Life Day by Day

Life has gotten away from me these past few weeks.  Starting college, raising a two year old, building a house, summer activities...we've been busy!  Sorry for the blog silence.  It seems to be the first thing to fall off my list when something has to give.

As far as weight loss goes, I have definitely plateaued.  I bounce around up a pound, down a pound but never really make a loss.  Tim, on the other hand, has lost a total of 15 pounds in the past 6 weeks which I am amazed because as we have gotten busier our eating "rules" have gotten looser!  He is looking so good.  I am proud.

The other night, my son Cian made me proud as well.  He has been eating a modified Paleo diet with us but the other night he surprised me by happily wolfing down shrimp, raw tomato slices, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, dates, walnuts and his special treat of cheese!  He LOVED it all.  I am so glad and hope that his taste for real, fresh foods stays with him as he grows.

Since we have been so busy, I have been sticking to recipes I have grown comfortable with, but we did try a new on the other day.  Spice Rub Crock Pot Chicken from http://www.everdaypaleo.com/.  It was EASY and delicious!  We had a lot of leftovers as well which made lunches for the next several days simple.  Here is the recipe:

Spice Rub Crock Pot Chicken
1 5-6 lb free range organic chicken - giblets removed, rinsed and patted dry with paper towels.
1 white onion, sliced
1 tsp sea salt (optional)
2 tsp paprika
1 tsp cayenne (I did a half tsp because a little goes a long way and our little one doesn't like too much heat)
1 tsp white pepper
1 tsp poultry seasoning
1 tsp garlic powder

Cover the bottom of crock pot with the sliced onions.  Mix all spices in a small bowl and rub over the whole chicken.  Place the spiced chicken on top of the onions in the crock pot, cover and cook on low for 5-6 hours.  No need for any liquid, the chicken will cook in its own juices.  Make sure you spoon the onions and a little of the juices over the chicken when you serve it.

Spice Rub Crock Pot Chicken

I was amazed at how much juice there was!

Spice Rub Chicken sauce

I would definitely recommend this recipe - quick prep, inexpensive, tasty and a lot of leftovers!

I will try to keep up with my blogging more consistently.  Give me feedback!  Knowing that I am reaching people and that what I post is helpful (or not) really helps keep me going. :)

So yesterday we totally blew it...we threw the diet to the wind.  It was just one of those days where something had to give, and for us, unfortunately, it was our diet.  We paid for it last night though...ugh, I never want to see a brownie again.

So yes, that is my confession - no one is perfect and we should all expect to fall off the wagon on occasion.  The thing is to get back up, do better next time, and not let one bad choice lead to more.

Back on the wagon and looking forward to this week! 

Tonight we had Stir-Fried Beef with Vegetables from The Paleo Diet by Dr. Loren Cordain, and I gotta say, it didn't get rave reviews.  It was a bit sour, and it turned out dry yet the veggies were not cooked fully.  If I had cooked it any longer, they would have burnt.  My only suggestion would be to add more oil and/or wine.  Also, I didn't add the mushrooms (Tim hates them), and I know they have a high fluid content so it could be why everything turned out so dry.

Stir-fried Beef with Vegetables

Here is the recipe for those who may want to give it a shot:

Stir-Fried Beef with Vegetables
12 oz boneless sirloin steak, trimmed of all visible fat, thinly sliced into small, bite-sized strips
2 T canola/olive oil mixture
1 clove garlic, pressed
1/4 c burgundy wine
1 yellow onion, cut thinly into wedges
1 red pepper, seeded and cut into slender strips
2 celery stalks, choppped
4 oz thinly sliced carrots
4 oz sliced mushrooms
3 T lemon juice

Saute the beef in half the oil with garlic and half of the red wine until the beef is browned.  Remove from skillet.  Heat the residual oil in the skillet.  Saute the onion, red pepper, celery, and carrots until the onion is tender - about four minutes.  Add the remainder of the red wine.  Add the mushrooms and lemon juice.  Stir-fry mixture for approximately three more minutes.  Combine the vegetables with the meat.  Serves two (HUGE servings).

On a different note, I have decided to stop going to CrossFit for the time being.  As excited as I am about it, and as much as I would like to continue, it is just not working with our schedule and I can't justify the sacrifice of time with my husband.  So, instead, I have found a new class that is offered on our air force base that is not only free but is only about 5 minutes away from our house.  It is High Energy Athletic Training (HEAT), and sounds a lot like CrossFit - as good a substitute as one can find anyway.  I hope that it is as good as it sounds.  I will start it on Wednesday.

Another day is coming to a close and I am off to cuddle up to my dh.

Last night we had the perfect dinner after a hot, sweaty day.

Ginger Shrimp Salad

Using pre-cooked shrimp, this recipe was really easy.  I got it from http://www.everydaypaleo.com/ (I love that blog!) and the recipe follows:

Ginger Shrimp Salad
1 lb medium shrimp (tails removed, cooked, and de-veined)
3 green onions
1 tsp grated fresh ginger
1/2 tsp crushed garlic
Pinch of sea salt (optional - it wasn't needed to taste great!)
Palm full of red pepper flakes
Juice from 1 lemon
Fresh Arugula (or any dark green, leafy salad)
Olive oil to taste
1 Avocado

If you are using frozen shrimp like I did; thaw, drain and pat dry with paper towels.  If using fresh shrimp, remove tails, de-vein, and toss into boiling water.  Bring the water back to a simmer.  Once the shrimp rise to the top, remove them and place in ice water.  Then drain and pat dry with paper towels.

Toss the cold shrimp with the lemon juice, ginger, garlic, onions, red pepper flakes, salt and pepper.  Serve on a bed of arugula (or salad) garnished with sliced avocado and top with a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.

Yummy!

We had an open meal on Wednesday and we blame that for our complete lack of energy all day yesterday.  Yuck.  It doesn't help that our son is cutting his two year molars as well, and we could hardly function.  I am starting to like open meals less and less...sure, it tastes great at the time to have bread or cheese or whatever, but then later it feels like there is a brick sitting in my stomach, my eczema flairs up, and my energy tanks.  Not really worth it!

It turns out my Mom has been following my blog and eating a modified Paleo diet until she gets the book to read for herself, and in 3 weeks, she has lost 7 pounds!  How great is that?!

It is time for me to go get my breakfast - an egg, a peach and some walnuts.  So much better than a soggy bowl of cereal!

Oh, and forgive the small picture.  I am not sure what is going on with blogger.  I post the pic, select medium size, like always, and then it shows up small.  When I click on it to re-size it, the options disappear before I can click on anything.  Rather frustrating!  To see the pic bigger, just click on it.

Month one results are in:


In 4 weeks, eating Paleo (with 3 open meals/week) and not working out at all, Tim has lost 11.7 lbs!
In 4 weeks, eating Paleo (with 3 open meals/week), doing Zumba and beginning CrossFit, I have lost 7.4 lbs!

We were going to post pictures but something is screwing with Blogger right now and it keeps screwing up my pictures.  If you would like to see before and current pics, ask and I'll email them to you.

Pretty great results for only 4 weeks! We are looking forward to continuing and seeing how we look and feel in another month. This week we have cut back our open meals to two a week. Three was just too many. Eating the open meals made cravings worse and we didn't enjoy that! Two seems like it would fit us better with fewer cravings.

On to month 2!

I love eating Paleo.  I love knowing that everything that is going into my body is good for it.  Not just neutral, non-bad food, but actually good for me.  I love the feeling of energy and well being.  I love having the confidence that I know this will work.  Looking at the food, you can just see that there is no way to be unhealthy eating it.  I love not having to count, or adjust, or guess, or do math...I eat when I am hungry and I will lose weight if I have weight to lose - and I will stop losing naturally when I don't have excess weight left.  I am not depriving my body of anything it needs; as a matter of fact, I feel I am getting more vitamins, minerals, and protein than I ever have before.  It is all so simple.  I love it.

Paleo breakfast

Here is what one of our breakfasts look like.  Eggs are fatty, so we limit our intake to about 6 per week (which for us isn't difficult...we aren't big egg eaters).  These are simply fried in canola oil and sprinkled with pepper.  Fried eggs can be healthy!

"Holly's" Chicken, mixed veggies and Paleo Mayonnaise with salt free lemon pepper

This is one of my favorite ways of cooking chicken.  It is easy, fast and delicious.  I cut off all visible fat on the breast, seasoned it to taste and fried it in a very small amount of olive oil in a skillet.  The Paleo mayo is from The Paleo Diet book and the recipe is:

Omega-3 Mayonnaise
1 whole egg
1 T lemon juice
1/4 tsp dry mustard
1/2 c olive oil
1/2 c flaxseed oil

Put egg, lemon juice, and mustard in blender and blend for three to five seconds.  Continue blending and slowly add oils.  Blend until the mayonnaise is thick.  Scrape mayonnaise into a snap-lock plastic container and refrigerate.  The mayonnaise should keep for five to seven days.  Makes 1 cup.

Tim doesn't like the mayonnaise very much...it has a very strong olive oil flavor.  We have found a lot of other paleo mayo recipes so we will be trying them out.

Today is CrossFit day.  I am hoping to not get quite so sore this time. :)  We will see what the WOD is I guess!

Tomorrow is the one month mark.  We will be posting our weight loss and before and current photos.  Stay tuned!

Okay, here is my menu for the next week - week and a half.  I like to keep it all pretty simple, and I like to be able to choose which dinner I feel like on a given night, so they are in no particular order.  Other than preference for the night, I also go by the freshness of the ingredients to make sure nothing goes bad as it waits its turn.

Ginger Shrimp Salad from http://www.everydaypaleo.com/
Round Steak from The Paleo Diet pg. 171
Sirloin Steak (trimmed of excess fat, rubbed in mustard seed oil, and broiled or grilled)
Pecan Crusted Chicken from http://www.everydaypaleo.com/ (I also posted the recipe in a previous post)
Tilapia (with lemon juice, olive oil, and garlic then broiled)
Holly's Chicken (chicken breast sprinkled with seasonings [it depends on my mood and what I have on hand] and pan grilled)
Stir-Fry Beef with Vegetables from The Paleo Diet pg. 169

For sides I usually serve mixed frozen or fresh vegetables, salad, spaghetti squash, or mashed cauliflower from http://www.everydaypaleo.com/ (I posted the recipe in an earlier post), or anything else I feel like whipping up like grilled veggies, fruit, etc.

This menu will probably last us about a week and a half because we have 3 open meals and those aren't always planned but arise if we want something in particular that isn't "Paleo".

Here is our shopping list.  It doesn't cover all the ingredients for all these meals because I already have some of the ingredients here at home.

Almond Butter (can be found at Costco or health/natural food stores)
Turkey Breasts
Fruit: Seasonal (I browse and price check then choose)
Pecans
Avocados
Tomatoes
Lemon crystals or salt free lemon pepper
Apple sauce
Veggies (quick grab: cucumber, carrot nibs, green pepper, etc)
Lettuce (loose, with broad, flexible leafs for sandwiches)
Bread (for Cian)
Jam (sweetened with fruit juice, no sugar or artificial sweeteners - again, for Cian)
Dried fruit (no sugar added!)
1+ lb. medium, cooked, de-veined, tails removed shrimp
Head of garlic
Arugula

This list will probably last us about a week before we need to re-stock on fruits and veggies.

I hope this gives you a little better idea of what kinds of foods we have on hand and how we eat.  I intend to post all the recipes as we have them and I'll let you know how they turn out!