Mr. and Mrs. Tenorman Chili

For those wondering, no I did not make my chili out of people. Unlike Cartman in South Park in the episode Scott Tenorman Must Die. But I wanted to name my carnivorous chili something that would stick in your minds. Like as if I made it out of people. Luckily for you my chili is 100% beef with some deliciousness mixed in.

There are a few cooking methods you can choose from in this recipe. I'll tell you how I did it, and then towards the end give you the alternatives. Sound good? Great.

Mr. and Mrs. Tenorman Chili
2 lbs ground chuck beef
16 oz tomato sauce
6 oz tomato paste
4 oz diced green Anaheim peppers (Fresh & Easy has a good organic canned green peppers in the "Latin" aisle)
1 cup beef broth
4 chipotle peppers, diced (The canned ones are perfect because they have the oils and juices all contained within!)
Chili seasonings - 1/4 cup total: chili powder, cumin, salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder.


My method: Place all ingredients in a crock pot. Set on "high" and cook for 3 hours, stirring occasionally. TASTE YOUR FOOD WHILE IT'S COOKING. Add more seasonings, broth, peppers to your taste. I ended up adding more chili powder and black pepper. The consistency you want is a nice thick chili. Not soupy. But if it starts getting too thick for you, just add a little beef broth until it is to your liking.

Super simple, right? Well here are two more ways you can make your chili.

Method 2: Same as above, but cook on "low" for 8 hours. This method is for those who will be gone all day and want dinner ready when you come home from work or school.

Method 3: In a large saucepan, brown beef on medium heat with about 2 TBL olive oil/coconut oil. Add tomato paste, sauce, chilies, broth and seasonings. Cover, and cook on medium-low heat for 2-3 hours or until you have a thick consistency.


Serve hot. We ate this just as it is. You can add raw chopped onions, or add a little hot sauce if you like! Or put it on some hot dogs... mmm... :P Obviously, if you are not Paleo, add cheese or french fries to make this super carb-a-icious.

Warm Chicken Salad

Ok friends, prepare yourself for this. This recipe was made by my lovely boyfriend Colin!

I've been having moments of dietary weakness recently, but Colin has been keeping me in line. So today while I was complaining about really wanting a pizza covered in macaroni and cheese (sounds brilliant, huh?!) he went into the kitchen and whipped up this delicious chicken salad.

Colin's Warm Chicken Salad (with dijon mustard reduction)


For the chicken:
1 (VERY) large chicken breast
1 TBL Trader Joe's 21 Seasoning Salute (I highly recommend this one. Really good all-purpose seasoning to have around)
1 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp garlic powder
1 TBL garlic salt
1/2 TBL Trader Joe's South African Smoke (Another of my favorite seasoning grinders. Again, GET IT! Sooooo good!) or substitute 1 tsp paprika
1 tsp black pepper
1 1/2 TBL olive oil + 2 TBL for pan frying
1 1/2 TBL red wine vinegar + 1 TBL for reduction
water to boil (about a 4 cups)
1 1/2 TBL dijon mustard

For the base: 
2-3 cups green leave lettuce, chopped
2 radishes, sliced
1 bunch (about 15 leaves) of basil, sliced

Place chicken and all seasonings in a pot of water and cook on high heat for 20 minutes or until the chicken is cooked all the way through.

Once chicken is fully cooked, remove from water (SAVE THE WATER). Get a large sauce pan and heat about 2 TBL olive oil. Cut chicken in half lengthwise and brown in the olive oil.

Once you have a nice brown sear on the chicken, pour water from pot into the sauce pan. Reduce the water to about 1/2 of its original volume. Remove chicken from water. Cube the chicken and set aside.  Add dijon mustard and the remaining red wine vinegar to pan, and whisk thoroughly. Reduce the sauce to a 1/3 of it's original volume. Set aside.

Make the base of the salad by plating lettuce, radishes and basil. Top with chicken and dijon vinaigrette.

Voila!

Look how beautiful this is!! See boys, you can cook too!

Chicken Parmesana... minus the parmesan.

As a Sicilian woman, I love my flag foods! For those who don't know what the Italian flag looks like, it's green, white and red; like basil, cheese, and tomatoes. The three staples of Italian cuisine. Being Paleo means no cheese though. Which is HANDS DOWN the only thing I do not like about being Paleo. But, I digress... (that's what cheat days are for! haha!)

For tonight's dinner recipe, I wanted a Paleo version of Chicken Parmesana. So here is my gluten-free, dairy-free chicken dinner that's just as yummy as it is easy to make.

Chicken Parmesana...minus the parmesan. 
 For the chicken:
2 large free-range chicken breasts
2 large cage-free eggs
1 cup almond flour
1 tsp salt
2 tsp black pepper
2 tsp oregano

For the sauce:
1 can whole tomatoes with sauce (make sure it's a good organic brand. I like Nina or Contadina)
1/2 yellow onion, diced
4-5 cloves garlic, minced. (If you don't like that much garlic, you don't have to use this much. Cut it down to 2-3)
1/3 cup basil, chiffonade (just a fancy culinary term for thinly sliced)
2 tsp red pepper flakes (or more if you want it spicy!)
2 tsp black pepper
2 tsp oregano
olive oil

Optional Super Easy Side Salad:
1 head ice burg lettuce
1/4 cup cucumbers, diced
2 carrots, diced
less than 1/4 cup green olives, sliced
Olive oil/Balsamic vinegar 1/4 cup mixed together.
salt/pepper

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. In a medium sauce pan, heat up about 1 TBL olive oil. Add onions, garlic, and red pepper flakes. Simmer until the garlic and onions are slightly golden. Add tomatoes, basil,  salt, pepper, and oregano. Cook on medium-low for about 15-20 minutes.

While sauce is cooking, prepare the chicken. Skim chicken of any excess fat. In one bowl or tupperware,  add two eggs and mix. In a separate bowl, mix almond flour, salt, pepper and oregano. Dip chicken into egg coating evenly, and then into the almond flour mix, coating evenly. Place chicken into an oven-safe dish or pan. Bake for about 35 minutes. (If your oven is crappy like mine, crank it up to 400 degrees for the last 15 minutes of baking.)

While the chicken is in the oven, turn the stove down on the sauce to low. Let it simmer for the whole time the chicken is cooking.

For the salad, mix all ingredients in a bowl. Add olive oil and vinegar, or have it on the side.

Serve hot and enjoy your meal!

Pan-seared Pork Chops with Homemade Apple Sauce

I know just reading the title of this post you can hear Peter Brady saying "pork chops...and apple sauce." 

My version of this classic dinner will leave you wanting seconds. Again, I try to keep my dinners as simple as possible both for me and my readers to create. I know at the end of my day all I want to do is eat, and preparing a complex dinner always makes me tempted just to order take out. (But I don't!)

Pork is a delicious substitute for chicken. It's nice and lean and when cooked properly can be super juicy!

Pan-seared Pork Chops with Homemade Apple Sauce:
Pork Chops:
4 pork chops (bone-in or boneless.) I prefer bone-in, I feel like you get more tenderness and juice when cooking.
Sea Salt (I have neglected to say I use Himalayan Pink Sea Salt. It's delicate and packs a lot of flavor)
Pepper
Olive oil.

Apple Sauce:
2 Fuji apples, peeled, cored, and diced
2 Gala apples, peeled, cored, and diced
1/2 cup water
Sea Salt/Pepper to taste
1 TBL cinnamon
PINCH nutmeg. (about 1/8 tsp)

Optional: Grilled Onions:
1 yellow onion, sliced
1 TBL olive oil
1 tsp paprika
1 tsp black pepper
1 TBL balsamic vinegar

Prepare apples. Place apples and all ingredients into a 4 quart saucepan. Simmer on LOW for about 30 minutes, or until apples have reduced by almost half. Add water in small quantities throughout cooking if they start to look dry. You want a syrup-y consistency in the apples.

With about 15 minutes left in the cooking process of the apples, grill pork chops and onions. Season the pork with salt, pepper and olive oil and pan-sear them in a large frying pan. Cook until 170 degrees inside, or until there is NO pink left. (Under-cooked pork is very dangerous. Similar to undercooked chicken.)

While the pork is cooking, place sliced onions, olive oil, paprika and pepper in a separate frying pan. When they are about halfway cooked (soft, no grill marks yet) add the balsamic vinegar. Cook until soft and have blacked ends.

Serve hot with a side of fresh radishes.

Easy Steak and Potatoes with Jalapeno Salsa

A good staple for the Paleo diet is a nice juicy steak. At least for me it is. Chicken is delicious and all, but when the carnivore in me comes out, chewing on some red meat really gets my mouth watering!

I started out being a vegetarian (6 years of it!) then went to only eating chicken as a meat. Red meat was a little hard for me to get used to at first. But, I'm in love now, and it's in most of my dinners I make!

This recipe is really super duper simple for those nights you don't really feel like cooking, but you need a substantial amount of food in your belly.

Today is the 30th day of our 30-day strict Paleo diet. At the end of our trek, he lost 13 lbs and I lost 10 lbs! (thank you, thank you!). Had to get that out, now back to the recipe...

Easy Steak and (Sweet) Potatoes with Jalapeno Salsa
For the steaks:
2 top sirloin steaks
salt/pepper to taste

Sweet Potatoes:
4 large sweet potatoes, sliced into fries
2 TBL olive oil
1 tsp black pepper
1 tsp cinnamon

Jalapeno Salsa:
5 fresh jalapenos, seeded and diced
1/2 yellow onion, diced
1 roma tomato, diced
3 cloves of garlic, diced
1 TBL olive oil
1 TBL vinegar
juice of 1 lime
pinch of cayenne pepper
salt/pepper to taste

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Slice sweet potatoes into fries, and set them in a oven-safe pan or dish. Sprinkle with the olive oil, black pepper, and cinnamon. Bake for 30-35 min, or until the middle is soft and the outside is a little crunchy (just like normal french fries).

While the fries are cooking, make your salsa. Cut all of your veggies and mix well in a bowl. Add olive oil, vinegar, lime, and cayenne pepper and mix again. Salt and pepper it to your taste. Set aside. (You want the flavors to kind of melt together)

When the potatoes have about 10 min left to cook, start grilling your steaks. Salt and pepper the steaks to your liking. I have a cast-iron grill pan, but if you have an actual grill, that will work as well. Heat up the pan (or grill) and place steaks on it. Grill for about 5 min each side (more for more well-done steaks, and less for more rare steaks). I like my steaks medium to medium rare, so I cooked them for about 5-6 minutes each side.

The sweet potatoes should be perfectly done by the time your steaks are done. Serve immediately with the jalapeno salsa!

We had left-over salsa, so I put the remainder in a left-over jalapeno jar!

Paleo Pancakes

This is gonna be a short little post for the night!

There are limited things to eat for breakfast when you are eating gluten-free and dairy-free. As much as I love bacon and eggs, it gets a little boring after almost 30 days. I love pancakes and have tried a few GF/DF recipes, and this is my favorite one that we have found and tried so far.

This recipe is from The Southern Eclectic. It's a much slower cooking process than "normal" pancakes, and it has an obviously different texture. But they are SO delicious! We melted chocolate then added it to the batter because I was having a craving (as we women do every now and then haha).

You can eat these with bananas, strawberries, blueberries, maple syrup, or whatever fresh fruit or nuts you would like!

Totally satisfies those carb cravings you can get every now and then on this diet. :)

Chorizo Stuffed Poblano Peppers

This is the last dinner I posted on Facebook, and the one I got the most requests for a recipe!

I was looking through my cookbooks, and came across a recipe for Chorizo Stuffed Baby Bell Peppers. It was an appetizer, and since I wanted to make them for dinner I doubled the recipe and used full-sized peppers. It was delicious! (This was from my cookbook "Make it Paleo").

A week later I wanted to make it again. This time I decided I wanted it to be a little spicier, so I bought poblano peppers instead. So here is MY recipe I adapted from the Make it Paleo recipe. I made some minor changes, and added a side sauce to cool off some of the heat in the pepper.

Chorizo Stuffed Poblano Peppers with a Mango Avocado Puree

For the Peppers:

4 large poblano peppers

1 beef chorizo

1 pork chorizo (I got both pre-made chorizo sausages at Fresh&Easy. They have AMAZING fresh and organic food there. Especially meats. But, that's another blog...)

1/2 white or yellow onion, chopped (I used yellow, it's a milder onion)

3 garlic cloves, finely mined

1 roma tomato, chopped

1/4 cup black olives, sliced.

1/3 cup cilantro, chopped.

juice of 1 lime

olive oil

salt/pepper to taste

Set oven to 350 degrees. In a large pan, sauté garlic and onions in a little bit of olive oil (less than a tablespoon) until lightly golden brown. Set aside. 

In a large bowl, mix tomatoes, black olives, cilantro, lime juice, and the now cooked garlic and onions. 

Slice peppers lengthwise on one side to make an opening. Remove the stem and the seeds from the inside. 

Back to the stove: remove chorizo from casings and simmer in pan for about 5-8 min, or until 75% cooked. (You don't want to cook it all the way, because it will continue to cook in the oven.) 

Drain the excess oil out of the pan and then mix the chorizo with the vegetable mixture. Once it it fully combined, stuff the mixture into the peppers.

Place the peppers in an oven safe pan or dish (not covered) and bake for about 30-35 min. This totally depends on your oven by the way. If you have an Easy Bake Oven like me (I will post pictures soon), You're looking at 35-40 minutes. The main thing you want is for the top to be crispy and the peppers to be soft and charred.

Mango and Avocado Puree:

2 ripe avocados, pitted and sliced

1 mango, pitted and sliced

juice of 1 lemon

1 tsp chili powder

scant 1/4 cup sliced jalapeno (more if you want it spicier!)

2 Tbl olive oil

salt/pepper to taste

In a food processor (If you do not have one, a blender will work just fine. But I strongly suggest you invest in a food processor if you are dedicated to cooking) combine avocado, mango, and olive oil until well combined. Add the remaining ingredients and process until you get a smooth consistency. Add salt, pepper, more jalapeno, whatever you'd like to get the desired spiciness. (Maybe some hot sauce if you want to kick it up some more?)

I made this sauce specifically to balance out the spice in the pepper/chorizo, so I made my sauce fairly mild. I do LOVE spicy food, but you don't want to scorch your taste buds in one meal. Balance, my friends is the key to a meal! :P

Serve this with a light side salad, or just by itself! 

Mmm Mmm Mmm!!!

First Post! WOO!

Hello friends!

So this is my first blog post. I'm gonna start it off nice and simple-like and just tell all of you why I'm making this awesome bloggy-bloggerson.

I like to cook and make yummy food, and I've been posting pictures of all my yummy food on the book of face, and people have been asking me what my recipes are and such... so yeah! (now I'm using run-on sentences!)

So about 25 days ago, my lovely boyfriend, Colin, and I decided we were not going to eat like fatties anymore and change our way of eating. I heard about this amazing thing called The Paleo Diet (a.k.a. The Caveman Diet, Primal Diet, etc) through one of my customers at work. She said one of her friends tried it, loved it, lost weight, and is now a much happier person! I thought to myself, "Huh... it would be nice to not feel like I would like to die, throw up, or kill innocent people after I eat...maybe I should try this out." ::rubs chin in deep thought::

"What is The Paleo Diet?" you may be asking yourself, or your computer screen in an attempt to talk to me. Well there is this cool thing called the Internet and it will tell you everything you need! But if you don't want to search the interwebs right now, I'll give you brief insight to this lifestyle change! (Yes, I'm calling it "lifestyle" and not "diet" because the word "diet" makes me a sad panda.)

The Paleo Diet is pretty much eating how human beings are supposed to eat. Things that can be hunted or gathered, not man-made, cultivated, or not real food (i.e. spam, cheese wiz, tofu). Mainly you eat meat (beef, pork, chicken, fish), vegetables, fruits and nuts. You may NOT eat things like corn, potatoes, any dairy product (except eggs, cause you can find those under chickens butts and can steal them and eat them), grains, legumes, and most importantly anything processed. So if you are reading a food label, and one of the ingredients goes something like "monounsaturated xahfntlsjsand i-cannot-pronouce-you" then I would stay away from it.

For the best information on how to eat Paleo, I would go to one of these websites:
The Paleo Diet
Mark's Daily Apple
Nom Nom Paleo (My FAVORITE food blog. She is pretty awesome.)


Like I said earlier, Colin and I started this new way of eating 25 days ago. Since then we have both lost weight (he has lost 11lbs and I have lost 9lbs), have had less stomach problems, and find that we are actually enjoying the food we are eating! Who would have thought that I would have preferred a bowl of fruit over a big ol' plate of nachos?! Not this girl! I've even thought about eating non-Paleo foods, and got over it in a matter of seconds. Sorry, Taco Bell, this lady is not giving into your 99 cent burritos anymore!

To end this first post, I'm going to say that I am not here to "convert" anybody, or force you into my way of living. That's just rude. I'm simply appealing to the people who are interested in my new lifestyle and want some of my recipes. On that note, some of the recipes are mine that I made up myself (I'm pretty awesome, I know. Yay Culinary School!) and some are from other websites/books that I have found. I'll be sure to specify where I got my recipes so if you do decide to make this delicious AND nutritious food, you will have the means to.

Ok thanks. :)