{ chocolate crinkles }

Wednesday, March 7, 2012

My chilli red garlic press

My days of laboring over garlic is over! Meet my new friend, Trudeau garlic press!

Source: Amazon

I went to TJ Maxx yesterday. I love, love, love shopping for kitchenware at TJ Maxx and Marshalls. It was only $12.99, even cheaper than Amazon. But the garlic press that I'd really wanted is the Kuhn Rikon, the product reviews are amazing! But oh well, mine's cheaper, it's in a hot chilli red color and it works great! I'm happy :)

Scallops with strawberry arugula salad

Eating Paleo is not cheap! Wild caught fish, organic herbs, vegetables and fruits, grass fed beef, cage free poultry. But as I get older, I'm starting to agree that we should take care of our body and (try to) only put the best stuff to care for our body. I went grocery shopping at Whole Foods today and stock up on some essentials. I now understand why Whole Foods is popularly known as Whole Paycheck.

Having said that, even when you do shop at Whole Foods, do pay attention to the labeling. I've bought salmon filets that aren't cheap, only to find out, upon close examination of the fine prints on the price tag, that they are farm raised and not wild caught. Don't assume everything at Whole Foods is organic. It's only organic if they say so. And usually it's slightly more expensive. I remember almost paying $1 a lemon, an organic one. Thankfully, Mitch now supplies me with meyer lemons, for free!

Ok, back to what I had intended to blog about. My second attempt at eating Paleo was great, I made myself a delicious dinner.

Homemade pan-seared scallops served with
strawberry argula salad

Pan-seared scallops

(Serves 2-4 depending on whether you serve this as an appetizer or entree)

Adapted from The Food Lovers Make it Paleo and Paleo Adventure

Ingredients:

12 scallops
1 tbsp olive oil (I still haven't transitioned to using coconut oil)
2 shallots, minced
2 garlic, minced
4 tbsp fresh parsley, finely chopped
1/2 tsp paprika
Juice of 1 lemon (I use meyer lemon)
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Preparation:

Rinse scallops with cold water and pat dry with a paper towel, set aside.
In a bowl or ziploc bag, place the minced shallots, minced garlic, finely chopped parsley, paprika, juice of 1 lemon and a dash of sea salt and pepper. Mix well.
Add the scallops to the marinade. Make sure scallops are well marinated.
Heat olive oil in a frying pan.
Add scallops to frying pan.
Sear scallops for approximately 2 minutes per side.
Tip: Consider using a splatter cover.

Strawberry argula salad

(Serves 2)

Adapted from Laaloush's Pear, Quinoa and Spinach Salad (also very delicious, but I don't know if quinoa is Paleo)

Ingredients:

4 cups argula
6-8 strawberries, thinly sliced
1/4 cup walnuts, chopped
1 tbsp walnut oil
1 1/2 tbsp pomegranate vinegar (you can also use strawberry/raspberry balsamic vinegar)
1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper
Sea salt to taste (I cheated and used 1 tbsp fat free vegetable broth, probably not Paleo but I had it in the fridge)
Optional: 1/4 tsp fresh chives, chopped

Preparation:

Whisk oil, vinegar, broth/sea salt, chives and black pepper in a large salad bowl. Make sure all ingredients are evenly combined.
Add strawberries and argula. Toss lightly to coat.

Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Paleo Hacks...clever!

Just in the last couple of days, I've discovered a few Paleo or CrossFit blogs that I love! I've created a bookmark folder in Google Chrome. This is cliche and obvious, but I'm constantly amazed at the amount and relevance of information you can find on the Internet, on any given topic!

Here is the list:

And of course, there's FitBomb and Nom Nom Paleo that I mentioned in my earlier post.

I know I can't be 100% clean in my Paleo diet. I love cheese, bread, pasta and wine too much to give up completely. Instead, I'll strive for 80%. I've been wondering how I can follow the Paleo diet without my friends and colleagues asking if I'm on a diet and thinking I'm no fun to dine with. OMG, just thinking about passing on the bread basket makes me wince.

Girl walks into a bar(bell) shares her Paleo hacks, which I think are very clever!

Chipotle Paleo Hack:

Source

I love Chipotle, who doesn't? What's a Paleo girl gotta do? I'm going to try this next time. Chicken/steak bowl, no rice (yes, not even brown), double lettuce, no beans, two scoops mild salsa (I love the fresh tomatoes), one scoop hot salsa. Like GWIABB, I'm going to pass on guacamole, but not because I don't love it but because it costs extra.

In n Out Paleo Hack (Thank God!):

Source

I've started ordering my cheeseburger protein style, animal style. I'll try this next time, "Double Meat mustard fried with grilled onions, chopped chillies, and extra tomatoes portein style. Please hold the spread." Wow, this is a mouthful, I may need a pocket card to help me remember this. LOL. But this is awesome, I can still have my In n Out burgers! Yea!

Recipe: Paleo Korean bi bim bap

My 3 Paleo cookbooks arrived on Friday and I was ecstatic. There are so many good recipes that I want to try. Sadly, I don't have most of the basic ingredients that the Paleo recipes call for. I'll make a trip to Whole Foods this evening to buy coconut oil, almond flour (I can still bake, yea!), almond milk, good quality olive oil and grass fed/clarified butter. And most of the recipes are protein-rich, requiring 1-2lbs of beef, chicken, etc. So I'm going to finally make use of my Costco membership and make a trip there this weekend to buy some beef, chicken, salmon, eggs, etc. I'm hoping Costco has organic produce!

So yesterday, I made Korean Cauliflower Rice Bowl (similar to Korean bi bim bap which Matt loves!), based on a recipe featured in Mark Sisson's Primal Blueprint Quick & Easy Meals cookbook. He's a liar, it took me more than 30 minutes to prep for dinner. All that grating and chopping (I need to invest in a garlic press!) took so much time. I was planning to have dinner cooked so we can eat after our workout. But that just wasn't possible. I did all the prep work and put the ingredients in ziploc bags and dashed out. I was 5 minutes late for our 2nd CrossFit On Ramp training.

We did the cooking after our workout, and that took less than 30 minutes. I guess Mark Sisson's reference to 30minutes is the actual cooking time. But it was a delicious, primal, carb-free dinner. How interesting, grated cauliflower to replace rice. Yummy and healthy. But we chased that down with a Manhattan (alcohol is very bad for Paleo diet...oops!)

This isn't a good picture. But this rice bowl is filled with microwaved grated cauliflower at the bottom and covered with sauteed shredded carrots, organic spinach and shitake mushroom and beef slices marinated in Tamari sauce, rice wine vinegar, toasted sesame oil and chopped garlic.

My first Paleo attempt...success! :)

Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Have you heard of the Paleo diet?

Matt and I met with a Crossfit trainer last week. We were hoping to do private training but his schedule is too packed, he's unable to train us. Instead, we will join the 4-week On Ramp introductory class, starting this Saturday. I'm excited but also scared! I've been looking at pictures of Crossfit women. In those pictures, they're lifting huge barbells, pulling a car (omg, really!?), crazy gymnastic moves and other moves that I can hardly see myself doing. Yes, that's what we are signing up for!

Jorge also introduce us to the Paleo diet. I've never heard of it and in the last week, I've been doing some research. I found many blogs touting about the benefits of Paleo and the changes they feel and see in their bodies. Paleo is a modern nutritional plan that mimics that of our hunter-gatherer ancestors - lean meats, seafood, vegetables, fruits and nuts.

I found this description of Paleo on Whole Nine via Fitbomb,

I eat "real" food - fresh, natural food like meat, vegetables and fruit. I choose foods that are nutrient dense, with lots of naturally-occurring vitamins and minerals, over foods that have more calories but less nutrition. And food quality is important - I'm careful about where my meat comes from, and buy produce locally and organically as often as possible.

It's not a low calorie "diet" - I eat as much as I need to maintain strength, energy and a healthy weight. In fact, my diet is probably much higher in fat than you'd imagine. Fat isn't the energy - it's a great energy source when it comes from high quality foods like avocado, coconut and nuts. And I'm not trying to do a "low carb" thing, but since I'm eating vegetables and fruits instead of bread, cereal and pasta, it just happens to work out that way.

Eating like this is good for maintaining a healthy metabolism, and reducing inflammation within the body. It’s been doing great things for my energy levels, body composition and performance in the gym. It also helps to minimize my risk for a whole host of lifestyle diseases and conditions, like diabetes, heart attack and stroke.

Fitbomb's wife, Nom Nom Paleo shares some amazing Paleo recipes on her blog. The pictures of the food looks amazing, and I'm thinking following a Paleo diet wouldn't be too hard for me. I've always thought of myself as one of those who live to eat rather than eat to live. But I'm starting to pay the price of my gluttony, my clothes are getting tighter and my family who haven't seen me in months weren't afraid to tell me that I need to lose weight.