Archives – Primal Fed’s Paleo Lifestyle Blog

Recipe: Chile Mango and Watermelon

May 28, 2011 By Richard and has 1 comment.

Sometimes our meals are inspired by the selection that we find at the grocer or farmer’s market, sometimes they are inspired by other blogs we read on the Internet, in this case our meal was inspired by a Facebook picture posted by one of Amanda’s friends living in Mexico.

This is another summer-time dish that makes a perfect complement to a Memorial Day feast. If you’re short on time it can be made well in advance and kept cool until serving.

Ingredients:
2 C. Watermelon Chunks
1 Mango
Chili Powder
1/2 of a Lime

Preparation:
1. Prepare the watermelon in any fashion you’d like. In our case we cut it into chunks to fit in a bowl, but you most assuredly can cut it into slices and season it the same way just fine.
2. Cut the mango into chunks. For those new to cutting mangoes, there is a large seed running lengthwise close to the middle of the fruit but usually not perfectly centered. Slice the fruit lengthwise close to this seed and then separate the fruit from the skin.
3. Sprinkle the fruit with chili powder and a splash of lime juice and serve.

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Recipe: Quick and Easy Fruit Salad

May 26, 2011 By Amanda and has no comments. We would love to hear from you!

Having a craving for something sweet doesn’t mean you have to reach for that Snickers bar.

We made this fruit salad the other night simply using a combination of fresh and frozen fruit that we had on hand, some almonds, and a splash of coconut milk. It was just what we needed and we didn’t have to cheat ourselves by eating processed sugary junk.

Ingredients: (Makes 2 Servings)
1 Large Banana
1/2 C. Frozen Blueberries
8 Frozen Strawberries
6 oz. of Coconut Milk
Handful of Almonds (Walnuts are also excellent!)
Shredded Unsweet Coconut (Optional)

Preparation:

1. Slice the Banana and place in a bowl.
2. Add Frozen Blueberries and Frozen Strawberries.
3. Sprinkle with Almonds and Unsweet Coconut.
4. Pour Coconut Milk over the top. Some of it will coat and freeze to the frozen fruit — delicious.

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Recipe: Primal Low Carb Burger

May 22, 2011 By Richard and has no comments. We would love to hear from you!

Summer Barbecue
It seems like yesterday we had snow on the ground here in Arkansas, but in just a few days Memorial Day will be ushering in the start of Summer.

Memorial Day is an important holiday — not just for remembering those who served and provided the freedom we enjoy today — but also because it’s one of the few days out of the year where many families can get together to enjoy each other’s company and good food.

In that respect, it’s time to start planning what’s going on our Memorial Day menu. And while many traditional Memorial Day dishes such as hamburgers, hot dogs, and corn on the cob don’t suit a primal diet very well, you can get creative and come up with delicious, easy-to-make food while sticking to your diet.

This is our first attempt at a Primal hamburger and they were awesome. I don’t use that word lightly.

This is a variation on the same type of “low carb” burger with questionable ingredients you might find at Carl’s Jr. or Hardee’s.

Ingredients: Makes Approximately 4 Burgers

2lbs Ground Beef
1 Green Bell Pepper
1 Large Tomato
1 Head of Iceberg Lettuce
4 Strips of Bacon
Mustard (Optional)

Preparation:

1. Cut the Tomato and Green Bell Pepper into thick slices.
2. Remove the outer leaves of the Iceberg Lettuce and set aside. Choose leaves that are large enough to wrap around the burger.
3. Form the Ground Beef into patties and place in a skillet over medium heat.
4. To save time, you can also place the Bacon and Green Bell Pepper slices in the skillet as well. Otherwise cook separately.
5. Place cooked hamburger patty on the Iceberg Lettuce leaves and stack with a Tomato and Bell Pepper slice. Top with crumbled bacon.
6. Drizzle with Mustard if desired.
7. Enjoy.

* In retrospect I wish I had taken better pictures, but these didn’t last long enough to get any more shots!

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When is it Too Late to Get Healthy?

May 19, 2011 By Richard and has 9 comments.

I have a grandmother who is dangerously obese.

As long as I’ve been alive (26 years now) she has been severely overweight. It got significantly worse about 15 years ago when she divorced and moved away from her long-time home.

Her diet has migrated to almost exclusively fast food and she is barely able to move around at all anymore as both of her knees have went out — as a result of her diet and weight I’m sure.

The doctors say that she is ‘pre-diabetic.’ She has already had a bypass surgery; a surgery the doctors classified as high-risk and did not want to perform because of her weight.

She isn’t able to stand up very long to cook and her boyfriend simply doesn’t. So the food she consumes is food that her boyfriend picks up on the way home from work — usually Arbys, KFC, or McDonalds.

I remember as a young kid that we would visit her house and she would make very good food for us. She worked as a registered nurse at the time. Even though she had a busy schedule, there was always time for dinner when she got off work.

She is only 65 years old.

When I see people living into their 80s, 90s or even over 100, I wonder if it’s too late for her. I wonder how her body could be in such terrible shape at a relatively young age.

Just how old is too old to try to get healthy? I recognize that after all these years that she has done irreparable damage to her body; but isn’t trying to do something while alive better than nothing while dead?

Truth be told, we all — including her — felt she was going to die 15 years ago when she was 50 . I remember my mom going to visit her because “It may be the last time she’ll see her.” And her health has been so bad since then, that I wouldn’t have been surprised on any day of those 15 years getting the phone call. But I never received it.

“I’m already old. It’s too late for me. But, you kids, you’re the ones that need to worry about your health…”

That was her attitude 15 years ago. And that is her attitude to this day. I’ve heard the same thing from Amanda’s grandparents. Heck, I’ve even heard the same thing from my own parents.

I’m writing this more or less for people that are in the position she was in 15 years ago.

Maybe you’re 50 now. Maybe you feel terrible. You’re probably on a myriad of prescription pills. Do you want to spend the next 15 years or more of your life just waiting to die? My grandmother did and she’s still waiting.

Suffering, stress, and worry for 15 years seems like a terrible way to spend the rest of your life. I urge everyone to do something now.

Do you really want your grandchildren wondering (like I do) ‘What if…’ they got to spend more time with you if only you ate healthier?

What if you got to spend another 40 years watching your children and grandchildren grow up…?

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Recipe: Late Night Egg Scramble

Recipe: Top Sirloin and Brussels Sprouts

May 15, 2011 By Richard and has 1 comment.

We love a big, juicy steak. Steak is easy, it’s quick, it’s packed with protein, and it keeps you full for hours. One of our favorite cuts is the top sirloin.

The top sirloin is sourced from the upper rear portion of the cow and is just one of the many loin cuts of beef. Unless specifically marked as top sirloin, meats marked as ‘sirloin’ are usually bottom sirloin cuts which compose a much larger portion of the animal and are less tender than top sirloin cuts. Priced accordingly, top sirloin is generally a little bit more expensive.

Top sirloin is made to be cooked rare to medium. There is no such thing as a well-done top sirloin. Once the meat has reached well-done, it is usually so rubbery that you might as well use it as a frisbee instead of food. We like ours rare. Once you get over the ‘ick’ factor, you’ll find it’s amazingly melt-in-your-mouth tender and full of flavor.

Ingredients:

Top Sirloin
Black Peppercorn
Sea Salt
Brussels Sprouts
Mushrooms
Butter

Preparation:

1) To prepare a rare/medium-rare Top Sirloin the first thing you want to do is get your pan hot. No, hotter. Hotter. The pan should almost be smoking. Cooking it hot and fast will sear the outside of the steak but leave the inside juicy and tender.

2) Rub both sides of the steak with Sea Salt and crushed Black Peppercorn. These are the only two seasonings I use on sirloins. There really isn’t any point in buying an expensive cut of steak to drown it in cheap marinades. Use cheaper cuts for marinades. The combination of salt and pepper waken up your taste buds and serve to make the meat more savory.

3) Place the meat in the pan and cook for five to seven minutes per side, flipping the steak exactly once. Depending on how hot your pan is, and the thickness of your steak, it may take a little longer than mine. The most important part of the whole cooking process is to not flip the steak more than one time. Be patient.

Note: If you are using an electric stove, I would add at least another 3-4 minutes per side due to the fact that they have built-in shut-offs once they get too hot.

4) Once the steak is removed from the pan, set it on a plate and leave it sit there. Don’t stick a fork in it. Don’t cut into it. Just leave it sit there for a good five minutes.

During the cooking process all of the juices have cooked out of the edges of the steak, by allowing it to rest after cooking you are giving the juices plenty of time to migrate back into the overcooked parts. This does two important things: 1) It makes the center of the steak less ‘bloody’, and 2) It imparts flavor evenly throughout the steak.

5) Serve with a vegetable of your choice. I chose Mushrooms and Brussels Sprouts which I quickly sauteed in Butter while the steak was resting.

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Blog Update

May 6, 2011 By Richard and has no comments. We would love to hear from you!

Spam isn't paleo.

Spam isn’t paleo. I had to turn on comment captcha‘s today. The enormity of comment spam on this blog is just getting too time-consuming for me to stay on top of.

I’ve been having to pre-approve comments so the posts aren’t flooded with spam, but now I’m having to clear out upwards of 600 spam comments per day from bots. Trying not to accidentally delete legitimate comments from the comment pool is a tedious process.

The captcha system seems to work okay, but may be a minor annoyance. If you have any problems with the comment system, such as not being able to leave a comment, I’d appreciate if you could shoot me an e-mail at richard(at)primalfed(dot)com.

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Recipe: Primal Breakfast Pizza

By Richard and has no comments. We would love to hear from you!

Today we experimented with a mostly primal breakfast pizza.

I say it’s mostly primal because this time we included some dry salami with questionable ingredients and a little cheese.

I know there are people that think cheese and such are fine while eating primal. If your body can takes it and you feel better, more power to you. It’s your diet. We try to eat as little dairy as possible.

I’d like to find a nice substitute for the dry salami. We’ve also had this same recipe with bacon on top — and it was great. But it was less pizza-like and more eggs-and-bacon-like.

Ingredients:

1 Strip of Bacon
1/2 C Spinach
1/2 C Mushrooms
Tomato
2 Eggs
Cheese (Optional)
Dry Salami (Optional)

Preparation:

1) To get started you should cut the bacon up into pieces and fry it in a skillet over medium heat. You’ll want to use a small skillet for this so the eggs will take on the form of a small, round pizza. Leave the bacon grease in the pan. It will act as a release agent for the vegetables and egg, preventing them from sticking and burning to the bottom of the pan.
2) Cut up all of your vegetables into smaller pieces and add them to the bacon.
3) In a separate bowl, whisk the eggs together.
4) Pour the eggs over the vegetables and bacon in the skillet.
5) Reduce the heat to low. The egg will start cooking from the outside first. After it has started firming up, add the pepperoni and cheese if you so desire.
6) Serve on a plate and cut into handy pizza slices.
7) Eat.