BBQ Chicken Baker

Sometimes Oftentimes I am in need of a dinner that is delicious, satiating, and quick. That seems to be a trend with me - maybe this blog should be called Quick Paleo or Paleo In A Hurry....hmmm.

Anyways, when I was in high school, we would occasionally eat at McAllister's after church. Every now and then, I would order one of their chicken Spuds. If you aren't familiar with that, here is the run down. They would give you the biggest, white potato, you have ever seen with about a pound of chicken smothered in cheese, bacon, and bbq sauce. It is delicious and really, not that far from 'paleo'. I got to thinking about those the other day and decided that I wanted a Spud! I always have these ingredients on hand so I was able to whip this up in no time.

Ingredients:

• 2 medium sized sweet potatoes
• 3 slices bacon
• 8-12 oz chicken
• BBQ sauce of choice

Instructions:

1. Wrap sweet potatoes in plastic wrap and microwave the sweet potatoes for approx 10 minutes
2. Meanwhile, cook the bacon in a skillet.
3. In a separate skillet, cook the chicken on medium high heat for about 6 minutes on each side, or until no longer pink. I used left over rotisserie chicken which I warmed in the oven
4. When sweet potatoes are finished, cut lengthwise and open - scoop some chicken into the potato and top with bacon and BBQ sauce.
5. Consume!   

I served this with asparagus that I sauteed in the bacon fat. YUM.

Salmon Cake's

Tuesday night's are Adam's bible study nights. He isn't home for dinner, so if I cook anything, it is something really easy and a lot of times not very glamorous. This week was no exception on the 'easy' part, but luckily it did turn out a bit glamorous! I plated the salmon cakes on top of some baby spinach and garnished with dried cranberries and a piece of bacon I cooked separately. I then cooked some asparagus in the bacon fat and I used a light dressing of EVOO and lemon juice to compliment the salmon.

Ingredients:

• 1 medium sweet potato, mashed
• 1 small yellow onion, diced
• 2 6oz cans of salmon
• 3 slices uncooked bacon, diced small
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• zest 1/2 lemon
• 2 eggs
• 2 Tbsp almond flour
• salt & pepper

Instructions:

1. Combine all ingredients in a large bowl. Patty the salmon mixture - this made 9 patties for me.
2. Heat a skillet over medium heat with some EVOO
3. Cook the patties for approx 3-4 minutes on each side. 
4. Enjoy!

A couple helpful hints: Wrap the sweet potato in plastic wrap and put it in the microwave for 7 minutes. You can then easily pull the skin away and remove the insides. Also, if you but the bacon in the freezer for about 10 minutes, this makes it much easier to dice the bacon.

Preparation and a breakfast recipe

In my opinion, preparation is the key to cooking. Before I began eating paleo, I rarely cooked. And when I did, it was a grilled cheese & Campbell's soup, or a box of noodles & jar of Ragu. I wouldn't even season the meat. When I first began cooking I would tend to get stressed as it always took a lot longer to prepare and I was not good with my time management skills. I would start cooking at 6:00 and by the time I measured ingredients, preheated the oven/stove, made the dish and side's, we were eating at 8:00. Over the months, I have learned that preparation is key. ANYTHING that you can do the night before, or even a couple of hours before, will help tremendously when it is actually time to cook. For the recipe below, I chopped the sweet potato, onion, and bell pepper the night before and stored it in tuperware in the fridge over night. I also patty'd (is that a word?) the sausage the night before. This way, in the morning while getting ready for work, all I had to do was throw the sweet potato, onion, and bell pepper in a pan with a little oil and saute it, put the sausage in another skillet to cook, and then fry my egg. The ONLY reason I was able to eat this full, nutritious breakfast was because I had prepared. Cooking paleo is not difficult, it is easy really because you are working with whole foods, but it does require time, planning, and preparation!

Breakfast Hash

Ingredients:

• 1/2 lb bulk breakfast sausage
• 1 sweet potato
• 1/2 yellow onion
• 1 red bell pepper
• 1-2 eggs; or however many you want

Instructions:

1. Patty the sausage to your preferred size. I made them roughly the size of sliders
2. Peel and chop sweet potato into bite sized pieces
3. Chop yellow onion and bell pepper
4. In a skillet over medium heat, add the sausage patties and cook until done. Then remove patties
5. In a separate skillet over medium- high heat, melt a little bit of coconut oil then add the bell pepper, onion, and sweet potato. Saute until sweet potato is soft and can be easily pierced with a fork
6. In the same skillet that you cooked the sausage fry an egg, or two. I like my eggs sunny-side up and to do this, I turn the skillet to medium- low (about 3 on my stove) and crack the egg. Then I just let it sit until the white part of the egg is cooked through. 
7. When everything is done, plate some of the sweet potato mixture, then add the sausage patty(s) on top, and then finally your egg! Enjoy!
8. 
   

Breakfast Pizza

Lately I have been getting a little tired of my normal breakfast routine. I have been eating the same thing for breakfast, during the work week, for the past couple months or so. I don't usually mind eating the same thing over and over.....but it was time to change things up a bit. The only requirement for this dish is that it last for the week. I like to make a big breakfast on Sunday nights and eat on it for the majority of the week. This Breakfast Pizza was amazing. I was so excited about how it turned out! I will definitely be making this again soon!

Ready to go in oven

Ingredients:

• 1 medium sweet potato
• 7 eggs
• 1/2 lb ground sausage
• 1 red bell pepper
• Spinach, a couple handfuls

Instructions:

Hot out of the oven

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees
• Peel and slice sweet potato into circles. You want them to be pretty thin
• Line the bottom of an 8'' cake pan with sweet potato slices (I would recommend spraying the pan first with coconut oil) . Its okay if they overlap each other. They will shrink some in size while it bakes, so use more than needed to cover the bottom. Place cake pan in oven while you prepare the next steps
• In a medium skillet, brown the ground sausage
• Dice the red bell pepper while sausage is browning, and sweet potatoes are baking
• Once the sausage is done, stir in red bell pepper. Remove sweet potatoes from oven
• Beat eggs in small bowl and pour over sweet potatoes. Evenly distribute sausage/bell pepper mix over eggs and top with spinach
• Bake for an additional 20 minutes, or until eggs have set
• Cut into pie shaped pieces for easy removal   

Creamy Purple Mashed Potatoes

Don't these look amazing?!?!?! And totally weird?!?! If you haven't tried purple sweet potatoes that have been missing out on something great. These sweet potatoes are a bit sweeter, IMO, and make amazing mashed potatoes!

Ingredients:

• 2 purple sweet potatoes, peeled and sliced into rounds
• 1/2 can coconut milk
• Salt, pepper, and cinnamon

Instructions:

• Place sliced Purple Sweet Potatoes in a big microwave safe dish; cover with plastic wrap. Microwave for 8 minutes.
• With a potato masher, begin to mash the sweet potatoes. Once you have mashed them a bit, put the bowl back in the microwave for another 6 minutes.
• Add coconut milk to bowl and mash until coconut milk is combined and sweet potatoes are completely mashed. At this point taste and see if you want to add more coconut milk to make it creamier.
• Season with salt, pepper, and cinnamon. I garnished mine with a few walnuts, too.

Sweet Potato Salad

There is this amazing sweet potato salad they is in the deli section of Whole Foods. Problem is, it's not Paleo. They add sugar, canola oil, and other questionable ingredients. I have decided to recreate this recipe so I can enjoy it as often as I'd like :)

Ingredients:

• 3 sweet potatoes, cubed
• 4 garlic cloves, chopped
• EVOO
• 8 pieces of bacon (read ingredient list!!)
• Juice of 2 limes
• 2 TBSP EVOO
• 1 TBSP balsamic vinegar
• 2 green onions, thinly sliced
• Fresh basil, roughly chopped
• Cayenne pepper
• Sea salt and pepper
• handful of raw pumpkin seeds
• handful of dried cranberries

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees
2. Cook bacon in a skillet until crispy. Once done, remove bacon and set aside to cool. Once cool, chop.
3. Peel and chop the sweet potatoes and garlic into chunks. Toss in some EVOO and spread on a parchment lined baking sheet. Bake in oven for approx 30 minutes or until potatoes are beginning to brown. Remove from oven and set aside
4. Meanwhile, chop the green onions and basil, then combine those with the remaining ingredients (except pumpkin seeds and cranberries) to create your dressing
5. In a serving bowl, combine the sweet potatoes, garlic, and bacon. Mix in the dressing and combine well. Garnish with pumpkin seeds and cranberries.
6. Serve. 

Sweet Potato Spaghetti

I have been working really late at work this week and haven't had time to go to the grocery store, cook, or blog! My dinners have been really simple and I have tried to use what I had in the fridge. Here is what I had: 2 lbs veal, onions, celery, minced garlic, a couple sweet potatoes and 2 cans of diced tomatoes. My result? SWEET POTATO SPAGHETTI!

Ingredients:

• 2 lbs veal
• coconut oil
• 1/4 yellow onion, minced
• 3 stalks celery, minced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 sweet potatoes, shredded with a cheese grater
• 2 cans of diced tomatoes, pureed in food processor

Instructions:

1. Heat large non stick skillet over medium heat. Cook veal until no longer pink - drain excess fat
2. Meanwhile, heat a small skillet over medium heat and melt coconut oil. Saute minced onions, minced celery, and minced garlic until veggies are tender and garlic is fragrant
3. Add the sauteed veggies/garlic and shredded sweet potatoes to the skillet with veal. Stir
4. Add the tomato sauce to the skillet, cover, and let simmer for 20 minutes
5. Enjoy!

Fun Food Friday - sweet potatoes!

Thanks to the beautiful weather we have been having, I really miss the beach. A lot. I never made it there last summer, or in the sun much at all, because I was on some crazy medicine that basically forbid sun exposure. But, when I have traveled to the beach over the years we typically went to Destin. Our vacation would always consist of a meal (or two) at The Back Porch. As my side dish at T.B.P., I would always order the twice baked potato. YUM! It was amazing. Lots of cheese, white potato, sour cream....all mixed together in a warmed goodness. It really was the best twice baked potato I had ever had.
Now, let me connect the dots....beautiful weather = beach = twice baked potato; therefore, I have really been craving a twice baked potato lately. Problem is, I don't eat cheese, white potato's or sour cream anymore. What's a girl to do? Why, make a twice baked SWEET potato! I have no idea why this thought has never occurred to me before. But seriously, it never crossed my mind that I even COULD make a twice baked sweet potato. But that's exactly what I did, and it was divine. Really. Absolutely wonderful. So wonderful, in fact, that I had only planned on eating half of it for dinner - and I ended up eating the whole thing.  Oops :-)


Ingredients:

• 3 sweet potatoes
• 6 strip's of bacon, diced (high quality!)
• 1 cup basil leaves (fresh is best!)
• 4 Tbsp EVOO
• 1/4 cup dry roasted almonds
• 1 Tbsp lemon juice
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 1/2 Tbsp cinnamon

Instructions:

1. Cook the sweet potatoes. I always buy the microwavable kind and zap them for a handful of minutes, but some people are crazy and think microwaves will kill them and would rather use the oven. That's fine. Preheat it to 425 degrees, poke holes in the S.P. and cook for approx 30 minutes. *Even if you choose the microwave method, you still need the oven preheated to 425.*
2. While the S.P. is cooking, throw diced bacon in a skillet and cook until crispy. Once done, remove skillet from heat
3. Add basil and almonds to your food processor (invest in one!) and pulse until  almost combined. Slowly add in olive oil and pulse continuously until well combined. Then add your lemon juice and salt/pepper and pulse a few more times.
4. When the S.P.'s are done cooking, let them cool until you are able to handle them. Slice the sweet potato lengthwise and remove flesh. Try not to tear the skin away. 
5. Put the inside's of the S.P.'s in the pan with the bacon. Mash and mix together. Add cinnamon and basil pesto. Combine well. 
6. Scoop the sweet potato mix back into the sweet potato skins and top with a little extra cinnamon, if you'd like.
7. Put the sweet potatoes on a baking sheet and pop in the oven for 9 minutes.
8. Consume

I did snap a picture, but showing it wouldn't have done it justice. Just believe me when I say, again, how amazing it was. This is a recipe that was adapted from Juli at PaleOMG! And if anyone wants to head to the beach, lake, or pool, just let me know! :) Until next time, Happy Friday! 

Smoky Bacon Chili

I have officially made the best chili ever. I'm not kidding. This stuff was amazing. I adapted the recipe from my new favorite blog: paleomg.com. You should check it out. The writer is HILARIOUS and has so many good recipes. Back to the chili.....why is it so good? Well, it has bacon in it. We all know that bacon makes everything better. It also has a nice smoky flavor to it. I've never had chili that has had a smoky flavor, and now I will never make my chili without it. Adam loved this so much that he asked if we could run back to the store to buy more meat (I had all the veggies on hand) to make more. I laughed and promised him I would make some this weekend so we can freeze it and he can warm it up anytime he liked. He loved it, too :)
You will not regret making this. The only thing I would do, is double the recipe. You can't possibly make too much of this.

Ingredients:

• 1 lb ground beef
• 6 slices of bacon, cubed
• 1 yellow onion, diced
• 1 red bell pepper, diced
• 1 green bell pepper, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 (14oz) can of fire roasted tomatoes
• 1 (8oz) can of organic tomato sauce
• 1 TBSP garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp chili powder
• 2 TBSP smoked paprika
• 2 tsp cumin
• 1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
• 2 sweet potatoes*

Preparation:

                 Here is a quote from the original recipe: "This really ain't that hard people. Check this out. I served my chili over sweet potatoes because I think I'm cool like that. So do it." - Couldn't have said it better myself.

1. Get a large pot and add cubed bacon to it. Let it cook until crispy
2. While bacon is cooking, chop up all the veggies
3. When the bacon has cooked, add the veggies and let cook for about 6 minutes. Add ground beef and spices
4. Mix well and let meat brown
5. Once brown, add the can of fire roasted tomatoes and tomato sauce. Mix well.
6. Cook on low, stirring occasionally for about 10 minutes, or until ready to serve.
7. While the chili is heating through, throw the sweet potatoes in the microwave and cook as directed
8. Cut the sweet potato in half, place in bowl, and pour chili on top.
9. Eat your heart out

*If I am cooking sweet potatoes to eat whole (not cutting up for fries, or something else) I will buy the kind from Publix that are wrapped in Siran Wrap. There are directions attached to the sweet potato on how to cook it - its only like 7 minutes. If you want to buy the regular sweet potatoes, you will need to cook them in the oven at 400 degrees for about 30 minutes. Make sure you poke some holes in the S.P. and this should be step 1.