Planned Off-roading and a Redemption Run

First of all if you are not on a Whole30, go make this now! So, so, so good. I've tried several Paleo banana bread recipes and this is the one.

We were on the road for most of the day yesterday. I took along a cooler with drinks and breakfast. In my opinion finding primal breakfast on the go is the hardest. I had some planned indulgences. We were celebrating being done with the school year and so a trip to Five Guys and Bliss Cupcakes was in order.

At Five Guys I had a bacon cheeseburger with no bun topped with grilled onions, mushrooms, jalapenos and hot sauce. And I ate the fries. Of course I ate the fries. Wouldn't you? A family friend owns Bliss Cupcakes in Ft.Smith and they have some absolutely delectable GF cupcakes. I thought I was a chocolate devotee to the very end until I tried the GF Blueberry Cream Cheese cupcake. I will never eat another flavor again. Not that I need to be eating cupcakes more than once a year. I won't. I promise. Thanks to Kerri though I can do it without too much guilt and gastric distress. They also have a few varieties with all natural color and flavor so my kids get to have a treat too. After that we saw Maleficent. Which was................oh ma gah! Amazing! Great movie! Loved loved loved it!

Once back home I was quite exhausted and shamelessly threw Amy's frozen pizzas in the oven. Rice crust for Warren and I, regular cheese for the kids. It was one of those nights were we just wanted to kick back, eat pizza, and watch Star Wars. Any maybe drink some wine.

 

 

This morning I was up with the sun and at the track with my friend for a few miles and a few bleachers. It felt good to work all the gunk out of my body from yesterday. Don't get me wrong. I enjoyed my indulgences yesterday. I don't feel guilty because I planned to eat that stuff. It's not getting me down.



I polished off the last piece of banana bread after my run and the rest of my day will be clean.  Have a great weekend!

In My Coffee

This is sad.

I'm starting to believe that dairy and I are incompatible.

Waaaaaaaaaa!

I discovered this during my last attempt at a Whole30. I made it 11 days. Go me! Not.

Anyways...

I would wake up in the morning with a flat belly (well as flat as my belly could get) and upon having my first cup of delicious caffeinated manna with a splash of raw cream I would blow up like that girl from Willy Wonka. "You're turning violet, Violet!"

I should have known considering that when I cleaned up my diet four years ago, ice cream began to give me fits. Meaning it sent me to the bathroom within minutes of consuming it.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not at the point where I will turn down a delicious piece of Brie or a slice of gluten free pizza topped with three different artisan cheeses.

But for the most part, I'm avoiding dairy.

That means coconut milk in my coffee, almond milk in my smoothies, and leaving the cheese off of most of my meals.

I think I'll survive.

Whole 30 Day 1

Yesterday was the first day of the Whole30. I attempted one of these a few months ago and didn't make it past day 2 before giving into the temptation of a glass of wine. I'm a bit more motivated now and am really and truly interested to see what my body can accomplish with 30 days of no dairy, alcohol, or sugar. I cut the grains out a long time ago so that is a non issue.

Day 1 consisted of black coffee. Salad eggs for breakfast. Carnitas and avocado for lunch. A peach and two slices of Applegate farms turkey as a snack. And one giant ribeye with mushrooms and sweet potato for dinner.

 

 

Good luck to any and everyone participating in a month of uber clean eating!

Back From Vacation!

 In my last post I talked about staying on track while on the road. Warren and I had the chance to exercise that when we took an overnight trip to Oklahoma City.

But first...my eats from the day before. I started the day off with some scrambled eggs, guacamole, and market sausage. This is a picture of my plate after I devoured half of it and remembered to take a picture. Appetizing...I know.

 

I was pretty busy packing and cleaning so I gulped half a Naked Green Machine and gave the other half to Warren. I also flipped through this book looking for new ideas.

 

 

The chocolate chip cookie recipe from Against All Grain's website kept popping up on my radar. I decided to give it a try. Chocolate chip cookies is definitely a treat my family has been missing.

 

Whoa! We were not disappointed. This was the best grain free treat I have ever tried. Amazing. In fact the kids are bugging me right this minute to make some more.

 

Dinner that evening was a collaborative effort. Warren had brought home about 8 ribeye steaks that were about to go out of date and we had cooked them in the dutch oven low and slow. He made a Paleo gravy after looking up how to achieve the proper thickness. Add in some sautéed veggies and dinner!

 

The next morning....roadtrip! I packed a cooler with a ton of primal snacks so we wouldn't have to eat out too much. Leftover sausage, apple slices, brie, Larabars, Applegate Farms turkey slices, string cheese, guacamole, pistachios, wine, coconut water, and kombucha. We had breakfast on the road.

 

About lunch time it was time for a stop. We came across choc brewery in Krebs, OK. This is a their bar room.

 

My homebrewing husband is always in heaven when we make a brewery stop.

 

I totally broke my beer fast. It was worth it.

It's good to get away with the love of your life.

 

And this band was the whole reason for the trip. We had 4th row tickets. Insanely amazing!

 

The next morning we had lunch at Kitchen 324 in downtown OKC. The building was gorgeous but I was not impressed by the food. At all.

 

 

And back to reality and home cooking! This morning I seared some pork chops and had mine with scrambled eggs, apple slices, and brie. I'm trying to get all my favorite cheeses eaten up before I start my first Whole30 on August 1st.

Dinner was part of a T-bone with steamed broccoli, nearly burnt sweet potatoes, and sour cream steak sauce. The potatoes were good despite me forgetting about them. The past few days I've been going down to only two meals a day. I'm just not hungry around lunchtime. Probably because I often don't eat breakfast until 10am or so. I am truly interested in intermittent fasting and I think I could probably do it but I'm not sure if I should be eating more at my two meals or not. Any suggestions?

Eats Day 6 & Fall Garden Hopes

I have really noticed a major increase in energy over the past day or so. I put it to good use with a 3.5 mile run at 7 am, followed by working at our business for about 4 hours (our monthly organic delivery came!), did some major major grocery restocking, came home and proceeded to build a raised bed in the backyard.

We have lived in our home about 5 years and have had variable luck with gardening. One year we had more squash, zucchini, tomatoes, and jalapenos than we knew what to do with. This year, everything I planted was killed by a late frost, and everything I replanted became so overgrown with weeds that I gave up. Before I went on vacation I noticed a few squash plants holding on but by the time I got back they had succumbed to the heat.

I have been dreaming of a collection of raised beds for some time now and yesterday I got out the tools and scraps of wood from our shop and got to work. Hopefully I can get some stuff in the ground to have a small fall crop. Turnips, and kale, maybe acorn or butternut squash.

A few of my hens were hanging around watching me build the raised bed.
Chickens are actually really sweet.



Tired and glad I was able to construct a box without my husbands help, also very glad I didn't lose a finger to the saw.
Or break my wrist with the drill.



 

 

After the run, I was starved but had to rush to open the store. My sweet husband made us a big Sunday breakfast and called me to come home and eat. We live very close to our business so I was able to run right over and enjoy having someone else cook for a change. Funny thing was, he made Paleo pancakes and instead of using coconut flour he used shredded unsweetened coconut. They tasted fine but the consistency was off. He kept commenting on how they weren't cooking right and then I noticed what he had used. It was comical but he was very adamant about how I should start labeling my mason jars better since we have coconut in 7 different forms in our house. Shredded, flaked, fresh, flour, water, milk, and oil....all coconut!

 

Breakfast was still delicious. I topped my pancakes with a bit of organic blueberry jam and a splash of maple syrup.

 

 

 



For lunch I had some Wild Planet sardines in marinara sauce, with pickled asparagus, and a nectarine.

After this amazing lunch I pulled the dutch oven out of the well....the oven. It had been hard at work braising some ribeyes. Benefit of having a grocery store....lots of meat to eat!

I shredded it and nibbled on a little and then put it away for dinner later. I had a spoon full of Justin's Chocolate Hazelnut butter and a bottle of GT's Kombucha. I fixed dinner for the family but skipped it myself. I just wasn't hungry. Energy and not feeling hungry all the time? Well, its pretty awesome I have to say.

Giant platter of meat. Yum! We now have emergency protein for days.

Day 5 Eats

I posted some pictures on the Before & After page for those of you interested in that sort of thing. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't impatient to get some after pictures up there but we all know these things take time! Day by day, choice by choice, bite by bite.

And I do like my bites!

One of my very favorite breakfasts is a chorizo egg scramble with avocado on the side. Chorizo makes my heart sing!

The best flavor of Larabar hands down had to suffice for lunch today. We installed new space age cash registers at our store and I was pulling my hair out trying to use them. I was glad I didn't give into the stress and pig out on junk which is what the old me would have done.

 

 

I ran home for a hot minute and pan fried some onion, peppers, and shoulder steak. Topped it off with sour cream and guac and lime juice. Avocados two times today?!?!?!

 

 

And then I fell face first into a bar of chocolate.

 



I really shouldn't have done that.

Day 4 Eats & A Good Sign

If you follow along on Instagram (@primalhippie by the way) you might have seen some of these photos already. Sorry!


Breakfast started out with a bang! I got in some greens first thing after I noticed the lack of them on yesterdays menu. More spicy sausage that was blended up right in our very own meat market. Two over easy eggs fried in coconut oil on a bed of baby romaine.

I practiced yoga for about 30 minutes right around lunch time. When I was done with that I was in no mood for heavy rich food. Smoothie it is! Banana, Justin's Chocolate Hazelnut Butter, almond milk, and chia seeds. I have a Justin's addiction. I know this! When I attempt to complete a Whole30 in August I am going to have to give it up. Waaaahhhh! I poured this gorgeous concoction in my KOL pint glass and enjoyed. So excited that I get to see those boys in 3 days!

 

 

Dinnertime came and we were out of town. Normally when we are on the go we hit up Panera for healthy and tasty eats. You must remember that we are in Arkansas and even the bigger towns have yet to pick up on the farm to table craze. There are no amazing grassfed restaurants. No pop ups offering Paleo type fare. The three best places to eat in this town are Panera, Five Guys, and the local health food store. Yesterday evening I must have been out of my head because I let the 9 year old talk me into something else. He was debating for sushi which I almost agreed too, but I knew I couldn't be good and forgo the rice so I said no. He then rallied for Olive Garden. In the back of my mind I knew it was going to be a disaster. We got there. I ignored the breadsticks and requested their gluten free menu. It was tiny. Literally three options. What was I to expect though. I ordered their Mixed Grill. It was supposed to come with grilled veggies and broccoli with steak and chicken in a rosemary demiglaze. Instead of broccoli mine came with potatoes. I suspected they had been coated in flour before being roasted so I avoided them like the plague. All in all it was just yuck! I won't be talked out of our tried and true places again. I would have been much happier with a Five Guys burger bunless topped with jalapenos and other yumminess.



My not good dinner and evil potatoes!


 

But upon arriving home last night we got the most unexpected gift from good ole' Mother Nature.

Day 3 Eats

Breakfast was some super yummy spicy sausage made in house in our meat market by our wonderful butcher. A couple of scrambled eggs rounded it out.

 

 

Lunch was leftover bacon wrapped chicken thighs with some sautéed spinach on the side.

 

 

Snack was more Primal Cereal. Seems I've got a bit of an addiction going on here.

 



And for dinner....more chicken! Half a grilled chicken breast topped with cheddar, salsa, sour cream, and hot sauce.

Looking back over the day's eats I realize it was dairy heavy and lite on the ruffage. I'll keep that in mind today as I am preparing and scarfing my food.

Eats Day 2 & Some Nature Thrown In For Good Measure

 

Living in Arkansas we tend to take it for granted the natural beauty that surrounds us. But not the Primal Hippie family! We ventured down to our local river, the Cossatot, yesterday. In the native Indian language in our area Cossatot means "Skullcrusher". Its a quite popular place with kayakers when the water is up.

It never fails, every time we head to a favorite swimming spot we end up picking up trash. Pack it in pack it out people! It wasn't just the Gatorade bottle. It was three snack wrappers, bottle caps, and cigarettes I stuffed in there.

No one needs to be messing with the beauty of a place like this.


And on to the days eats!

Breakfast! Leftover steak from the night before. One egg fried in coconut oil. Really wanted another egg but the hens were not obliging this morning.

Lunch was a bit of a repeat from yesterday. Primal cereal. Yummy!

No picture of dinner. We had guests and I got so wound up in entertaining that I forgot to snap a picture of dinner. It was grilled ribeye steak, leftover kuri squash, bacon jalapeno poppers, and a bit of mashed potatoes.

No workout yesterday. I busted out a few mock pull-up's because I've got that goal remember? And the hike down to the river was nice, so I got some moving done. Just move right?

Day 1 Eats

Today started off rainy. My very favorite kind of day. I spent the better part of an hour drinking coffee and blogging on the back porch.

In just a short time I had to prepare breakfast. This morning it was bacon with over easy fried eggs. Try putting your eggs on top of fresh baby greens. So so so good! A little trick I learned while on vacation.

 

 

Lunch was two of these leftover chicken legs. See the begging Primal Aussie?

With a little bit of primal cereal. Just some nuts topped with fresh sliced bananas, coconut flakes, and half and half.

 

 

Dinner was round steak with roasted kuri squash. Simple, easy, filling.

 

(Not shown the super yummy dark chocolate I consumed this afternoon, still battling the sugar monster round these parts!)

Workout for the day was 30 minutes of Polly Yoga. I needed it after the strenuousness of yesterdays at home crossfit workout. Stretching is oh so good!