Plantain(flour) pancakes

I have been meaning to post this and keep forgetting. This is one of our favorites. If you wanted to try something exotic, try plantain flour. Plantain and plantain flour are staples at our house. I normally use the flour for making pancakes. I don't really measure anything when I make plantain pancakes but I'll estimate for the sake of this post.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup plantain flour
1 egg
2 tbsp sunflower oil or any oil you prefer
1 tbsp honey
1/4 tsp aluminum free baking soda
1/4 cup milk or anything non-dairy that you use. I mostly use hemp milk
2 tbsp Enjoy Life chocolate chips

Mix it all until all lumps are gone.  Heat skillet to medium.  Once on medium,  I normally turn it down to less than medium, on my stove it's on a "3."  It doesn't take long to cook so keep an eye on it and flip it to cook the other side.  Serve warm with organic maple syrup.

Missing paleo

As some of you know, recently I revamped my diet again. I could not strictly stay paleo anymore because I had to remove many foods that I was eating while following that lifestyle.  I would say I miss coconut the most. I used coconut everything.  Coconut oil, coconut milk, coconut butter. I miss almonds as well and other nuts(most are also moderate to high in salicylates).  The only nut I'm eating right now is cashew.  It's been frustrating to be honest, being so limited with foods. It was already so limited before and now it's even worse.  I was doing well until last year when I had pneumonia and had to be on steroids and antibiotics. And then a few months after that, had to be on antibiotics and steroids again. Later on I had to be on antibiotics again. I really believe that jeopardized the integrity of my stomach and cause even more dysbiosis. In other words, all the antibiotics and steroids sabotaged my path to healing.  I'm upset about it but there was nothing I could do. 

I haven't been posting many recipes because I'm still struggling with this low salicylate diet. I'm still learning. Some days I just want to give up and just eat everything and just deal with the consequences!

Kare-Kare paleo style (Filipino dish)

Kare-kare

I apologize for the lack of picture but every time I make this it gets snatched so fast. I don't even get a chance to take pictures.  This is a Filipino dish that I've changed a bit to make it paleo.  I hope you like it. I grew up eating it.  My dad made this with peanut butter and I changed it to cashew butter to make it low salicylate and also paleo.

As always I don't ever measure when cooking(aside from baking).

Ingredients:

4 or 5 pieces of ox tail (yes you read it right!)
a dash of black pepper(optional, omit if low salicylate)
a dash of sea salt
1 tablespoon (eyeballing this) of cashew butter or almond butter(if not low salicylate)
3 or 4 cloves of crushed garlic
a handful of chopped bok choy
A cup or two of filtered water

Put everything except the boy choy in a pot to cook until the meat softens.  After oxtail is soft which takes about an hour for me, add the bok choy. Cook for another 15 minutes until bok choy is soft.  Then it's done!  I grew up eating this with boiled white rice.   I also omitted the shrimp paste because I'm severely allergic to shrimp.

Hazelnut scones

1 cup soaked and dehydrated hazelnuts(for easier digestion).  I buy hazelnuts and soak them for 8 hours then dehydrate them until they are dry. Then I grind it using my food processor until it's "meal" consistency.

1 pastured egg

1/4 teaspoon aluminum-free baking soda

1/4 teaspoon gluten-free vanilla

2 tablespoon raw honey

1/8 cup Spectrum shortening, softened

a dash of sea salt


Mix everything and then scoop them on a parchment-lined baking sheet.  Bake at 350 for about 15 minutes but check often.  It's done when you check with a toothpick and it comes out clean.

We really liked this. It tastes a little bit like Nutella!  Next time I make it, I will add raisins or cherries.

Paleo/SCD banana bread

1 cup almond butter (or cashew butter)
2 eggs
1/2 teaspoon aluminum-free baking soda
2 tsp gluten-free vanilla
3/4 cup raw honey
1 ripe banana

Mash the bananas. Mix everything.  Put mixture in a square greased pan.  I used a glass pyrex lined with parchment paper.  Bake at 350 degrees for 30-40 minutes or until inside is cooked.  Check with a toothpick or a knife.  This comes out sweet so if you want less sweet, use more almond butter and less raw honey.

Paleo chocolate cookies again

I made these twice now because they were a big hit at my house. I've had to hide some just so I can eat one!  This was a recipe from http://howtoeatandlive.com/2012/02/paleo-chocolate-chip-cookie-recipe/.

By this way, this recipe is egg-free, great for those who are avoiding eggs.  This was the best paleo chocolate chip cookies I've ever had.   I think the picture speaks for itself!

Simple Paleo lunch

Bacon, eggs and curry cabbage.

The eggs were from the farmers market.   Can you see how dark the yolk is?  These eggs were from chickens that were cage-free, free-range and mostly foraged on their own and ate very little grains.  They have a wonderful taste, not bland like supermarket eggs and definitely healthier for you because they are high in omega-3.  The cabbage was chopped up and cooked with duck fat, almond milk, sea salt, black pepper and curry powder.

Anyway, just a quick, easy meal to prepare when you're in a rush!

Almond Butter Chocolate chip cookies (paleoish)

 
Ingredients:

1 cup of almond butter
Enjoy Life chocolate chips, as much as you want
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 eggs (I used duck eggs)
Several teaspoons of dried coconut
1 tsp lemon juice or apple cider vinegar
3 tbsp. Spectrum shortening (I didn't melt it)
4 packets of Truvia. If you use honey, you will have to adjust the amount of almond butter.

Preheat oven at 350 degrees Fahrenheit.  Mix all the ingredients together. Make into small balls, these get bigger as they cook.  Put them on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet.  Bake for 10 minutes or so, just keep checking.  You should take them out when they're still a little soft, that's a given for cooking with nut.  They will get harder but will still be chewy enough.

I hope you like them!  My 4-year-old child ate 6 in one sitting!

Paleo Stir-fry

I like to make stir-fry with leftover meat from the day before.  This time we had plenty of pheasant.  .

Ingredients:  

*I'm eyeballing as usual so please bear with me.

1 package of yam noodles (they sell this at Whole Foods or other health food stores)
Coconut aminos, about 1/8 cup
Sea salt to taste
Ground pepper to taste
Sesame oil, maybe about 1 tsp (optional)
Leftover pheasant meat, removed from bones and diced (you can use chicken, beef, pork, etc)
1 bag of stir-fry veggies
Duck fat (or any animal fat)

Boil yam noodles for however long the package tells you. Drain and then rinse. Heat up a large frying pan or wok with duck fat or any lard you have. Saute meat, then add veggies.  Then add the noodles and everything else. Stir around for a while.  Serve warm and enjoy!

Almost paleo chili

Okay so this is not completely paleo, but it's GAPS-friendly if you're in advanced stages.  I added some sprouted red lentils to this recipe. I soaked and sprouted them myself.  You can omit that to make it paleo.

Please bear with me as I am once again not sure as far as the exact amounts of spices and such that I used. I always eye ball these things.

The veggies don't need to be perfect. If you want them chunky, then just cut them up in whatever shape or form you like, no need to dice them.  It's all good.

Ingredients:

1 pound grass-fed ground beef
Diced onion, half of the onion
A few cloves of garlic, smashed
1 tsp sea salt
1 TBSP cumin
1 TBSP all spice
1/2 TBSP cocoa powder
a cup of beef broth (I made it from beef bones)
1/2 cup of water or so
black pepper
Trader Joe's chipotle salsa, about 1/2 of the bottle or less if you don't like it too spicy*
Tomato paste (I used 3 ounces)
2 TBSP beef tallow (I made this one too) or coconut oil or any other good quality animal fat
I large green bell pepper, cut up/diced
1/2 cup of sprouted red lentils (optional)
1 medium zucchini, peeled and diced added at the end

Heat casserole and add the tallow.  Saute the onion and garlic, don't burn them!  Add the beef and brown it.  Add all the other ingredients and stir.  Come to a boil and then turn it down to simmer for about 90 minutes or so.  Make sure it's covered during this time.

*Trader Joe's Chipotle salsa says it's medium hot. It tastes mild to me though but maybe that's because I like spicy food. Anyway, just be careful with this if you're not a big fan of spicy.

Enjoy!

Almond Banana Chocolate Muffin

Ingredients:

1 Cup almond butter, creamy (I used the one from Trader Joes)
2 pastured eggs
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tablespoon chocolate chips
1/4 cup raw honey
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar or lemon juice
1 very ripe banana

Mash the banana.  Combine everything except the apple cider vinegar or lemon juice.  Add them later.  Bake at 350 degrees F for 25 minutes or til toothpick comes out clean.  

They came out so great! It's very dense so I don't think I can eat more than 2 in one sitting :).  Enjoy!

Paleo Irish Soda Bread

Ever since we went paleo a year and half ago, we haven't had any Irish soda bread.  My husband is of Irish descent and this was one of those things that I made that he truly enjoyed. We used to be just gluten and dairy-free so I would make the soda bread with millet and sorghum flours.   I'm so glad we can have soda bread again! I adapted this from Elana's Pantry's Irish soda bread recipe.

2 and 3/4 cups blanched almond flour
¼ teaspoon celtic sea salt
1 ½ teaspoons baking soda
½ cup raisins
2 eggs
2 tablespoons raw honey
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar(or you can also use lemon)


Mix all the wet ingredients separately in a bowl.  Mix the dry ingredients separately in a bowl as well.  Then mix both.   Form into a dough and put on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.  Please see picture above, it's about 8 inches sideways and about an inch and a half of height.   Score the dough with a sharp knife.  Bake at 350 degrees F for 20 minutes, turn off the stove and let it sit in there for another 10 minutes. Take it out and cool it on a rack for half an hour before serving.  It tastes great by itself but my 4 year old loves it with apricot jam.

Paleo Coconut pineapple muffins

I realized I have a lot of coconut flour left and some leftover pineapple that has to be consumed ASAP.  This recipe is really easy, paleo and GAPS-friendly as well.

I need to add more pineapple next time!

1/4 cup sifted coconut flour
3 pastured eggs
1/4 tsp gluten-free vanilla
a dash of celtic salt
Bits and pieces of pineapple(I'm not sure how much I used, sorry)
1 tsp baking powder
2 tbsp melted Spectrum shortening or real butter if you can handle it.
2 tbsp raw honey

Mix eggs, honey, Spectrum shortening, salt and baking soda.  Then add the remaining ingredients. Make sure to remove clumps.  Bake at 400 degrees F for 15 minutes. Makes about 6-7 muffins.

Note: I've made this with nuts and blueberries. Just substitute for the pineapple and add nuts, berries or whatever you want. Enjoy

Coconut Waffles

This is quick and easy and paleo!   It's always a hit at my house.  I eyeballed everything so I'm giving you approximate measurements in this post.

1/4 cup coconut flour
2 large duck eggs (you can use chicken eggs too but you may need 3).
1 tsp GF vanilla
2 tbsp coconut milk(I made my own)
a dash of salt
1 tbsp honey
1 tbsp virgin coconut oil

Pre-heat your waffle maker.  Mix everything and make sure to remove all lumps.   Cook! Serve. I served this with honey lemon creme that I purchased from an SCD-legal website.

Fake Larabar balls

these didn't last long!

I can't think of a snazzy name for these so because they taste like Larabars I decided to call them  "Fake Larabar balls."  These are so easy to make and so delicious, you'll devour them all in one sitting!  

I always get raw nuts and soak and dehydrate them first, which could take a couple of days.  However,  if you just want to use regular nuts and not go through the lengthy process like I do, that's fine too.  If you're interested in the art of soaking nuts, here's how I do it:

Wash the nuts thoroughly.  You'll notice that bubbles will form. Rinse well.  Soak in cold water with a little bit of salt.  Soak for at least 12 hours.   After the allotted time, rinse well.  I dehydrate them after. I have a dehydrator, I leave them there for about 7 hours. You'll have to check, times may vary, depending on your machine and the type of nuts you're using.

Ingredients:

1 cup dried dates (I used Dole)
1 cup walnuts ( you can use any nuts you want)
1/2 cup shredded organic coconut *optional

Pulse dates in a food processor.  Set aside. Pulse the walnuts but not too much, you don't want to end up with walnut butter!

Mix them together and form into balls. Or if you want to make them look like Larabars, make them into bars.

Refrigerate until it sets.  For Larabar look-alike, wrap in plastic wrap individually, tape it and refrigerate until it sets.

I hope this is not too confusing! Enjoy!

Dairy-free Peas and Carrots soup

I was reading a story online and in it a teenager makes peas and carrots soup for a cancer-survivor.   I've never had it before so naturally, it made me curious and I just had to make it.  I googled and tweaked a recipe that would work with our food issues.  So here it is.

*Ingredients:

1 cup of frozen peas
1 cup diced carrots
Some diced celery stalks
A dash of thyme
A dash of salt and pepper
A few pieces of chopped garlic
A cup or so of hemp milk ( you can also use almond or any other dairy-free option.  Use real milk if you can tolerate it)
A tbsp of tapioca starch to thicken it (you may use arrowroot or potato starch too)

Saute garlic then add everything to the pot.  Bring to a boil.  When vegetables are tender, turn off the stove.  Let it sit for a little bit.  Puree.  Serve!

I initially made this with coconut milk.  It was lovely!  The 2nd time (in the photo) was with unsweetened hemp milk.

*I eyeball when I cook.  I apologize for the approximations. 

What we eat(Rotation Diet)

I've had quite a number of people asking me what we eat everyday, mainly for breakfast.  I'm sorry I'm just posting this now so late.  I'm making some drastic changes though so in a few weeks this may not even apply anymore.   DD and I are going to do GAPS.  See link if interested.

gapsdiet.com

Anyway, here are things we eat for breakfast on rotation: I'm not specifying what days we actually eat them.

Breakfast ideas:
Muffins made from nut butter or nut flours
Pancakes made from nut butter or nut flours
Fruit with malanga butter*
Fruit peanut butter or cashew butter
Chestnut flour muffins *I'm still experimenting with other recipes
Coconut pancakes
Coconut bread
Coconut muffins/cupcakes
Coconut yogurt (homemade)
Turkey bacon
Sunny Side up eggs/scrambled eggs
Poached eggs
Avocado or avocado with eggs or with turkey bacon
Malanga cookies (they're healthy) that I baked
Yam cookies

Occasionally:

Homemade hash browns
Sweet potato hashbrowns

Keep in mind that I mainly bake/cook sugar-free on top of everything else. If I think of something else I'll post :).  I hope this helps some of you.

*I purchased malanga butter, malanga flour and yam flour from Specialty Foods.  They don't have a website, just a phone number you call and they will send you a very detailed catalog of all the tuber flours they sell.  They sell baked goods, imitation nut butters, specialty oils, lipbalms and lotions that can be made according to your allergies.  They are all pricey items but worth it if you have plenty of allergies.

SuperBowl Sunday Beef Stew!

I love cold weather because I love soups and stews :).  Here's another hearty yet easy recipe.  It was just succulent and a perfect healthy meal for Superbowl Sunday!

*Ingredients:

Any cut of beef, preferably with bones, preferably grass-fed (this one is organic), this was a large cut.
1 tbsp ground pepper
1 tbsp sea salt
A cup of roughly chopped carrots
A cup of roughly chopped
a cup of Bok Choy
1/2 red onion(or white or whatever you have)
A few pieces of diced garlic
1/2 cup of chopped celery
Enough water to cover the entire thing

Put the meat to cook with the garlic, onion and celery. Cover the whole thing with water.  Set to cook in low.  In the morning when I woke up, I added the vegetables and let it cook for another hour or so, til they're tender.

Voila! Easy meal!

*I don't measure except when baking, sorry! I just love, love, love to eyeball!

If you have leftovers and you're tired of this meal, shred the beef and make it into Vaca Frita!  I'll post a photo and a recipe for that later.

Coconut pancakes

Who doesn't love coconut?  This is easy and doesn't require a lot of prep work. 

I apologize for the picture, the pancakes were devoured.  Also I don't go for perfection, I like things to look rustic as long as the taste is great!

Ingredients:

1/4 cup coconut flour
2 organic eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla
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1/2 cup hemp milk, get unsweetened if you can.  Or use coconut milk, even better
Optional: a dash of salt

Mix everything together and make sure there are no lumps.  No one likes lumpy pancakes! LOL  Set it aside after mixing.   Heat up pan or griddle, cook on medium heat til done.  It won't bubble up like a traditional pancake recipe, please make a note of that.

Enjoy!  I actually served it with watermelon, just because today is watermelon day in the rotation diet but you can serve it with anything!

Paleo Pork stew

Paleo Pork Stew


This came out very good and I was eating everything in sight!  I served it with organic baked red potatoes.  Towards the end, I dipped the potatoes on the broth/soupy part, however you call it!

Ingredients:

Pork tenderloin ( is that what you call it, LOL).  It had some bones
A few bay leaves
Turmeric (for color)
Black pepper
Sea salt to taste
garlic
1/2 onion, diced
2 Tbsp Coconut Aminos
A few cups of water

Boil everything together until the meat is tender.  Mix it every now and then to make sure the color stays even.  Eat and enjoy!