My favorite side dish

Ok so here is a side dish I make on a regular basis, but will switch up sometimes adding different vegetables.

Ingredients

2 Yellow zucchini
1 Onion
2 Cayenne pepper
Extra Virgin olive oil

Directions

1. Pour about tbs olive oil in a wok pan on med heat
2. Cut up all ingredients to your desired thickness and place in pan when heated
3. Sauté until all ingredients are soft, we like ours to be cooked to where the edges look they are about to burn but that is just our preference.

**Sometimes I use regular green zucchini, squash or a combination of squash and zucchini. I always put onions though, but if I don’t have cayenne pepper then I will use red pepper flakes instead.

Enjoy!!!

Sweet potato chips

Another super easy, yummy recipe! Are you noticing a trend here? Lol. These are more “chip” like, and yes they will go just as quick if not quicker than a bag of chips will. These would have the same slogan as the Pringles do, “once you pop, you just can’t stop”. But these are waaaaaaaaaay healthier than Pringles 🙂

Ingredients

2-3 sweet potatoes
Grapeseed oil
Sea salt
Pepper

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375
2. Line baking sheet with parchment paper
3. Wash potatoes and then cut to your desired thickness
4. Place potatoes in a bowl and drizzle with grapeseed oil, toss the potatoes around in oil to make sure it’s got a thin coat.
5. Layer potatoes in as much of a single layer as you you can on baking sheet and then season lightly with salt & pepper. (Just as the kale shrinks, so does the potatoes so that’s why I say lightly season. You can always season more when they are done).
6. Bake for about 25 minutes and then flip, return to oven for a additional 25 minutes.

I served these as part of our dinner last night, but these are also a good thing to keep for snacks.

Enjoy!!

Because who doesn’t love bacon???

Ok so my family is addicted to bacon, like we would totally get it in a IV form if we could. No lie. I wrapped tilapia is bacon and cooked it a while back and it was a big hit so I figured why not try with chicken? Yes I’m aware that’s been done before, I’m not claiming to be the master creator of this combination but I had yet to try it. I didn’t feel like wrapping the chicken, so instead I just layered the bacon across the top of the chicken. Needless to say, the kids and the Mr have since asked for this meal or my version with pork chops at least every couple days.

Ingredients

Chicken breasts (or pork chops)
1 pack of bacon
Coconut oil

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375
2. Spread a thin layer of coconut oil on the bottom of a glass baking dish
3. Place chicken/pork in pan
4. Place bacon as a single layer across the top of the chicken, because I have to cook a big amount of chicken I use a large pan and it takes the whole pack to cover the chicken. But you might need the entire pack, so if you want you can save the extra for another time (just make sure you date whatever you seal it in so you don’t forget)
5. Cook chicken/pork for about a hour if the chicken/pork was frozen, and around 30 minutes if thawed out. Internal temperature must be 170 degrees.

*Here is a little bit of info that might help with this dish.

-the juices from the bacon come to the bottom of the pan and it is cooked into the chicken/pork like a marinade. Therefor the juice will cause whatever part is in juice to have a pinkish look. As long as you are using your thermometer to ensure its cooked to 170 degrees internally its ok. At first I thought it wasn’t cooked, so I flipped the chicken over and cooked it a little longer and then the other side turned pink.

With this I made steamed broccoli and sweet potato chips (recipe coming up on the next post).

Enjoy!

Today’s breakfast :)

Here is a quick post of the kids breakfast this morning 🙂

Mandarin oranges, peeled
Scrambled eggs
Bananas drizzled with raw honey
And not pictured, almond milk to drink

Quick, easy, healthy and yummy 🙂

That was a close one!!

So last night we went and participated in our cities weekly evening walk. We were so excited we were able to go finally and that the Mr actually got off work in time to go too!!! Well needless to say the change in our nightly routine and me being forgetful (yes I admit it) I completely forgot to pack my husbands lunch for today. When that alarm went off this morning it hit me, CRAP!!!!! Luckily I keep lots of veggies around so I was able to throw this together in about 5-10 mins.

It consists of

Steamed broccoli
Red pepper
Jalapeno
Sausage

I sautéed the sausage with the red pepper and jalapeño so the flavors would all come together.

Quick, easy and yummy! All in 5-10 minutes 🙂

Paleo chips????

One of the biggest things we have struggled with when trying to stay true to our diet is snacking. Well we have found a great option that is created with the powerhouse vegetable kale. This vegetable right here is one of the best you could ever eat, and has shown significant health benefits including cancer protection and lowered cholesterol. One cup of kale includes 33 calories and 9% of the daily value of calcium, 206% of vitamin A, 134% of vitamin C and 684% of vitamin K!! It is also a good source of minerals copper, potassium, iron, manganese and phosphorus. So yeah, you pretty much want to keep some of this bad boy in your kitchen 🙂

Ingredients

Kale

extra virgin olive oil

sea salt

pepper

parchment paper

Directions

1. preheat your oven to 375 degrees

2. cover a baking sheet with parchment paper

3. break up kale and place in a single layer on the parchment paper (the kale with almost shrink in half when cooked so no need to be stingy when placing on the pan, just make sure the kale is not on top of each other)

4. drizzle the top of the kale with olive oil

5. sprinkle salt & pepper on top, you can also add cumin or lemon pepper etc if you’d like. Just keep in mind once again the kale does shrink so don’t go crazy with the salt & pepper, or else it will be too salty and unless you just like salt as a meal. In that case salt away 😉

6. bake for about 10 minutes, keep an eye on it though. Different stoves heat higher or lower than the temp you choose. If you keep it in too long you will have a smoke fest when you pull it out (and yes I learned that the hard way).

7. pull out when done and after cooling off it is ready to eat 🙂

I made 4 batches the other day, and no lie my husband ate every bit of them as soon as he got home and has yet to stop bragging to everyone about how god they were.

I swear it’s better than ice cream :)

Ok so I know you are probably thinking “there is no way whatever she is posting is better than ice cream” but I promise everyone in my household has gone nuts over this sweet treat I make! It’s very simple, and it is the perfect addition to a bowl of fruit. We have put it over peaches, blueberries and strawberries. And come on, it’s HEALTHY!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ingredients

1 cup coconut milk 

1tsp cinnamon 

1tsp pure vanilla extract 

2tbs (I use about 3) raw honey

 

Directions 

1. Pour all ingredients into a blender and mix until honey is blended well. You can even heat the honey up for about 30 seconds before adding if you’d like but I don’t see the need to because it blends just fine for me without. 

2. Pour mix into a mason jar (I keep a arsenal of these in my kitchen and recommend you do also, especially when making your own sauces etc.) and place in the freezer. 

3. After it has been in the freezer for 1 hour I stir it up, the top freezes first so this just helps to make it evenly consistent. Then let it freeze for about another hour and then stir again and it’s done! 

4. Pour over a bowl of fruit and ENJOY!!!! 

 

**You can always add more or less cinnamon/honey or exclude one or both of them also. This is just what I use and we enjoy. I only make a mason jar at a time, because it is just that good that we cannot save for another day lol.