Whole30: Days 19 & 20

Day 19 

Meal 1: Sweet & Savory Blueberry Tortilla. It was so good that I had to make it again. It looks weird, but I promise that it is good! I left out the pepper this time. Made this on my way in from work. I was too hungry to go to bed without anything in my belly. 

Meal 2:Woke up hungry after sleeping all day, but it was too close to dinner for a full-fledged meal. Roast beef and a handful of almonds.

Meal 3: Salad with grilled chicken, capicola ham, pepperoni and salami. 

Day 20

Meal 1: 2 Aidells Chicken & Apple sausages, almonds and baby carrots

Meal 2: Leftover kitchen sink soup. 

Meal 3: Um well, we sorta went to Skyline. I stayed within the guidelines and did a potato with chili on it. Those 3 ways and coneys looked good though!

Whole30: Day 17 & 18

Day 17

Meal 1: Sauerkraut with 2 Aidells Chicken & Apple sausages

Meal 2: Tuna mixed with avocado, a couple tablespoons of homemade mayo & guacamole seasoning mix that I got at Findlay Market and fried plantains from Melissa Joulwan's blog The Clothes Make the Girl.  

Meal 3: Italian sausage with sauteed peppers and onions, Rao's marinara and zoodles. 

Day 18

Meal 1: Sweet & Savory Blueberry Tortilla from Stupid Easy Paleo. OMG this was AH-MAZING!! The picture totally looks gross. I think I cooked it a little too long. Also the tupperware is because I was saving the other half for the next day. Totally did not happen!

Meal 2: Kitchen Sink Soup. Made this one up on the fly. I was freezing and really wanted some soup to warm me up. I used leftover chicken stock that I had, added some potatoes, carrots, celery, onion, kale, oregano, thyme, black pepper, kosher salt and chicken. Delish!

Meal 3: My tuna-mayo-avo concoction

Meal 4: Leftover italian sausage, marinara and zoodles

Whole30: Days 15 & 16

Day 15

Halfway there! I can't believe that the 30 days is half over. I have definitely had fun trying new things and like I said, will continue to eat Paleo/Whole30 as much as I can. I do want to incorporate some diary back in - really just mainly butter because it's easier to cook with then making ghee or clarified butter. It would definitely still be grass-fed though. Also the occasional latte from Starbucks would be nice. 

Meal 1: Ground pork with breakfast sausage seasoning (from this recipe here - minus the sage because I didn't have any), topped with 2 fried eggs and one plantain sliced, sauteed in clarified butter and sprinkled with cinnamon. 

Meal 2: Irish sausage from Kroeger & Sons at Findlay Market (ah-mazing place if you live in Cincinnati!) and left over Skillet Chicken Divan (the last of it - finally!).

Meal 3: Dinner at my uncle's house. It was unavoidable to stay on Whole30 for this meal without being rude. It would have been awkward to bring my own food. I know most Whole30-ers would say that I should have done that, but I did not want to be that person. So I ate roasted turkey, scalloped potatoes, corn casserole and broccoli-cauliflower salad. I might have also eaten some delicious deviled eggs and nuts as "appetizers". It is what it is. 

Day 16

Meal 1: Leftover sausage and plantains from yesterday.

Meal 2: Must not have been that awesome because I don't remember! My daughter was sick this day so I'm pretty sure that lunch was something whipped up quickly.

Meal 3: Grilled chicken wings with this sauce (minus the Worchestershire and clarified butter instead of regular butter), oven fries and homemade ranch dressing (recipe to come!).  

Weekly Menu: October 19-25

WEEK 3!! I can't believe next week is the last week of Whole30. I've made the decision that I am going to do a modified Whole30/Paleo diet. I say this because Paleo doesn't really include squash as an "allowed" food, but I think squash is delicious and I don't really see a reason to leave it out. I'm definitely going to keep eating Whole30/Paleo as much as I can.

On a side note, I went out to lunch with hubby and our daughter this weekend. I have to admit that I cheated and ate a small piece of bread. It just looked so good and I know that this restaurant has yummy rolls. Um, yeah it tasted like glue. No joke. It's crazy how your taste buds change in just a couple of weeks. I seriously took a little nibble and had no desire to continue eating it!

Grilled Buffalo Wings

Ranch Dressing

Italian Sausage with Zoodles

Kielbasa with Sauerkraut

Herbed Chicken Salad

Whole30: Days 12-14

Day 12

Snack: Running out the door to take my daughter to school I ate 2 hard boiled eggs and a handful of almonds. I knew I was going to brunch with my sister so I didn't want to eat too much.

Meal 1: Market Hash (minus the cheese) from First Watch. I had brunch with my sister and cousin. It was delish! I obviously did not eat the english muffin on my plate. 

Meal 2: Leftover Skillet Chicken Divan

Meal 3: Orange Chicken with cauliflower rice -sooooo good! 

Day 13

Meal 1: I don't even remember! I'm sure it was eggs and some sort of veggie.

Meal 2: Oriental Chicken Salad - meh. needs a lot of work. I'm not sure I'm even going to post it until I rework it. The original recipe was either wrong or misleading.

Meal 3: Burger with guacamole, lettuce, tomato and pickles

Meal 4: Leftover Skillet Chicken Divan - eaten quickly at midnight or something. It was a long, long night at work.

Day 14 

Meal 1: 2 Hard boiled eggs, handful of macadamia nuts and some dried apricots. 

Meal 2: Omelet with local ham, mushrooms & onions and crunchy skillet potatoes

Meal 3: Antipasto Salad with capocolla ham, prosciutto, salami and grilled chicken.   

Orange Chicken

Overall, this was very good. I would make a few changes though - swap out the thighs with breasts. Unless you are really into thighs. Simmer the sauce longer until it's thicker OR maybe lightly coat the chicken in coconut flour? Not sure about the last suggestion. I'm not on the up-and-up with flour substitutes. Hubby ate it over white rice and I ate mine over cauliflower rice. Our 2 1/2 year old took a bite, but declared it "too spicy". Hubby doesn't like spicy stuff at all and he didn't think it was spicy so...  

Orange Chicken

adapted from Health-Bent

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cooking Time: 10-15 minutes

Servings: 2-3

Ingredients
1 lb. boneless, skinless chicken thighs, cut into small pieces
juice of 2 oranges
zest of 1 orange
1 tsp fresh ginger
3 TBS coconut amino (like soy sauce, but different - if using soy sauce 1/2 the amount)


Directions
In a small saucepan, combine the orange juice, orange zest, ginger and coconut aminos. Bring to a boil over high heat and then reduce it down to medium-low to simmer. It may take 10-15 minutes to thicken the sauce. While the sauce it thickening, saute your chicken in a couple of tablespoons of your fat (ghee, clarified butter, olive oil, coconut oil). Once the sauce has thickened, add it to your chicken and cook together for a few minutes, just enough time for it to soak into the chicken. Serve over rice, cauli-rice or your other favorite veggie (broccoli would be yummy!). 

Enjoy!

Skillet Chicken Divan

This was very good! I do have some changes that I would make - add paleo mayo, reduce the curry, add more broccoli. The flax meal on top was a nice addition and give it a good crunch. My 2 1/2 year old took a bite and like the broccoli, but I think the chicken had too much curry on it.

Skillet Chicken Divan

adapted from Popular Paleo

Prep Time: 30 minutes (plus overnight soaking)

Cooking Time: 20 minutes

Servings: 4-6

Ingredients

3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, diced

2 cups broccoli florets

1 cup raw cashews

cloves garlic

cup white or yellow onion, large dice

cup chicken stock

tsp kosher salt

1/2 tsp curry powder

1/4 tsp fresh black pepper

1/4 cup flaxseed meal

Directions

The night before you plan to make this, soak your cashews in 1 1/2 cups of water. Before you use them, just drain the water off. 

Add the soaked cashews, chopped onion, garlic cloves, curry, salt and black pepper to a food processor. Pulse it a few times to break up the cashews. Turn the food processor "on" and use the small feed tube to continuously stream the chicken stock into the cashew mix. Let it run for another minute or two after the chicken stock has finished streaming into the bowl. Set your sauce to the side.

Heat a skillet on medium high heat with olive oil, ghee or clarified butter (I used clarified butter). Once hot, put your chicken in the pan and cook until golden brown. Toss the broccoli on top, cover the pan, reduce heat to medium and cook for 3-4 minutes. 

Uncover and add the cashew-curry sauce to the chicken and broccoli. Simmer for 5-10 minutes, or until sauce thickens. 

Before serving, sprinkle the pan with the flax meal. 

Enjoy!

Whole30: Day 10 & 11

Chugging right along! I definitely feel like it's getting easier. I don't feel as overwhelmed by the prep. I do find that it is helpful to have a big batch of something to eat throughout the week. Today I made an Oriental Chicken Salad that I will eat for the next week or so. Since I prepped late this week because of my work schedule, some of my meals will probably run into next week. 

Day 10

Meal 1: Um can I count meal 4 from day 9? I didn't eat much this day because of my schedule. I got home at 10:30 am and slept until 4. We had dinner around 6. I did have a snack of an apple and a handful of cashews because I was hungry and stuck at my parents house waiting on a delivery for my dad. 

Meal 2: Grilled grass-fed filet mignon, baked sweet potato topped with ghee and cinnamon, and sautéed green beans drizzled with olive oil. 

Day 11

Meal 1: Scrambled eggs, sweet potato leftover from the night before and bulletproof coffee (ghee and MCT oil blended with coffee). The coffee sounds gross, but so yummy. I prefer butter to the ghee (it's too nutty) so I'll make a batch of clarified butter this week in hopes that it will be better. 

Meal 2: Leftover grass-fed filet mignon on lettuce leaves topped with guacamole and a side of steamed broccoli drizzled with olive oil. 

Meal 3: Skillet Chicken Divan 

Whole30: Days 8 & 9

Day 8

Meal 1: sautéed zucchini and steamed broccoli drizzled with olive oil - this was a couple of hours after the sausages before I went to the football game. 

Snack: Blueberry Muffin Larabar - ate this at the football game

Meal 2: Mom's Beef Chili with avocado

Meal 3: 2 Mulay's brats

Day 9
Meal 1: Scrambled eggs and oven roasted potato wedges with onions

Meal 2: Tuna mixed with homemade mayo and avocado & large salad with lemony dressing

Meal 3: 2 Aidells chicken & apple sausages and the remainder of the salad from meal 2.  

Weekly Menu: October 12-18

We are on to week 2! My first week of Whole30 was interesting. I noticed that I felt less stiff during this night when I got up to use the bathroom or first thing in the morning. I also have not taken any ibuprofen for my back since day 2! I don't know if this is placebo effect or what, but I think it's pretty crazy. Now the headaches have been pretty bad and I think that is mostly due to not eating enough carbs/starchy veggies. I also get the headaches when I haven't eaten in a while and have been too busy to eat. Can't wait for this week's meals!

Chinese Chicken Salad

Chili Garlic Sauce

Skillet Chicken Divan

Orange Chicken

Whole30: Day 7

The end of week 1!! Learned a lot this week. Dairy has been the hardest thing to kick for now. I love a coffee in the morning. My wallet is thanking me though. I learned that I love, love, love roasted sweet potatoes. So delish!

Meal 1: Sweet potato hash with sautéed spinach and mushrooms, topped with 2 poached eggs. 

Meal 2: 2 Mulay's brats (I know, I know - totally lacking veggies, but I was late getting back from the grocery and needed to get some food in before laying down for a nap)

Meal 3: Salad with grilled grass-fed burger and creamy avocado dressing. 

Meal 4: 2 Aidells chicken & apple sausages

Whole30: Days 3-6

So I've been busy with work and totally forgetting to take pictures of all my meals. So I'll recap them and post the pictures of the meals that I did take pics for. 

Day 3

I didn't get to eat much this day. I worked Monday night and then slept until 3:30 pm on Tuesday afternoon. 

Meal 1: 2 Simply Balanced Spinach & Garlic chicken sausages and a steamed broccoli drizzled with olive oil. 

Meal 2: large salad with lemony dressing

Day 4

I ended up working this day during day shift. What can I say? I like to mix things up a little. 

Meal 1: Scrambled eggs with avocado and boiled new potatoes drizzled with olive oil. This was kind of on the run. I ate the eggs at home, but the potatoes in the car. 

Meal 2: Curried Chicken Salad, baby carrots and a red pepper with guacamole as a dip. 

Meal 3: Chipotle! I got a salad with double carnitas, fresh tomato salsa (pico de gallo) and guacamole. 




Day 5

Meal 1: Scrambled eggs with avocado and sauteed green beans drizzled with olive oil. 

Meal 2: Zoodles (zucchini julienned to make "spaghetti"), Rao's Arrabbbiata sauce and Mulay's Mild Italian Sausage. I was craving some comfort food on a rainy day and this hit the spot! I steamed my zoodles in a Lekue steamer in the microwave. I used my peeler this time to julienne them, but I think the mandoline works a little better. 

Meal 3: Curried Chicken Salad and salad with lemony dressing

Meal 4: 2 Aidells Chicken & Apple sausages and a peach. At this point in the night I didn't want to mess with my veggies. Plus I was full from the sausages and the peach. This was to tide me over until I got up on Friday.

Day 6

Meal 1: Pulled pork, steamed veggie mix with ghee 

Meal 2: Grilled grass-fed beef burger with lettuce "bun", tomatoes and guacamole & oven baked "fries". 

Overall I think there were some good days. Even with prep I realized that I should have bought more quick prepare food since I am on the go so much. I often don't have a lot of time to make food in the morning. Meals at work need to be easy too. I feel a little more prepared now. I think this week might be easier. I definitely loved having the chicken salad prepared and ready for me to throw in a container to take to work. 

Curried Chicken Salad

This was delicious and I will definitely be making this again. Below in the recipe, there is a link for the paleo/Whole30 approved mayo. You use an immersion blender and it is sooooo easy! This makes quite a bit, but I ate it throughout the week. Plus it's one of those recipes where the longer it sits the better it gets. You could even add water chestnuts for additional crunch. 

Curried Chicken Salad
adapted from Whole Foods

Prep Time: 30 minutes
Serves: 6-8 

Ingredients

2 1/2 pounds cooked chicken, diced

1/4 cup diced red onion

3 ribs celery, diced

1/2 to 1 cup chopped almonds (optional)

1/2 cup chopped grapes (optional)

1 1/2 cups homemade mayonnaise

2-1/2 tablespoons curry powder

Salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste

Directions

In a large mixing bowl, combine cooked chicken, red onion, celery, almonds and grapes.

In a smaller bowl, mix together mayonnaise and curry powder. 

Pour the mayonnaise mixture on the chicken, tossing to coat.

Let it sit for 30 minutes or more to let the flavors meld together. Serve on a bed of lettuce. 

Whole30: Day 2

Still feeling the effects of the "carb flu". I know that it's because I'm probably too low carb and need to add more starchy veggies into my meals. Today has been a weird day for me in the sense that I am going to work tonight so I have to pack food and think differently about what I take. Normally I would eat something before going to work and then eat around 2 or 3 am. Sometimes I don't eat at all before I go and then I'll eat around 10 or 11 pm and then not eat again for the rest of the night. If you are a night shifter trying to figure out how to do this Whole30 thing then I recommend Nom Nom Paleo's blog post about Surviving the Night Shift.

So I will end up eating 4 meals "today". I say "today" because it really rolls into tomorrow because of the shift, but it's pretty much the same day for me since I will not have had a full nights sleep.

Meal 1: Eggs with spinach and mushroom sauteed in ghee and topped with salsa. It looks the same as yesterday minus the avocado. I didn't even bother to take a pic. I struggled to get this meal down. I was not very hungry and eggs two days in a row were just gross.


Meal 2: Curried Chicken Salad on a bed of butter lettuce. This was soooo yummy! I had a hard time not nibbling on it after I made it. On a side note, I know that I definitely don't have enough veggies on my plate here. I wasn't hungry after I ate and didn't get hungry again until 9 pm so I think I did okay.

Meal 3: Salad of romaine and iceberg topped with Mom's Beef Chili, jalapeno, black olives and Creamy Avocado Dressing. It looks sketchy and gross, but it was really good. I totally forgot to get a pretty shot before I started eating. I was just too hungry!

Meal 4: Aidells chicken & apple sausage and steamed sweet potatoes with ghee, nutmeg and cinnamon. This was at 3am while I was trapped in the nursery. I didn't take a picture and the sweet potatoes were sorta gross. Some were soft and some were crunchy. I ate half and threw the other half out. I was still kind of hungry so I took 2 hard boiled eggs and mixed it with the left over Creamy Avocado Dressing. It was so good!

Mom's Beef Chili

Mom's Beef Chili

Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cooking Time: 2 to 2 1/2 hours
Servings: 15+

Ingredients

3 lbs Ground Chuck

1 – 28 oz can Tomato Puree

2 – 28 oz cans of Crushed Tomato’s

12 oz can Tomato Juice (Campbell’s)

15 oz can Tomato Sauce

2 large onions, diced

4 garlic cloves, minced

¼ cup + 1 Tablespoon chili powder

1 Tablespoon cumin

2 tsp salt

1 Tablespoon paprika

2 tsp oregano

¼ cup cider vinegar

Tabasco, a couple of shakes

Fresh ground pepper

Directions 

Over medium heat, brown ground chuck and diced onions together in large dutch oven, when onions are translucent toss in the garlic and cook for a few minutes.  Drain fat from pan.  Add all spices / herbs to meat mixture and mix to coat.

Add all liquid ingredients and mix well.  Simmer, partially covered on low for about 1 ½ to 2 hours until thick, stirring occasionally.  If not thick enough for you – take of the cover and let it simmer longer.

Whole30: Day 1

Well I think today has gone pretty well. I feel good  I did have a little "carb flu" earlier today and felt really foggy & tired. My energy definitely picked up once I ate lunch. I feel like hubby and I accomplished ten times more today then we normally do on a weekend day. Anyway on to the meals, that's what you are really here for, right?

One thing I learned today... I HATE coconut oil. I didn't have any ghee made yet, but had some coconut oil sitting in the back of my pantry. I had read on a forum that while it smells like suntan lotion it doesn't taste like it and is delicious. Those people must be deranged. Or have no taste buds. Coconutty eggs is quite possibly the nastiest thing I've ever had. Okay enough said. 

Meal 1: Eggs sautéed in coconut oil with spinach & mushrooms. Topped with avocado and salsa. 

Looks good, doesn't it? Except for that darn coconut oil. 

Meal 2: Grilled steak salad with carrots, orange bell pepper, avocado and lemony dressing. Oh and that's not cheese, it's grated egg. Even my two year old was confused. It's fabulous like that. 

The steak was a left over from last night so it was nice to have something that didn't take too much prep time. 

Meal 3: Mom's Beef Chili. Yep, my mom. Totally compliant from the start. No tweaking necessary. Guess she didn't know she was a trendsetter. I topped mine with avocado, but I'll be heading the to store tomorrow to grab some olives for later this week. 

I also did a small side salad with the same stuff from lunch, but minus the steak. 

Today was also a huge prep day for me. I made the chili which will serve as the base for several meals this week (hubby is also taking it for lunch). I made ghee which made the house smell like I'd been baking. I roasted chicken for Curried Chicken Salad this week. I forgot to make the frittata. Maybe tomorrow?