Whole30 Day 10: Zoodles Carbonara

Spaghetti Carbonara is probably my favorite pasta dish.  I love the richness of the egg and the saltiness of the bacon.  Fortunately, this dish is still very yummy plus it's good for you.  Bonus: it's quick and easy, too!

Photo: http://www.insulinresistancerecipes.com

Ingredients:

• 2 zucchini, spiraled or julienned
• 6 pieces of bacon, diced
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 2 eggs, beaten

Directions:

1. Cook bacon, add garlic, and cook for just a few seconds.
2. Add zoodles and cook for a couple minutes
3. Add in eggs and stir to coat evenly.
4. Enjoy!

Whole30 Day 5: Spaghetti Pie

This recipe is similar to one I posted last year, Pepperoni Pizza Casserole.  But PaleOMG's recipe is just different enough it made me want to try hers instead of mine.  Plus, PaleOMG's version is straight-up whole30 compliant. But I'm topping mine with non-compliant pepperoni slices as inspired by From Here To Health.

Photo: From Here To Health

Almost 5-Ingredient Pizza Spaghetti Pie

Ingredients

• 1 large spaghetti squash
• 1 lb italian sausage
• ½ yellow onion, diced
• 1 cup pizza sauce (no sugar added)
• 1 teaspoon dried basil
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 3 eggs, whisked
• (optional: add anything you like with pizza: veggies, basil, even cheese if you do primal)

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 400˚F.
2. Cut spaghetti squash in half lengthwise. Place spaghetti squash cut side down on a baking sheet and bake for 20-25 minutes or until the skin of the squash gives when you press on it. Then, remove squash from oven and reduce temp to 350˚F.
3. Once squash is done cooking, remove threads and place in a large bowl. Set aside.
4. Place a large pan over medium heat. Add italian sausage and onion. Cook until pink no longer remains in the sausage and it is broken up into pieces.
5. Add pizza sauce, dried basil and salt and pepper to the pan and mix well.
6. Add sausage mixture to the spaghetti squash and mix well.
7. Add whisked eggs to the spaghetti squash and mix everything together until you can no longer see the eggs.  Pour into an 8×8 baking dish.
8. Place in oven and bake for 1 hour or until the top of the mixture forms a slight crust that doesn’t give when you press on it in the middle of the dish.
9. Let rest for 5 minutes before serving.

Flourless Mocha-Bacon Brownies

Nineteen years ago today my husband did the greatest thing - he proposed to me!  Thankfully, I was smart enough to say, "YES"!

In honor of our good choices, 19 years ago, I made my husband a batch of these to-die-for-brownies from Diane Sanfilippo's book Practical Paleo.  Now don't just copy the recipes from my blog.  Go out and buy the book yourself.  It is chock full of information along with great recipes like this one.

Photo: Practical Paleo

Ingredients:

• 4oz dark chocolate, melted and cooled
• 1/2 cup butter, melted and cooled
• 1/2 cup pure maple syrup
• 3 eggs
• 1/2 cup + 2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
• 2 tablespoons very strong coffee
• 2 tablespoons fine coffee grounds
• 2 slices cooked bacon, chopped

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375˚F.
2. In a medium-sized mixing bowl combine chocolate, butter, maple syrup, and eggs.
3. Slowly sift in the cocoa and mix to combine.
4. Add coffee and coffee grounds and mix to combine.
5. Spread into a parchment lined brownie pan.
6. Top with chopped bacon.
7. Bake for about 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
8. Dust with cocoa powder.

Did you notice this recipe is grain free? It is also FODMAPs free!

Enjoy, we did!

Pancake Bacon Strips

Photo: blog.chefuniforms.com

What a delicious way to start (or end) your day.  Try this with Pancakes My Kids Will Eat from my earlier post.

Guess what we're having for breakfast on Saturday.

Pancakes My Kids Will Eat

Pancakes were a staple in our house before drastically changing our diet.  My husband made waffles or pancakes every other day.  I don't think I'm exaggerating, either.  I've tried many pancake recipes and I either got a, "no way" or "eh, it's ok".  I stopped trying for a long time and now I've stumbled on a new recipe.  Last week when I made them before school, both kids had seconds! 

Photo: Real Food Made Easy

Ingredients:

4 eggs
1 cup coconut milk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 tablespoon coconut nectar or honey
1/2 cup coconut flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon

Directions:

• Add all ingredients to a blender and blend until smooth.  Using a blender is fast and makes for easy pouring.
• Allow batter to sit for a couple of minutes to thicken.
• Melt butter in a frying pan or griddle and pour in pancake batter to the size of pancakes you desire.
• When the batter bubbles on top, flip over and continue cooking for about 30 seconds.
• Top with grass-fed butter and Grade B 100% pure maple syrup.

Bacon Butternut Squash Soufflé

Thanks to PaleOMG for the inspiration for this one.  This would be a nice addition to your side dishes but also a great post-Thanksgiving creation using leftover mashed yams or sweet potatoes.

Photo: PaleOMG

Ingredients:

• 2 cups butternut squash, pumpkin, sweet potato, or yam, pureed
• 4 eggs, separated
• 1 heaping tablespoon arrowroot starch
• 4 slices of bacon, diced
• 2 tablespoons bacon fat
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 1 shallot, sliced
• 1 teaspoon fresh thyme, chopped
• 1 teaspoon fresh sage, chopped
• salt and pepper, to taste
• butter
  

Directions:

1.    Preheat oven to 400˚F.

2.    Cook bacon until crispy. Remove with a slotted spoon and place on a plate with a paper towel.

3.    Add puree, 1T bacon fat, and egg yolks to the food processor. Puree until smooth, pour into a large bowl.

4.    Heat 1T bacon fat in a skillet over medium heat and add garlic and shallots.

5.    Cook until shallots are tender and translucent.

6.    Add shallots, bacon, arrowroot starch, herbs, salt and pepper to the bowl of puree and mix well.

7.    In a separate large bowl beat egg whites until stiff peaks form. With a spatula, fold egg whites into your squash bowl until no white streaks remain.

8.    Grease a glass baking dish with butter and pour in mixture. 

9.  Bake for 35-40 minutes.

Spaghetti Squash alla Carbonara

This recipe, from Paleo Parents, is my VERY favorite spaghetti squash dish.  I could make it every night and as I'm typing this I'm wondering why it has been so long since I've made it.  Everyone in my family loved it, especially since it has bacon in it.

Ingredients
1 medium spaghetti squash
12 oz bacon
1 Tbsp coconut flour
1/2 C coconut milk
6 eggs
1 Tbsp Italian seasoning (or herbs de provence)
1 tsp dried parsley
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp garlic powder
1 heaping Tbsp coconut oil or butter

Instructions

1. Cut the spaghetti squash in half, scoop out the seeds, place open side down on a plate and microwave for 10 minutes (alternatively, bake for 40 minutes at 350 degrees)
2. While the squash is cooking, fry up the strips of bacon (whole) in a pan over medium heat. Use one you can also scramble eggs in, we like a cast iron skillet
3. When the bacon is finished cooking and crispy, remove from the pan and set-aside bacon
4. Over medium heat, whisk in the coconut flour to the bacon grease and let cook for a few minutes
5. While the flour cooks, combine eggs, coconut milk, seasoning, parsley, salt and garlic powder in a bowl until all yolks are fully incorporated
6. Pour eggs into pan, stirring frequently, and cook in bacon fat until still wet but cooked through (about 3 minutes)
7. Slice bacon into 1/4 inch strips, add to serving bowl and top with egg mixture
8. Scrape out spaghetti squash “noodles” with a fork and and add to serving bowl, top with oil or butter
9. Slowly start to incorporate oil/butter into spaghetti squash; once melted, stir to combine all ingredients

Delish!

Eat Real Food

"There is no one diet that will work for everyone, but if your diet doesn’t involve mostly REAL FOOD, then you are setting yourself up for failure." Yum Yum Fit

Doesn't it make sense?

We should eat real food – meat, fish, eggs, vegetables, fruit, healthy oils, and nuts. We should choose foods that are raised, fed and grown naturally, and foods that are nutrient-dense, with lots of naturally occurring vitamins and minerals.  Shouldn't we?

It shouldn't be a “diet” – we can eat as much as we need.  We're eating for fuel to maintain strength, energy, activity levels and a healthy body weight.  We should aim for well-balanced nutrition, eating animals and a significant amount of plants.

Eating like this will help us look, feel, live and perform our best, and reduce our risks for a variety of lifestyle-related diseases and conditions.

It seems to go against everything we've grown up learning and doing.  That's why, when Brad started eating real food, I thought he was just asking for a heart attack.  What about the USDA Food Pyramid?

Since the USDA food pyramid was released in 1992, the obesity rate has increased unabated. Take a look around you. The obesity rate is the highest it’s ever been, and almost everyone who’s not obese is “just” overweight. Diabetes is on the rise. People live out the end of their lives relying on a complicated cocktail of pharmaceuticals and medical apparati just to eke out a few more years. All this, despite the majestic, all-powerful USDA dietary recommendations informing everything we put into our collective mouths. How’s that USDA food pyramid working out for us so far, I’d like to ask. I’m not necessarily assigning a causative role to the pyramid (though it certainly plays a role, in my view) in the obesity epidemic. I’m just saying that it has done absolutely nothing to stanch the rise of diet-related illness. I’m saying it doesn’t have a real impressive track record. 

Read more: http://www.marksdailyapple.com/top-8-most-common-reactions-to-your-grain-free-diet-and-how-to-respond/#ixzz1xbMJSTCc

The first step to getting our health back and our bodies looking the way we want it to is to shift what we eat toward whole foods.

We’re still in the process of learning by doing.  Hope you'll come along with us and hang in there.