Category: paleo

Cool Spinach-Mango Salad

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Flash back to 4 p.m. yesterday. I run into the grocery store. Ok, Ok, I didn’t literally run. I walked, briskly, in my super cute, electric blue heels. ~click click click click click click~ People probably thought I was a little nutty. Why was I in such a rush? Well, Mom’s on the east coast for a few weeks (long story, and not worth telling) and I needed to get her to the church near my sister’s house by 4:30 for 5 o’clock mass so I could then pick up Brent from work by 5.

I was late… as usual…

So, my head is racing. What on earth can I serve tonight with those scrumptious smelling Indian Spiced Ribs we slow cooked? I wanted something seasonal and light, like a salad. Spinach? Kale? Romain? What would make any of those work with Indian-spiced anything?!?

And then I saw the mangos. OMG I love mangos. If they weren’t so expensive 90% of the time, I’d buy them ALL THE TIME. (Have I mentioned that I make a wicked pineapple-mango salsa? I should really make that and post it sometime soon. Sorry, I’m such a tease!) Mangos would be a great foil for the ribs. Those bad little babies were so aromatically rich, earthy and spicy–mangos would really lighten things up!

OK, MANGOS. 🙂

I grab two moderately soft ones. I’m scanning the walls for leafy greens. Why must this particular store have such a poor selection?! Spinach? That would work with mangos… Oh! and, and, red onion. I have that! Perfect. Ok… Spinach… where is it?!

Finally, I find a spinach-spring mix blend. That’ll do. I use the self check-out and scurry back to the car, in which my mom is patiently waiting. As I drive her to the church–which, by the way, is 30+ miles away, on the other side of the District and traffic is not easy… it’s never easy in the District, except at, like, 3 a.m. (please don’t ask why I know that)–I realize I can dress the salad with a balsamic vinaigrette. That’ll be simple and delicious.

Fast forward to 6 p.m. yesterday. Finally, Brent and I are home, and I set to work on the salad for dinner. In the end, I was really happy with it. Try to imagine it: first, there’s the subtle earthy-grassiness of the spinach and spring mix; then, the sweet, juicy mango; and finally, a refreshing crunch of oh-so-slightly-bitter red onion. And that’s just if you go without the dressing! Toss in the tangy balsamic-olive oil vinaigrette and BAM! Salad perfection.

Alright, alright, stop drooling. Here’s the recipe 😉

Cool Spinach-Mango Salad

Salad Ingredients

  • approx. 1/3 of one container of Nature’s Promise Organic Baby Spinach and Spring Mix
  • 1 large mango, sliced or chopped (mangos can be difficult to cut in a pretty way, so do it however works for you)
  • approx. 1/3 of a large red onion, sliced (and the slices halved)

Dressing Ingredients

  • 1 tablespoon olive oil
  • 2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
  • a sprinkle of salt and pepper (to taste)
Method
  1. Toss all of the salad ingredients in a large bowl. 
  2. Whisk the dressing ingredients in a small bowl.
  3. Serve separately, or toss the dressing with the salad and serve.
It’s so easy, right?! 🙂 I love salads for that reason.

I’m pretty sure this one would be great with a piece of grilled chicken (next to or sliced on top) or served as a side a summer BBQ. As I already mentioned, we had it along with a meat-falling-off-the-bone, mouth-watering rack of Indian Spiced Ribs.

Enjoy!

Indian Spiced Ribs

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Disclaimer: This is not going to be a complete recipe.

Why? Well, simply put, this delicious dish relies on one very important ingredient: the indian spice blend from Practical Paleo by Diane Sanfilippo (Balanced Bites). I will say that this spice blend does include the usual suspects of indian cooking. However, I won’t provide any details beyond that. Sorry, everyone, but if you want this or any of Diane’s other amazing spice blends, you have to just go buy her book.
If that doesn’t convince you, maybe Brent’s eloquent review will. Or, just google it–there are a lot of really well-written reviews. HER BOOK IS WORTH EVERY PENNY. You should buy it, use it, share it, use it some more, and share it again.
Alright, so here’s the recipe (with the appropriate material omitted):

Indian Spiced Ribs

Ingredients

  • 3 tablespoons of Diane’s indian spice blend from Practical Paleo
  • 1 large rack of pork ribs, about 15 or 16 ribs (We got our ribs from Costco this time, so we had three huge racks in one package. One went towards making this, the other two went towards making the BBQ ribs that we’ll post about soon.)
  • 1 tablespoon of coconut oil
Method
  1. Coat the bottom of your crock pot with the coconut oil.
  2. Rub down the ribs with the spice blend. Go on, get your hands dirty. 😉
  3. Place the ribs in crock pot.
  4. If your crock pot cover doesn’t make a perfect seal (most don’t, from what we’ve seen), seal the crock pot with tin foil and then place the lid on it. This will trap nearly all of the moisture from the ribs inside the crock pot while they cook, which will prevent them from drying out and also makes them fall-off-the-bone tender and moist. YUM!
  5. Cook on low for 6 to 8 hours.
We let this cook overnight and woke the next morning to some pretty amazing smells in our kitchen. For dinner last night, we served this with our Cool Spinach-Mango Salad. It was a great pairing.
Enjoy!
P.S. I apologize for the lack of photos. We were so busy preparing the ribs two ways (this way and with homemade BBQ sauce) that we kind of missed the boat on taking pictures of this as we prepared it. 

Leek, Mushroom & Tomato Sauté with Scrambled Eggs

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Today I’m telecommuting. I love these days. TELECOMMUTING.IS.THE.BEST.

So, for Brent’s breakfast this morning I heated up a keilbasa sausage (I had cooked up the package of 4 yesterday, but only used 2 in the recipe I made them for) and scrambled up some eggs. He was a very happy man leaving for work with such delicious food in his belly.

Now, my plan was to make the same for myself a little later–after getting the laundry going, dropping the car to the gas station within walking distance for an oil change, dumping drain-cleaner down our bathtub drain, etc. But, as I was going into the fridge to pull out the eggs and last keilbasa, I remembered the leek…

We made something with leeks weeks ago. (I honestly can’t even remember at this point what it was, haha!) And there’s been one lonely leek hanging out in our veggie drawer ever since. Also chilling in the veggie drawer: some baby portabella mushrooms, Roma tomatoes, avocado, onion, etc. Well, knowing that leek needed to be used because I HATE wasting food, I decided to say “maybe another day” to the keilbasa and find a way to use that.

Here is what I came up with: a sauteed mixture of leek, mushrooms and tomato served with eggs. This was super easy and fast, and best of all, it came out delicious!

Leek, Mushroom & Tomato Saute with Scrambled Eggs

1 Leek (just the light green part), sliced and rinsed
1 Roma tomato, quartered and sliced
5 Baby portabella mushrooms, sliced and rinsed
1/2 – 1 Tablespoon of bacon fat
2 Eggs, beaten

First, make sure you rinse the leeks and mushrooms well under cold running water in a strainer. Leeks tend to have little gritty stores of sand between the layers, and it’s best if you try to separate the layers while rinsing the slices to make sure all that washes away.

1. Melt the bacon fat in medium skillet over medium-high heat.
2. Toss in the leek and mushroom slices.
3. Sauté until soft (about 3-5 minutes).
4. Add the tomato slices and continue to sauté for about 1 minute.
5. Put your sauté mixture on your plate or in your bowl, leaving a small amount of the juices in the skillet.
6. Scramble your eggs in the skillet.
7. Put the scrambled eggs on your plate or in the bowl with the sauté mixture.

Now, you’re ready to eat. 🙂 Enjoy!

I hope you like this as much as I did. The leek provides a subtle, oniony flavor. The mushrooms, of course, provide a nice earthy undertone. Meanwhile, the tomatoes keep it light and fresh! And who doesn’t love the hint of bacon-y goodness from using bacon fat? Feel free to toss in a little salt, pepper or other seasonings; but I think this is great without anything extra. 😉

Whole30 Challenge, Again. Say what?!

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As we may or may not have already mentioned somewhere on Facebook or Twitter,  Brent and I have begun yet another Whole30 Challenge. We haven’t done one in a while, and we know it makes us feel great. This time, it will actually be more than 30 days:

We started this past Monday and we’re planning to keep clean until the Mid-Atlantic Super Spartan 2012 at 11:00 A.M. Saturday, August 25.

Yep, that’s right. We are participating in the Mid-Atlantic Super Spartan race. It’s going to be insane. We are so very excited and, maybe, a little frightened. (…Ok, ok, I’ll admit, I’m frightened a lot!) We’ve been working out and eating pretty well–I’d say we average 80% clean Paleo most of the time–but we knew we wanted to do something to kick-start our last month of training for this crazy event.

So, on Monday we took measurements and photos. Also, Brent crafted a nifty template which we will use to track our progress! 

Meanwhile, we’ll continue to post as frequently as we can new recipes as well as occasional tweets about the Whole30 approved meals we’re particularly excited about. If you’re doing a Whole30 too, keep in touch with us! Let us know what you’re doing to keep clean. Tweet at us, like our Facebook page and leave a comment on our wall, or simple leave comments here.

We’d love to hear from you!

P.S. If you just so happened to stumble upon this blog randomly and you don’t know what Whole30 is, you should learn more here at Whole9life.com/category/Whole-30. Then, you should try it. 🙂

IT. WILL. CHANGE. YOUR. LIFE.