your grill screaming hot. I did this on my indoor grill and I actually liked it better especially since I didn't have to put them on skewers.  Spray your grill with coconut oil spray and put the shrimp on. Flip them over about 3 minutes into cooking if you're doing it on the indoor grill. If you're skewered them and are grilling outside you'll need less time. I used Romaine lettuce as my vessel for everything. So on the lettuce, I stacked up the tomatoes, sauce, shrimp and bacon bits and wrapped them up! Josh put his on a bun, but honestly even if I did eat wheat, I wouldn't have this time because all the flavors popped and I think the bread would have outweighed a really delicious mix of flavors. He did love it though, so I don't know.

This was a light meal that was creamy, spicy, salty, smokey and fresh all at the same time. I highly recommend you try this one and even if you eat wheat, try it without, I think you'll be happy you did.

Salud!

Go Go Go!!!!

It was going to be a hectic week. Two night meetings, two late evening workouts and one super early bootcamp, a walk through the new condo, plus getting ready to head to Vermont. So on Sunday, despite the fact that my entire body hurt, I knew I needed to get food ready for the week. When I say my whole body hurt, I am not exaggerating. On Saturday sweet Jackie from the gym and I took a gymnastics class. Let me remind you that I am 30 and that equals to 13 years out of practice. I thought that because I'm so much stronger and in better shape than ever before that it wouldn't be a problem. This makes me laugh at how wrong I was as I sit here typing! It may have felt ok at the time, but as each hour passed various parts of my body started to get sore. By mid day I was in pain head to toe. Good pain, but pain nonetheless. What I will say, is that gymnastics is a little like riding a bike and according to the instructor "muscle memory is an amazing thing". True dat sista love! In fact, during the open gym portion, round off handsprings came very easily and I managed to get the courage up to try standing tucks with her spotting of course. Gymnastics is half ability and half mental. So even though my old lady body was totally cooked on Sunday from it, I'm giving myself a huge pat on the back! Anyway back to cooking. I knew mornings were going to be rough for me this week since I'd be out late working and back up early. And you know I don't go without a pretty full breakfast, so I decided to pre-make some sausage balls that I could reheat in the mornings for quick breakfast. They weren't really breakfast sausage, but I don't really care if it's actual breakfast food at breakfast time. They turned out great and were super easy.

Here's the breakdown:

1 lb sweet italian sausage
1/2 - 3/4 cup dried cherries
1/2 medium union, diced small
2 ribs celery, diced small
1/2 cup almond flour
1 egg
1 tsp dried parsley
1/8 tsp Cardamom 
S&P
Coconut oil

In a skillet over medium-lowish heat sauté onions and celery in coconut oil. You won't need much oil. Stir them until they are soft. Pre-heat your oven to 400 degrees or if your oven runs hot like mine does, bring it down 25 degrees. Throw everything (minus oil) into a bowl. Then roll the mix into golf ball size or a bit smaller balls. Just make sure they're somewhat uniform in size so they cook in the same time. Ya don't want raw sausage ball! Ick! Bake these little beauts for about 25-25 minutes. You'll want to flip them over about half way through.

It absolutely astounds me how good these are! Josh was VERY SKEPTICAL when I added cardamom, but I think it worked perfectly with the cherries. Another successful risk! This recipe makes a bunch of them so just store them in your fridge, pop in the microwave for 1 minute and keep moving, just like I have done so far this week! Total lifesaver!

Salud!

NO to the PACKAGE!!!

Last Thursday I was completely worn out from cooking at home. I normally cook 3 sometimes 4 days in a row before I'm too tired and we either go out or Josh cooks something (don't laugh). So after cooking on Sunday night, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and last Wednesday, I was not exactly happy about cooking again last Thursday night. However, I had an itty bitty dress for New Year's Eve planned and I've been working too hard in the gym to be eating out three days before getting into it! But dinner absolutely had to be easy or my crank was really going to get out of control. So I grabbed a red pepper, yellow pepper, red onion and a carton of baby bello mushrooms for Mexican stir fry aka Fajitas. I had chicken breast thawed; now to just find the seasoning for it. I started shifting through the maze that is my spice cabinet and pulled out one of those Taco Seasoning packets by Old El Paso (Betty Crocker). I ALMOST mindlessly threw it in my food, but for some fabulous reason thought to check the ingredient list. You'll be interested to learn what I found....

Maltodextrin, salt, chili pepper, onion powder, spice, monosodium glutamate, corn starch, yellow corn flour, partially hydrogenated soybean oil, silicon dioxide, natural flavor, ethoxyquin.                 

Let's break this down real quick: 
Maltodextrin = Sugar derived from starch

Monosodium Glutamate....MSG yeah MSG

Corn Starch...Do we really need to add starch to our diets? I'm trying to get rid of it in mine!

Yellow Corn Flour...Again with the grain starch! Remember, this is seasoning....

Partially Hydrogenated Soybean Oil = Trans Fat

Silicon Dioxide...Long Story Short, Google it, I cannot even begin to completely comprehend this chemical compound

Ethoxyquin = Preservative

I think you see the point I'm trying to make. These are things I neither want, nor need in my body. But I do love some taco/fajita flavor. So I took the good things out of this little packet and what I got was terrific and worked the same way!

Meags' Taco Seasoning

1 Tbsp chili powder
1.5 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
1/4 tsp pepper
1/2 tsp cumin

The dinner I made with this was delish and I apologize for not having a picture.....I was staaaahvin and again, remember the crank! 

Healthier Taco Seasoned Fajitas

2 chicken breasts, sliced into thin strips
1 red bell pepper, sliced
1 yellow bell pepper, sliced
1 small onion, sliced
1 carton baby bellow mushrooms, sliced
Meags' Taco Seasoning
*Most of it, not the whole batch
Coconut oil
Splash of water

In one pan heat 1 Tbsp coconut oil over high and cook chicken strips through. In a separate pan heat 1 Tbsp coconut oil over high and cook all the veggies until softened, but not limp. Strain out the juice from the chicken and add to the veggies. Sprinkle most of the taco seasoning over the chicken veggie mix and stir well. Add a splash of water and stir/toss around until it's not cakey, more of a suace.....kind of. If you need to keep adding a little water at a time, no problem. I served this just with an itty bit of sour cream and pico de gallo on top. No tortillas, no starch! Woooo! It was so so so yummy and I'm feeling great aobut not having eaten all that random stuff in the packet! 

Try this out, might even do really well for dip!.......hmmmmm Maybe a future blog in the making!

Salud!

Brussel Bliss with a Side of Fish

I was surfing the meat counter at Whole Foods not too long ago since I'm regularly looking for products I've never seen before. Especially since I dazed out a this month and forgot to pick up my CSA from Stillman. So for the next month, I'll be getting meat elsewhere. But back to the meat counter...I was looking around and saw pancetta. Alright, so I know Italian folks are regularly cooking with this product, but if I'm being honest, I'm not even sure I've ever seen it in the store. So I decided I was going to figure out how to use it. I mean, it's just fancy bacon, right? Couldn't be too hard. I decided to go with brussel sprouts as the veg to go with it. Not a ton of thought went into this mostly because I love caramelized foods. So that's what I was going to do with all of the ingredients.

Here's the breakdown:

Pancetta and onions

2-3 cups brussel sprouts
1 onion
1/4 lb pancetta
s&p

Slice onions thinly. Dice pancetta into small pieces. Brown in a pan until fat renders. Add onions and turn heat to low. Sprinkle with a little salt and pepper and cook on low, stirring frequently until onions are caramelized. 30-45 minutes. Meanwhile, cut ends off brussel sprouts and quarter or half the sprouts. Turn heat to high, add sprouts. Here's the important thing. DO NOT TOUCH the brussels until they have browned on one side. You can check them by flipping the one in the middle of the pan. You want to get a good brown on one side of them. Sprinkle with pepper and serve.

I paired this dinner with mahi. Earlier in the week I made cookies for work that had almonds and coconut flakes (the big kind; not finely flaked or shredded). I decided to crust my mahi with those ingredients to make a nutty complex fish.

3 mahi fillets
2 cups coconut flakes
1 cup whole almonds
2 eggs
1 jar sugar free apricot preserves
1 Tbsp dijon mustard
coconut oil
s&p

Put the coconut and almonds in a food processor to thin it out a bit and put it in a gallon size Ziploc bag. Pat the fish dry with paper towel, whisk the eggs and dredge the fish in egg. Put the fish in the Ziploc bag and toss around pressing the coconut almond mixture into the fish so that it sticks. Heat about 2 Tbsp coconut oil in a pan over medium-high heat. Put fish in pan and cover 4-5 minutes or until that side is brown. Do not rush this by upping the heat or you'll have raw fish. Blech!!!! Flip your fish and cook until brown and cooked through. If you get the right brown and the fish isn't cooked, throw it in a 350 degree oven until it's cooked through. This won't take long. Put the apricot preserves and dijon mustard in a small sauce pan with a pinch of salt and heat through. Drizzle the sauce over the fish, add brussel sprouts to the plate and voila, a beautiful dinner! The sauce was particularly delicious and even Ray who refuses to eat salty and sweet together like it! The mustard really changed the profile of the preserves.

As a side note, make sure you're reading the label on the apricot preserves. I was able to find a brand that has fruit, apple juice and pectin. That's what you want, stay away from all that sugar that most brands add!

Salud!

Kentucky Mexico Collision

I grew up eating chicken salad. Not like greens with chicken on it. Like chicken with mayo in it. My mother made the literal best chicken salad any side of the Mason Dixon and that’s a fact. In fact, when I was a teenager, I worked in the country store we owned and when I tell you I made and sold about 900 pounds of chicken salad in any given week, I’m not totally exaggerating. Ask one of my oldest friends, Ash, who worked alongside me. I mean, to give you an idea, we would mix it up with gloved hands because no spoon/spatula/snow shovel could stand up to the mass quantity that was being made at any given time. And it’s not like we just made a ton and threw out the leftovers. People from all over the small town of Frankfort, Kentucky came out daily; ordering chicken salad every which way you can think of. My mom’s chicken salad only has breast meat, red grapes, celery and mayo in it. It’s simple and it’s delicious. I even requested it when she was planning the catering for our wedding. I guess you can take the girl out of the country, but you can’t take the country out of the girl. We may have also had whiskey barrels full of beer and sweet tea vodka, but that’s for a different blog!

So here’s the thing. I am a chicken salad addict. But I try not to eat too much mayo if I can help it, however much I may…do…love it. Additionally, the way we ate it back in the day was either on white bread or a croissant, neither of which appear in my diet these days. So I decided to make a version of chicken salad that would be yummy (not as yummy as my mom’s) but sans all the guilt I get from my mom’s version.

Here’s what I came up with, I hope you like it as much as I did.

Mexican Chicken Salad

2 chicken breasts

Grape tomatoes, diced roughly
1/2 green bell pepper, diced small

1 Jalapeno, minced

Handful Cilantro, chopped

1-2 Tbsp red onion, diced finely

Lime

Cumin

½ - ¾ cups Guacamole

*I use Wholly Guacamole brand

s & p

Lettuce

Cut chicken breasts in half horizontally to make thin cutlet-like shapes. Sprinkle each side of the chicken liberally with cumin. Grill on each side approximately 4 minutes or until cooked through. Let the chicken sit and cool. Meanwhile, dice up grape tomatoes, green pepper, jalapeno and red onion. In a food processor mince the jalapeno, but make sure to take out the seeds first, or don’t if you want it really spicy. Chop up the cilantro into a confetti-like consistency. Put everything in a bowl. Chop up half the chicken in a rough but small dice. The other half of the chicken should be chopped up very finely. Add the chicken to the bowl and mix in the guacamole until it has a “creamy” type of consistency. You want the pieces sticking together.  Then juice the lime over all of it, sprinkle with salt and pepper and mix thoroughly. Serve in lettuce cups.

Verdict? It’s not the same as my mom’s. But I never expected it to be. What it is; is a really yummy healthy alternative! Josh and I both really loved it and I know you will too!

Salud!

A Healthy Southerner's Paradise!!!

As I’ve mentioned….or rather driven home the point…..I am a southern girl. For those of you who are as well, you’ll probably agree with me when I say that it’s one of my favorite things about myself. Unfortunately, it produces a regular argument between my healthy me and my southern me with regards to food. But after a wildly flattering comment post Crazy 8’s this week, by one of my trainer’s other clients, I was revved upped to keep fit and find a way to make a southern meal healthy and happy!

As I’ve said before, I just don’t see the point of eating if it’s not delicious! This revised southern classic was not only delicious, but really cute too!

Here’s the Breakdown:

Turkey Meatloaf Muffins

½ lb ground turkey breast

½ lb ground turkey (regular)

1 egg

¼ onion, diced finely

½ green pepper, diced finely

1 ½ Portobello mushroom caps, diced small

Splash of Worcestershire sauce

2 tsp – 1 Tbsp Montreal Steak Seasoning

½ tsp crushed red pepper flakes

1 Tbsp dried parsley

½ tsp garlic powder

Coconut oil

Muffin Topper

½ lb center cut bacon

1-8 oz can tomato sauce

Worcestershire

Dried basil

Mix everything for the meatloaf muffins together. Grease the muffin tins with coconut oil and fill each cup with the meatloaf mix. You should have about 8 “muffins”.  Cut the bacon in half to make smaller pieces. Then microwave on paper towel for 3 minutes. Meanwhile, mix up the tomato sauce, Worcestershire and dried basil. Smash down the meat a little with a spoon. Spoon on the sauce, layer on a piece of bacon then spoon on a little more sauce. Bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes. If you like your bacon a little burnt/crispy like I do, turn up the heat to 450 degrees after 20 minutes. Make sure you put your muffin tins on a large baking sheet so that it doesn’t leak into your oven and smoke up. I learned this particular lesson the hard way.

Roasted Garlic Cauliflower Mash

1 head cauliflower

1 cup grass fed yogurt

10 cloves garlic

Olive oil

S&P

Before you start doing anything with the meatloaf, coat garlic with olive oil. Roast in the oven at 300 degrees for about 15 minutes until lightly browned and soft. Trim and boil the cauliflower for about 20 minutes or until soft. Mix in a food processor with yogurt and garlic. Mix in s&p to taste.

As far as the zucchini goes, I just sautéed it in a pan with a little oil and s&p.

The verdict? Soooo yum yum yummy!

I want to share a few of my tricks to healthing up this typically unhealthy meal. I learned that if you add Portobello mushrooms to meat, it serves as an expander but you can’t really notice that it’s not meat. This way you remove some calories with healthy veg! And it’s true, you would never know. I also replaced mashed potatoes with cauliflower. The Irish girl in me really struggles with this tough transition, but it was super and as my soul.train. friend Jackie mentioned when discussing the benefits of tequila, it’s Paleo! I used Traders Point Creamery yogurt to make them creamy, but felt great about the fact that Traders Point is grass fed dairy. You can get this brand at Whole Foods.

I hope you enjoy this as much as I did. One other score….totally portable leftovers, should you have any!