Chocolate Protein Lava Mug Cake

Wow! It's been a while! I'm still eating (mostly) Primal/Paleo with dairy. Quick catch-up:

I'm running the 5K Dairy Capitol Run again this year (May 29) as part of the Global 5K with Runkeeper, I will also be running the Ingersoll Sprint Into Summer 5K on June 12, and I am seriously considering doing the 10K Hamilton Road2Hope in November. I'm also lifting heavy 4-5 times a week.

I was wanting something sweet today after lunch, and remembered a delicious mug cake recipe I have done some fiddling with to make it more to my tastes. This is a link to the original.

Ingredients:
1 scoop Chocolate PVL Essentials Sport Whey
1 T coconut flour or gluten-free flour (I use GF)
1/2 t baking powder
1-2 T sweetener of your choice (I use Truvia baking blend, about 1 t)
2 T cocoa

1 egg
1/4 whole milk (can use any milk: almond, etc)

1 T oil or melted butter

Optional: 2 T peanut butter and/or a small handful of chocolate chips

In a small mixing bowl, blend dry ingredients together.

In another bowl, whisk together the egg and milk. Pour slowly into the dry ingredients and stir until smooth.

Coat a deep mug or bowl with oil or butter. Pour the batter into the mug and top with a dollop of pb and/or the chocolate chips. Microwave for 60 seconds and eat immediately. The batter is not supposed to be cooked all the way; if you don't like lava cakes, cook it for longer.

You can also bake this in the oven. Just keep an eye on it so you don't overcook.


Macros as I make it:
Calories: 524
Protein: 42
Fat:  29
Carbs: 27

Enjoy!

BBQ Crockpot Chicken

I love my crockpot. I don't think I can actually express how much I love it. I use it to make chicken, turkey, and beef stock for use in homemade soups and sauces; I use it to make meals for when we'll be gone all day and coming  home late; and I use it to prepare meals for when I won't be home to cook dinner (my husband can't cook AT ALL). I actually have two - a regular sized one, and a super large one. The larger one is great for making large roasts or making stock with turkey bones.

The only thing I love more than my crockpots are the vast resources available online. I've recently discovered the joys of several different paleo cooking blogs and have been trying out different crockpot recipes. I think my favourite so far is tikka masala beef with coconut cauliflower.

Yesterday I made BBQ chicken using THIS recipe by Civilized Caveman Cooking Creations. I used a family tray of boneless skinless chicken thighs (there were 9 thighs in the tray). The only thing I changed was that I reduced the pepper (but only because I ran out) and added a bit of maple syrup to mine when I reheated it for dinner when I got home from the gym late last night. I pulled out three of the thighs, some sauce, and shredded the chicken into a small saucepan. I then added a teaspoon of 100% maple syrup, because I like my BBQ sauce slightly sweet. I heated it all up and enjoyed it with some sliced sweet potatoes fried in tallow. MMMMMMM.

I'm sorry I didn't take a photo before I ate it. I was hungry.

Tikka Masala Crockpot Beef with Coconut Cauliflower

I've been buying one-pound packages of ground beef and stewing beef from pastured, grass-fed cows from a local health store. I'm getting tired of having stew or shredded beef (even though it's delicious) twice a week. So I decided to try a new recipe! I did a Google search of "paleo coconut beef" and came up with this recipe over at FastPaleo, a fabulous Paleo recipe sharing site. As usual, I changed the recipe in minor ways to suit my needs and this is what resulted:

It was good. A little on the spicy side, and I found the taste slightly bitter, so I actually needed to add some coconut sweetener and salt to it to balance out the flavours. Next time I will reduce the spices even further (those changes are reflected in the recipe below) and maybe use some honey. This will serve two adults and a pre-school kid and leave some leftovers for someone's lunch. Note: "T" is my short-form for "tablespoon" and "t" is my short-form for "teaspoon." Don't mix them up. Ha.

Ingredients
1 lb grass-fed, pastured stewing beef chunks
1 cup coconut milk
1/4 onion, chopped
1/2 each of red, yellow, and orange sweet peppers, chopped
1/2 package of grape tomatoes, left whole (you could use 1/2 can of stewed tomatoes if you have them)
2 T homemade ketchup (I didn't have tomato paste, you can use that instead)
1/2 T garam masala
1 t each ginger and garlic powder
1/2 t each cumin, paprika, turmeric, chili powder, curry powder, cinnamon, and red pepper flakes OR cayenne pepper (reduce if you don't like spicy)
1/4 t each salt and coriander
1 T lemon or lime juice
1 T unsweetened dried coconut
1 T coco sweet OR honey OR xylitol (use Stevia to taste, I have no idea how much you'd need)

For the Coconut Cauliflower:
1 head of cauliflower
1/2 cup of coconut milk
salt and pepper to taste

Directions
Put the beef into your slow cooker and add the onions, coconut milk, and all the spices. Stir to mix everything together and then cover and put on low for 4 hours. About one hour before you plan to serve the meal, add the peppers, stir, and cover again. Fifteen minutes before dinner time, cut up an entire head of cauliflower and steam it until it is still slightly firm. Mash to desired consistency (I leave it a bit chunky) and stir in half a cup or so of coconut milk, some salt, and some pepper to taste. Serve the Tikka Masala Beef over top of the coconut rice. Enjoy!

The Great Meatball Experiment AKA Liver and Onion Meatballs

I've always hated liver. I don't like the taste, smell, texture, or look of it. I'm not sure if my parents like it or not, but one day I remember coming home from school and all I could smell was liver. My Mother had cooked liver, and then made chili. She tried to hide the liver in the chili. It didn't work. Blech. I think the problem was that she cooked the liver first. She would have been better off to have ground or chopped it it to mix into the ground beef. Ah well. She tried, right?

There are many reasons why everyone should eat liver, especially that from grass fed cows. Liver is a great source of vitamins  A and B, plus essential fatty acids like Arachidonic Acid and DHA. Here is a great article by Chris Masterjohn on the benefits of these nutrients.

I want to like liver, I really do. But since I don't like it alone, I need to try other options, where you mix the liver in with other meats. I'm trying an idea I saw here at The Food Lovers Primal Palate (fabulous site, by the way, go check it out. They have resources, recipes, and lots of other cool stuff). Instead of using their recipe with cinnamon, paprika, and garlic powder, I'm using my stand-by hamburger patty/Salisbury steak seasonings: mustard, salt, pepper, and onion powder. I added chopped onion at the very end, mixed everything together well, and formed into meatballs a bit larger than 1oz each.

Does it look like there is liver mixed in here?

My husband and daughter had spaghetti and meatballs (they're still not 100% Paleo, but they're really close). I had the meatballs as-is, with a huge side of steamed broccoli and cauliflower drenched in pastured butter.

Taste Test Results:

Daughter (almost 4 years old): She ate it up. No complaints.

Husband: rated the meatballs a 4 out of 5, and said you couldn't taste the liver at all.

Me: I'd eat these again. I could totally mix that liver into ground beef for my Salisbury steak recipe and pour the mushroom gravy over it. I could probably add more liver, too.

Now I'm off to look at food processors.

Recipe for people who need that kind of thing:
1 lb pastured ground beef (I'm unsure of the meat/fat ratio, we don't do that in Canada, it's either regular, lean, or extra lean. I figure this is between lean and medium.)
1/4 lb pastured beef liver
1/4 cup chopped onions
1 tsp dry mustard or prepared mustard
1/2 tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp pepper
1/8 tsp sea salt

Mix that all together and form into meatballs - I got 15. Place in a baking dish and bake at 350F for 25 minutes.

One week on Low-Carb Paleo AND Salisbury Steak Recipe

I'm now on day 9 of low-carb paleo....except I can't count last night. I had a friend over and we made a bunch of tequila-and-club-soda-with-lime drinks. They were meant to be margaritas but I totally forgot. Anyway. As usual with alcohol consumption, I kind of strayed from the whole "eat in moderation" rule and ate about 3/4 of a batch of almond crackers with asiago and artichoke dip. Oh well.

For dinner I tried out a new Salisbury Steak recipe. The site is not a Paleo one, but the recipe is low-carb, gluten-free, and Paleo friendly. It does contain dairy, but you could use coconut milk instead of cream in the gravy.

Please excuse the picture, we ate our dinner before I thought to take photos. This is a pic of the leftovers.

It's a fantastic recipe but I did change it a bit. I've found I don't need egg in my ground beef to hold together patties, so I omitted the eggs from the original recipe, and cut the almond flour into 1/4 cup. Here's my altered recipe:

Patties:
1 lb pastured ground beef
1/4 cup ground almonds (almond flour)
1/2 tsp each: black pepper, onion powder, sea salt, prepared yellow mustard (use ground mustard if you have it)

Gravy:
2 cups beef stock
5-7 mushrooms, sliced
1/2 tsp black pepper
dash of salt (depends on if your beef stock has salt in it to start - mine doesn't)
dash of celery salt
2 dashes of wheat-free soy sauce (Bragg's makes some)
1 tbsp cream
1-2 tsp arrowroot flour (used as a thickener instead of flour or cornstarch)
2-3 tablespoons water (to mix with the arrowroot flour)


Directions:
Start the gravy: place the mushrooms, beef stock, and seasonings into a small saucepan and bring to a boil over med-high heat. Reduce to simmer for about 20 minutes. Taste and see if it needs more salt or pepper. Turn off the heat a few minutes before you want to thicken it. Stir in the cream. Just before serving your meal, mix the arrowroot flour into a small bowl or cup with a couple tablespoons of water and blend with a fork. Pour that into your beef stock/mushroom mixture and mix with fork. If it's not quite thick enough, repeat the process with 1/2 to 1 teaspoon or so of arrowroot flour. (Waiting to allow the gravy to cool a bit will help guarantee your arrowroot starch doesn't break down in heat and fail to set.)

Mix the meat ingredients together and form into 3 or 4 patties. Cook on a baking sheet or baking dish for 25 minutes at 350F. Broil for 2 minutes at the end. Remove to plates and ladle gravy on top.

Serve with a side of mashed/whipped cauliflower and a nice veg - I used sauteed asparagus. MMMM.

Turkey Breakfast Sausages

One thing I miss is pork - not that you could tell from my last three blog posts, right? It's not cut out of my diet due to the whole paleo thing, it's just that I don't make it much because Ben can't eat it. I can't even cook it when he's home, or he'll react to it.

My absolutely favourite pork items (besides bacon) are breakfast sausages, and cheddar smokies...neither of which I am willing to eat anymore. Bacon is even a hard sell for me these days, unless it's nitrate free. Breakfast sausages and smokies are full of disgusting fillers, nitrates, wheat, and a whole lot of other stuff I don't even want to think about. But I digress.

I miss sausage. So I found a couple recipes to make breakfast sausage out of ground turkey, and bought a package of organic ground turkey (not as good as pastured but until they start selling that in the grocery store, I'm stuck). I've always been very dubious of ground turkey, chicken, and pork. My brother makes turkey burgers all the time but the last time I used it I didn't like it, and haven't, since. So this was a total experiment.

I used the recipe from cavemanfood, with a few changes because I didn't have exactly the same spices. But they turned out really well, aside from being kind of dry and needing salt - which was totally my fault because I missed that line in the recipe. I'm not sure if you can buy anything other than "extra lean ground turkey" but if you can, choose one that's not so lean. Or maybe baking these would keep them moist. I don't know. ***edited to add: I made up a double batch and added 1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil to the meat mixture before forming into patties. Made a HUGE difference in texture and moistness.

Ingredients
1 lb ground turkey
1 tsp onion powder
1/4 tsp of each: ground ginger, red hot pepper flakes, cumin, black pepper, nutmeg, oregano
1/4 to 1/2 tsp sea salt
1 1/2 tsp of poultry seasoning (or 1/4 tsp ea of basil, sage, and thyme-mine has other stuff in it too but it worked fine)
1 lightly beaten egg

Mix all items together. The original recipe suggests you refrigerate it for an hour to let the flavours meld. I didn't and they turned out great. You'll have to use some kind of oil in the pan so they don't stick. I used a 50-50 mixture of cultured butter and organic olive oil.

Now, if I can find me some pastured pigs and order some ground pork, I'll be making up thousands of these puppies and throwing them in my freezer for when Ben's not home.

In case you're interested, each 120g serving has around 130 cals, 1g carbs, 1.6g fat, and 27g protein. Wowza! Add more fat grams and calories for the type of oil in which you decide to cook them. For some perspective, I used a .65kg package and got 8 flat little patties out of it. Two of those patties is 120g. This is a fantastic high-protein, low-fat and low-carb meal option!