This was a kid lunch…bell peppers are good dippers with guacamole.
Breakfast
Scrambled eggs, turkey sausage and apple hash, orange slices Lunch Veggie Curry soup with avocado, chicken sausage or hot dog, guacamole and pepper slices Snack
Apples and almonds Dinner
Roasted turkey, mashed sweet squash with cinnamon, green beans, and sauteed celery, green onion, and mushroom hash
Here is the turkey after dinner was over. It got moved back to the kitchen, but Thad decided he needed more of the yummy salty-crisp skin.
And so…our 30 day diet adventure ends. I’m not sad to see it go: although I will be cooking a lot of the same food in the weeks (months, years?) ahead, at least now we can add back in dairy and honey to broaden our food choices (and dairy is really great for a ready snack…).
So we’ve eaten a LOT of great food, and here’s where we stand:
Mr. Wonderful: lost 10lbs and 6 inches in two measurements (waist and belly)
Me: lost 4lbs and 3 inches in 6 measurements (pecs, bust, ribs, waist, belly, hips)
Favorite new habit: the “big” sit down breakfast as a family…with tea!
Breakfast
Scrambled eggs, turkey sausage patties, orange slices Lunch
Salmon salad (scd mayo with curry added) on a bed of romaine, or hot dog, apple slices Snack
Apples and almond butter Dinner
Taco Tuesday! (Taco meat over finely sliced romaine and cabbage, with tomatoes, guacamole, bell peppers and salsa)
And finally a photo of a Taco Bowl. I think I always devour it before I can snap a picture.
Breakfast
Fried eggs, turkey sausage patties, grapefruit Lunch
Hot dog or leftovers, with spaghetti squash sauteed in ghee and garlic, apple slices
Snack
Raisins and almonds DinnerPlum-mustard BBQ Chicken Drumsticks, roasted carrots, salad with apple and avocado
I thought the sauteed spaghetti squash (leftover from our “spaghetti” of last week) was good. Mr. Wonderful disagreed. You can decide for yourself.
Do you notice I’ve had fewer pictures, less new meals, and more recycled meals in the last few days? Yes…running out of steam. 🙂 Looking forward to day 31 when we can add dairy back in!
I love watching my two year old chow down on good food I’ve made!
Breakfast
Grapefruit, Banana Crepes with berry compote and turkey sausage Lunch
Leftovers and hot dogs Dinner Bratwurst Roast
The Brat Roast is our new Saturday night tradition; we love this meal!
Although acorn squash looks beautiful in the brat roast, pealed and chunked butternut squash works better as it doesn’t need to be scraped out once on the plate.
Breakfast
Scrambled eggs, turkey sausage patties, grapefruit Lunch
Veggie soup, sausage or hot dog or leftovers, apple slices Dinner
Chicken Tiki Masala
This recipe was the inspiration for dinner. I converted it to crockpot cooking, and also added roasted cauliflower and purple carrots at the end; the single dish dinner with chunks of veggies reminded me of curies my husband’s Moroccan uncle has made for us.
Cook on high for 4 hours, then cut up chicken into chunks/shreds. At this point I had a lot of liquid in the crockpot; if I had thawed the chicken in the fridge the night before and drained off the liquid and cooked it on low for 8 hours or longer this would probably not be the case.
I ladled out most of the liquid into a large skillet and simmered it on the stove to reduce it.
Meanwhile, heat oven to 500 and melt in a saucepan on the stove:
2 Tb ghee
2 Tb olive oil
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp paprika
1/4 tsp fresh ground pepper
Heat and stir. Pour into two large glass pans, and toss and coat:
1 head cauliflower, cut into florets
4 large carrots cut in chunks (I used purple and orange carrots; any color will work)
Roast in the oven 30 minutes, or until browning. Stir occasionally.
To the reduced chicken sauce add:
4 tsps paprika
1 tsp salt
1 can (15oz) tomato sauce
1 cup chopped cilantro
Heat to simmering and add back to the chicken in the crockpot.
When cauliflower and carrots are browned and soft add into the crockpot.
Serve hot, over rice if eating grains. We had it straight like a stew.
Breakfast
Scrambled eggs, turkey sausage, bananas, hot tea Lunch
Curried Pumpkin Veggie soup, leftover Goulash and Rotkohl or hot dog or apple chicken sausage, apple slices Dinner Spaghetti Squash with Marinara and Meat Sauce, steamed broccoli
You would think this would be the dinner that the kids loved…but no. The squash was too different from pasta for them, but they ate decent amounts anyway. In the past I have used shredded zucchini, unheated under simmering sauce (heats up right away in the bowl), with better all around success. But it’s winter, so we used the winter Spaghetti Squash this week.
Spaghetti Squash with Marinara and Meat Sauce
Preheat oven to 400. Wash your whole squash to remove any dirt. Prick all over with a fork or small knife so it won’t burst while cooking. Place in a pan and bake for one hour.
Remove from oven and allow to cool just until you can handle it to cut it in half lengthwise. Scoop all the seeds and pulp from the center, discard. Using forks, shred the flesh of the squash into noodle-like pieces. Serve into bowls and cover with heated sauce.
Marinara and Meat Sauce
And you thought I was going to give some great recipe, right? Wrong. I try not to make marinara from scratch, certainly not on a weeknight in the dead of winter. In summer, when I have too many tomatoes in the garden, I love to make an easy oven-roasted marinara, but right not, out of a jar is fine with me.
There was only one(!) marinara at TJs that didn’t have sugar, soybean oil, or dairy; their Roasted Garlic. WOW! Is that ever a lot of garlic! On weeks when I can get to WholeFoods (never), I like to buy their store brand (Everyday 365?) in the fat free “flavor” because it’s a great basic sauce without nasty add-ins.
So:Brown 1 lb grassfed ground beef in a skillet. Add:
1/2 tsp sea salt
1 tsp Italian seasoning
1 jar marinara
Simmer 10 minutes and serve over squash.
When I was newly married, my husband (aka Mr. Wonderful, a German) asked me if I could learn to make a German meal and a few German desserts. This was a tiny bit overwhelming to me, since I was raised on mainly American, Mexican, and Italian fare.
So I started reading about German food, and I invited myself over to the home of a German gal I’d met through a Bible study. She taught me goulash and rotkohl, which has been my go-to German meal since. (Thank you, Kathleen!)
(I also make a few German desserts… All in gluten free versions now.)
Oh, and my kids have now “left France and gone to Germany” in school studies. German food. Perfect timing.
Beef Goulash
2-3 lbs steak or roast meat, fat trimmed, cut in chunks
Lard
1-2 onions, chopped
Salt
Fresh ground pepper
Bay leaves
In a large heavy enamel lidded pot, brown meat in lard over medium high heat. Add salt, pepper, onions and bay leaves. Allow onion to begin to caramelize, then add 1/2 cup liquid (beef broth, water, or red wine). Turn to low and simmer for two hours with lid on, or until meat is falling apart and shreds. Remove any remaining gristle or bones, and add another 1/2 cup liquid, and continue to cook on low heat until liquid is absorbed. Remove bay leaves before serving.
I used red wine in the beef today. This is not approved on the whole30 diet, however, I was cooking grassfed beef (a very large chuck steak and a small tenderloin) and Mr. Wonderful really prefers to have a marinade type flavoring whenever we eat this beef. I’m not so sensitive to the stronger flavor of grassfed, but it is often gamey to his taste. He heartily endorsed the flavor of tonight’s beef though.
I baked sweet meat squash for this dinner. These squash are so huge! I thought it was so cool that the skin came off the squash so cleanly when I lifted it off.
Breakfast
Scrambled eggs (yep, that was all…busy morning getting out the door to church!) Lunch
Leftovers! Dinner Asian Meatballs with dipping sauce, butternut squash fries, blooming onion (or at least my first attempt)
Roasted Onion and Sweet Fries
On stovetop melt:
2 Tb ghee
1/2 tsp garlic
1/2 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp fresh ground pepper
2 Tb olive oil
Use an apple slicer to cut a sweet onion into wedges. Separate layers and dribble marinade between pieces.
Peal and cut a butternut squash into French fry size pieces. Toss remaining marinade on pieces and place in a single layer on papered baking sheet. Roast at 500 for 15 minutes, turn up to broil and broil until pieces are brown and just starting to blacken. Serve immediately.
Yum…this was so good. I made two pans for all 7 of us.
Brat Roast
Preheat the oven to 475.
Place on parchment papered baking sheet:
6 Bratwurst (mine made by local health food store and contain only natural pork and herbs and spices, and salt)
1 acorn squash, in 1/2 inch slices
1 sweet onion, pealed and sliced
4 apples, cored and chunked
2 Tb olive oil
Sprinkle of coarse Celtic sea salt
Sprinkle of fresh ground proper
Toss together to distribute olive oil. Arrange in a single layer on baking sheet; I had enough here to need a second baking sheet.
Place in hot oven for 15 minutes, then remove, flip brats, and return to oven for 5 more minutes. Turn on broiler and broil each pan for approximately 5 minutes, or until the onions are looking a bit charred but sausages are not yet blackening.
Serve immediately, with senf and sauerkraut.
Wow, the sweet onions in this dish were so amazing…actually it was all so good. Mr. Wonderful named it as his new favorite meal. 🙂
