Beef Tacos

Ingredients

• 3 lbs ground meat
• 4 peppers, chopped
• 1 med onion, chopped (Do more, if you like onions. We only like onions in this recipe.)
  
• Taco seasoning to taste

Taco Seasoning:

• 1 tablespoon chili powder
• 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/4 teaspoon onion powder
• 1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
• 1/4 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1/2 teaspoon paprika
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
• 1 teaspoon sea salt
• 1 teaspoon black pepper

We make an enormous batch of the taco seasoning at a time (about 10x of the above) and just keep it in an airtight container.

Directions
Brown the meat on medium high for 5-7 min, stirring frequently. Drain meat; add taco seasoning. Stir for a few more minutes. Add peppers and onion, stir in with meat. Cover pan and reduce heat to medium-low; simmer for 10-15 min. Serve and enjoy. Try to save some for leftovers.

You can eat the meat by itself (we do when we're starving or lazy or out of time). You can also try making egg white tortillas.

Baked Chicken Wings

Ingredients

• As many chicken wings as you need to eat (we usually make around 30-40); we prefer either drummettes only or buffalo style wings
• Salt & Pepper
  

Cashew Butter Sauce - made to taste and desired consistency (aka, Jon doesn't measure things)

• ~1/2 c cashew butter
• ~1/3 c coconut aminos
• ~1/3 c water
• Tabasco to taste

Buffalo Sauce

• ~1/3 c coconut oil
• ~1/2 c Franks Red Hot Sauce Original
  
• ~1 T garlic powder

I'll update the amounts if he ever decides to actually measure them.

Directions
Preheat oven to 375. Add salt and pepper on both sides of the wings and place in a foil-lined pan (pans, for us). If you have a convection oven, use it; it seems to help the wings get a little crispier. Bake wings for 20 min. If you're making plain wings, flip them and bake for another 20 min. If using a sauce, take the pan(s) out of the oven and baste the wings with sauce on the top side. Put back in oven for 10 min. Remove the wings and flip; baste the other side and put back in the oven for 10 min. Voila!

Beef Satay with Cashew Butter Sauce

We re-worked this recipe to our liking from a Williams-Sonoma recipe. It's especially delicious with fresh green peppers, or at least it was last night :) We also make our own teriyaki sauce, but that's something everyone should make to their liking.

Ingredients

• 2 lbs flank steak
• 2/3 c teriyaki sauce
• 1/2 tsp hot pepper sauce
• 2 green or red sweet peppers
• 6 Tbsp cashew butter
• 6 Tbsp water
• 1/2 tsp hot pepper sauce
• 4 Tbsp teriyaki sauce

Directions
Cut steak diagonally across the grain in thin slices. For marinade, combine 2/3 c teriyaki sauce and 1/2 tsp hot pepper sauce. Cover and refrigerate for at least 30 min. Drain steak, reserving marinade. If grilling on skewers, alternate steak strips and peppers. Brush skewers with remaining marinade. For peanut sauce, combine 1/2 tsp hot pepper sauce, cashew butter, water and 4 Tbsp teriyaki sauce in a saucepan. Cook and stir over medium heat until heated through; keep warm.

Grill, saute with marinade, or broil steak and pepper mix until steak is cooked to your liking.

Back From a Cruise, Time for Better Eating

So... Last week, we shouldn't even discuss. When all food is free and buffet-style or room service, and you're on vacation, it's really hard to be good. In fact, we didn't even try. So this week, we're being fairly strict and really good, and so far, it has paid off.

For Father's Day Sunday night, we had absolutely amazing balsamic glazed pork chops, with the inch-thick pork chops from the farmer's market, and a spinach and bacon salad that I nicked from Paladar.

Then Monday night, we gave two new recipes a shot: Coconut chicken nuggets and Egg Drop Soup. The nuggets actually kept the breading and stayed crispy, and the egg drop soup looked like anything you might order from your favorite guilty pleasure Chinese place. And, incidentally, both were delicious. For guilt-free soup, we did lard instead of butter, coconut aminos instead of soy sauce, and arrowroot instead of cornstarch.

Tuesday night, we re-worked an old recipe from a Williams-Sonoma cookbook: Beef Satay with Cashew Butter Sauce. I love it even more than the original recipe, I think the cashew butter comes out much better than peanut butter. Also, the fresh green peppers from the farmers market were so soft and sweet!

A few gym-night standards for the nights to come:
Chicken pesto - yay for frozen pesto cubes! We made a double batch last time, so no blending tonight!
Beef curry
Chicken thighs w/ creamy tomato sauce

Tuna Casserole

This is one of about three meals in my regular repertoire, and unfortunately for Jon and me both, one that he doesn't enjoy very much. Still, he indulges me every now and then, or I make it when he's gone. That was my intention last week, but I never got around to it, so we had this last night. This was my first time attempting something more Paleo with the recipe (it used to have rotini in it), and it turned out better than I would've thought. Even Jon had a full portion :)

Ingredients

• Cooked broccoli (either 8oz frozen, or a couples handfuls fresh)
• 2 zucchini, peeled (this will replace the noodles)
  
• 8oz raw sharp cheddar cheese
• 2 cans tuna (haven't experimented with other options here yet; one change at a time)
• Homemade mayonnaise, to taste (I used 2 heaping tablespoons)
  
• Salt & pepper, to taste

Directions

Preheat oven to 375. Use vegetable peeler to peel off thin slices of zucchini. Grate about 2/3 of your cheese. Mix zucchini, broccoli, cheese, tuna, mayo, salt and pepper. Grease 9x9 pan with olive oil or butter, add mix to the pan. Grate remainder of cheese on top. Bake for 20 min covered with foil, then an addition 5-10 to melt any remaining cheese. This probably makes about 3-4 portions, and is a bit heavy on the cheese.

Many Mini-Muffins!

Because it's impossible to not be happy when I think about these. I made lemon blueberry last weekend, and tonight I made apple cinnamon.



The recipe I ended up using was pretty close to Liz K's, and there's a similar one on Jen's Gone Paleo.

Base Recipe

• 1/2 c coconut flour
• 1/2 tsp sea salt
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 6 eggs
• 1/4 cup raw honey
• 4 tbsp unsweetened applesauce
• 1/4 c coconut oil
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

Then add some of whatever you'd like. Last weekend, it was a tbsp of lemon zest, and a cup of blueberries. Tonight, it's cinnamon and apples.

Directions
Preheat oven to 350. Mix dry ingredients in one bowl, wet ingredients in another. Add dry ingredients into the wet ingredients, then fold in your fruit. Pour batter into lined or greased muffin tins. Bake 12-15 min.

This recipe made about 30-35 mini-muffins. The muffins were a little oily last week, so I decreased the coconut oil from 1/3 cup to 1/4 cup.

Beef Stroganoff

Ingredients

• 2 lbs ground or cubed meat (we've used beef, pork, venison, bison)
• 3 c beef broth
• 2 c diced mushrooms
• 1 c sour cream (grass-fed if available)
• parsley (garnish)
  
• Pepper to taste
  
• 1-2 packs of kelp noodles
  

Directions
Brown the meat in a large skillet, add pepper while browning. Add the beef broth and mushrooms, heat to a boil. Add kelp noodles, cook until softened, about 5-10 min. Stir in sour cream and heat through.

If you can't find the kelp noodles, this could probably be made as just a meat dish. We order our noodles by the case, and they keep in the pantry for several months.

Chicken Pesto

Ingredients

• 2 lbs chicken thighs, cubed
• 3 c fresh basil
• 1 1/2 c pinenuts
• 4 cloves garlic
• 1/4 c grated parmesan cheese (optional)
• 1 c olive oil
• salt and pepper to taste

Directions
Add all ingredients except the chicken to a blender or food processor. Blend until well-mixed. Saute chicken in a large skillet until cooked through. Add the pesto sauce, simmer for 5-10 min.

Supposedly, the pesto sauce freezes very well. We still need to test this. I say the parmesan is optional because we made this meal a lot during our first Paleo challenge, and it works fine without the cheese. This week will actually be the first time we make it with cheese.

Freezer stew

I've been trying to clean out our freezer, and I had about a pound of beef chuck roast and a pound of boneless lamb leg.  Not enough to do anything with on their own, but they made a really good stew together!

Ingredients:

• 1 lb beef chuck roast, cut into 1 inch cubes
• 1 lb leg of lamb, cut into 1 inch cubes
• 2 carrots, chopped
• 1 parsnip, chopped
• 2 celery stalks, chopped
• 5-6 large white mushrooms, chopped
• 1 large onion, chopped
• Spices: dried basil, thyme, oregano; black pepper; seasoned salt
• 6 giant cloves of garlic, crushed in my garlic press
• 2-3 cups of chicken broth

I threw all this in the crockpot this morning and let it cook on low for 7 hours.  It came out really flavorful, the meat was perfectly tender and not dry at all!  Usually, I find my miscellaneous stews to be rather bland and uninspired with a taste that doesn't make me want to eat the leftovers, but this one was really good!  I think the secret ingredient was the Borsari seasoned salt.  We picked it up at Whole Foods a few weeks ago and so far it's made everything we've put it on amazing.

Ground Beef Curry

This recipe is a conglomerate of several online recipes, and one recipe from The Paleo Solution. It's a very easy meal, and always better than I remember.

Ingredients

• 2 lbs ground beef (any ground meat will work here; we've used venison, pork, bison)
• 1/2 tbsp olive oil
• 1/2 c curry powder
• spinach (a lot; we chop ours up pretty small because we're still wusses when it comes to veggies)
• 1 can coconut milk
• 4 cloves garlic

Directions
In a skillet, saute minced garlic in olive oil. Brown the ground meat. We usually drain the meat before continuing. Mix in the curry powder. Add the coconut milk and spinach at the same time. Mix well and let it simmer for a few minutes.

This is enough for both of us for dinner and lunch the following day.

Slow-roasted pork shoulder

Yesterday's all-day cooking adventure was the slow roasted pork shoulder, with a deboned and trussed 8+ lb pork shoulder!  I followed the recipe fairly faithfully, with the exception of slightly reducing the amount of fennel since I'm not a huge fan. (More fennel was requested for the next iteration, however.)  In my oven it took almost exactly 8 hours to get to an internal temperature of 195 degrees, the temperature for pull-apart pork according to the internet.  I think next time I might take it up to 200 or so--parts of it were meltingly tender and shreddable, while a few other areas were a little more solid.  The fat of course was delicious, melting into the meat and making it moist and very flavorful!  There wasn't much orange or onion flavor, however, unless you were eating a piece that had sat on top of the fruit during the cooking.  I didn't mind much, but maybe next time I'll experiment with getting a little more in there?

Leftovers--of which there were many--were delicious for lunch today.

Short rib ragu

I made the short rib ragu yesterday while puttering around the house, and wow.  It came out delicious!  The meat is incredibly meltingly tender, and the sauce is thick and fatty without feeling greasy or heavy.

I made a few modifications out of necessity: my grocery store didn't have porcini mushrooms this time, so I substituted 0.75 oz of assorted dried mushrooms.  I also didn't have Worcestershire sauce, so I added a dash of tamari soy sauce and probably about a teaspoon of anchovy paste.  And I skipped the gremolata (out of laziness).

For the meat, I used about 5.5 lbs of bone-in short ribs.  I would have liked to put in more to increase the final amount of meat, but that's all that would fit in my pot!  Lacking an immersion blender I pureed the sauce in my food processor in two batches.  Finally, I ended up simmering it very gently for about 2 more hours to reduce it, in large part because that's just how long it was until we ate it.

The final product doesn't look like the picture of the recipe; mine is much more like a thick stew.  I can imagine it would be delicious served over some sort of floppy pasta (like bowties) so I'm trying to figure out a good paleo substitution.  Maybe thin blanched zucchini slices next time?  It's delicious in a bowl by itself though so I'm not thinking too hard about it!

Beef braised in coconut milk

I made this beef braised in coconut milk and was thoroughly impressed!  It came out tender and flavorful, although I think next time I might actually increase the seasonings some.  It mostly tasted like coconut and beef--delicious, but the other flavors didn't really come through.

1. Preheat the oven to 275, and cut a ~3 lb beef chuck roast into six or so pieces.  Rub them with salt and brown them well in coconut oil in a big (oven safe) Dutch oven.  You'll want to do them in batches, and reserve them on a plate to the side.  I also took a lime out of the fridge now so it would be at room temperature for later juicing.
2. Drop the heat on the Dutch oven to medium and add a chopped onion, 2 minced cloves of garlic, a tablespoon of freshly grated ginger, the zest of one lime, and 2 tablespoons of curry paste.  Saute this for a few minutes to partially cook the onion, scraping the beefy bits off the bottom of the pan.  Then, add a can of coconut milk, 2 tablespoons of brown sugar, and 2 tablespoons of Thai fish sauce.  Now, you put all your beef (and any juices) back in the pot, cover it up, and put it in the oven.  It took mine 3 hours to get to falling-apart tender.
3. Pull the pieces of beef out and put them on a cutting board to cool slightly.  Meanwhile, put the pot over medium heat and add a chopped bell pepper; simmer for a few minutes to cook it.  Add the juice of that lime, 2 chopped scallions, and 1/4 c of basil cut into thin ribbons.  Chop or shred the beef into bite size pieces and add them back in!

We made cauliflower rice and served it over that--it was perfect.  I''ll definitely be making this again!