As the Paleosphere turns...

Controversy, controversy everywhere!  Man, I miss when we used to argue about potatoes.  Here's an assortment of my favorite articles that have come out lately about our community.  I'm really just here for the food, but these are good reads.

• From Highbrow Paleo, the collective blog that I need to contribute to again very soon.  Russ' article is probably our most popular post to date, and was recently featured on Free The Animal.  Then Richard went and called some of our members c*nts and that made me sad :(
• From The Paleo Periodical- Karen keeps it classy as always.  I don't like shrill tones either.
• From Ancestralize Me- an excellent post on body-image that has really been making the rounds, and with good reason.
• And this brand new addition to Highbrow Paleo, by Pat from Nutritionator.

My Extreme Kitchen Makeover

Since goin' paleo, I have been spending a LOT of time in the kitchen.  Eating a lot of home-cooked meals from real ingredients is just part of the deal, so I had pretty much resigned myself to being in the kitchen for most of my evenings.  It's become a bit demoralizing as of late, feeling chained to my kitchen.  I've tried making larger portions of foods, but some things just aren't good as leftovers, and eating the same thing for a few days can get boring!

Enter the Weekly Cookup!  This is a fantastic idea from my new favorite cookbook Well Fed, and it just might set you free from Good Food Jail.  Just think- now you can pay attention to your children and spouse, you'll have time to catch up with friends, maybe even go out for happy hour!  You can spend your time like a normal person again!  Here's what you do:

• Make a list and go grocery shopping
• Cook up a few pounds of meat with minimal seasoning
• Partially cook some sturdy veggies
• Mix and match with different condiments and seasonings over the course of the week

I did my first cookup last weekend.  It was kinda rough- I have a hard time focusing, so I did get a bit frazzled by doing so many things at once (and unfortunately burned a pan of bacon), but having dinner on the table in five minutes (that didn't taste like leftovers) the next day made it all worth it.  Here's what I got out of it-

• 2 small roasted spaghetti squash (about 6 servings)
• 1 baggie of partially cooked broccoli florets (4 servings)
• 1 baggie of partially cooked brussels sprouts (2 servings)
• A little over a cup of cooked onions
• 1.5 lbs of baked boneless chicken thighs
• 1 lb ground beef, cooked with garlic salt & pepper

The next day, I came home from work super hungry.  I heated up the broiler, put four chicken thighs on a baking sheet, and brushed with a mixture of honey & dijon mustard, and sprinkled on some herbes de provence (it's my Frank's Hot Sauce- I put that shit on everything).  Then I heated up some clarified butter in my new T-Fal Caldero, and tossed in 2 cups of the brussels sprouts & about a handful of the onions (plus a little salt, pepper, and the herbs), and put the chicken in the oven.  Then I just cooked the veggies until they got a bit caramelized, and the chicken until it was heated through (just a few minutes, until the sauce sizzles).  That's it!  I had my dinner and lunch to bring to work.

Materials and my sis' donuts

The finished product, just a few minutes later!

After eating dinner, I threw my breakfast together.  I wiped out my pan and heated up 1/3 of the hamburger with a little water & taco seasoning, and added some onions.  Once that came together, I set the meat aside, wiped the pan, cooked an egg in it, plopped that on the beef, and packed it up the next morning with some avocado, tomatoes and cilantro.  That was a damn fine breakfast. 

By 5:30, I was done cooking and cleaning up for the day; I was freee!

Are You Well Fed?

This post can also be seen at Highbrow Paleo!

I was so excited to learn last year that Melissa Joulwan was coming out with a cookbook.  Melissa writes the very popular blog The Clothes Make The Girl, which is my go-to resource for fun Whole30 meals, delicious homemade sauces, and paleo-friendly ethnic recipes.  After checking out the handy-dandy free sample though, I saw that this book is so much more!

If you're a paleo-eater, you may find yourself spending a pretty ridiculous amount of time in the kitchen.  I don't have children or a spouse to cook for, yet I often find myself coming home from the gym, and spending upwards of two hours preparing my dinner for that evening, plus my lunch and breakfast for the next day.  I love to cook, and I know this is an investment in my health, but it's still a bit much!  Well, I am happy to say this is now a thing of the past, thanks to Melissa's tips.  Well Fed outlines how to run your kitchen like a restaurant, so you're never more than a few minutes away from a good meal.  Melissa recommends taking a couple of hours each week to cook up a few pounds of meat and partially cook a bunch of veggies (this is the "Weekly Cookup"); these items can be infinitely combined into "Hot Plates" with seasonings and sauces to keep your belly happy over the week.  It makes so much sense, I was kicking myself for not thinking of it before!  I did my first cookup this past Sunday; my self-diagnosed ADD was raging, but I got it done (and unfortunately burned up a batch of bacon) and it was SO worth the effort.  When I got home from work on Monday, I had my dinner on the table within five minutes, ate it, and then had my Tuesday lunch and breakfast packed away fifteen minutes later. Shazaam!

Cookup #1 (with the beggarcat)

Yes, the cookbook has fantastic recipes too!  Melissa's Paleo Pad Thai is a favorite of mine, and I am looking forward to cooking my way through the whole book.  My (non-paleo) sis looked through the book and declared that every single recipe looked like something she would like- not too shabby!  If you only buy one cookbook this year, Well Fed is well worth it.

Ask nicely and your copy can by signed by the Melicious herself!

And so the years passed, as they do somewhat regularly...

2011 was a hell of a year.  Christmas Eve 2010, my mom was the victim of a head-on collision near my parents' neighborhood, and this resulted in a 4 week hospital stay in D.C., followed by a lot of rehab at home.  It was very hard seeing my mom have to go through all this, but my family and our friends really pulled together and got through it; when I feel angry about it, I think about all the support and well-wishes she received, and it helps. 

There were other not-so-happy things going on last year.  I am notorious for trying to fix things I can't fix, and otherwise manage things that are really out of my control, and the results are usually disastrous.  It's hard striking the balance between fighting for what you want and knowing your limits.  Slowly, I'm learning that I'm not as powerful as I think I am, and sometimes I need to let things happen the way they're supposed to.

There have been so many positive things happen in 2011, too.  I got into all this paleo-stuff a little over a year ago, and I sure didn't expect it to enrich my life in so many ways.  Of course, I'm the most grateful for feeling better; not being sidelined by pain and discomfort is a wonderful thing.  Additionally, my dietary overhaul led to an exercise overhaul.  Like so many, I used to dread going to the gym; when I would go, I'd do my 30 minutes of cardio, and dick around on the Nautilus-type machines, making no discernable fitness gains.  After learning about weightlifting and kettlebells, I LOVE going to the gym.  I'm still not in as great shape as I'd like to be, but it's pretty cool that last year I was too intimidated to go near the free weights, and now I get approached by people at my local big-box gym asking me about what I'm doing, and giving me kudos on my progress.  When I work out at Southern Maryland Crossfit, it's always a humbling experience, and it gets me thinking more about those delicate balances- I want to push myself and improve, but I need to be careful about comparing myself too much to others.  I can barely snatch 65lbs, and clean 95lbs on a good day, but I never even thought I would be trying snatches at all, and the first time I tried to clean an empty bar, it was a hot mess (there was some funky reverse-curling going on, and I thought I was going to break my wrist).  I haven't come as far as I could have, but I have come pretty far.

I'm also so, so I happy I had the privelege to attend the Ancestral Health Symposium.  It was hella exciting to be in the same space with all my favorite writers and thinkers, and it just feels great to be among like-minded people.  There were more warm-fuzzies to be had at the MovNat and Whole9 workshops I attended in the fall, and I've been having such a great time interacting with my friends from Highbrow Paleo!  Let's face it; many of us that eat this way are pretty hardcore about it.  We love talking about our meals, what we got at the farmer's market, how much bacon we ate yesterday, what kind of workouts we've been doing, etc.; most of our friends and family probably don't share our rabid enthusiasm, and that's totally fine.  Of course it matters most that that I feel good about what I'm doing, but there is something to be said for belonging to a community.  I'm grateful to have found a group of smart, fun, and opiniated folks to talk with about all this stuff so I don't have to annoy the crap out of my "real-life friends" and family as much.  That said, I'm definitely troubled by a lot of the in-fighting that's been going on in the larger paleo community as of late; our "thought leaders" have a lot of different opinions and of course healthy debate is a great thing.  Unfortunately, things have gone way outside the realm of "healthy debate," and prominent folks in our community have been acting really nasty towards one another and alienating those of us who look to them for guidance.  I don't get why they don't all just give the best advice they can, disagree respectfully, and remember that we really all have a lot in common.  It makes me a bit sad to see this behavior from people I respect(ed?), but I'm just taking what I can use and leaving the rest.

As for resolutions, I don't really have one, but I've definitely tightened up on my diet this month.  I'd been getting a little crazy with the candy again and after the holidays, it's definitely time for a reset.  I'm also trying to get a handle on my technology addiction by barring myself from using my phone, computer and iPad after 8:30 on worknights.  I have such a hard time focusing on tasks, and sometimes a hard time falling asleep, and I believe all the bright flashy lights and social networking are contributing!  Hopefully the January tech diet will prove helpful.

I'm very excited to see what the year will bring. :)

Bacon & Onions with Liver

This post can also be seen at Highbrow Paleo and Chowstalker!

I worked through some childhood trauma last week; I've had a grassfed beef liver in my freezer for... a year or so. Haunted by memories of "that nasty liver smell," it took awhile to get the nerve to cook the damn thing, but I finally did it. I want to love liver, really I do, but I think I'll have to settle for tolerating it; I pulled every trick out of my sleeve that I could, but I still can't say this was an enjoyable experience. Some of you actually enjoy liver though, so I will share my method.  Meh...

1/2 a liver (mine was a little under 1.5lbs., and I knew I wouldn't eat it all, so I just made half. I'm no scientist, but I'm not down with eating the filtering organs of sick animals; get a good grassfed one, it should still be pretty inexpensive)
1/2 lb bacon, cooked and crumbled, grease reserved
1 large onion
a few TBS of clarified butter
2 TBS arrowroot

1 head cauliflower, chopped into large chunks
1/3 cup broth
a few TBS heavy cream (optional)
a few TBS butter
Salt, pepper, & herbs to taste (I used herbes de provence)

A few hours before cooking time, slice liver into 1/2" slices, and soak in milk or lemon juice; they say this will diminish some of the liver flavor. Slice onion and cook in clarified butter on medium-low heat for about half an hour until the onions get a bit caramelized; add bacon and set aside.

At this point, heat broth in a saucepan over medium high heat, and add cauliflower; steam for about 6 or 7 minutes until you can easily poke with a fork. Once it is tender, add butter, cream and seasonings, and puree (great job for a stick blender if you have one.) While cauliflower is cooking, add bacon to the pan that the onions were cooking in, and heat up to medium-high. Dry off liver slices, and place in a baggie with arrowroot, toss to coat. Once pan is hot, add slices of liver, and cook for about a minute on each side; it will be brown on the outside, and pretty rare on the inside. I was amazed that there was NO SMELL! My mom is a great cook, but we have some, uhh, different ideas about how long to cook things; if you don't cook the hell out of the thing, you may be spare your loved ones from the liver-stank. Serve with plenty of bacon & onions, and choke it down!

Mmm bacon!  Eww liver!  So conflicted...

#prettygirlproblems

Katherine Heigl has caught some crap over the years for some stuff she has said in interviews; I myself do like her, and I admire that she speaks her mind, knowing she is exposing herself to scrutiny.

This kinda irks me.  Katherine Heigl is a little thicker than Jennifer Aniston, but is by no means overweight; why should we congratulate her for "accepting her body the way it is?"  Being so fortunate to look like her without having to do any work for of it is hardly something worthy of applause.  Also, I like food too!  I love all the food I eat; loving food and being careful about what you put in your body are NOT mutually exclusive. I'm so tired of people saying "oh, I like food too much" to eat healthy; what a big ol' BS copout.

Everyone has their insecurities, and kudos to her for speaking up about hers, and blah blah blah, but it struck a nerve with me regardless.  *shrug*

Wow, she is SO BRAVE for going out

in public looking like that.

Image courtesy of MSN Wonderwall

Probiotic Pumpkin Spice Smoothie

I guess I seem to be getting on a fermented foods kick; I've been reading a lot about how so many of us are lacking these foods in the diet, and I'm definitely one of them.  Cultured foods were a big part of traditional diets and have unfortunately been replaced with pasteurized, sanitized versions; it makes sense to me that our gut health is suffering for it.

I recently made some lactofermented mayo (which I am thrilled about because I am now free from my Hellman's prison) and tried out some goat milk kefir.  Yeah, it's a little different!  It was like runny yogurt, as I expected; I stirred in a little honey and cinnamon to make it more palatable.  Then I had an idea!  I made a pumpkin smoothie.

8 oz grassfed goat milk kefir (that's what I used, but there are cow and coconut varieties on the market)
3 TBS pumpkin puree
1 TBS honey
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice

Just stir it all together; you don't even need a blender!  Sorry, no pic as of press time, but you can probably get the idea.  If it looks like a glass of orange stuff, you're on the right track.