Paleo diet Archives • Ant & Anise

The Paleo Diet Challenge: Top 5 Positives

At the start of the Paleo diet challenge, I was looking to test three things: First, if I could actually stick to a grain-free diet for a whole month. Second, if it would make me feel any different (more energy, perhaps?). And third, if it would make any difference in my usual blood test results for TSH, which impact the amount of thyroid supplement I take every day because of my Hashimoto’s.

I’m happy to report that the answers are yes, yes, and yes. Three for three!

I stayed true to my month-long challenge of eating a Paleo diet, specifically avoiding any grains like rice, corn or (the big one) wheat. It wasn’t always easy, but feel proud that I stuck it out to the very end. Now that I’ve had a few days to think about the experience, along with the most challenging parts, here are the top 5 positives:

1. I feel better.
I don’t feel dramatically different, unlike so many stories I read about life-changing results after trying a Paleo diet. For me, feeling better is more subtle and nebulous but I’ve noticed a definite difference. I feel lighter, even though the scale doesn’t reflect that. I also feel healthier.

2. It opened my eyes to new ingredients.
Before the challenge I was blissfully unaware of several Paleo-friendly ingredients, like coconut flour and almond flour, to use in baking. In particular, blanched almond flour rocks, and it is something I’ll be using regularly.

3. It increased my creativity in the kitchen.
It’s easy to fall back on tried and true dishes. In my case, this means answering the what’s-for-dinner question with a pasta or a stir-fry with noodles. Both of these are good, but they’re also kind of boring. With grains off-limits I was forced to get more creative, which was refreshing for the most part.

The three twists I particularly enjoyed were using cauliflower for ‘rice’ (or, when I got a little carried away with it in the food processor, ‘couscous’), using lettuce and cabbage as convenient wraps (fish tacos, Thai beef wraps), and using eggplant as a flatbread.

4. It made me more thoughtful about what I was eating.
I’m fairly aware of what I eat anyway, but the challenge made my food radar (my foodar?) razor sharp. My label reading became even more serious, as I looked for traces of wheat or peanuts that lurk in foods like soy sauce or other prepared foods, albeit in small amounts.

5. It did have an impact on my TSH level.
Now this is exciting: I had a blood test done a few days ago, which showed the level of TSH in my blood had dropped from 1.8 to 0.8. This is a good thing, as it means my body is absorbing the Synthroid more effectively. It’s not enough of a reduction to warrant a change in dosage (the normal reference range for TSH is wide, from 0.3 to 5.0), but it’s a step in the right direction.

So is it possible to reverse my Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis with a Paleo diet?

Not in 31 days, in my case. I’m encouraged by the blood test result, though. For now, I’m saying goodbye to the Paleo diet but will aim to stay gluten-free, since the more reading I do the more research I find that connects gluten consumption to autoimmune diseases like Hashimoto’s. I will retake the blood test in a few months to see if there’s been any further change in my TSH levels, and will keep you posted with what I find.

That wraps it up the Paleo diet challenge. It’s been an interesting journey, and I’ve hoped you have enjoyed reading about it and trying some of the recipes.

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: Top 5 Negatives

Wow, it’s over. 31 days of the Paleo challenge done. Whew.

It’s taken me a few days to gather my thoughts on how the last month went and what I learned. There were a lot of positives — more than I thought there would be, actually — but first, let’s start off with the things that didn’t go so smoothly. The things that were, well, the most challenging about the challenge. Here goes:

1. Grain-free items are difficult to find.
In Vancouver we celebrate fresh, quality food and have access to a wide range of ingredients. I found it really disappointing to find a dearth of grain-free choices in our grocery stores. And I mean stores like Whole Foods and Choices. Grain-free crackers? Forget it. Grain-free pasta? Um, no. Gluten free, sure. Grain free, no way.

2. Restaurants are minefields.
If you deviate from the salad section, it’s a safe bet that you’ll run into grains pretty fast. Wheat is everywhere. Some restaurants are accommodating when it comes to adapting dishes (like having a lettuce wrap instead of a hamburger bun) but many aren’t so friendly when you’re “that girl” with all the questions and special requests.

3. Making everything from scratch, day after day, is tiring.
I expended a significant amount of energy thinking about meals. What can I have? What’s off limits? All this thinking and planning meals within the Paleo boundaries made me a more anxious than usual. I was very grateful on the rare occasions when we could just eat leftovers.

4. I like eggs, but not that much.
Switching my well-entrenched morning routine from peanut butter toast to eggs wasn’t very smooth. I liked the egg recipes I tried, especially the eggs in ham cups, but the thought of eating eggs almost every morning didn’t appeal to me, not in the least.

5. My craving for bread is difficult to shake.
I do feel healthier eating a Paleo diet, and I think that’s largely due to not eating so much bread. But at the same time, I still crave a dense, multigrain bread and my chewy pizza crust. (Oh, that pizza…!) I thought the lack of bread was going to be the biggest hurdle for me in the challenge, and it turned out to be true. And despite my hopes of finding a Paleo bread recipe to quell my craving, I didn’t find a really good one during the 31 days. (I still need to try this recipe from Paleo Effect, which looks very, very promising.)

But it’s not all doom and gloom. To end this series, I’ve come up with the top 5 positives of the challenge and my thoughts on moving forward.

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

Finish line photo courtesy of jayneandd via Flickr Creative Commons.

The Paleo Diet Challenge: Day 31

Final day of the challenge. Big sigh.

(Okay, I suppose technically it was a 30-day challenge…but with July having 31 days, it didn’t make sense to me to not make it through the entire month.)

It’s been up and down for the last few weeks — my feelings about Paleo eating, my weight, my anxiety levels about what to do for dinner (not the big questions in life, I realize) — and I’m glad the challenge coming to an end. There are a number of positives I’ll take away, no question.

But today, the last day, it’s about my quest for making a Paleo-friendly bread, something that has eluded me so far.

I wish I could say that, after trying a number of recipes and combinations of Paleo-friendly flour substitutes this month, I found a killer recipe. A Paleo bread that I could toast up and enjoy, if not with peanut butter then with another nut butter, to make it like the pre-challenge breakfasts I used to have. Yeah!

The recipe I settled on was for Paleo biscuits, and overall it was pretty decent. The biscuits were moist and had a good crumb, and they toasted up quite well. Score! (They did stick miserably in the muffin cups though, despite being well greased. I had to chisel them out with a knife, which was not fun. Arg).

I toasted one up and topped it with almond-cashew butter. Morning coffee at my side, I had high hopes that this biscuit would be the one to replace my beloved (wheat) toast.

Another big sigh. Turns out it was just not meant to be. It’s not that I didn’t like the Paleo biscuits. It’s that they weren’t amazingly good, either.

As a former baker and lifelong pastry maker (and eater), I realize I’ve set the bar for good bread fairly high. That doesn’t mean that it’s not possible to make a great Paleo bread, just that I haven’t found the right recipe. But I like a challenge, obviously. On the Paleo bread front, we’re not done yet.

With the challenge coming to a close, I’m going to take a few days and gather my thoughts on what I thought of it all, the good and the bad. Stay tuned.
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 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