grain free Archives • Ant & Anise

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

The Paleo Diet Challenge: Day 24

I know every new day is a fresh start, full of promise in trying Paleo recipes and building a new repertoire. It’s exciting, right? Mostly yes, it is. But when regular life demands more of my attention, it’s great when the pressure of what to make for dinner lightens up a little.

We’re talking recipe repeats. Aside from the morning glory muffins, I haven’t had too many things that I’d want to make regularly. And while it’s interesting to keep trying new recipes every day, it’s also a little tiring. Lots to chalk up to experience, and to know what not to do next time, but so far I haven’t added many Paleo recipes to my arsenal.

One that has earned a spot is the eggplant flatbread. When I first tried it, it was as an alternative for puff pastry and, in some ways, I actually liked it better. Did I really just say that? Better than puff pastry?

I need to qualify that a little. First, I wasn’t aiming to make a Paleo puff pastry substitute. I knew it wasn’t going to be light or flaky in the least, just flat. But it surprised me by having a multigrain-like quality — dense, flavorful and chewy. That I wasn’t expecting. A most pleasant surprise, especially considering the underwhelming results I’ve had with Paleo breads.

I decided to try the flatbread as a base for pizza. It was the original use for the flatbread in Make It Paleo, plus pizza is one of those things that, when done well, I can’t seem to get enough of. Usually that means a substantial chewy crust with a few little air pockets, like what you would find at Pizzeria Barbarella and Campagnolo here in Vancouver. Or what you could get with the homemade pizza I’ve been making in the past year. I’m really missing my pizza.

The verdict? Definitely not a chewy crust with air pockets, and not something you could pick up and eat with your hands. (I’m more a knife-and-fork pizza eater anyway.) But with the roasted tomato sauce, good goat cheese and capicollo, it turned out to be a fine stand-in, when options are so limited. A keeper, as my Mom would have said.

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 23

Hmmm, on the Paleo Diet Challenge Day 23, how timely: I run across an entertaining article on Scientific American’s website about why the Paleo diet doesn’t make much sense. Now you tell me.

Most of the article is about explaining how the human “gut” works and about the evolution of our digestive tract, which has evolved to eat grains, along with vegetables, fruits, nuts, and meat, and pretty much anything else we toss into it. Judging from the comments so far, he’s touched a nerve from Paleo defenders. Hmmm, I guess I can’t be sure until the challenge is over, but I think I know which camp I’ll end up in, eventually. Hint: it’s not the die-hard Paleo one.

One of the things that I am missing, more than I thought I would, is tortilla chips. Plain, salted, corn tortilla chips, preferably the blue, organic ones from Que Pasa. (Not sure why I like the blue ones so much, but they’re my favorite. Maybe because of the novelty? It’s not like there’s a lot of naturally blue foods out there.)

But since corn tortilla chips are off the menu for the next 8 days, I thought I’d try my hand at oven baked yam chips for a pre-dinner snack. Now, Paleo-friendly nuts are great, and I love them, but they’re not something I’d would want to be dipping in my guacamole.

I’ve done thicker yam fries in the oven before, and they are very, very difficult to get crispy. Almost impossible, really. I blame the high sugar content. But armed with my mandoline to make paper-thin slices, I was confident I’d end up with a crispier result.

Well? They looked very bright and pretty, and tasted great, but even though they were as thin as the mandoline could make, they weren’t nearly as crispy as I had hoped. The burnt ones were the best for crispiness, and got eaten first.

I think I’m officially starting my countdown until the end of the challenge. Crispy tortilla chips are in sight.

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 22

It was another Paleo bread attempt today. And while it wasn’t a shout-from-the-rooftops success, it wasn’t nearly the disaster that the first one was. Perhaps I should feel comforted by that.

This time I set my sights a little lower, opting for an Irish soda bread that naturally has a denser texture than a bread you’d make for sandwiches. I have some good memories of soda bread, especially one my mom used to make from one of Anne Lindsay’s cookbooks. It makes good toast, that’s what I remember. I had my fingers crossed.

The recipe I was using calls for blanched almond flour, but all I had was almond meal (still waiting for my online delivery of blanched almond flour), so it was going to give me a denser result. And did it ever. Despite the baking soda the bread didn’t seem to rise, even a little. It stayed only a couple inches high, and reminded me of a rounded log of biscotti, ready to be cut and baked a second time in the oven.

Where I went wrong was thinking that sunflower seeds would be a nice addition, to give a welcome crunch. Big mistake. They did add a crunch, but they took on a greenish outline when baked. (Maybe they do all the time? I can’t remember the last time I made anything with sunflower seeds baked into it.) It made the bread look, well, almost a little creepy. It’s like the bread had gone moldy even before it had a chance to cool down.

Or maybe it was something that Martians would enjoy, if they were eating a Paleo diet.

It toasted up quite well, which I was most happy about. It didn’t bring all those happy Irish soda bread memories from my childhood flooding back, but it wasn’t too eggy and it didn’t crumble. If I closed my eyes and forgot about the green flecks in the bread, I enjoyed it quite well. With my morning coffee, it was almost like my breakfasts used to be.

Paleo Irish Soda Bread

Yield: 1 loaf

Adapted from Elana's Pantry.

Ingredients

2-3/4 cups almond meal
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1-3/4 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 cup pecans or raisins (or sunflower seeds if you want a Martian vibe)
2 eggs
2 tablespoons honey
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350F.
In a stand mixing bowl, combine almond meal, salt, and baking soda. Add nuts or raisins and mix to combine.
Add eggs, honey and vinegar to the bowl, and mix together until the dough has a uniform consistency.
Place dough on a parchment- or silicon sheet-lined baking sheet. Form dough into a large, flat circle, about 8 inches around by 1-1/2 inches tall. Using a serrated knife, cut a cross about 1/2 inch deep in the top.
Bake soda bread for 20-25 minutes, until it is golden brown. Remove and cool on a baking rack.

The Paleo Diet Challenge: Day 21

This challenge is a funny thing. For the past 3 weeks I seem to swing between two feelings: One is being energized and quite optimistic about finding a new way of eating, which might turn out to be better for me. (Is it a pathway to get off the daily Synthroid pill? Perhaps.) I really like the discovery of new ways to use ingredients that I never would have thought (like almonds as flour, cauliflower as rice), so there’s a certain adventurousness that I’m enjoying.

The other is spending a fair amount of time being frustrated about what’s allowed and what’s not. I like food a lot, obviously. But thinking about this Paleo diet almost constantly, how to make it interesting, working it into our daily lives without it being too much of a jolt, has been consuming way too much of my mental energy these days. Thinking about it is almost more challenging than actually doing it. Strange, hey?

(And, of course, there’s the still-unsuccessful quest for a decent Paleo bread. One that I can eat as toast, for breakfast. I thought I was losing my bread craving, and maybe after 30 days it will be curbed at least a little, but every so often it bubbles up and sends me on a new search for Paleo bread recipes.)

I’m thankful for the few times that I am able to eat out successfully, meaning I can order something that doesn’t need a lot of special instructions. Hold the bun! Can I get that wrapped in lettuce? Like you might expect, breakfast and brunch are a good time to eat out for Paleos, simply because eggs play a starring role. This Californian omelette from Milestones, with bacon, avocado salsa, diced tomatoes and cheddar, was a good example of a restaurant meal that didn’t need any strange requests, aside from skipping the toast. All I had to do was refrain from eating the potatoes. Whew.

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 20

On days like this when so much is going on, like, for instance, working and battling with contractors, I wish that the Paleo way of eating didn’t still consume so much of my mental energy. (Sigh.)

One thing that’s been bugging me is that I haven’t really kept track of grocery receipts so far. There is a lot of talk on Paleo sites and blogs about how expensive it is to maintain this diet, where so much meat (preferably grass-fed, organic) and fresh produce (again, preferably organic) are involved.

I think it is a more expensive way to eat. I don’t have any hard evidence, really, more of a gut feel. But a couple of things stand out.

First, I am going to the store more often to pick up fresh ingredients, usually meat, eggs or fruit. (Thank goodness for the CSA or I’d be shopping for vegetables too.)

Also, we are not eating nearly the number of stir-frys and pastas for dinner that we used to. These are the kind of dinners where rice or noodles provide at least half (if not more) of the meal, with just a little meat and vegetables to round things out. They’re reliable, fast, and easy since we’ve made them so often. When you get home from the office at 6:30 or 7:00, they’re usually what we end up making. Oh right, aside from ordering pizza. Okay, I admit it.

So no, not very scientific observations here. And while we’re not eating rack of lamb every night, I’m curious about ways to make the Paleo diet less expensive. There are loads of resources on the web and, as you might expect, some are better than others. Here are three good ones I found so far:

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

Image courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net.