Paleo Comfort Foods

Score 5.5/10

 

This cookbook tries to bring homestyle cooking into the paleo world. The problem is, ingredients get pretty expensive when you are trying to mimic this style of cooking. Coconut butter, coconut oil, almond flour, pecans, macadamia nuts, and the list of expensive food items goes on and on. There are some good recipes in here and the pictures of the food are sure to make your mouth water (the problem is to get your creations to look like theirs!). We enjoyed several of the items we cooked from this book, of which you'll read more about in week three's post.

Katy cooked out of this book for several recipes and had this to say: Pros of the cookbook are that the pictures are excellent, the ingredient notes about lesser known items were very helpful, and it was fun to see some traditional recipes done with a paleo spin. A big negative of the cookbook was that they don't list the number of servings their recipes make, so it was sometimes hard to plan out our meals when cooking for ourselves and trying to decide whether to half the recipe, or cooking for friends and trying to figure out how much to make. Some of the recipes were also hard to follow, which was frustrating.

My biggest issue with the cookbook was the long narrative at the beginning that detail the authors journeys. They do make some excellent points, and I found myself at times nodding my head in agreement with what they were saying. At other times I found myself shaking my head because I am already getting tired of the arrogant tone that seems to be characteristic of a lot of paleo authors and bloggers. Multiple times they refer to paleo as eating "real" food and talk condescendingly about non-paleo foods. They mention that some people can do good on a vegan diet and that's great, but for them paleo is a lifestyle. Well, I have news for these authors, for plenty of people being vegan isn't a diet, its a lifestyle as well. I think paleo can be a wonderful diet for the right people...but it is not for everyone. That doesn't mean that people not following paleo can not pursue or even attain optimal health. As a nutrition student I am a firm believer in our food choices being a very personal and individual decision with more than just good health playing a role in these choices. Everything from religion to culture to emotion and to just sheer enjoyment plays a role in what we choose to eat. I want people who write books about food and diet to remember this, but it seems often they are narrow minded in their food perspective.

I gave this a lower score than the last book because it had less recipes and some of the recipes it did have I later found almost identical recipes for free online. I loved the idea of taking a style of cooking (homestyle) and putting a paleo twist on it, and the pictures were excellent. So, in my unscientific rating scale, I gave the book a slightly higher than average score of 5.5.

Caveman Cookies

Katy and I thought it would be fun to try some Caveman Cookies. These are paleo cookies made with whole food ingredients. We ordered the regular cookies, which are made with honey, almond meal, walnuts, raisins, ginger, nutmeg, and cinnamon. We also ordered the Alpine cookies which consist of honey, hazelnut meal, almond meal, and toasted ground carob. Both cookies were really tasty and served to appease mine and Katy's sweet tooth on several occasions. However, these cookies are also expensive and the packages only contain 8 of these treats, which are quite small. Both on the Caveman Cookie website as well as on Amazon these packages are listed at $6.25 for 8 cookies.

The verdict: It was fun to try them and we might order them again in the future, but for now we'll stick to the delicious peaches we've been buying for our nightly sweet fix.

Week 2 Paleo

 

 

This week was a little difficult to be Paleo, but we did our best.

Monday

 

 

Breakfast

Walnuts

Blueberries

Coffee (black)

 

Lunch

Salmon Salad

Veggies

Apple

 

Dinner

Squid's!

 

 

 

 

 

Monday night was mine and Katy's 7 year wedding anniversary. To celebrate we went out to eat and devoured some freshly killed lobster. Not sure how you can get much more Paleo than that...your food is alive one minute and dead and in your belly the next. I guess eating it raw would be even more caveman-esque. To go with our lobster we had mixed veggies. On a side note, my wife is amazing and I could not have asked for a better partner in life. I mean, come on....she's giving up dairy, grains, and legumes for me!

Tuesday

 

Breakfast

Chia Pod

Cherries

Coffee (black)

 

Lunch

TunaSalad

Veggies

Plum

 

Dinner

Hamburgers

Watermelon

Salad

 

 

In the morning we experimented with a Chia Pod from Whole Foods. The ingredients were Chia Seed, Coconut Milk, and Vanilla Bean paste. According to several paleo blogs, Chia seed is a good primal food full of healthy omega-3 fats. Out of curiosity we decided to try it as we're trying to get creative with our breakfast foods. I thought it was a winner...had a good taste and fit the bill for Paleo. Katy was a little less convinced as she was not crazy about the texture.

 

Wednesday

 

 

Breakfast

Kale Smoothie (compliments of Pinterest)

Coffee (black)

 

Lunch

Garden Salad

Mixed Nuts

Peaches

 

Dinner

Med Deli

 

Med Deli is one of our favorite restaurants. We decided to try it out and see what Paleo options we could find. Katy got a squash eggplant stew, roasted peach salad, and a fattoush salad. I got a cantaloupe stuffed with chicken salad and a greek salad. It was hard, but we said no to the pita bread. We can't know for sure what ingredients were used in the dressings, but for the most part we staid true to Paleo, because if it was not for this diet, our plates would have looked a lot different!

 

Thursday

 

 

Breakfast

Banana/Spinach smoothie

Coffee (black)

 

Lunch

Celery and Almond Butter

Mixed Nuts

Apple

 

Dinner

Chicken Jalapeno Burgers

Guacamole

Veggies

Peaches 

 

 

 

 

 

Friday

 

 

Breakfast

Baked Sweet Potato with cinnamon

Coffee (black)

 

Lunch

leftovers

 

 

The weekend was a busy one with us eating out both nights with friends. We tried our best to stay true to Paleo (Katy did better than me) but could not resist when one of our friends brought us over a homemade blueberry peach pie on Saturday night....it would have been rude to turn that down!

 

Thoughts

 

The challenge continues to be eating out. We feel like we can do a pretty good job staying away from grains, legumes, and dairy, but the hard part is staying away from added sugars as we are unsure of what all goes in to the dishes. Some paleo blogs recommend asking the waiter/waitress to inquire about all the ingredients, but we're not that crazy with this diet and so when we eat out we do our best and then kick back and enjoy our time with friends.

 

We did not cook a lot this week, but the winner was definitely the Chicken Jalapeno Burgers served with our homemade guacamole (Katy makes some awesome guac!). Not only were the burgers awesome, we realized we really like dipping different vegetables (cucumbers, carrots, and celery) in the guacamole in place of tortilla chips.

 

We're getting creative with breakfasts. I told a friend we did sweet potato one morning and they thought that was crazy. My question is, why is that crazy? We think in our minds that only certain things should be for breakfast, and, to me, that is what is crazy.

 

Another successful week (for the most part) of Paleo is in the books. People have started to ask if I feel different and I tell them,  "Its strange, but I keep getting this strong urge to leave my house and hunt down a wooly mammoth!" So, no, the answer is I don't feel any different than from two weeks ago.

 

 

 

 



 

 

 

 

Week 1 Paleo

As I made out the grocery list and shopped for our first week of paleo, I realized something exciting....everything I bought and put in our cart (with the exception of the cashews and almonds which were salted) had only 1 ingredient...meaning everything I bought was a WHOLE food.
That was a good feeling.

 

 
Monday

 

 

Breakfast

Walnuts

Cherries

Coffee (black)

 

Lunch

Garden Salad

Mixed Nuts with dried fruits

Apple

 

Dinner

Steak (quality grass-fed New York strips)
Green Beans (straight from a friend's garden and steamed)Strawberries

I used the skirt steak marinade off of the blog, Mark's Daily Apple





 


Tuesday



 

 

Tuna Salad ingredients

Breakfast

Hardboiled Egg

Blackberries

Coffee (black)

 

Lunch

Tuna Salad

Mixed Veggies

Mixed Nuts and Dried Fruit

 

Dinner
Lemon Basil Cod

Sautéed Zucchini and Squash

Cherries




Before

After



 
 

Wednesday

 

 

Egg Salad Ingredients

Breakfast

Pecans 

Cherries

Coffee (black)

 

Lunch

Egg Salad

Mixed Veggies

Peach

 

Dinner

Strawberry Chicken Salad
Green Beans

Strawberry Chicken Salad

 

 

 

Thursday

 

 

Breakfast

Strawberries 

Avocados

 

Lunch

Garden Salad

Mixed Nuts with dried fruits

Blackberries

 

Dinner
 Salmon

Baked Sweet Potato

Spinach and Strawberry Salad

 

 

Friday

 

 

Brunch

Scrambled Eggs with Onions,

Spinach, and Avocado

Strawberries

Pears

Veggie Juice (homemade)

Coffee (black)

 

Dinner

Steamed Shrimp and Crabs
Sautéed Veggies

 

The Weekend

 

The weekend was challenging because Katy and I spent the weekend at Virginia Beach volunteering with the organization "Life Rolls On" at their "They Will Surf Again" event in which volunteers help people with physical disabilities surf. It was an amazing event, and so we cheated some during the weekend, but we did our best and I was proud of our efforts. For breakfast they offered doughnuts and bagels, but we brought a pear and banana and so ate those instead. Lunch and dinner we cheated out of necessity. On Sunday we had eggs and fruit for breakfast at a local restaurant and for lunch stopped on our way home at a grocery store to have a salad. For dinner we picked up some shrimp and we made a salad.

 

 

Thoughts

 

We made it through the week with only eating desert once, and that was during our weekend at the beach. For every night that we were at home we staid true to the diet, and we did our best while eating out. Every recipe we cooked was from the cookbook 500 Paleo Recipes. We made mayo, salad dressings, tuna salad, and egg salad all from scratch. It was a good first week of Paleo and definitely made evident what some of the challenges will be (eating out) and what some of the rewards will be (cooking everything with whole ingredients).

 

 

500 Paleo Recipes

500 Paleo Recipes

 

Score: 6/10

 

I kicked off my paleo journey by buying the cookbook, 500 Paleo Recipes, by Dana Carpender. Ms. Carpender spends the first 25 pages of her cookbook talking about paleo and some of her personal beliefs. She is of the train of thought that dairy, even though the cavemen did not consume cheese and butter, is okay. To me, this is just another paleo enthusiast saying they are eating like a caveman/cavewoman, but then taking exceptions to that rule because they don't want to give up some of their favorite foods. I realized that Ms. Carpender was writing largely based on her personal beliefs, some of which I think are a little nutty. She talks about the importance of exercise, but says to remember to exercise how our ancestors did, which, as she points out, did not include running marathons. Just because our ancestors did not (and we can't know for sure) run marathons does not mean this is not a healthy form of exercise. Also, Ms. Carpender recommends ditching the sun screen because our ancestors ran around all day naked without it! She says our obsession with sun screen has led to vitamin D deficiencies....I would argue its not our use of sunscreen but our lack of outside time due to the overuse of television and videogames.

Despite disagreeing with some of what Ms. Carpender says, she also makes some good points. She talks about our insane sugar consumption in this country, talks about the importance of not only diet, but other lifestyle factors as well, like sleep and exercise. She mentions the importance of eating quality meat and meat that has been humanely raised.

Most importantly, the cookbook has some good recipes in it. The recipes, for the most part, are easy to read and follow. The cookbook has good variety and I enjoyed skimming the pages looking for tasty ideas.

I am going to give this book a 6 out of 10 on my rating scale that is based solely on my thoughts and opinions. I liked a lot of the recipes I read through, but found some to be complicated with unclear instructions. While Ms. Carpender made some good points in her intro, she also wrote about some topics I disagreed with. All in all, a good cookbook for someone new to this diet.

Paleo

Paleo. A word that is defined as referring to the ancient or prehistoric. However, when one mentions the word Paleo nowadays, most people associate it with the new diet craze. So, for those of you are unfamiliar with this diet, what exactly is Paleo? Well, this is where it gets confusing. As I have been exploring Paleo blogs, it seems there is not a consensus on an exact definition. However, paleo is essentially a way of eating that is similar to the way our oldest ancestors, the cavemen, ate. It means all food that came about after the agricultural revolution is a big fad no no! No grains. No legumes. No dairy. No added sugars. Essentially, no processed foods. All the meat, nuts, seeds, fruits and veggies, and healthy fats that you can hunt or gather at your local grocery store is allowed.

Where paleo becomes confusing is where you decide to draw the line. Some paleo bloggers and authors say dairy is okay, some argue only certain dairy is acceptable, and others just man up and tell the truth...they're not willing to give up their butter and cheese! Alcohol is another dicey subject. Some paleo enthusiasts argue that different berries were sure to have fermented on the vine and so our cavemen ancestors were sure to have ingested alcohol from time to time. To me, I think paleo, like all food choices, is deeply personal and so for someone choosing to follow this diet, they have to decide for themselves where to draw the line and what are their reasons for following this food plan.

 This will be mine and Katy's first foray into the world of fad diets. We will become Paleo for the next three months, which, coincidentally, will bring us right to the start of the holidays...thank God! We are going to do our best to be 100% pure paleo, which means we are not going to allow dairy along with the other restrictions.

One caveat I must mention...with football season fast approaching and my last year of college ahead of me, I will make exceptions from time to time to partake in alcoholic beverages. I will try and stay away from beer for the sake of staying honest to the "no grains" rule...however, this is one area I will definitely cheat in from time to time.

Throughout this paleo phase I am going to read different cookbooks and try new recipes, all of which I will blog about. I am doing this blog purely because of personal interest and because I hope to learn from this experience. I am not doing this as a secrete vegan or a closet paelo hoping to sabotage the other fad diet by writing negatively about one over the other. I am doing this out of curiosity, with an open mind, and with the passion of a future nutrition professional.

As I have been telling my friends who are wondering why I want to do this, "The best way to learn about something is to live it."