2014 in review – What a year!

This past year has been crazy – a baby, a death in the family, etc… And I hope that 2015 brings more time to try new things in the kitchen (and pass it onto you!).  Happy 2015!

Here’s an excerpt:

The Louvre Museum has 8.5 million visitors per year. This blog was viewed about 250,000 times in 2014. If it were an exhibit at the Louvre Museum, it would take about 11 days for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

Super close to Panera Bread Broccoli Cheese Soup

I’ve been trying recipes that claim to be “copycat Panera Bread” Broccoli Cheddar soups for a couple years now and haven’t found any to my liking – until tonight.  I almost never post a recipe same day, but this soup was SO close to Panera’s Broccoli Cheddar soup that I couldn’t wait to share.

For all the primal peeps out there – substitute arrowroot powder or tapioca starch.  I used flour because I didn’t have arrowroot on hand this time around.

Broccoli Cheddar Soup

INGREDIENTS

• 1 tablespoon melted butter
• ½ medium chopped onion
• ¼ cup melted butter
• ¼ cup flour (or arrowroot powder)
• 2 cups half-and-half cream
• 2 cups chicken stock
• lots of fresh broccoli (I used about 4 cups)
• 1 cup carrot, julienned
• 8-16 ounces grated sharp cheddar cheese (depending on how much cheese you like)
• salt and pepper to taste

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Saute the onion in 1 tablespoon melted butter and set aside. In a large pot whisk together the melted butter and flour over medium heat for about 3-4 minutes.
2. Slowly whisk in the half and half and chicken stock. Let it simmer for about 5 minutes.
3. Add the broccoli, carrots, and onions. Let them simmer on medium low for about 25 minutes until the broccoli and carrots are tender.
4. Add salt and pepper and sharp cheddar cheese. Let the cheese melt and then serve. For a smoother soup puree it with a handheld blender, but I kept it chunky.  SO yummy!
5. Enjoy!

Chicken Fried Rice

You guys – it’s been awhile.  But I’m still here – cooking new recipes up & not finding the energy to post them for you.  I’m going to try to do better – we’ve hit the 6 month mark with my newest babe and she’s finally (finally) sleeping longer stretches.

Anyway, this recipe is a winner!  It’s super yummy & I promise it won’y even seem like you’re eating cauliflower.  Plus, bonus, it’s Paleo as well as Primal (no dairy!).

Chicken Fried Rice

Marinade:
1 Tbsp soy sauce
1 Tbsp minced garlic
1/2 Tbsp ginger (I used the tube variety)
1/8 tsp fish sauce
1/4 tsp black pepper
1/8 tsp salt
4 tsp red chili paste

Main ingredients:
1 C minced carrots
1 1/2 C minced mushrooms
1/2 a head of cauliflower, riced (approximately 5 cups)
1 C minced onion
2 eggs, beaten
5 chicken thighs, bones and skin removed and cut into tiny pieces
4 Tbsp sesame seed oil
1/4 C soy sauce

Blend the marinade ingredients in a small bowl. Mix marinade in a larger container with the chicken and set into the refrigerator to marinate for at least 2 hours (I did overnight and it tasted great!).  While the chicken marinates, mince your carrot, and mushroom – which I did in a food processor.

Heat sesame seed oil in a large wok & scramble the eggs until firm; remove and set aside.  Add the remaining tablespoon of oil to the wok and then add the onion, carrot and mushroom. Sauté for 3 to 4 minutes.  Create pocket in the center of the wok; add a quarter-sized drop of oil and then add the chicken.  Sauté for 5 to 6 minutes. Add in the cauliflower rice and cook until the rice is tender.  Drain any excess liquid off (I find there is some after the chicken & rice).  Then, drizzle in the 1/4 cup soy sauce and continue sautéing for another minute.  Add the eggs back in and serve!  Enjoy!

Pizza Spaghetti Casserole

I’m back from my time off of having a baby back in March – thanks for your patience with me 🙂

I had a healthy baby girl, Olivia Claire, and she’s a cutie, if I do say so myself!

Anyway…now that life is back to a new normal, I’ve started incorporate new recipes in our meals – heck, I started making meals, period.

I wanted to share with you this new favorite – Pizza Spaghetti Casserole.  I normally do not care much for spaghetti squash, but in this recipe, I really liked it.

Pizza Spaghetti Casserole

• 1 large spaghetti squash
• 1 pound italian or regular sausage
• ½ yellow onion, diced
• 1 cup pizza sauce (no sugar added)
• 1 teaspoon dried basil
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 3 eggs, whisked
• Add anything you like with pizza: veggies, basil, cheese, etc…

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
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 reduce oven heat to 350 degrees.  Cook for another 30 minutes or so.
3. Once squash is done cooking, remove threads and place in a large bowl.
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.  Drain the grease & add to bowl with squash.
5. Add pizza sauce, dried basil and salt and pepper, toppings to the bowl and mix well.  I used cheese in mine pictured
6. Lastly, add whisked eggs to the bowl and mix everything together until you can no longer see the eggs.
7. Pour into a greased 8×8 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.

Enjoy!!

 

Cashew Chicken

 

I love Chinese food – this is a really yummy recipe and I sat on it for awhile before trying it because there were a lot of steps.  I like easy recipes, and wasn’t sure if this one would end up being easy.  Once you get through the first time, it’s simple. 🙂

We almost always use cauliflower rice for our “rice” but this time around we just used regular rice.  Sometimes it’s a nice change.

Also, you can make your own Hoisin sauce if you like, but I just bought some.  Easy.

Cashew Chicken

3 chicken breasts, cut into 1 in cubes

1-2 Tbs of arrowroot powder (or more, depending on what your chicken looks like)

sea salt & black pepper

6 cloves of garlic, minced

6-8 green onions, white and green parts separated, chopped

2 Tbs of rice vinegar

1/8 – 1/4 cup of Hoisin Sauce

3/4 cups of cashews (I used roasted/salted)

 

 

 

 

Instructions:

Toss chicken cubes in arrowroot powder & salt/pepper.  I used a ziploc bag for this.

Heat coconut oil in a wok over medium/high heat.  Cook chicken, garlic, and white parts of the green onion.  Stir OFTEN, until chicken is cooked through.

Add rice vinegar to wok and cook until evaporated.  This took about 1-2 minutes for me.

Add hoisin sauce (as much as you’d like – personally I used 1/4 cup and thought it was a bit too much) and cook until warm.  Add cashews and green parts of the green onion and stir.  Take off heat.

Serve over rice, cauliflower rice, in a lettuce wrap, etc…

 

 

Enjoy!!

 

Dutch Apple Pancake

 

I’ve been a little lax in posting recipes lately – I’m due with baby # 2 next month, so I’ve not had as much time to cook up new, fun recipes.  But I promise we’ll get back to normal in a couple months.

The below recipe is really yummy – I love apples, so incorporating them into breakfast is always fun.

Dutch Apple Pancake

2 T of butter

3-4 apples: cored, peeled, & diced into 1/2 inch pieces

1 tsp of cinnamon

1/4 tsp of cloves

1/4 tsp of nutmeg

5 eggs

1/2 cup of milk

1/2 cup of coconut sugar

1/2 tsp of vanilla

3/4 cup of almond flour

 

Melt the butter in a skillet (I used cast iron).  Add the apples and spices and mix together.

While the apples are cooking, mix the eggs, milk, coconut sugar, & vanilla together in a bowl.  Whisk until smooth.  Add the almond four into the egg mixture and mix very thoroughly .

After the apples cook until very fragrant, remove from the heat & allow the pan to cool down for 5 minutes or so.  Then our the egg/flour mixture on top.

Bake the pancake in a preheated oven at 475 degrees for 30 minutes, until golden on top.  I served with a little maple syrup on the top – yummy!  Enjoy!

 

Frittata

 

I oftentimes do breakfast for dinner partly because I love breakfast for dinner and partly because I am not hungry enough at breakfast time to eat large amounts of food.  Frittatas are super easy, super yummy, and very adaptable to your preferences.  You can add whatever veggies, meat, cheese combos your want (or if you’re paleo, skip the cheese altogether!).

I make mine in a cast iron skillet that I’m still curing, so my frittatas stick a little, but if you skillet is cured, you shouldn’t have that problem.

Like I said, you can change up a frittata recipe easily – I make mine different each time.  The recipe below matches the pictures in this post.

Frittata

Base ingredients:

1 T of olive oil or coconut oil

8 large eggs

1/2 cup of whole milk (coconut/almond milk if you’re paleo)

1/2 – 1 tsp of sea salt (if you are like me and like things salty, use 1 tsp)

1/2 tsp of pepper

Optional, Changeable ingredients:

1 chopped green pepper

1/2 lb of breakfast pork sausage

some chopped tomatoes (I had leftover garden tomatoes for this frittata)

1 cup of shredded gouda cheese

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.

Heat up 1 T of olive oil in your skillet.  Add your veggies and sauté for a couple minutes.  If using meat, add your meat next and cook until browned, breaking up in small pieces.

While your meat/veggies are cooking, whisk together eggs, milk, salt and pepper.  When veggies/meat are done, pour egg mixture into the skillet and cook for about 5 minutes until the bottom is starting to set.  Take skillet off the heat and sprinkle your cheese (if using) on top.

Transfer your skillet to the oven and bake for another 12-15 minutes, or until the frittata puffs up, is brown on top, and doesn’t jiggle.  Remove from the oven and let cool for a little before serving.
Enjoy!

 

 

Coconut Flour Apple Pancakes

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas holiday!  It seems like forever since I’ve posted a new recipe – time flies during the holidays.  🙂

Breakfast is one of my favorite meals – I love making it for dinner.  Our favorite pancake recipe is the simple coconut flour pancakes (found here) but sometimes it’s fun to spice things up a bit.  I tried this recipe back when we had apples coming out of our ears during harvest time.  They’re yummy with maple syrup or honey drizzled over them.

Coconut Flour Apple Pancakes

3 eggs

3 T of butter, melted

1/4 cup of milk (I use whole milk)

1 T of honey or maple syrup

1/2 tsp of salt

1 tsp of cinnamon

3 T of coconut flour

1 medium apple, cored and shredded

Combine all ingredients except the shredded apple in a bowl, until very well mixed and all the coconut flour clumps are removed.  Fold in the apple bits and combine well.

Cook batter in a preheated, greased skillet over medium heat until both sides are nice and golden brown.  Enjoy!

Primal Pumpkin Pie Filling

 

The holiday season is in full swing and because of that, I’ve been a little behind in my recipe posting and experimenting.  But I did want to get this recipe posted in time for Christmas.  I’ve been trying all sorts of variations for a primal pumpkin pie filling and finally landed on one that tastes yummy.

You can substitute a can of coconut milk for the heavy cream but it will taste like coconut.  In my opinion, it’s not nearly as good, but if you’re wanting to avoid dairy, it’s your best bet.

Also, I’ve not started working on a primal pie crust, so pair this filling with your favorite primal pie crust recipe or do what I did and cheat (I just made my usual pie crust).

Primal Pumpkin Pie Filling

1 can (15 oz) of pure pumpkin (save the can for the heavy cream)

1 15 oz can’s worth of heavy cream

1 tsp of vanilla

1 tsp of cinnamon

1 tsp of pumpkin pie spices

1/2 – 3/4 cup of coconut sugar

1 tablespoon of maple syrup

1 tablespoon of arrowroot powder

3 eggs, whisked

 

Mix together the pumpkin, heavy cream, & eggs thoroughly.  Add the remaining ingredients and mix well.  Pour into a pre-baked crust.

Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour, or until you can stick an knife into the middle and it comes out clean.

Let the pie cool completely before cutting into it.

Enjoy & Merry Christmas!

Mix together the pumpkin

 

Primal Biscuit Recipe, take 2

 

I don’t usually post a recipe the same day I try it, but in this case, I’ve made an exception.  I have used a different biscuit recipe for my biscuits & gravy recipe for over a year now (here) but for kicks and giggles, I tried a new recipe I found over at the Health Starts in the Kitchen blog, which I adapted slightly.

These biscuits are really great – very dense, slightly sweet, and completely filling.  My husband called these biscuits a “grand slam” which is saying something, since most new recipes are “singles or doubles”.

These are great with jam or honey, too.  🙂

Anyway, this will be our new go-to biscuit recipe I think.

Here’s the details:

 

Grain Free Buttermilk Biscuits

2 1/2 cups of almond flour

1/4 cup of arrowroot powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp sea salt

1/2 tsp baking powder

3 T of butter

2 T of coconut sugar

1/4 cup of sour cream

2 large eggs

2 (more) T of butter

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.  Line your cookie sheet with wax paper & grease.

In a medium bowl, combine almond flour, baking powder/soda, and sea salt.  Set aside.  Now, in a small pan, over low heat, melt 3T of butter and the add the sour cream and whisk until combined.  Take off heat and whisk in the 2 eggs.

Pour whisked liquid mixture into the dry ingredients and stir well.  Fold in the 1/4 cup of arrowroot powder.

Divide dough in 8 equal portions, dust your hands with arrowroot powder, and form each portion into a biscuit shape.  Place on cookie sheet.

Bake the biscuits at 350 for 20 minutes.  Halfway through, melt the 2T of butter and brush on top of the biscuits.

Cool biscuits for about 15 minutes before eating.

Enjoy!!