Browsing Tag

Paleo Diet

What Do I Eat On The Paleo Diet?

July 11, 2016

I still get weird looks when I tell people I’m paleo. Either it’s because they don’t know what that means. Or because they do know what it means, and are thoroughly confused as to how I get by every day with such a "restricted" menu. They always ask, without bread, grains, beans or dairy*, what do you eat?? The answer: A LOT.

*Note: I am paleo-ish, so at times, I do eat dairy, quinoa, hummus and trial bites of my husband's burger pretty much every time he orders one 🙂

So I thought that I’d share with all of you who are curious – what does this paleo girl eat in a day?

— June 24 —

First Thing: Turmeric Bone Broth

This is paleo bone broth with a touch of turmeric and salt and peper

If you read my last post on how to make bone broth, you know how I'm a big fan of sipping the golden juice daily (or at least a few times a week) for preventitive care of joint pain, inflammation, indigestion and tons of beauty benefits. Any way I can get turmeric in my day is a good thing. So this  morning, I tried a simple combo of turmeric, salt and pepper + coconut oil. Remember, turmeric is much more effective if it's taken with pepper and fat.

Ingredients:

Breakfast: Booger Smoothie

PaleoSmoothie

You can't get away from the ugly colored smoothies when you've got greens in your juice, but you can make it prettier by adding pretty healthy toppings like bee pollen and goji berries. I've already told you all about why Bee Pollen is the New Black and why Turmeric is my Favorite, but there are some other gems in here like Ginger Root (good for inlammation), Wheat Grass (known to be a healing agent, but not to be used in mass amounts on a regular basis) and Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides (my favorite – and the most natural way to get extra protein in my smoothies). I was particularly proud of this combination of fruits and greens, as the flavor turned out delicious – which is not always a guarantee when your as ambitious as I am about stuffing every fruit and veggie imaginable into one Vitamix.

Ingredients:

  • Romaine Lettuce
  • Ginger root
  • Turmeric
  • Pepper
  • Frozen Pineapple
  • Frozen Mango
  • Coconut Water
  • Bee Pollen
  • Wheat Grass
  • Vital Proteins Collagen
  • Goji Berries

Lunch: Fruits from my Roots Salad

PaleoMangoAvocadoSalad

I have a salad almost every day. I know to some that sounds boring. But I don't see it that way. With the pure number of fruits and vegetables, spices and seasonings, and nuts and seeds in this world – there are endless combinations to what you can stuff in a bowl. This particular one reminded me of my childhood because I used two fruits that were staples in my house growing up – Avocados and Mangos. My Barbados-born dad was adamant about never wasting ANY of the fruit. So I'd always have to scrape that mango dry before I threw away the skin. Don't worry Dad, I made sure to get every last drop 😉

Ingredients:

  • Romaine Lettuce
  • Sliced Cucumber
  • Chopped Mango
  • Chopped Avocado
  • Homemade Balsamic Vinaigrette (Balsamic Vinegar + Red Chili Pepper + Salt + Pepper + Extra Virgin Olive Oil)

 

Dinner: Hormone Balancing Meatballs + Paleo Pasta

Paleo meatballs with zucchini pasta and sweet potato pasta created in a spiralizer PaleoPasta

You guys have already heard me sing the praises of my hormone balancing meatballs. You'll see these pop up on my dinner table (and my Instagram feed) often because they're so easy and so damn good. I love coming home from work, and pulling out a few already-made delicious meatballs from the freezer. All I have to do is simmer them in bone broth for 10 minutes or so in a saute pan. They are part of my fertility diet, but I highly recommend them to anybody who is looking to balance their hormones. My favorite thing to top them with is "Paleo Pasta" which is really just a combination of any vegetable I can spiralize. In this case, I used a Sweet Potato, Zucchini and Yellow Squash.

Ingredients:

  • Spiralized Sweet Potato >> sautéed in Dr. Bronner's coconut oil and sprinkled with Salt, Pepper and Cinnamon.
  • Sprialized Zucchini and Squash >> sautéed in Dr. Bronner's coconut oil and sprinkled with Salt, Pepper and Herbs de Provence.
  • Hormone Balancing Meatballs, defrosted from frozen by simmering in Bone Broth for 10-ish minutes.

Alrighty folks, that's all she wrote. Question: Did you like this post? Would you like to see more of what I eat in a day? Or could you care less? Comment below and let me know!

Much Love,

HealthyStaceySignature

Healthy Body

What is Paleo?

July 13, 2015

9-course-meal-steakOn a recent work trip, I got completely spoiled with a 9 course meal with so much gastronomical fantasticalness, that I’m not even going to attempt to explain what the dishes were made of (see pictures above and below). I do know, however, that there was plenty of beef, duck and chicken liver (I think?). My coworker approached me after we had left the clients, with a very concerned look.

Octopus

"Are you okay? I saw you eat every dish!" she said. I asked her why that was a problem, and she said, "I thought you didn’t eat meat?"

I proceeded to explain to her that I’m not vegan; I’m paleo. When I got blank stares in response, I realized something.

Not everybody knows what paleo means. DUH.

I get so sucked into my own little world that sometimes I forget that paleo is still in many respects under-the-radar. SO, this is my long-overdue post to you on what it means to be Paleo. You ready? Here we go…

WHAT DOES ‘PALEO’ MEAN?

Paleo is an abbreviation for Paleolithic. People who follow this lifestyle eat foods that pass this test: Would our ancient ancestors have eaten this food?

But, for me, Paleo is really about eliminating the foods that cause inflammation (and indigestion, and stress, and feeling like crap), and enjoying the ones that don't.

WHY EAT WHAT OUR ANCESTORS ATE?

People ask me this question all the time. Why would we use the caveman as our model of health? They died at like…30. Welp. Cavemen also didn’t have modern medicine to cure their ailments or heal their bones. What they DID have was real, whole unprocessed foods that served them well: plants, meats, seafood. For about 2.5 million years, humans biologically adapted best with these foods.

Then agriculture came along. And with it, came wheat, sugar, and chemically processed vegetable oils and seed oils. Crazy coincidence – it wasn’t until this time that diseases such as autoimmune disorders, cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes and…wait for it…OBESITY came into our lives.

Yes, cavemen died earlier than us. But they were dying because they starved to death or were mauled by animals. NOT because of heart disease and obesity. Although we may be more evolved than our ancestors in a lot of ways, they’ve got us beat in the food department. And since our basic biochemical responses pretty much work the same as theirs – maybe, just maybe, we should follow their lead at the dinner table (not in a eat-with-your-hands-scratch-yourself kind of way, of course). 

WHAT DO YOU EAT?

  • Grass Fed Meat & Poultry
  • Wild Caught Seafood
  • Pasture-Raised Eggs
  • Vegetables
  • Fruit – mostly berries
  • Nuts, in moderation
  • Seeds, in moderation

WHAT DON’T YOU EAT?

  • Gluten-containing grains
  • Legumes
  • Dairy
  • Sugar
  • Processed foods (i.e. 80% of the food in the center of the supermarket)

WHY DON’T YOU EAT THOSE THINGS?

As I said before, agriculture didn’t come into our lives until about 10,000 years ago. Foods like grains, beans, dairy and Doritos were new to our bodies. And research shows that humans have not been able to adapt fast enough to properly digest and metabolize these foods. Again, it was only after we started eating these foods did we develop obesity, heart disease and diabetes.

This is where I could get super detailed and research-heavy with you. And I have done that in other posts like my happy stomach series and my processed oil post. But for now, I would just like to say that sometimes, it’s as simple as listening to your body. Think about it. How do you feel after you’ve eaten a cheesy pizza? A bean burrito? A bowl of sugary cereal? A box of cookies?

Okay, I know that some of you with stomachs of steel are going to say you feel fine. But I know that once I eliminated gluten, sugar and processed foods from my diet (I never ate much dairy to begin with), I felt and looked a whole lot better. Not very scientific, I know. But it’s the only evidence I need.

WHY WOULD SOMEBODY GO PALEO?

For a variety of reasons. To lose weight is obviously one of them. But more often than not, people with autoimmune diseases and digestive related problems turn to the paleo diet when they realize that medicine is not making them feel any better.

People with diseases like…

  • Crohn’s disease
  • Celiac disease
  • Ulcerative Colitis
  • IBS
  • Lupus
  • Rheumatoid arthritis
  • Interstitial cystitis
  • Multiple Sclerosis

Are improving, and sometimes eliminating their symptoms with the Paleo diet1.

WHY DID I GO PALEO?

I have always been a health nut. But for me, the definition of “health” has changed a lot over the years. For the better half of my life, my goal has always been to lose weight. That’s all I ever cared about. Being thin. That meant a lot of low-fat, non-fat, fake sugar, diet-packaged crap. As “healthy” as I thought I was, I was never happy with my weight, often unsatisfied with my food, and almost always in uncomfortable digestive pain.

My now-fiancée introduced me to the paleo diet, back when I was closer to vegan than anything else. I was frustrated with my weight, as my initial weight loss from eliminating all meat and dairy from my diet had worn off. My stomach was bigger than I wanted it to be, and often, in pain. But most of all, I always felt like I was restricting myself. I wasn’t really enjoying food.

I slowly started following some of the paleo guidelines. I switched to unprocessed oils in my cooking. I started eating grass-fed meat. I reduced a little, then a lot, of gluten. And most importantly, I threw away anything low-fat, non-fat, and let good fat back into my life. It took no longer than a couple weeks of these small changes to immediately feel and see results. And now, almost two years later, I can’t imagine eating and living any other way.  

Becoming paleo:

  • Allowed me to eat ridiculously delicious and satisfying food
  • Encouraged me to listen to my body rather than a book or a blog (Ha! Ironic)
  • Inspired me to fall in love with cooking and start making more food from scratch – it tastes sooo much better!
  • Got my body looking the best it ever, ever has
  • But most importantly, feeling the best it ever has

Digestive health is so much more connected to our overall health than any of us ever realized. Yes, I think it’s great for people with Celiac Disease or Colitis, but I don’t think you need to “resort” to paleo. I think it can and should be something that we can all learn from. As you may have guessed from my 9-course meal above or some of the dishes I post on my instagram feed, I don’t live and die by the paleo rules. That's why I'm paleo-ish. I listen to my body and eat real food. Whether you accept it 100%, 80% or even 20%,  we can all benefit from eating more real, whole, homemade food. It’s hard to argue with that.

WANT TO LEARN MORE?

This is obviously an oversimplification of a very complicated, slightly controversial topic. I don't pretend to be an expert on it, but I do know a few people who are. If you're interested in learning more about the paleo diet, I highly reccommend checking out Sean Croxton's podcast, Underground Wellness, Mark Sisson's blog Mark's Daily Apple, and Chris Kresser's site on functional medicine (i.e. connecting what we put in our body with health and disease). These are people willing to go the extra mile to tell you everyhing you need to know about the paleo diet and how we can use it to improve our health. Plus, they'll give you all the nitty gritty research that I don't have the time, the patience, or the expertise to cover here. But I hope, at the very least, this was a good start.

 

Well, what do you think? Do you get it now? Do you have something to say? Whether lovely and complimentary or mean and embarrassing, I want to hear it! Those cute little gold icons underneath this post are for sharing. You can share on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, or just comment right here on this blog. So go ahead. Floor's all yours…

1https://s3.amazonaws.com/paleodietevo2/research/The+Nutritional+Characteristics+of+a+Contemporary+Diet+Based+Upon+Paleolithic+Food+Groups+The+Paleo+Diet.pdf

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