Darn Good Chicken & Cauliflower Fried Rice

I HAVE to tell you about this recipe. It was THE FIRST paleo recipe I ever tried and Oh. My. Word. is it DELICIOUS! After the idea of ACTUALLY eating paleo foods (instead of just THINKING about eating paleo foods) sunk into my thick skull, I decided to start with THIS recipe. It seemed simple enough and not SO far off what we were eating as a family and it didn't require a HUGE amount of "new" groceries. 

[Mind you, thus far anyway, eating paleo isn't that hard of a transition if you are already eating real food.]

Of course, I needed something to go WITH the chicken. And because no one I knew had tried it, I HAD to give cauliflower fried rice a try. 

Groceries acquired, I let this recipe sit for TWO days. I finally decided to STOP putting off eating paleo and give it a go already! Having only read the ingredient list, I was rather disappointed to find out that time for marinating was required for the chicken. And I was REALLY looking forward to having this for lunch. So it turned into dinner instead. Let me just say, if you skip all of my "this recipe requires marinating time" you will be VERY disappointed when you go to make this dish; the marinating time MAKES this dish. At least, I think so. I haven't been impatient enough to find out otherwise, so if you do, let me know if I can skip all that "waiting". Okay?

[Please note, also, that this was my FIRST paleo recipe and despite my love of photographing my food I'm about to consume, I did NOT take adequate photographs. The hazards of posting PAST food consumption. My apologies.]

I'll say it again, you need a couple hours to let your chicken marinate, so make time to MAKE this recipe! (I'll try and throw this phrase in at least two more times before this post is over. :)

Darn Good Chicken & Cauliflower Fried Rice

(First made: 22 Jan 13)

What you Need:

Darn Good Chicken

-Chicken Drumsticks (2 per person; I started with just four)

-1 Tbsp of diced shallot

-1 scallion, thinly sliced

-1 Tbsp oil (I used sesame)

-1 Tbsp vinegar (sherry vinegar, red wine, whathaveyou)

-Salt

-Pepper

Cauliflower Fried Rice

-Head of cauliflower

-1 c. peas

-1 c. diced carrots (about 2-3 carrots)

-2 Tbsp oil (I used sesame)

-4 Tbsp tamari sauce (or coconut aminos)
-3 eggs
-3-4 scallions thinly sliced


Start with the chicken. Mix your shallot, scallion, oil, vinegar, salt and pepper in a bowl. Toss your chicken into a plastic bag and pour your marinade over the top. Seal the bag by CAREFULLY rolling it until there is NO AIR and your chicken is slathered in the marinade. (Did that make ANY sense? Look at the bulgogi recipe, down to the picture of the meat ready to marinade in the plastic bag.)

I do NOT marinade my meats in a bowl. I like to ensure that ALL of my meat is absorbing its marinade yumminess. By rolling the plastic bag (SLOWLY) you get a good bit of the air out so that all that is mixing together is meat and marinade.

Put your bag of marinade and chicken yumminess into the refrigerator and let it sit. I let mine sit for approximately 5 or 6 hours. From before I even ate lunch, to right about when I wanted to start dinner. You could marinate this overnight, whatever suits you, but I think at LEAST a few hours (maybe even only 2) is a minimum to get this recipe JUST right.

While your chicken is marinating you can get the ingredients ready for the cauliflower fried rice.

Take your head of cauliflower and chop it in your Cuisinart. Or your food processor regardless of brand. Or your blender. I'm sure you could also use your knife; it just won't be as fast as an electronic device. I have an INCREDIBLY tiny Cuisinart, so I have to "rice" my cauliflower in batches. Literally batches. And NOT just two.

Pulse your food processor 10-12 times and your cauliflower ends up looking like rice. When you have rice-sized bits, your cauliflower is done. And if you are me, it's time to start batch #17. (Okay maybe it's not THAT tiny.)

Dice up your carrots and slice up your green onion.

Set everything aside (in the refrigerator, please) until you are ready to CREATE!


I won't lie, when I saw the recipe for the chicken, I wanted mine to be nice and crispy looking. Of course, I took the skin off (first mistake) and fought the BBQ for 15 minutes trying to get the stupid knob to turn the gas on. [My husband's grill HATES me.] So I opted for cooking my chicken in the oven knowing it would NEVER look like the original recipe. HOWEVER, I have HIGH hopes that one day my husband's BBQ and I will see eye to eye. And by eye to eye, I mean I'm going to kick the SNOT out of thing!

Ahem.

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees. (I swear this is the SWEET spot for my oven.) Prep whatever pan/dish you plan on using to cook your chicken. Seeing as your marinade HAS oil in you, you could be okay, but I know the ONE time I think I'm golden, my food will end up darker than golden. (Read: blackened when the recipe isn't for blackened anything.)

Chicken, ready to go!

Place your chicken (inside it's baking dish/pan) into the oven. Seeing as I only cooked four drumsticks, I knew it would only take 30 minutes to cook all the way through.

Set a timer for 15 minutes. When the timer goes off, it's time for two things: start a second timer for 15 minutes and start your cauliflower fried rice!

On to the "fried rice"!

Add your peas and carrots to a small pan with water. Cook for 5-7 minutes. Carrots should be fork tender or darn near close.

Drain your vegetables.

Heat your oil in a large skillet for a minute or two without it beginning to burn. Add your "riced" cauliflower and tamari (or coconut aminos) sauce. Stir continuously until your cauliflower is coated with the sauce. Make a well in the center of the skillet and crack in the eggs. Stir the eggs until they're cooked and then incorporate into the "rice".

Let me tell you how this worked for me. EVERY single time I would "stir" the eggs, more would leak out to the surrounding rice and my "well" ended up the size of my skillet. So, don't be afraid if your well seems to spring a leak, mine did too! Just make SURE to cook long enough so the eggs are COOKED.

Once the egg is worked into your cauliflower, add your peas and carrots, and green onion. Stir it around.

Looks JUST like regular fried rice!

 Take your chicken out of the oven.

Yuuuuuuuuuum.

Now it's time to serve it up and EAT!

Add another drumstick because it smells AMAZING.

And ever so politely, DEVOUR your meal before you.

Five minutes later. Okay, maybe TWO.

This meal is absolutely FABULOUS. SO fabulous, in fact, I almost devoured the leftover rice straight out of the container the following day while waiting for my second batch of chicken to cook.

Cold.

It's THAT good.

Day 2 and STILL delicious.

This Darn Good Chicken also makes for a fabulous salad.

Lettuce, spinach, grated carrot, darn good chicken, and Aunt Trish's Salad Dressing.

Make this recipe. ENJOY this recipe. And LOVE this recipe! :) Oh and I didn't manage to throw it in twice more, so here goes:

...You need a couple hours to let your chicken marinate, so make time to MAKE this recipe! ...You need a couple hours to let your chicken marinate, so make time to MAKE this recipe!

Leek Potato Soup (Paleo)

Have I mentioned how much I LOVE sweet potato fries? Well, I do. So when I found a paleo "potato soup" recipe that used sweet potatoes, I HAD to try it!

Now, I already have a potato soup recipe. And it is HEAVENLY. Honestly, it is THE BEST potato soup I have EVER had in my ENTIRE (almost 31) year life. And I only discovered it last month. But it was "life changing". In the sense I swore I'd never eat another potato soup again. 

Then I started trying out paleo meals and discovered my addiction to sweet potato fries (something I HAD tried in the past, but fast food is NOTHING compared to REAL food). Then you add my discovery of a paleo potato soup made with sweet potato and well I HAD to try that one too; knowing FULL well it could "never compare to MY potato soup".

Leek Potato Soup

What you Need:
(first made 19 Feb 13)

A Pack of Bacon (you MAY or MAY NOT use it all :)
2 Large Sweet Potato
3-4 Medium Carrots
4-5 Stalks of Celery
2 Leeks
1 Small Onion
2 Cloves of Garlic
32 fl oz Chicken Broth (or more)
1 can Coconut Milk
Salt
Pepper
Cayenne Pepper
Green Onion
Cheese

Ingredients (minus the cheese)

Firstly, take your bacon and cook it up. Set cooked bacon aside and drain most of the fat. [I was able to take a short cut because I cooked a pack of bacon for breakfast, so I was able to skip this step.] You could also cook your bacon in the oven if you'd like to avoid the splatter on the stove top. (This is my preferred method of cooking bacon and how I cooked my bacon this morning; it is the BEST way for that perfect, melt-in-your-mouth crispy bacon. The way bacon SHOULD be.]

While your bacon is cooking (or BEFORE you start cooking/baking your bacon), chop up your vegetables: sweet potato, carrots, celery, leeks, onion, and garlic. You want equal amounts of carrots, celery and leeks.

Need some more celery.

I did not have enough celery, so I added two extra stalks (making 5 total to my 4 medium carrots). I also chopped up my sweet potatoes thin (as you can see). The thinner the bits of potato, the faster the soup cooks and the sooner you can start eating!

You want the amount of sweet potato to be double that of your carrots/celery/leeks.

Two sweet potatoes were MORE than enough.

I am a little weird about potato soup, so I made sure to chop up my carrots, celery, leeks, onion and garlic nice and fine. I added my garlic to the leek pile as I'd be putting those into the pot at the same time. 

Vegetables all chopped and ready to go.

Once your vegetables are all chopped, you are ready to make your soup! BUT, before you start, make sure you put your "extra" vegetable pieces into a plastic bag. You can use them to make stock and won't have to pick some up for your next recipe calling for stock! You know if you want to get the crock pot out and all that jazz.

Gonna make some vegetable stock!

Now that that is out of the way, place some bacon fat (or whichever fat you'd like to use, but bacon is SOOOOO good; plus you're going to put bacon on top so why not just use bacon fat?) in the bottom of your pot. When it's melted and beginning to get hot, put in your onions. You could add your carrots and celery in as well, but I like to cook my onions a bit before adding the colorful carrots and celery.

My big ole pot makes the amount of vegetables look so small!

Cook your onion, celery, and carrots for 2-5 minutes. Remember even if you THINK you haven't cooked them long enough to soften, you still have quite a length of cooking time remaining. AND you are going to puree all this at the end regardless of how soft your vegetables are (or aren't). Then add your garlic and leeks. Cook for another 2-4 minutes; make sure you continually stir to ensure the garlic doesn't burn. After 30 seconds or so you should be able to smell the garlic. At this point I add some salt and pepper and toss in the potatoes (again, you still have some cooking time remaining, so the leeks will get soft.. you REALLY don't want burnt garlic in your soup). Stir to combine and cook 5-7 minutes. Add your stock. (I used chicken.)

(You can also add your potatoes and stock at the same time.)

Chicken stock added.

Unfortunately, you can see my 32 fl oz was NOT enough to cover all my vegetables. If you can SEE the chicken stock, then just ignore the next step because that means you like your soup extra thick. If you like yours a little less thick, add some water. JUST enough to cover your vegetables. 

(Keep in mind when deciding what consistency of soup you want, that you are NOT adding any flour (which thickens the soup). If I had been thinking about the entire can of coconut milk I had still to add, I would NOT have added any more liquid to my soup. My soup still came out spectacular, but for a more potato soup consistency you may not want to add the water. Isn't hind sight fun?)

Bring this to a boil and cook for 10 minutes, or until your potatoes are fork soft. If you aren't sure about your carrots and celery, check them too! (This step, because I had my burner down to medium heat, took FOREVER. I ended up turning it up to high just so the soup would heat up and the potatoes would cook!)

Turn off your burner and add your can of coconut milk. 

Then, if you are AWESOME and have an immersion blender, use your immersion blender to puree your soup. If you DON'T have an immersion blender, don't worry. Neither do I.

We can use the blender to begin the puree process for this soup.

A word of caution though: Please don't be like me and have soup fly up out of your blender because the heat caused a reverse suction and as soon as you turn your blender on, it blows potato soup all over you.

Thank you.

My blender blew up. Or my potato soup blew up. One of the two.

I need AND want an immersion blender. However, I have mastered the art of potato soup blending; although (obviously) there was a bit of a mishap this go around. I use a soup spoon and deliver it to the blender, put it on pulse and blend until creamy looking. Then I transfer the ENTIRE blender back into the pot. Repeat this a few times until the OBVIOUS non-pureed pieces are harder to find. Then I take a slotted spoon and fish for large pieces; I'm REALLY dedicated to a smooth consistency in my potato soup. 

Once you have finished, it is TIME TO EAT! 

Serve yourself some soup. Add on some grated cheese (I'm a dairy (and sugar, and and and) kind of paleo girl :), some chopped bacon, and green onion. (You can prep all these while the soup is cooking.)

Then scarf it down. After you've finished scarfing it down, remember your forgot about the "life changing" ingredient: cayenne pepper.

Serve the kidlets a bowl each (and listen to them complain about not wanting soup, minus the baby who is whining because he wants to eat already and ends up eating three servings) and serve yourself another bowl. Add on the cheese. Add on the bacon. Sprinkle on some green onion (which personally you can skip on this soup; it is not THAT necessary, but it sure is pretty). And EVER so carefully, sprinkle on some cayenne pepper. (Unless you REALLY like hot.)

Absolute. Perfection.

Scarf down your second bowl and absolutely ENJOY it because despite the fact you used sweet potatoes instead of red, the cayenne covers perfectly the sweet flavor and brings you back to the most perfect potato soup recipe you've EVER had. Oh wait, that's me. DON'T WORRY, this soup is good too! The cayenne just adds something special that helps cut the sweetness of the sweet potatoes and coconut milk I tasted in my first serving.

Enjoy a third bowl if you must (I didn't have room to do so) and then contemplate the dishes.

Then remember that during the LONG wait period for your potatoes to soften, you did most of your dishes. And your soup can store in the pot overnight because you are going to have it for dinner again tomorrow and you can clean the pot out then. So dishes are a BREEZE! But PLAN ahead! :)

"Happy Cow"

"Happy Cow" is what the girls call 'beef'. WHY "Happy Cow"? Because we try to purchase beef that came from a "Happy Cow". And let's face it, I've said it before, I have picky kids. So if you make something sound "pretty" or "happy" it tends to go over a WHOLE lot easier. Of course, for a good while the girls wanted "happy cow with cheese" (read: a cheese burger) so when we presented them with just "happy cow", not on a bun and without cheese, it turned into disappointment. HOWEVER, after the successful dinner (and mealtime conversation) of my EASY Chicken Bites and "French Fries", I thought I'd try the dish with beef.

And it did NOT disappoint. (Unless you count the fact that the children were expecting chicken with their sweet potato fries. But EVERYONE ate it up! SO win!)

Mommy's Plate.

Kids' Plates

I KNOW my plate looks STUFFED with food, while the kids' plates look bare. FIRST, I hadn't done dishes (even though I said in the last post that there weren't that many) so we only had our HUGE plates and second, instead of showing you a barren plate, I chose the small amount-looking of food. I PROMISE I fed my the kidlets AND that they asked for seconds. AND thirds!

I used what beef I had in the freezer (I think it was just a one pound chuck steak?) and similarly with the chicken, I sliced it thin so I consumed more vegetables than beef. I've come to realize (and teach my body) I actually ENJOY eating lettuce and spinach and green onion to the point I've started to eat up all the lettuce BEFORE the meat is gone. (It USE to be that I HAD to have meat on a salad to even CONSIDER touching it.)

Thinly sliced, DELICIOUS beef.

[I simply LOVE these fries. Have I mentioned they're my new addiction? SO tasty. Looking at them makes me want to make some more. Hmm.. I DO have to make lunch for the kids and I...]

The recipe is IDENTICAL to the EASY Chicken Fingers and "French Fries" with only a few changes:

1. Use steak instead of chicken. I used a 1 lb. chuck steak (what I had in my freezer)
2. Exclude the paprika and parsley on your steak

The end.

Easy right?

EASY Chicken Bites and "French Fries" (Paleo)

The end MUST be nigh because tonight's supper COMPLETELY won over the kids! All FOUR of them! My FIVE year old asked for more before she'd even taken a single BITE!

Listen, you HAVE to understand: they are picky. And not just, "I don't want that" picky, I mean reincarnationfromwhenIwasyoung picky. It's a nightmare. I have LITERALLY called up my parents to tell them, "I am SO sorry I was a picky eater!" When you have children, you learn REAL quick they are the grandparents' revenge. How I WISH I had eaten my vegetables as a kid.

[And they are SNEAKY! Oh how they are sneaky!]

Tonight's supper consisted of "chicken fingers and french fries". Now, my eldest (okay, she's FIVE) use to ONLY want to eat chicken nuggets. Even at our unhealthiest point in life, we did NOT frequent the fast food joints. However, when we DID eat out, she ONLY EVER WANTED CHICKEN STRIPS. (Or fingers. Or nuggets. Whatever restaurants called them, THAT was what she wanted.) 

Every. Single. Time.

I've made "Real Food" chicken fingers, I've made pan fried chicken, etc. And every time it was pretty much a miss. TONIGHT, however, was COMPLETE VICTORY!

"You can make this again, Mom. Maybe tomorrow. Or the next day. Or the day after the next day. Or on a Sunday. Or a Wednesday."

Tears, people. Tears. I could have bawled my eyes out I was so happy. 


EASY Chicken Bites and "French Fries"
(first made 16 Feb 13)

What you need:
1 large chicken breast per two people (half a breast is MORE than enough for one person)
1 sweet potato per two people (I used one LARGE potato for five of us)
Olive oil (or take your pick)
Salt
Pepper
Garlic (I used powdered)
Parsley
Paprika
Salad (I used lettuce, spinach, and green onion)


Preheat your oven to 450 degrees.

Then work on your sweet potato(s):

Peel them. (I don't have an actual peeler, so I just use a really sharp knife.)

Slice it up. Try and make uniform sized fries.

Put your fries into a bowl and mix them around with some olive oil. You could season your "french fries" here, but I wait until they're on the pan (which is also coated with some oil).

Space out the fries so they aren't touching each other. 

 I only use salt on my sweet potato fries. I WILL use pepper one of these days, but for now it's just salt.

Bake the sweet potato(s) for 15 minutes. During this 15 minutes you can get your chicken all set up.

Slice up your chicken breast(s) to the size that will work best in your skillet/pan. I butterflied my chicken breast so that the pieces would cook evenly. I wasn't concerned about what the pieces looked like because I knew I'd be slicing them up for the kidlets when supper was ready.

One chicken breast, sliced and seasoned.

Don't forget to season your chicken.

If this bit didn't take you a full 15 minutes, go ahead and add some oil and butter (equal amounts) to your skillet. Then set the table (or if you prepare plates in the kitchen, set the plates out). Wash some lettuce and spinach, cut up some green onion (mine literally sits in the refrigerator in a cup with water, so I just take some scissors and cut up my green onion right onto my salad) and set up your salads. The kidlets, also, each had a bit of lettuce (and the middle one even ended up asking for more; the only one who did NOT get any was the fifteen month old) on their plates (no spinach this time and no green onion; although they usually end up with a bit of spinach as well).

When the timer goes off, pull out your sweet potato(s) and flip them; again, making sure when they are flipped that they are not touching each other, but all separate from one another. At this point, I turn the oven down and flip my pan around. I've made these "french fries" a couple times and they always end up too crispy for the kids and one side ends up moreso than the other. I turn the temperature down to between 400 and 425 and set the timer for 10 minutes.

While the sweet potato(s) are finishing, heat up your skillet of oil and butter (again even amounts). When the pan is hot, place your chicken breast in and cook for 2-3 minutes until golden. Flip the pieces over and cook for an additional 2-3 minutes. I am personally NEUROTIC about cooked chicken. Because I sliced my pieces so thin, 6 minutes total was plenty of time for my chicken to cook through. PLEASE make sure you cook your chicken sufficiently. No one wants to get sick.

Especially on such a yummy meal! :)

Because I have little ones, as SOON as the sweet potato fries are done, I start setting plates with them to give enough time for them to cool, so no one burns their mouth. Cut up (or scissor up) chicken bits for the kids and watch them chow down!

Because the chicken turned out SO BEAUTIFULLY this evening, I decided to go for a "pretty" picture and not cut up the chicken for my salad. Then I decorated the plate with my "french fries". And for the final touch, I scooped out some of the yumminess at the bottom of my chicken pan as "salad dressing". There are NOT a lot of salad dressings I enjoy; I prefer meat juice, olive oil, butter (but heck, butter makes EVERYTHING better, right?), and seasoning to any salad dressing, any day.

See? Pretty! And SO delicious!

Despite having to use the "big" plates tonight, I wanted to show you that I really wasn't eating THAT much food. Mostly I ate vegetables tonight with "some" chicken. I sliced the chicken breast relatively thin to help in the cooking, but to limit just how much we were all eating too!

See how THIN the chicken pieces are? So mostly vegetables and "some" chicken.

And you know what? EVERYONE (and I mean EVERYONE) ate up like there was NO tomorrow! I hadn't won the kids over with sweet potato fries until TONIGHT. And chicken, unbreaded, out of a skillet/pan, FORGET ABOUT IT. Tonight equaled TOTAL victory!

Mommy's Plate.

Four kidlet plates. CLEAN.

And of course, because I want to keep this all as real as I can:

Dishes.

But DON'T worry; it is NOT as bad as it looks. Figure the sinks themselves are COMPLETELY empty. The two cutting boards (because we keep our meat separate from our fruits and vegetables) and the large sheet/pan for the fries are blocking any access for the other dishes to actually SIT in the sink. The ONLY dish missing from this picture would be the fifteen month old's cup.

Now.. who wants to do those "easy" dishes for me?

Anyone?

Hello?

Drat.

"Spaghetti" and Meatballs (Paleo)

Have you heard about the spaghetti squash? Apparently you can substitute it for pasta. Now in our family, squash only makes an appearance during Fall. And it's usually seen in pie form. In fact, it's really the ONLY squash my husband will eat (or at least THINKS he'll eat) and it HAS to be MY pumpkin pie or it's a "no go". 

I won't lie, squash and I don't REALLY get along. Unless it's already in a can and I'm turning it into pumpkin pie. Even then, though, the first 10 minutes of pie making are BRUTAL. But I have to say, hearing the words "spaghetti squash" INTRIGUED me. The girls are PICKY about pasta, so how could I go wrong with trying out a spaghetti squash, right?! 

And in truth, saying squash and I don't get along, isn't COMPLETELY honest because we really have never given it a chance. Growing up, Joshua's side of the family killed squash for him. On my side of the family, zucchini never really sat well with me; unless it was in bread or stuffed by a high school friend's Mom. Other than pumpkin pie, there was NO squash loving going on for me and absolutely NONE going on for my husband.

So, with Joshua gone on again, I decided it was time to try out the spaghetti squash. And if I could win the kiddos over, I would HAVE to be successful at winning the husband over. (Right? That IS how it works?)

I had found a couple recipes online for paleo meatballs. And a couple different recipes for paleo spaghetti. And seriously, the zucchini pasta looked JUST like noodles in the photo (8th one down), so I HAD to try it. (I'm weird about food, remember? :) The REAL challenge was going to be HOW to make this appealing to the kidlets. 

My eldest is INCREDIBLY particular about food (JUST like her mother was growing up); especially pasta (at least it seems that way). So to make supper appealing to her took some thinking. FINALLY, I figured it out. A CONTEST! We'd sample our meal and decide which items we liked best. We each even received our own piece of paper to make our tallies and then we'd discuss after eating (or while eating) what part of the meal everyone liked best.

"Spaghetti" and Meatballs
(made 26 Jan 13)

This recipe posting will be slightly different than what I've done in past posts. I literally made three types of meatballs and two types of pasta. Because I wasn't sure HOW this meal would go, I only used two zucchini and one small spaghetti squash (and I mean SMALL).

I had some ground beef and some hot and sweet italian chicken sausages. Because I KNEW the kidlets wouldn't like the hot sausage, I turned them into larger meatballs by squeezing them out of the casing and rolling them. The sweet italian sausage I knew the kids could handle and made meatballs the same way as the hot italian sausage. To the ground beef I added Italian seasonings: salt, pepper, garlic, parsley, oregano, and maybe some onion. Rolled them into balls and placed everything in it's own area on my meat cutting board. (I did NOT want to have the hot italian chicken sausage meatballs get mixed in with the others, plus how would we know which meatball we enjoyed most if they were all mixed together? And I'd NEVER win my kidlets over if they ended up with a hot italian sausage meatball. Never.)

Sweet Italian chicken on the Left, Hot Italian Chicken in the Middle, and Mommy's Meatballs on the Right

I coated a pan with some coconut oil and let the meatballs cook. Before tossing (and keeping a VERY close eye on them) the meatballs in the pan, I prepped the spaghetti squash and zucchini. I won't lie, I WISH I had this julienne peeler; I need to pick one up, because I cut the zucchini by hand. And let's just say that although they DID end up looking like spaghetti, I think they'd have been WAY more awesome had I used the "correct" tool for the job.

And of course, I didn't snap a photo of my sliced up zucchini.

I just set the zucchini in a bit of water on the stove, let the water boil, and cooked the zucchini until it was fork soft.

The spaghetti squash, I think, terrified me the most. WHAT IF it didn't curl like all the photos I've seen? WHAT IF it tastes more like squash than pasta? WHAT IF trying to make supper a competition totally doesn't work and the kidlets are put off further by pasta?

This recipe helped me get over the fear of not cooking the spaghetti squash properly. What I didn't grasp from said recipe, or any of the other ones I looked at was that you have to fork the spaghetti squash in order to get the noodle look. I don't know WHY, but I thought upon pulling it out of the oven it'd be all curly for me. So imagine my disappointment and heart sinking when I pulled the squash out of the oven (375 degrees F, for 45 mins - face DOWN) and it still looked the same as when I put it in. I won't lie, I was CRUSHED. I had TOTALLY psyched myself up for this meal only to end up with NOT spaghetti squash noodles. I decided to fork it and see if maybe the flesh just hadn't loosened enough. 

What the squash looked like straight out of the oven on the left and forked squash on the right.

And what do you know, I had NOODLES! I think my heart actually skipped a beat! I actually had spaghetti noodles out of a squash! Of course, I still had to win the kidlets over, but I managed to NOT mess up the scariest part of the meal.

I also threw together a pasta sauce. I've made pizza sauce, so I figured I could handle making pasta sauce (despite having failed in the past). It seemed simple enough. Instead of tomato paste, though, I used tomato sauce because although I could just add water to the paste to get the consistency I wanted, I LIKE the consistency of tomato paste and it has worked wonderfully in the past for pizza sauce. This is another moment of add your favorite Italian seasonings and mix it all together until the taste test comes back satisfactory!

I assembled the kidlets' plates the same (except for the youngest; he just wants FOOD and could care less how it is presented, just FEED HIM):

Zucchini noodles and Spaghetti Squash Noodles; each with a Sweet Italian (Top) and Mommy Meatball (Bottom)

And of course, MY plate. Err, bowl. FILLED. With yumminess.

And of COURSE, a FRESH sprinkling of cheese (Parmesan, Romano, and Asiago; all combined) on top ALWAYS helps with winning kids over too. At least, in my house it sometimes works. Or maybe that just works for me.

Surprisingly the zucchini pasta won over the spaghetti squash, but seriously I couldn't choose between the two, they are both SO good. And both meatballs won, but I think Mommy's meatball won by one or two votes more than the pre-made Sweet Italian. But I think it's because I called them "Mommy's Meatballs"; I mean, who wants to break Mommy's heart? No one is going to tell me my meatballs were terrible, right?

Quick and Simple Brown Sugar

You MIGHT be thinking, "What? Brown Sugar? I thought she was sharing paleo recipes!"

While I HAVE shared paleo recipes (and will continue to do so :), my family's food intake is not solely paleo. I started trying some paleo meals thanks to a friend opening my eyes, but before paleo my family's food lifestyle consisted of "Real Food": eating non-processed foods in which every ingredient was known. Now, if you are familiar with "Real Food" then you are probably STILL wondering about Quick and Simple Brown Sugar (sugar is a processed "food"). 

The answer is simple: I'm only human. I'm NOT perfect. And you know what, I DO enjoy consuming sugar from time to time; just not straight sugar. Our family chooses cane sugar and truly limits just how much we put into our bodies; plus in using cane sugar we can further reduce how much goes into a recipe. We definitely slide from time to time, but it TAKES time to train and teach your body it doesn't NEED processed sugars. At least it takes time when you're husband is in the Army (and gone for days at a time training, deploying, field time, whathaveyou), when you have five little monkeys to take care of (ages 5 and under; one of them is a dog), house work to do, and bills to pay. And if you have discovered the secret to maintaining ALL this and never cheating on your healthy lifestyle, you need to LET ME IN ON THE SECRET! :)

I've looked at the ingredient list on brown sugar packages. And really I've ONLY looked at the packages of brown sugar I'd buy. And the ingredients say the same thing: brown sugar. And then of course there are the varieties: Extra Dark, Dark, Light.. I'm sure there are probably more. I have ALWAYS used light brown sugar. For ANY recipe that called for brown sugar. Then I found out one day that brown sugar is simply molasses mixed in with white sugar. Wait, seriously?!

Of course I had to look it up and sure enough, I found I could make my own. I just needed to buy some molasses. Now, molasses isn't exactly cheap if you're looking for happy, earth friendly molasses, but I could MAKE my own brown sugar, so I picked it up. Now, before you get TOO excited, molasses tastes NASTY (in my opinion), so despite the fact that the molasses adds the extra UMPH to your sugar, resist the urge to lick your fingers. Please. Blegh.


Quick and Simple Brown Sugar
(this particular batch was made on 22 Jan 13)

What you need:

3 cups sugar (non-brown sugar, obviously)
1 Tbsp molasses
3 bowls/containers (one of which needs to be an airtight container for storage of sugar)


And that is ALL the ingredients! Now, the recipe I looked up uses one cup of sugar. I've messed with the recipe a few times over now and three cups of white sugar works best for our family. And it goes PERFECTLY with oatmeal, in cookie recipes, etc. I have never had a "Man, I wish I had only used a cup of white sugar when making this here brown sugar" moment. And somehow that should be COMPLETELY reassuring to you.

I'm sure I've mentioned it before, but in case I haven't, I'll state it again.

"I am weird about my food."

First you put in your three cups of sugar and your tablespoon of molasses into a bowl. Then take a fork (or the tablespoon) and start mixing your ingredients together. And just as Joy the Baker says, you really will think you are doing this ALL wrong and that I was COMPLETELY errant in my recipe.

I PROMISE, this is what it is suppose to look like. Just keep mixing the molasses into the sugar. Eventually, it will end up looking something along the lines of this:

You can see that there are still little clumps of molasses and sugar. And this is were my "food weirdness" kicks in. I pull out the second bowl and in batches of up to 1/2 cup start smoothing out clumps and further (and completing) mixing the molasses into the sugar.

My little bit of transferred sugar to the second bowl.

Using a spoon to smooth out the molasses bits.

After I COMPLETELY smooth out the 1/2 cup sugar or so, I transfer it yet again to its final resting place. 

BEAUTIFUL brown sugar.

Side view. NO clumps.

An air tight container will ensure your sugar does not dry out. I have kept one batch for up to a month and NEVER had a single hard rock clump form. I'm sure I could have kept it longer, but I ended up using up the sugar. Now, I do NOT use brown sugar every day. In fact, we usually use it to top our oatmeal and steel cut oats or for dessert items (cookies, scones, etc.) so three cups lasts our family for WEEKS if not up to month (possibly longer) before having to mix up a second batch. If you find yourself running low, you can whip up some more and add it to what you already have on hand.


And now you know how!