paleo Archives • Page 3 of 8 • Ant & Anise

The Paleo Diet Challenge: Day 30

I can’t honestly remember eating as much lettuce, especially in the form of lettuce wraps, as I have in the past few weeks. Lettuce has stood in as sandwich bread (with sliced turkey and grainy mustard in a hurriedly-put-together lunch), as a hamburger bun (for a pre-theatre chicken burger at a close by restaurant), and as tortillas (in the fish tacos). And that’s only 3 examples. I have many more.

It’s funny that I never really thought about the prevalence of grains in my own diet much before I started this challenge. Bread was always just, well, normal to have around, and I ate it pretty much every day without trying too hard.

It was always easy to make something as long as there was bread, or tortillas, in the house. One of my go-to dinners, when I lived on my own and wanted something simple, was cheese quesadillas. For the past few years I’ve enjoyed assemble-your-own dinners, like grilled lamb or chicken, in a Greek-themed marinade (usually lemon, garlic, olive oil and some chopped oregano), with some tomatoes, cucumber and feta, along with tsatziki and hummus, all in a pita wrap.

I can’t say that lettuce is as satisfying to me the same way that tortillas or pita bread are. It’s certainly not near as satisfying as a good naan bread with Indian food. Not yet, anyway.

What I’ve found with the Paleo challenge, though, is that using lettuce as a wrap shifts the focus to what’s inside. (Isn’t that what your parents used to tell you, it’s what’s inside that counts?) It also makes for a lighter meal — much lighter — than if you’d used bread-like wraps. So after this meal of Thai beef lettuce wraps, with such a flavorful filling, not only I was thoroughly full, but was surprisingly satisfied too.

Paleo Thai Beef Lettuce Wraps

Serving Size: 2

Adapted from Eyes Bigger Than My Stomach. Don't let the long list of ingredients scare you off -- this is a very flavorful recipe and you'll be glad you tried it. The key is to prep everything before you start cooking, because like any stir-fry it comes together very quickly when you start. It's worth noting that strict Paleos would stay away from soy sauce and hoisin. I used gluten-free versions of both those, and found that the hoisin was key for providing a welcome sweetness to balance the spice.

Ingredients

1 head sturdy lettuce or cabbage, washed and leaves separated
1 pound lean ground beef
2 tablespoons olive oil, separated
1 large onion, finely chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 2-inch piece of ginger, minced
1/2 cup carrots, julienned
2 teaspoons gluten free soy sauce
1/4-1/3 cup hoisin sauce (try this 'Paleo-fied' hoisin sauce from My Paleo Life)
1 tablespoon rice wine vinegar
1-2 tablespoons fish sauce
1-2 teaspoons Asian garlic-chili sauce
4 green onions, chopped
3 tablespoons fresh cilantro, chopped
2 tablespoons fresh mint, chopped
juice of one lime
2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil

Instructions

Prepare all the chopped vegetables before you start cooking. Set aside a handful of green onions for garnish.
In a large saute pan, heat 1 tablespoon of oil over medium-high heat. Add the beef and cook until it's browned. Strain the contents of the saute pan over a fine mesh strainer. Set the beef aside and ensure the pan is clear of excess oil.
Heat 1 tablespoon of oil in the same pan, this time over medium heat. Add the onion and saute, stirring frequently until softened. Add the garlic, ginger, carrots, soy sauce, hoisin sauce, fish sauce and chili-garlic sauce and stir until combined.
Add the green onions, cilantro, mint and lime juice, and continue stirring for about 2 minutes, until the green onions are just starting to wilt. Add the ground beef back in and combine well with the sauce, stirring until heated through. Stir in the sesame oil.
Taste for seasonings. You may want to add more hoisin (sweet), fish sauce (salty), or lime (sour).
To serve, arrange the lettuce leaves on a plate and present the Thai beef in a bowl.

More on the Paleo diet challenge:
Why I’m doing it in the first place
My plan for the 30 days

The Paleo Diet Challenge: Day 29

Oh, wow. Wow. I think I’ve found a new ally in the kitchen, for baking anyway: Blanched almond flour.

So far I’ve had success using a coarser almond meal in the morning glory muffins, where a denser texture is perfectly okay. But for some baked goods, a finer grind, something closer to actual wheat flour, is what’s needed. I hadn’t had any luck in local stores trying to find this (which I thought was odd, considering I was trying places like Whole Foods, Galloway’s and Famous Foods). When I spotted a recipe on the Urban Poser blog for Paleo cinnamon rolls that looked absolutely delicious, finally I was motivated enough to get my credit card out and place an order online for the blanched almond flour.

I’m so glad I did.

The blanched almond flour is super fine, noticeably finer than the almond meal I’d been using. I made a few changes to the cinnamon roll recipe, but they turned out really, really ridiculously well. Better than I expected. I love it when that happens. They’re definitely not like the stretchy pull-apart kind of buns, like the ones I devoured when I was at UBC.

These were more biscuit-y for sure. But they were soft, and, with the cinnamon-honey-pecan center, they were so good that I didn’t care about them not being so soft and stretchy. Not one bit.

The Best Paleo Cinnamon Rolls

I agree -- these are the best cinnamon rolls around when you're going Paleo. This recipe is adapted from The Urban Poser.

Ingredients

3-1/4 cups blanched almond flour (I used Honeyville brand)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 cup coconut oil
2 tablespoons honey
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1/4 cup honey
1/2 cup pecans, finely chopped
1/4 cup currants or raisins (optional)
4 teaspoons ground cinnamon

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350F.
In a large stand mixing bowl, combine the almond flour, salt and baking soda. In a separate bowl, beat together the coconut oil, honey and eggs.
Add the egg mixture to the almond flour mixture. Blend together with the paddle attachment until the dough is smooth. It will be quite sticky.
Sandwich the dough between two large pieces of parchment paper. With a rolling pin, roll out the dough into a rectangle, approximately 9×13 inches. Peel off the top piece of parchment paper.
Drizzle the honey evenly over the dough, then spread the honey out with your hands so that it covers the whole surface. Sprinkle the chopped pecans and currents or raisins (if using) evenly over the dough, then sprinkle the cinnamon on top.
Starting at the long edge closest to you, carefully roll the dough like a jelly roll, keeping it as tight as you can at the beginning. The dough isn’t elastic like a wheat dough, so go slowly and gently, patching up small holes in the dough if you get them.
Once the dough is completely rolled up, even it out a bit with your hands, being careful not to tear the dough. With a serrated knife, cut slices about 1-1/2 to 2 inches thick.
Lay the rolls cut side down on a parchment lined baking sheet. Bake for 12-15 minutes, or until the rolls are golden on the top and the dough in the center of the rolls is soft but not doughy.
Remove the rolls from the oven and let cool on the baking sheet for 10 minutes. Transfer them to a cooling rack and let them cool completely.
If you like, drizzle the rolls with a glaze. (I went outside the Paleo rules here and made one with powdered sugar and milk.)

Notes

When you're ready to cut them from the roll, get a ruler out to measure out even slices so they bake uniformly. If these bake too long, they'll get really hard....like hockey pucks. Watch the oven, and err on the side of having these slightly underdone.

More on the Paleo diet challenge:
Why I’m doing it in the first place
My plan for the 30 days

The Paleo Diet Challenge: Day 28

One thing I’ll take away from the Paleo challenge is a more positive attitude towards cauliflower. It may not be dramatic and life changing, but I’d say it’s a step in the right direction.

I mentioned cauliflower early on in the challenge, and I’ve made it a few times since then. The funny thing is, for as long as I can remember, I haven’t liked cauliflower at all. Bland, white and not a lot of flavor. What’s to get enthusiastic about? Why even bother with it at all? Sure it’s crunchy, but if you’re looking for crunch, I think broccoli is a much better choice. It’s more nutritious too.

When I was younger, I can remember my Mom serving steamed cauliflower on occasion. My favorite part was, undoubtedly, not the vegetable but the cheese sauce we’d pour, copiously, over top. Cheese sauce was the only reason to eat the cauliflower, really.

But when grains are out of the question cauliflower muscled its way onto my plate, and is no longer the side-vegetable-made-edible-only-with-cheese-sauce. I think it’s because cauliflower is similar to chicken or eggplant, which happily take on other flavors you’re cooking with. Even some sauteed onion and garlic give a simple but much-needed boost to cauliflower’s appeal, like they do in cauliflower rice.

The last time I set out to make some cauliflower rice, instead of chopping the cauliflower into small florets before they went into the food processor, I thought I’d take a shortcut by leaving the pieces fairly large. Seems logical enough (well, it did at the time), but I had to keep pulsing more and more to get the bigger chunks down to a rice-like size. Before I knew it, the cauliflower went from long grain to short grain, and then to something even smaller. Yikes!

Not exactly a kitchen disaster, though. Instead of cauliflower rice, we ended up with cauliflower couscous. Smaller, but just as good as the rice and a great base for the stir-fry here. Cauliflower in a whole new light. Very positive, indeed.

Cauliflower 'Rice'

Here is a very basic version of a Paleo staple that works well as a base for stir-frys and pastas. For a finer-grained result -- more like 'couscous' than 'rice' -- simply pulse it longer in the food processor.

Ingredients

1 head cauliflower, cut into equally-sized small florets
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 small white onion, minced
1 clove garlic, minced

Instructions

Place the cauliflower florets in a food processor and pulse until they resemble rice. If you're aiming for a smaller texture like couscous, pulse a few more times.
Heat the oil in a large saute pan over medium-low heat. Add the onion and saute for 2-3 minutes, stirring occasionally so that it cooks evenly. Add the garlic and saute for another few minutes, stirring occasionally. You're aiming to get an even, light golden color and a softened texture. Turn the heat down if the onions and garlic start to brown too much.
Once the onions and garlic have softened, add the cauliflower and stir in to incorporate. Continue sauteeing for 5-8 minutes, or until the rice (couscous) is a little softened but still has some crunch, like an 'al dente' texture with pasta.

More on the Paleo diet challenge:
Why I’m doing it in the first place
My plan for the 30 days

The Paleo Diet Challenge: Day 27

So, Day 27 in the Paleo Diet Challenge. I’ve mentioned before that I like getting a CSA box because it pushes me outside of my kitchen comfort zone, a little. Take garlic scapes. Not something you see at a big box supermarket, or even your local green grocer. Last year garlic scapes definitely had me stumped. I think we ended up chopping into a stir fry. Ho hum.

This year, when I we got the garlic scapes in late June, I thought I’d aim for something more creative, at least a little. Turns out that garlic scapes make a fine pesto, and I made one based on a recipe from Dorie Greenspan.

But when I tasted the pesto, I was a little taken aback. Garlic scapes are supposed to be milder tasting than the bulbs. What I had created was really strong, with a pungent garlicky smell and taste that made me think great, first I didn’t know what to do with the scapes…and now I don’t know what to do with this pesto. I parked it in the fridge and forgot about it. (Well, mostly. It still glanced at it practically every time I opened the fridge.)

I was feeling a little lazy today, and it was getting too late to make anything elaborate. When I looked in the fridge and saw the garlic scape pesto starting at me, again, I thought okay, here we go. It’s just me for dinner, so who would mind if I have a serious case of after-dinner garlic breath, except maybe the cat?

With some prawns, a tomato, and a few zucchini ribbons standing in for pasta, the pesto made a very quick, Paleo-friendly meal. The best part, and the biggest surprise, was how the pesto had mellowed. Really. It had toned down considerably from when I first made it, and now was pleasant and very, very mild.

And it didn’t give me bad garlic breath either. (I knew you’d be wondering.)

Prawns & Garlic Scape Pesto with Zucchini

Serving Size: 1

This recipe can be easily doubled. If you need to scale it up even further, I'd suggest sauteeing the prawns in their own pan so they don't have to compete for space with the zucchini ribbons.

Ingredients

2 small zucchini, peeled lengthwise (about 5 oz of ribbons)
1 tomato, chopped
1 tablespoon olive oil
1/4 - 1/3 cup garlic scape pesto
6-8 prawns, shelled
salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

Instructions

Using a vegetable peeler, make the zucchini ribbons: Peel the zucchini lengthwise, down one side until you get to the center and then down the other.
In a large saute pan, heat the olive oil over medium heat. Add the tomato and cook for 2-3 minutes, or until it has cooked down and released some juices.
Add the zucchini ribbons and saute for 1 minute until they soften slightly.
Add 1/4 cup of the garlic scape pesto and stir it in so it evenly coats the zucchini ribbons. Continue cooking for another few minutes until the zucchini has released some juices, but is slightly firmer than 'al dente'.
Push the zucchini ribbons and tomato to one side of the saute pan, and add the prawns. Cook for 2-3 minutes, or until the prawns are firm and pink. Add another few tablespoons of pesto if you like, and stir in to coat the prawns and zucchini. Season with salt and pepper and serve immediately.

More on the Paleo diet challenge:
Why I’m doing it in the first place
My plan for the 30 days

Garlic scape image from The Coast, via Google Images.

The Paleo Diet Challenge: Day 26

I’ve Googled I don’t know how many ingredients to check to see whether they’re considered Paleo or not. Is mustard paleo? Mayonnaise? Pickles? What about quinoa?

Ah, quinoa. It’s a superfood, right? Wouldn’t Paleos get behind that?

Well, not so much. Turns out it’s fairly controversial in Paleo circles. Quinoa is technically a seed, but it’s what is known as a psudocereal. Huh? A pseudocereal is a plant that isn’t a grain or a grass, but produces seeds or fruit that are used like grains. Amaranth, buckwheat and chia seeds are other examples, along with quinoa.

The Spunky Coconut has a good explanation of why Paleos stay away from quinoa, but even Mark Sisson concedes that more moderate Paleos let quinoa into their diets now and again.

As you might expect, I took a more moderate view of quinoa. We had a special birthday today, my Dad’s, and in contemplating what kind of cake to make, there weren’t too many Paleo choices. Quinoa to the rescue.

I stumbled across an intriguing recipe for a quinoa chocolate cake, and thought that, like zucchini, quinoa could lend a moist quality to the cake without imparting much flavor. Let the chocolate take over, as it likes to do. Who am I to stop that?

And you know, it worked like a charm. Thank goodness, since I didn’t have a back-up plan. It was moist, with a good crumb, and oh so very chocolately. Really, really good. Happy birthday, Dad.

More on the Paleo diet challenge:
Why I’m doing it in the first place
My plan for the 30 days

The Paleo Diet Challenge: Day 25

So, Paleo Diet Challenge Day 25. What I think is that simple is good.

Even better: Sometimes, simple is best. I’m not sure if it has something to do with expectation management again, although I suspect it does. But it seems that, very often, the simplest meals give me the most enjoyment. They punch above their weight, as you’d say.

It’s not the special occasion dinners that I’ve either toiled over for hours that are, in the end, the best. No, more times than I can count it’s been the unexpected mid-week dinners, the spontaneous why don’t we go there? meals or the why don’t I just try this? dishes that surprise, and surpass, my expectations. Those are the ones I remember, long after.

Such is the case with the breakfast sausages. For years, I’ve secretly liked the sausages that you would find on, say, a McDonald’s Sausage McMuffin or Tim Horton’s Breakfast Sandwich. (Hmmm, I guess it’s not such a secret now.) But I would never darken the doors of those places to actually order a breakfast sandwich. I could never bring myself to do it, ever. And when I do go out for brunch, my automatic response says ‘bacon’ when I order, just because you never know what kind of sausage they might have in the kitchen. They are definitely not all the same, right?

Maybe that’s why I was pleasantly surprised to see recipes for breakfast sausage in many of the Paleo cookbooks and blogs out there. They’re simple to make, and while they’re not something I would usually think of to make for brunch, it turns out that they’re really good. Amazingly good, in fact. Even better than bacon? Very possibly.

I’m happy because now these previously-forbidden delights can be mine, without having to drive through a drive-thru. I can actually make these at home. Light bulb goes on. And really, part of my prejudice with fast food is strictly on a geeky grammar level. (I’m with Grammar Girl, spelling t-h-r-u is kind of equivalent to dotting your i’s with little hearts.) But these breakfast sausages were well worth the wait, and are grammatically correct to boot. Whew.

Paleo Breakfast Sausages

Adapted from Paleo Comfort Foods by Julie and Charles Mayfield.

Ingredients

1 pound ground pork
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tablespoons red onion, finely chopped
1 teaspoon fennel seeds, lightly ground or chopped
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 teaspoon paprika
1/2 teaspoon salt
fresh ground pepper to taste
1 tablespoon fresh sage, finely chopped
1 tablespoon fresh thyme, finely chopped
1 tablespoon fresh parsley, finely chopped

Instructions

Preheat your barbecue to 400F*. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
In a medium mixing bowl, combine the pork with the garlic and onion. (You can use a spoon, but I find using your hands gives you a more uniform result, quicker. Plus it's kind of fun.)
Add the fennel seed, cayenne, paprika, salt and pepper and mix until combined. Add the sage, thyme and parsley, and mix again to combine.
With your hands, form the mixture into 8 patties and place on the parchment-lined baking sheet.
When the barbecue is up to temperature, place the patties on the grill and cook for 3-4 minutes. Flip them over and continue to cook for another 3-4 minutes, or until they're browned and firm. Remove from heat and serve.

Notes

You can also cook these on the grill or in a frying pan, and that's how I initially did them. I preferred using the grill so that any excess fat drips away. If you don't have a barbecue, I imagine broiling them on a rack on top of a sheet pan would work quite well too.

More on the Paleo diet challenge:
Why I’m doing it in the first place
My plan for the 30 days