Burger, almost.

One of the most challenging things about eating healthy is being on the go. I'm lucky enough to work in a restaurant so I have access to a stove and a grill and an oven, but it still involves a lot of foresight to eat well. The dressings at the restaurant are made with canola oil (a big no no), so even having a salad at work involves some home prep. They're generous enough to give us a free meal after every shift, but free doesn't usually mean healthy and what's more important? I'm all for the occasional night out eating what is delicious and brings you joy, but when you are there every night eating french fries and fried chicken, the nutrient deficit and inflammation really add up! Most 20-somethings don't care about that stuff, because to them the free part is hella cool, but when you start noticing patches of weird skin on your body and getting a little soggy around the midsection, it's harder to ignore.

I love burgers! It's not always the case that you can count on places you go out to source ethically raised meat, so be mindful of this. Knowing about the dangers of commercially-raised meats has made me pay way more attention to the quality of the meat I purchase and eat, so for this version of a paleo "burger", I brought my own (grassfed organic) beef to the restaurant and cooked it on the grill. Eating food that's been grilled isn't ideal if you're doing it regularly because that cooking method creates carcinogens, but man, there's no flavor like it and once in awhile I think it's okay.

So where do you come in, you ask? Well, though I have all the kitchen gadgets at my disposal at work, this meal is totally doable for anyone! Want to have this for lunch at work? Everything can be pre-prepped at home (bring your salad dressing in its own little container, greens in another, and your pre-cooked burger patty and sweet potato fries) and just pop the things meant to be served warm in the microwave for a minute or two. I am definitely not a huge fan of microwaves, but I say this food that you put real effort into procuring good ingredients for and put together to bring for lunch is way better than whatever commercial bullshit is available for sale at a convenience store or restaurant. If the only heating apparatus available is a microwave, so be it. It couldn't do more harm than eating that stuff that passes for "food"!

Want a "real" burger (as in, with the bread) and still want to be healthy? Check out this post from June of 2016. It's really good, if I do say so myself :)

Here's an easy to follow recipe for the burger you see in today's photo!

For the burger patty:

4 oz ground beef
salt and pepper

Heat a cast iron skillet until hot. Form the meat into a patty using your hands, and salt/pepper one side. Place the salted side down in the hot pan, and salt/pepper the other side. Cook for 2-3 minutes on each side, depending on how pink you like your burgers. Transfer to a plate or cutting board and allow to rest while you assemble your salad!

For the salad dressing:

1 Tbsp paleo mayo
2 Tbsp lemon juice

For the salad:

1 cup (ish) organic mixed greens
1/2 ripe avocado
1 roma tomato, chopped

Put all salad ingredients in a bowl. In a separate, smaller bowl, whisk together the mayo and lemon juice. Pour over salad and mix well.

For the sweet potato fries:

1 small sweet potato, cut into "fry" shape
butter or beef tallow
salt and pepper

Turn oven to 400. Melt beef tallow or butter. Place fries on a sheet pan and pour the fat all over them. Season. Place in the oven for 10 minutes or so, depending on your desired level of doneness.

[Paleo] Green pepper-braised pork shoulder with cauliflower rice and guacamole

Here's another paleo meal! Truly actually paleo -- I made some "maple syrup and balsamic beef with mashed potatoes [potatoes are paleo now, you know]" last night and woke up SO THIRSTY and could feel the weird sugar hangover. Come to think of it, it might have been the apple strudel I made for breakfast; I suppose it will just have to remain a mystery. It seems my pattern is to jump with every fiber of my being off the wagon into SUGAR, and then swim my way back (dragging my exhausted pancreas with me) to this new paleo "normal" I like to think I've established. It's getting easier to come back to; before, I'd have my little sugar fix and be like, "well, it's over," and go back to my not-so-healthy ways. Sometimes I'm snowed in and I just need to bake, it's just the way it is. Anyhoo, here's a delightfully sugar-free dinner that is super satisfying and delicious.

[Paleo] Green pepper-braised pork shoulder with cauliflower rice and guacamole

For the meat:

butter (or fat of choice)
1 small yellow onion, sliced
1.5 pounds pork shoulder, salted the night before and left in the fridge
2-3 cups chicken stock (water is fine if you don't have stock)
1 small can green chiles

Melt the butter in a dutch oven or stock pot. Add sliced onions and saute until they have some color. Add the meat to the bottom of the pan to sear on all sides. Add chicken stock and turn heat to low, cooking (covered) for 2-3 hours until the pork is fork tender. Remove the lid and increase heat to create a steady simmer (not a boil) and reduce the liquid for about 30 minutes. Add the can of green chiles. Taste and adjust seasonings.

For the guacamole:

2 ripe avocados
1/4 of a red onion OR 1 small shallot, (or heck, even a white onion if it's all you have) diced very small
1 roma tomato, de-seeded and chopped
juice of half of a lime (or a lemon)
2 Tbsp chopped cilantro
salt and pepper

Mix everything together in a bowl. Done!

For the cauliflower rice

Open a frozen bag of cauliflower rice and put it in a pot. Add a pinch of salt, a bit of stock or lemon juice if desired, and heat until it's hot. So easy!!

To plate:

Put some cauliflower rice on the plate. In the photo I left the pork in the chunk that it came as from the meat counter, but in retrospect I think it would have been better shredded. Do what floats your boat! Pour a nice big ladle of the braising liquid over the meat and rice, and then place a nice dollop of guacamole on top. And there you have it!

Anti-Inflammation

Inflammation. It is caused by our immune system attacking anything that it recognizes as foreign. Sometimes our bodies go into overdrive and mistakenly start attacking themselves, something we refer to as auto-immune disease. Reasons for changing our diets to one that includes more anti-inflammatory foods might be more imminently noticeable for people who suffer from auto-immune disease, but the truth is that it would be good for everyone. Did you know that by reducing inflammation in our bodies, we significantly decrease our chances not just for one particular disease, but disease in general!?

To add anti-inflammatory foods is great, and something that would also be great would be to reduce inflammatory foods. Some of the most inflammatory foods are:

Sugar (including carbohydrates)
Dairy
Wheat/grains
Legumes
Commercially-raised meats
Canola and other highly-processed seed oils

On a side note, guess what the paleo diet eliminates? Bingo!

My beautiful sister, J, has been such an inspiration to me, not only in the way she has handled certain health challenges (she was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at age 4), but how she has actively started caring for her body and her health by starting to eat healthier, and has been able to wean herself off of all of her medication except for her insulin. As is the case with many auto-immune diseases like diabetes, one can easily follow the other, and this has been the case with J. She has to deal with something called Sjogren's, which affects the mucous membranes of the body, and most recently has had some concern raised by her doctor about her liver.

J and I both believe in the body's innate ability to heal itself if given the proper support (she has already been able to start taking less insulin since she started eating better), so we decided to see what effects implementing a diet that decreases inflammation in the body will have. Arthritis, lupus, fibromyalgia, asthma, and celiac are all auto-immune diseases that are caused by inflammation, and addressing that root cause can significantly reduce symptoms and pain caused by these disorders. Anti-inflammatory foods can regulate the immune system and impact the way inflammation affects our bodies and our lives.

So here's a list of some anti-inflammatory foods. I always say "I'm not a scientist" and it's true, and it's also true that adding these foods into your diet couldn't hurt (unless you have an allergy). So why not?

Anti-Inflammatory Foods

Avocados
Blueberries and blackberries
Grass-fed/grass-finished beef
Carrots
Kale
Olive oil (please do not cook with it, it breaks down and becomes rancid at high temperatures)
Salmon
Spinach
Turmeric
Ginger
Tomatoes
Nuts
Garlic
Beets (oo especially fermented ones)
Sweet potatoes
Fermented vegetables

This list is by no means exhaustive. For more ideas, take a look at this beautiful and adorable list from thepaleomom.com (who has a fantastic blog about the Auto-Immune Protocol that I highly recommend):

Anyone have good experiences with eliminating inflammatory foods and adding some anti-inflammatory ones? What are some of the changes you noticed? I'd love to hear your stories!

Paleo citrus bacon shrimp with caramelized onions, mashed potatoes, and cilantro!

This is a great way to get some sea food in that body! Shrimp is a great source of protein and man, is it delicious. I'd heard that it is high in cholesterol and therefore we shouldn't eat it, but that's just one more example of how we have been misinformed by mainstream nutrition to fear fat. We need cholesterol to make up some of the more important parts of our bodies (like our cells. Yeah, pretty important!). Read this for all kinds of interesting shrimp info!

[Paleo] Citrus bacon shrimp with caramelized onions, mashed potatoes, and cilantro
Makes 1 single-serving meal

For the mashed potatoes:

1 large yukon gold potato
the cream from 1 can of full-fat coconut milk (start with 1 spoonful and add more according to how thick you like your mashed potatoes)
butter
salt and pepper
1/2 tsp celery seeds, if desired

Chop the potatoes into chunks and boil in water until very soft. You can peel them if you want, but I never do. It's too much work when the skins are super tasty and add some nice texture. Just wash them really well first. When they're done cooking, drain water and mash them (using a hand mixer, potato masher, or even just a fork) with coconut cream, butter, salt, pepper, and celery seeds. Use discretion and preference of texture and taste to determine amounts of each ingredient. You can do it! Cooking for more than one person/meal? Just plan on 1 medium-large yukon gold potato per person, and increase the amounts of everything else. Another note: I have found that the addition of celery seeds gives the illusion of the presence of celery root, another starchy root vegetable, and helps mask some of the coconut flavor from the coconut milk.

For the shrimp and caramelized onions:

2 Tbsp butter
1 slice Paleo-friendly bacon, chopped
1/2 onion, sliced (can use a yellow, white, or red onion)
8-10 wild caught shrimps (just buy as many as you want to eat in one meal)
zest and juice of a lime (reserve one slice for garnish, if desired)
salt and pepper

1/4 of a bunch of fresh cilantro, chopped

De-vein and clean the shrimp really well. Season on both sides with salt and pepper.

Melt 1 Tbsp of the butter in a skillet and add chopped bacon, cooking until the fat is rendered and the pieces of bacon are crispy. Leaving the fat in the pan, reserve the pieces of bacon. To the hot fat, add the sliced onions, and cook on high heat until slightly charred. Turn down heat and allow to caramelize slowly for 15 minutes. Move onions to the side of the pan (you can leave them in there) and add the shrimp, cooking no more than 1 minute per side. You can add more butter if the pan is dry, it will help the shrimp cook. They will curl up and turn pink when finished, and this happens very quickly! When they are done, remove from heat and add the bacon back to the pan.

Plate by placing the mashed potatoes on the plate and creating a "cave" with the back of a large spoon. Place the shrimp/onion/bacon mixture on top of the mashed potatoes and sprinkle everything with the lime juice and a healthy sprinkling of fresh cilantro. Voila!