Bison + Bacon = Love

Very recently I started eating red meat.  I haven’t had a full on steak yet, but I’ve been eating bison and I like it…. I like it a lot!  Bison is very lean, so if you’re going to make ground bison you need to add some fat into the pan.  I could have made bison burgers, but throwing everything in a pan was just easier.  This meal was delicious.

Ingredients

• 1 package ground bison
• 4 strips bacon
• 1 leek  (onion will work too)
• 1 celery stalk
• 10 brussel sprouts (more if you want them on the side like I did)
• sea salt/ pepper to taste
• avocado/ salsa on the side

 

Directions

Cut the strips of bacon into about 4 pieces each strip and put in a frying pan.  Chop the leek and celery, add to the pan along with the ground bison.  Cook on medium heat for 15ish mintues or until it looks done. 

* While this is cooking, boil the brussel sprouts in water for 8 min.  Once done boiling, chop them into fourths and add to the meat frying pan.

Put on a plate and add sea salt/ pepper/ avodaco/ salsa to taste. 

So easy! 

Spicy ground turkey and veggie randomness

Randomness seems to be my favorite word right now.  It decsribes almost every aspect of my life, and I’m 100% ok with it.  In fact I cherish it, because I know one day I won’t have the freedom to live a fairly random life.  Don’t get me wrong, I still have a full 9-5 corporate job that is 100% NOT random, but outside of that, life is gooood.

I had some random vegetables and spices I just wanted to use up, this recipe is everything combined in a pan and it was awesome.  

Ingredients

• 1 package ground turkey (lean, extra lean, whatever you like)
• 1 cup mushrooms
• 1 can green chilies
• 2 stalks of celery
• ½ onion
• 1 can diced tomatoes
• ½ jalapeno
• Taco seasoning packet (optional- I used the one from TJ’s)
• Avocado 

Directions:

Chop the onion and celery and sauté in pan with some olive oil for a few minutes.  Add ground turkey and lightly brown.  Add everything else and cook for about 20 min on med heat.  Put this all in a bowl, add some slices of avocado and enjoy! 

Note:  You can really add in ANY vegetables/ spices you have on hand and need to use up.  Extra lean ground turkey doesn’t have as much flavor as just “lean” ground turkey, but because you add so many flavors to this dish, it will work fine.  This makes a ton of leftovers to add in your eggs or just eat out of a bowl again. 

 

White chocolate chip macadamia nut coconut cookies

I went to a BBQ at a friend’s house this weekend and I felt the urge to bake cookies.  Haven’t baked sweets in a while since I don’t want to eat them, but I miss it. 

I’ve noticed that when I go to a BBQ most people just bring chips, a pre made veggie platter or something else store-bought, and I am not a fan of that.  I wish more people took the time (and had the time) to make side dishes and desserts, it tastes so much better.  I brought these cookies and no one could eat just 1, and that makes me very happy!   These cookies are seriously good.

White chocolate chip macadamia nut coconut cookies

• 1 bag White Chocolate Chips
• 1 cup butter, softened
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 cup brown sugar, packed
• 2 large eggs
• 2 teaspoon(s) vanilla
• 3 cups unsifted flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup macadamia nuts, chopped
• 1/2 cup sweetened coconut flakes 



Directions
Heat oven to 350ºF.

In large mixing bowl, beat butter with sugar and brown sugar at medium speed until creamy and lightened in color. Add eggs and vanilla, one at a time. Mix on low-speed until incorporated. Gradually add in the flour, baking soda ,and salt.  Stir in nuts, white chocolate chips, and coconut. Drop by tablespoon onto ungreased cookie sheets. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes or until golden brown.  *10 minutes was the perfect time if you like them a little chewy.

Apple Crisp- Paleo style

Yesterday was a baking kind of day.  You know that kind of day where it is cold and foggy outside, and you have absolutely nothing to do?  That was my day.  I was also craving sugar but wanted to eat healthy and luckly I saw this apple crisp post by a friend so I decided to give it a try.  The only thing I would do next time is add walnuts and raisins in with the apple mixture that goes on the bottom of the pan, I think this would make it crunchier and sweeter.

 Ingredients:

 ‎5 baking apples- gala, brabeurn etc..
4 strong dashes cinnamon 

 3 strong dashes nutmeg
Lemon juice from 1 lemon
2 cups almond meal
1/2 cup diced up walnuts or flaxseed
1/2 cup shredded unsweetened coconut
1/3 cup grapeseed oil
3 tbls honey

 

Directions:  Peel and slice apples, mix with lemon juice, cinnamon & nutmeg to taste. Layer in baking dish.  In seperate bowl mix almond meal, walnuts, coconut flakes, grapeseed oil, and honey in a bowl until crumbly, put on top of the apples. Bake at 350 for 40 min, let cool for 10 min.

Meatza!

Meatza in one word:  A m a z i n g.   I am the kind of girl that  likes to eat meat!  It really is my favorite, so  I had some girlfriends over for dinner and made this and they all loved it, it truely is ammaazzing.

Meatza tastes just like pizza, but it has no grains and no dairy!  If your going Paleo, this is a great recipe (although the pizza sauce is not 100% paleo- sorry)

Recipe adapted from SweetCheeksHQ.com

Ingredients

1 lb ground hamburger (I used ground turkey)

 1 lb sweet italian sausage (squeezed out of its casings)

1 teaspoon sea salt

½ teaspoon pepper

1 teaspoon red chili flakes

2 teaspoons oregano

1 can TJ’s (Trader Joe’s) pizza sauce

Meatza toppings (mushrooms, onion, peppers, olives etc…)

Directions:  Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Mix the ground turkey , sausage, salt, pepper, oregano and garlic powder, and red chili flakes together.  Use your hands and just mush it all. 

Spread the meat out on a cookie sheet or mold into whatever shape desired. Make sure the meat is spread fairly thin, but without holes and round the edges up to make a crust, about 1 ” thick is good.  Cook in the oven for 10 minutes.

While your meatza is cooking, get your toppings ready- chop them or do whatever you need to do. 

 

When the Meatza is done cooking, take it out of the oven and pour the pizza sauce on top, then top with your veggies and stick back in the oven for 5 minutes.

 

Enjoy!

Pork loin and cabbage

You may have noticed this huge, gigantic, scary looking thing in the first plow to porch box I received…  a full head of CABBAGE!  Yikes!  I had to figure out some way to eat this baby since I’ve never cooked cabbage before and I’m not going to just throw it out.  Honestly, I was not excited about this… it’s cabbage for crying out loud. 

I decided to steam, then saute it in a pan with olive oil and black pepper.  It came out kind of mushy, but as left overs it’s actually quite good because it hardens back up. 

Pork Loin:

2 lbs pork loin

sea salt, pepper, olive oil, rosemary, thyme, garlic

Directions:  Preheat the oven to 350.  Line a baking dish with foil and spray with non stick spray.  Cover the pork loin in everything listed above (eyeball the amounts and put however much you like)  Place the pork loin in the pan and place in the oven for about 60 to 75 min.  This is a very simple recipe that takes little time and you end up with a ton of left overs.  Good stuff!

I served this with zucchini sautéed with olive oil, sea salt, and pepper and the cabbage. 

 

Tandoori chicken & curry cauliflower “rice”

This recipe is awesome.  I’ve made it about a dozen times and I still love it.

Paleo Tandoori Chicken

**Marinate over night so prepare a day early**

3 lbs of boneless/skinless organic chicken breast

1/2 C Coconut Milk

2 tablespoon lemon juice

1 tablespoon finely chopped or crushed ginger (I leave this out)

1 tablespoon ground cumin

1 teaspoon ground coriander

1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom

1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper

1 teaspoon sea salt

Olive oil for brushing

Fresh cilantro and red onions for garnish (optional)

Directions:  Poke the chicken with a fork and score the top with a knife. Mix up all the ingredients and combine with chicken in a zip lock bag or shallow dish. Marinate overnight.

Next day:  Preheat oven to 375. Put chicken on a rack within a pan and brush olive oil on top. Cook for about 30-40 minutes or until chicken juices run clear when cut with a knife. While its cooking make the curry “rice”

Cauliflower Curry Rice

1 med head cauliflower

1/2 teaspoon ground curry

1 green onion – finely chopped

dash of cayenne pepper, sea salt, ground black pepper

1 Tablespoon olive oil

Directions: Finely chop cauliflower, discarding stem pieces. Add 1 tablespoon olive oil to a hot pan and stir-fry the stuff, add the seasonings and green onion too.

Cooking takes about 5 min

Plate it and serve the chicken with any marinade you have left over (make sure to reheat on stove until hot)

Enjoy!

Plow to Porch

Recently I signed up for Plow to Porch (http://plowtoporchorganics.blogspot.com) which is a service that delivers you a box of fresh, in season, local produce from the farmer’s in your area.  I signed up for the small box every other week.  This means I get to try things I would normally not buy, and I have more free time instead of trying to make it to the farmer’s market during the week, looking for parking etc.  This service is AWESOME!  They also provide you with a weekly recipe that incorporates some of the food in your box.  I am so happy I have finally signed up for this! 

This week I received:

1 pint raspberries

1.5 lbs apricots

1 lb red cherries

2 avocados

1 head green leaf lettuce

1 lb broccoli

1 green cabbage

1.5 lb zucchini

1 green garlic

1 bunch thyme

Flower cake with chocolate ganache and chocolate-mallow filling

Hello hello, and how is everyone doing today?  I’m doing great, although I am sad to say that today is my last cake decorating class (level 1).  Once again I spent my lunch hour rushing home to prepare the buttercream frosting for class 🙂  I can’t seem to prepare enough ahead of time.   This cake I made using a box because I was busy studying for a class and was in a hurry (what’s new!?)  Between two of the layers is a dark chocolate whipped ganache, and the middle layer is a mixture of semi sweet chocolate chips, marshmallows, and heavy cream (which kept it from becoming too hard for a filling).  It tastes gooood!

Flower cake with chocolate ganache and chocolate-mallow filling

Ingredients:

1 box yellow or white cake mix (or chocolate, whatever you want)

Apple sauce

8oz dark chocolate (I used the kind you buy as a 1lb block from TJ’s)

8 oz semi sweet chocolate

1 handful of mini marshmallows

1 cup + 2 tblsp heavy cream

Directions:  Prepare cake as directed on back of box mix however, substitute apple sauce for the oil (it comes out great, more moist, less fat!).  Cool on wire rack.  Ganache:  Break up 8oz of the dark chocolate and put into glass mixing bowl.  Heat 1 cup of the heavy cream in the microwave (2 min or less), then add the hot cream to the chocolate pieces and incorporate until all chocolate is dissolved.  Put ganache in the fridge to cool down.  Once cool, take out of fridge and reheat in microwave for about 20 sec, and whip with a mixer to make it a bit more fluffy.  Chocolate-mallow filling:  Put the 8oz of chocolate chips in a microwave safe bowl and heat until melted (don’t burn them, heat at 30 sec intervals until melted) add in marshmallows and the cream and stir with spoon.

Cake layers:  Cut your cake so that you have a bottom, a top, and two more layers in between, so if you made 2 round cakes then cut both of them in half.  Put on a hard piece of card board and top with a layer of chocolate ganache, then top with another layer of cake.  Add the chocolate-mellow to the top of this layer, top with another piece of cake, then more chocolate ganache on this, then add the final cake layer to the top.  Now you are ready to frost!

Frosting the cake:  Prepare buttercream frosting and a crumb frosting.  A crumb frosting is just buttercream frosting watered down.  Lightly coat your entire cake with the crumb frosting and let sit for about an hour.  This helps to get rid of crumbs that pop up when you go to frost your cake.

Next- frost your cake, and now it’s ready to be decorated!

Now to add a basket weave…  (use medium consistency icing)

Then a shell border and green leaves (icing- medium consistency for shells, soft with piping gel for leaves)

Ok, now arrange your flowers on your cake.  I used drop flowers in orange and roses we made the previous week in class.

TA DA! 

 

I passed level 1, woot woot! 

Meatloaf and brussel sprouts with bacon!

I recently discovered I love brussel sprouts!  Who knew!?  My parents never made me eat them since my mom didn’t like the taste, so I’ve gone almost 27 years having never eaten a brussel sprout!  I tried one recently and loved it, so I was on a mission to make some for dinner. 

Last night for dinner I made a turkey meatloaf covered with a paleo bbq sauce (the ones sold in stores have tons of sugar/ salt and other things we don’t need to be eating) and a side of brussel sprouts with bacon.  This entire meal was delicious and made tons of leftovers which I use everyday for lunch. 

  

Paleo BBQ Sauce (recipe modified from www.livestrong.com)

Ingredients:

• 1 cup Orange Juice, Raw
• 2 tbsp Red Wine vinegar
• 1 can organic tomato paste (I used Trader Joe’s)
• 4 tbsp shallots
• 1 tbsp crushed garlic
• 1 tsp Dijon mustard
• 1/2 tsp Paprika
• 1/2 tsp Sea Salt
• 1 tsp Ground Black Pepper
• 1 tbsp Olive Oil

Directions:  Finely mince 1/4 cup shallot and garlic cloves and sauté in olive oil until soft.  Stir in remaining ingredients and simmer over low heat for 15-20 minutes with a cover on.  Make sure to stir every 5 min or so.

 

Paleo Meatloaf (recipe modified from www.everydaypaleo.com)

Ingredients:

• 1 diced red onion
• 2 lbs of grass fed ground beef (I used 2+ lbs of ground turkey)
• 1 cup almond meal
• 2 eggs
• 1 can tomato paste
• 1 tbsp crushed garlic
• 1/2 tbsp sea salt
• 2 tbsp dried basil (I used rosemary and oregano instead)
• 1 tsp marjoram (left this out since I didn’t have it)
• black pepper to taste

Directions:  Mix all ingredients by hand in a large mixing bowl. Place meat mixture into a large glass baking pan and form into a loaf (I used a big loaf pan and it worked perfect).  Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour (I had to cook it for 1.5 hrs) or until meat is no longer pink in the middle.  About ½ way through cooking time, take meatloaf out and top with ½ of the Paleo BBQ sauce, then put back in oven.

 

Brussel Sprouts with Bacon (recipe courtesy of www.everydaypaleo.com)

Ingredients:

• 1 lb Brussel Sprouts
• 6 cooked and diced bacon strips (I used only 2 strips and it was enough bacon for me)
• 1 tbsp dried dill weed (I left this out)
• olive oil to taste
• black pepper to taste

Directions:  Steam brussel sprouts for 4 minutes and quarter.  Mix with all other ingredients, spread evenly in a glass baking dish (I used a pie pan and it came out great) and bake at 350 for 20 minutes.  Stir once half way through cooking time.

Forgot to take pics, so these posted are of the food a day old, whoops!