Simply Stuffed Burgers

The only thing better than a bunch of awesome toppings on a burger, is a bunch of awesome toppings stuffed inside a burger!  I spent labor day with my brother, sister in law, and oh so cute niece, and we made some delish stuffed burgers.  The burgers we made weren't exactly paleo, so I re-made them for the blog in a more "clean" fashion.  I stuffed these burgers with bacon, onion, and mushroom.  These make some big ol' burgers, my brother said they looked like Ninja Turtle Shells.



Just showing you how cute Kayla is :)

You will need:

- ground beef -- I used 1 lb, it made three large burgers
- toppings of your choice: I used about 7 slices of bacon, but the more the merrier, one package of mushrooms, and one onion.
- couple tbs of olive oil to sautee veggies
- 1 clove garlic

1. prepare bacon-- the crispier the better ( to me anyway)
2. sautee onions, mushrooms, and garlic in olive oil  ( there was a ton left over, so I just served the burgers with more on top)

3. form ground beef into thin patties.  Make them as big as you want, but big enough to fit the goods in the middle.
4. spoon toppings ontop of the patties.

5. use the remaining ground beef to form thin patties to cover your burgers. Seal burgers around the edges using your fingers.

6.  Either grill them for about 6 minutes on either side, or bake them @375 for 12 minutes, flipping burgers at halfway point.

I served these with Zucchini pancakes ( stay tuned for this recipe).  But they would also be delish with another recipe I made last week but still haven't posted, Sweet Potato Fries (stay tuned for this also)

zucchini pancakes

sweet potato fries

Coconut Flour Flatbread Pizza

My family gets together for every single birthday on my mom's side of the family.  For every single birthday my grandmother makes homemade pizza, i'm talking the perfect thin crispy crust with just the right amount of  homemade sauce &cheese.  While this is a memorable family tradition, which will probably continue for years to come, for a carb/cheese lover trying to maintain a clean diet, this is absolute torture!!  Sometimes I sit at the table eating my salad while the rest of my family eats pizza with thoughts running through my head like " Why is this worth it??" " I'm eating f&$*ing veggies and everyone else gets pizza!" Sometimes the thoughts get to me and I will give in and have some.  When I do give in, within an hour I realize why eating a clean diet is allllll worth it.  When the bloating, stomach cramping, carb hang over,( not to mention guilt) kicks in, that's when I realize why I avoid the best food in the world, Pizza.  If foods like pizza, don't have a negative affect on your body like they do mine, then enjoy it once in a while.  For those like me, here is a better option, I'm not going to say its as good as pizza, because its not.  But it is still yummy and its also a fun to build your own pizza.

I used this recipe and split into two  pizzas.  I used two baking dishes because I don't have a pizza dish.  I made one with tomato paste, chicken sausage, and mushrooms.  The other with sundried tomatoes, spinach, and grilled chicken.  They were both delish!!

You will need:

- 3 eggs

- 1 cup coconut milk (whole fat) I've only been able to find this @ stop & shop in the baking section of the organic aisle. 

- 1/2 cup coconut flour

- 1/2 tsp baking powder

- 1/2 tsp salt

-1/2 tsp garlic powder

- 1/2 tsp oregano

- 2-3 tbs olive oil

-** parchment paper- this is necessary, the mixture is more of a batter than a dough so it gets pretty sticky.

-Any toppings of your choice

1. Preheat oven at 375

2. mix all dry ingredients together, coconut flour tends to clump together when you add wet ingredients to try and get it as smooth as possible.

3. mix wet ingredients-- sometimes coconut milk is a little chunky when you open the can, so make sure you stir until its smooth.

4. mix wet and dry ingredients together

5. line whatever dish you are using with parchment paper and then brush olive oil onto parchment paper.

6. evenly spread mixture into the bottom of pan, put as much as you want for your desired crust thickness, but this crust is more fragile so it might fall apart if its too thin.

7. bake crust for about 20 minutes

8. Take crust out and transfer to a cookie sheet, carefully peeling off the parchment paper

9.  Set your oven to Broil

10. add your sauce ( I used tomato paste because its lesss watery than sauce, this helped keep the crust more crunchy)

11. add your pre-cooked veggies/meats/other toppings

12. stick back in the oven on broil for about 2 minutes to crisp up the crust



lost the corner of one crust from pulling the parchment paper off too fast



Enjoy!

~Nicki PizzaLover Peet

Roast Beef

Hi Guys, remember me? Nicki Peet?  I know, i've been slacking on recipes lately, but it's been a pretty busy past couple of weeks.  But I am now officially a Registered Nurse! No more homework, no more studying = much more time for cooking( and once I get a job, much more money for cooking)  But I am living proof that you can find ways to maintain a healthy diet/lifestyle even when the budget is tight. Anywho, it was finally cool enough today to cook in my A/C-less kitchen.  I found a recipe for a slow-cooker beef roast on the Every Day Paleo Site, but Nicki didn't get to the grocery store until about 430 today, so slow cooker was out of the question.  So I used her recipe for a dry rub, and roasted it in the oven.

Speaking of Every Day Paleo, I really enjoyed this blog post Sarah posted the other day. You Can't Fix a Body You Hate  I have had this conversation many a times with friends/fellow gym members, usually women of course, but sometimes no matter how hard we work and no matter how good of shape we are in, we are never satisfied with our bodies.  Are you guilty of this?  I know I am.  Check out her post, it may give you a different perspective.

Ok here's what you need:

- 2 1/2 lbs beef roast
- one yellow onion
- 1 tbs olive oil
- 1/4 tsp chipolte powder
- 1/2 tsp unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1/4 tsp cinnamon
- 1/2 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tbs oregano
- 1 tsp curry powder
- 1 tsp celtic sea salt-- it turned out pretty salty so use less if you don't enjoy salt. I have an unhealthy love for salt.



Beef from Trader Joe's





all the spices for the dry rub

 1.) preheat oven to 420
2.) mix all spices together
3.) massage spices into the beef-- give this thing a good rub down.  If you had a run in with the pull-up bar this week, I don't recommend bare handing the raw meat and spices with ripped hands.  Throw a zip lock bag on your hands like I did!

4.  Chop up an onion, toss it in about a tbs of olive oil
5. Put your spiced up beef roast in a pan, and toss the chopped onion ontop of the meat and around it in the baking dish.
6. I cooked my meat medium- so I cooked it at 420 degreees for about 45 mins total/ until the temp of the meat read 140 degrees.
7. Take the meat out and lightly cover with a piece of tin foil for another 10-15 mins.  The meat will continue to cook in the center and you want the internal temp to rise to about 150 degrees.  Again this is for cooking it medium. Cook for less time if you want it more rare.

8. slice & serve!

*** I took the Juices from the Roast Beef and mixed them with a couple of teaspoons of Coconut flour to make a yummy gravy!

Enjoy!
~ Your Long Lost Friend,
Nicki Peet, RN  ( sorry that's the first time I got to write my name that way, I had to throw the RN in there)

Nicki Peet's Favorite Paella

Coconut Curry Paella

Nothing says summer time like a gorgeous medley of seafood!  What is your favorite part of a good Paella dish?  My favorite Paella is at Ola on the post road in Orange.  I usually end up wasting half of it though after picking out the rice and my least favorite seafood...scallops ( i'll eat them wrapped in bacon though)..  In nicer restaraunts its almost as if the staff gets offended if you try and ask for a dish with-out something like the main part of the dish (rice).  I was at bistro basque with a group of friends last year and one friend asked if he could get the Paella without the rice (obviously a Paleo friend, who may or may not own crossfit milford) and the waiter looked at him like he was a crazy person. He quickly changed his mind and ordered something else. Why not make this delicious dish at home and put whatever the heck you want in it??  My Paella consists of shrimp, clams, chicken, spicy chorizo sausage, and spinach ( not my favorite thing but had to throw a bit of color in there).  I got the idea for this from a recipe on paleodietlifestyle.com.  It was a recipe for a coconut curried shrimp and spinach, and I thought it would be pretty amazing with a bunch of different proteins mixed in.
here is the recipe from paleo diet lifestyle for curried shrimp & spinach, I made basically the same exact sauce.
If you don't like seafood, this coconut curry sauce would be pretty delicious on just about anything, you can do just chicken and spinach, or maybe throw some sirloin strips in there.  As T.I would say " You could have whatever you likeee" ( I don't know much about rap but I do know that song...don't judge)

You will need: ( this is going to be a long one)
- one dozen little neck clams
-1/2 pound of shrimp (deveined/tails removed)
- 2 small chicken breast cutlets
-1/2 package of spicy chorizo sausage ( I got mine at whole foods already cooked--I usually buy the uncooked chorizo there, but they only had a mango chorizo today)  Find it right in front of the butcher counter at whole foods.

- about 1/2 bag of spinach ( or 2-3 tightly packed cups)
- 4 tbs coconut oil
- 1 cup coconut milk
- 1/2 of a 6 oz. can of tomato paste


You can get these both @ stop & shop

- 2 tsp curry powder
-1/2 cup  diced onions
- 1 clove garlic
- 4 small basil leaves
- 1/2 cup of white wine
- 3 tbs olive oil
- sea salt & pepper for taste

Phew, I think thats all the ingredients

** this should feed about 4 people


1. First I steamed the clams, in a medium sized sauce pan add olive oil, clove of garlic, basil leaves, and white wine.  Let simmer for about 2 minutes on med/high heat.  Then add your well washed little neck clams. Cover and let steam for about 8 minutes or until all clams are opened.  If after about ten minutes there are some that haven't opened throw them away that means they are no good.  If you are tired of cooking after this step then you can just eat the clams this way because they are yummmy in a white wine sauce. Take off heat and leave covered and set aside for later.

2. heat 2-3 tablespoons of coconut oil in a large skillet. Add onion and sautee for about 3 minutes. 

3. Add curry powder to this mixture. sautee for another minute or two. -- while that is cooking, add tomato paste and coconut milk to blender or food processor.  After onions begin to soften add the onion/curry/coconut oil mixture to the blender. Blend until mixture is smooth.

I know, doesn't look so appetizing here

4. Leave mixture in food processor for now, and add two more table spoons coconut oil to the same skillet you used for the onions.  Heat for a minute then add your chicken cut into small chunks.  Let that cook by itself for about 2 minutes stirring frequently, then add the shrimp.

5. Sautee chicken and shrimp for another 2 minutes then add your Coconut curry sauce to the meat.
6. After that you can then add your sliced chorizo & clams to the mixture.  I added about 1/2 of the broth from steaming the clams as well.
7. Finally add the spinach, simmer mixture over medium high heat stirring freqently for about 5 more minutes or until the chicken & shrimp is cooked all the way through.


And there you have it, Nicki Peet's Favorite Paella.  Of course change this to add all of your favorite things.

Enjoy!

Bacon Smothered Meatloaf

I always hated meatloaf.  I don't think I really ever tried it due to the fact it has the word "loaf" in it. I decided I might try and start calling it a Meat Brick, as cool as that sounds, I didn't think it would exactly lure in my blog readers. Anyway, as I got older I decided to give meatloaf a shot, I mean what could be better than a bunch of ground beef with some BBQ sauce or Kethcup mixed in.  Oh, That's right, the only thing better is a bunch of ground beef with homemade "clean" BBQ sauce, smothered in BACON.  I made my own BBQ sauce for the meatloaf, I used almost the same recipe as I had posted a few months ago, I'll post the exact recipe I used in this case.

You will need:
- 2 pounds ground beef
- 1 clove garlic
-1/2 cup onions--or more if your an onion lover
-  1/2 cup shredded carrots
- 2 eggs
- 1 tablespoon coconut oil-- for a nice moist loaf...(thats what she said)
-1/4 cup coconut flour
- 1 cup homemade BBQ sauce
- enough bacon to SMOTHER the meatloaf

For the BBQ sauce:
- 1  6 oz can of tomato paste(no sodium added)
- 1 1/4 cup no sodium added beef stock
- 2-3 tsp honey
- 1/2 tsp chili powder
-1/4 tsp chipolte powder
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1 1/2 tbs apple cider vinegar
- 1 1/2 tbs dijon mustard
- 1 small shallot
- 1 clove garlic
- 1-2 tbs olive oil
- salt & pepper for taste

To make the sauce, I first sauteed the garlic and diced shallot in the olive oil, after 5 minutes I added the rest of the ingredients and stirred over a medium heat until you have a nice smooth sauce.  Use one cup in the meat loaf, and use save the rest to serve ontop of the meatloaf.

For the meatloaf, preheat the oven to 350, mix all of the ingredients except the bacon in a bowl, mix it thoroughly with hands.  Then put meat in a baking dish, I used this instead of a loaf pan to make it cook faster ( is it even called a loaf pan?? thats such a silly word to me)

Then totally cover the top with strips of bacon

Put in the oven for 40 minutes then turn on the broiler and leave in the oven for 4 more minutes to crisp up the bacon..yes four minutes exactly is what worked for me, another minute and I probably would have had burnt bacon. No Bueno.

Top it with BBQ sauce and  serve it with your favorite veggie, I had spinach sauteed in coconut oil, and I tossed in some walnuts for a little crunch, the texture of cooked spinach gets to me sometimes.

I didn't notice that nice chip in the plate until right now.  Ooops.

Enjoy!

Crab Cakes

This recipe is also from Sarah at every day paleo.  The roasted red pepper mayo I posted yesterday was for these delicious crab cakes!  Who doesn't love some fried seafood in the summer time!  These were actually really simple to make.  The red pepper mayo was the tricky part, if you make your own mayo like I did, but at least you can make the mayo ahead of time so its ready for dipping when you make these little crabby cakes.  Here is the link to the every day paleo recipe crab cakes

you will need:
- 1 lb crab meat- sarah suggested using the canned crab meat from trader joes so that's what I did, you can use fresh crab meat if you'd like.
- 2 tbs of chopped chives- recipe called for red onion but I like chives better
- 1 teaspoon crushed garlic
- sea salt and pepper for taste
- 1 egg
- 2 tbs coconut flour
- 1/8 teaspoon of chipolte powder
- 2 tablespoons paleo mayo recipe here -- the plain mayo not the red pepper mayo
- I also added about 1/4 shredded carrots- you can leave this out, I just had it left over and thought it would make a nice addition
- 3-4 tbs coconut oil for frying

1. mix crab meat ( break apart with hands to make sure there is no shell), chives, garlic, salt, pepper, coconut flour, chipolte powder, carrots, and mayo.

2. heat coconut oil in frying pan
3. form mixture into small cakes, toss in frying pan, fry on each side for about 2-3 minutes or until brown on both sides.



Even sponge bob likes these crabby patties

I served my crab cakes over raw spinach, the red pepper mayo is enough you don't need any dressing or oil, but you can service them however you like!

For those who didn't see yesterday, to make the red pepper mayo dipping sauce for these crab cakes, I just put about 1/2 cup roasted red peppers in the food processor with a tsp of garlic, pureed it and folded it into the Paleo Mayo recipe.  Thanks to Sarah from Every Day Paleo for all of these yummy recipes and ideas!

Enjoy!

The Art of Mayo Making

I have finallllly mastered the Art of Making homemade mayo!  It took about 3 attempts and a bunch of wasted olive oil and time, but after watching this video from Sarah at every day paleo, it made it much easier! 

  If you decide to make your own mayo know that it will take at least 10-15 minutes.  All the recipes I followed said slowly add olive oil to blender while blending.  They aren't kidding, you have to drop in the olive oil drop by drop at first (with 2 cups this takes a while).  My first few batches failed because I added the oil too quickly and it just was a watery mess.  I would say at least the first ten minutes you should be adding the oil in drop by drop, then once the mayo starts to emulsify, you can add a slow stream, it will eventually thicken and get a mayo texture.  Another tip I learned from this recipe from every day paleo is to actually use a lower quality olive oil.  You want to go to stop and shop and get a plain old olive oil, no extra virgin.  The extra virgin has a really potent taste, I used extra virgin on my last attempt and I couldn't stand the smell when I was trying to make it.
Also, she put a fun twists on her mayo recipe, you can turn it into dips, dressings, any other flavorful condiments.  I made a plain mayo and a roasted red pepper mayo that Sarah also posted on her site.  I'm very excited to now have my own "paleo" mayo to make chicken salad with! here is the every day paleo blog for this recipe click here for blog
 Ok here it is:

What you will need
- 2 cups of olive oil
- 2 eggs ( on the every day paleo site it shows how to pasteurize your own eggs if you are worried about salmonella)-- but using good quality farm fresh eggs pretty much eliminates your chances of getting sick from this.
- 2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
- 1 teaspoon mustard
- 1 teaspoon celtic sea salt
- 1/3 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1. add eggs, vinegar, and mustard to blender.  Blend alone for about 30 seconds.

2. keep blender running on low and SLOWLY drip in olive oil drip by drip until the mixture starts to emulsify.  It is very tedious and time consuming, but if you add it too fast the mixture will get ruined.  It took about 10 minutes for my mixture to start to emulsify, and then I added the oil with a slow pour.  Be patient.
3. Once all the oil and your mixture is creamy and thick, you can turn off the blender and add mixture to a small dish. 

4. then add the cayenne pepper and sea salt

I then split the mixture into two dishes, one I kept plain and one I made into a roasted red pepper mayo for a dish I was making for dinner(that recipe will be posted tomorrow)

For that I put roasted red pepper and garlic in the food processor, blended it up and then folded it into the mayo.  This could be use for a veggie dip, sauce, condiments, sea food, etc.  Another idea I want to try is a sundried tomato & basil mayo, maybe a pesto dip, you can basically add any spices, herbs, or flavors that you want!