Frugal Paleo--and Scotch Broth Soup

Since making the big change to paleo, do you ever look at your bank account and just totally have a heart attack?

Happens to me a lot.

Too much.  I seriously, seriously stress over food costs.  And money in general.  On the one hand, I want to do the right thing (buy local, buy organic), on the other hand, I want to keep my house.  And my car.  And my kids.

Sure, good food is important to health--pay for it now in healthy food, or later in medicine bills, all those sayings that justify the crazy food costs of a paleo diet.  Whoever coined all those phrases obviously didn't have a household full of teens, large-breed dogs, a mortgage, cars and debt.  All of these things came before learning about Paleo.

Is it just me???

Ok, I'm going to say something that is going to make me extremely unpopular.

Ready???  It is ok, and still totally Paleo, to shop at the grocery store, to buy food when it's on sale, to skip the organic and the grass-fed and finished meats.  Honestly.

Alright, let me finish.

Because you see, there is "optimum", and there is also "acceptable".  It is optimal to eat grass-fed and finished, and optimal to eat organic produce.  If you are diligent, you can find grass-fed beef for under $4/pound, and grass-fed free-range poultry and Tamworth pork for under $5/pound--and you can even find organic CSA's that are very reasonably priced.  But it doesn't always happen that way.  And not everyone has the large lump of money upfront to buy 250 lbs of pork or cow, no matter how reasonably priced it is.  or the $550 to shell out for a CSA, months in advance of receiving the food.

Don't get me wrong, I am 100% in support of both of those things, of buying local, of getting to know and supporting your local farmers.  But the truth is, if you are on a truly tight food budget, cost matters more than anything else out there.

When money is that tight, it no longer matters what the paleo-perfectionists have to say (or at least. it shouldn't matter).  You can only do what you can afford to do.  Did you know that stress is twice as bad for your body as grains are?  So don't sweat it.  Stretch the almighty dollar as far as you can--in fact, I challenge you to find new and innovative ways to do it!  Anything you do or try is still better than your old diet that used to include grains, soy, legumes, processed foods and refined sugars anymore.  That's a pretty big thing.

And for just one minute here,think about this, how much food do you throw away?   (North) Americans throw out more food than any other nation.

So it is with all of this in mind, this week, and well into my overdraft even after just getting paid, that I am being as frugal as I possibly can, while still eating as well as I can.  I'm making do with what I have, and I'm on a mission to waste nothing.  Oh, how I wish that all the food I need would just materialize in my house, that I didn't have to shop for it.  Food is expensive, but food should also be simple and stress-free.  Open fridge, combine ingredients found in fridge.  Make sure you use every last bit of that giant head of cabbage, use those broccoli stems and the bottoms of the asparagus (but peel them--I learned that one the hard way).  It is all food.  If you only knew what to do with it.

So on with the recipe, right?? ...

I didn't want to waste the bone from the lamb we cooked at Easter--so I threw it in the crock pot for 2 days (with water, apple cider vinegar, dehydrated onions and a bay leaf).  Bone broths are very high in protein, gelatin, they're full of minerals and gut-healing properties--and I don't have to tell you that, right?  You all know that.  And you know what else?  Lamb bones cooked into soup are far less gamey than the actual meat is when you roast it.  It's a good way to start your non-lamb-eating family on the road to enjoying it.

After 2 days of slow-cooking, I found that almost 2 cups of meat, marrow and fat came off the bone.

This is more of a guideline than a true recipe.    You can adjust or sub in anything you want to.

Scotch Broth Soup

Ingredients:

4 cups lamb bone-broth
2-3 cups leftover lamb meat
3 cups cabbage, chopped fine
1 cup carrots, chopped fine
1/2 cup onion, chopped fine
1/2 can  tomato paste
2 Tbs apple cider vinegar
salt and pepper to taste
butter or other fat for frying

Method:

In a heavy pot or Dutch Oven, on medium heat, melt fat and saute onions until almost translucent.  Add carrots and  saute for a few minutes more.  Add cabbage, tomato paste, vinegar, broth, and remaining meat, turn down to med-low, and simmer or half an hour.

Serve with these awesome biscuits...

(This recipe originally came from HERE with a couple of substitutions--the recipe was fantastic as-is, but I didn't want to spring for bacon this week, so  instead I used up some cheddar cheese).  If you eat dairy, cheese is a pretty cheap source of protein.  Just saying.....

Cheddar-Spinach Biscuits

Ingredients:

1/3 cup coconut flour
1/4 tsp baking soda
4 eggs
1/2 cup cheddar
1/2 cup spinach
1/4 cup onions
1/4 cup fat (I used bacon grease--cheap and available)

Method:

Preheat oven to 400F

Saute onions on medium heat in fat until translucent.  Remove from heat and let cool a bit.  In a bowl, mix coconut flour and baking soda.  Add eggs to dry mixture, stir well.  Add onions, all the melted fat from the pan, cheese and spinach.  Form into balls and place on parchment-lined cookie sheet.   I got 12 of them out of this recipe.

Bake 15 minutes until golden but still slightly tender to the touch.

Eat up.

All I needed to buy to make this recipe was a head of cabbage.  I already had everything else in my fridge.

$1.49.  Done.

I think I'll be making a lot more soups in the future.

Crockpot Carnitas and Herbed Cauli-Rice

I have begun to suspect that there is a paleo advocate carefully camouflaged inside the Chatelaine Magazine recipe-creating staff....  And it makes me so, so happy.

We will infiltrate everything, everywhere, until we have taken over the world, bwa-ha-ha-ha....

Because in Canada, paleo is still mostly unheard of.  It is a secret world mostly known only to crossfitters, celiac-sufferers and mega fad-dieters.  And the Canadian magazine Chatelaine is distributed worldwide; according to Rogers Publishing, it has a readership of 3,280,000.  So any recipe they publish is going to really, really be seen.

Of course, they don't CALL those recipes paleo.  Or primal.  Or grain-free.

But they exist.  Oh, how they exist--just look a little closer.

And even better than that, of the non-paleo recipes they present, many of those recipes are no longer carb-centric either, lending themselves to easy translation into a paleo-acceptable meal.  Or so I find.  Is it just me?  You decide--go check it out here.

So it is that I came upon this recipe for easy crockpot pork carnitas.  With a pretty picture for herbed rice, too, which is apparently the way we're supposed to be serving out carnitas, if we're going to do it right.  (I want THEIR food photographer...sigh...see right pic; next time I'm just going to have to try to imitate their photo set-up)

Now, I've seen paleo carnita recipes out there before.  I've cooked a few of those recipes.  And while they were definitely tasty, they were also hi-effort.  And I'm a lazy cook.

So, a few small tweaks to the Chatelaine recipe, and voila, perfection and deliciousness happened.  And as for the herbed rice?  A quick google taught me that its just rice with fresh herbs and lime juice added to it.  Wow, how simple and tasty THAT turned out.  So here's what I did:

Crockpot Carnitas

Ingredients:

• 2 lbs pork shoulder
• 2 tsp chili powder
• 1 tsp hot red pepper flakes
• 1 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 tsp dried minced onions
• 1-2 tsp garlic powder
• 2 tsp coconut sugar
• pepper to taste
• 1 tsp cinnamon 
• 1 bay leaf

Method:

If you have regular grocery-store meat, trim off all visible fat.  Cut pork into large chunks and place them in your crockpot.  Add all spices except bay and toss to mix. Place your bay leaf ontop of the meat, cover and cook according to crockpot manufacturers instructions.  With my crockpot, it's 10-12 hours on low, or 4-5 hours on high.

Go to work and forget about it.

At the end of the day, give the meat a quick stir to re-distribute juices, if there are any.  Heat frypan to med-high, add some fat of choice and throw those meat chunks in just to slightly crisp them on the sides that weren't face-up in the crockpot.


Herbed Cauli-Rice

Ingredients:

• 1 head cauliflower
• 1-2 Tbs chicken broth
• 1/2 c green onions, chopped
• 1/2 c fresh cilantro leaves, chopped
• 1/2 c fresh parsley leaves, chopped
• 2 frozen cubes of fresh dill, or 2 tsp dill from those "tubes" or 2 Tbs chopped fresh dill
• juice of 1 lime
• butter, for frying

Method:

Rice your cauliflower.  In frypan on med-high, add cauliflower and chicken broth, cover and "steam" for a few minutes, until broth evaporates.  Add butter, lime juice, and all spices, cook for a couple more minutes until fragrant and cauli is cooked al dente.

Serve pork over herbed cauli-rice. I served mine with all the extra pan-juices poured over top because I'm like that.  I love my fatty-fat-fat.   Enjoy!

Taco Beef Stew

One of the things I like best about having bought a half cow is that I no longer have to eat ground beef every other day to keep the grocery costs down.  Yea, I love ground beef, too, but some variety is in order sometimes, you know?  So I play this new game now--I open the freezer door, jam my hand inside, and whatever comes out is what we're eating.  Really, that's a fun game, I swear it is.  You don't think that's fun?  Well, you're just dumb, then.

Ok, now there's a small problem with my little game.  I keep pulling out stewing meat.  Unlike ground beef (aka the most versatile meat in the universe), there's not a lot of fun things you can do with stewing beef....  Or is there?  Is it possible that I just haven't had the luxury of trying to figure out new and innovative things to do with stewing beef?  I think that's a challenge!  Challenge accepted, sir!

So last night, for my initiation into this little experiment, a little something familiar, a little something new.  There is nothing my family loves better than mexican flavours.  Think chili--and tacos.  Sure, I could have spent a half hour whipping up a batch of grain-free tortilla bread--but who wants that kind of make-work project?  This was stewing beef, as in, set it and forget it in the crockpot!

I love my crockpot.  There's an awful lot of stuff I can cook well with a crockpot, and certain food just lend themselves to the crock, don't they?  Like stewing beef.  So I've learned that when cooking in the crockpot, everything gets all moist (and watery) which isn't always what I want (unless I'm making stew, which I wasn't).  Enter tomato paste.  Universal thickener.  Problem solver.

Easiest recipe ever.

Does the spice blend look familiar?  It's the spice blend Mark Sisson suggests for tacos.  The best spice mix for tacos I've had so far, so I stick with it.  Its almost perfect.  I only add cayenne.

Serves 4-5

Ingredients:

1 lb stewing beef or bison
1 5-oz can tomato paste
1 Tbs chili powder
1 tsp cumin
1/4 tsp onion powder
1/4 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp oregano
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
dash (or two) cayenne

Method:

In crockpot, mix tomato paste and all the spices.  Cover and cook on low 10-12 hours, or on high 4-5 hours.  Crockpot temperatures and times vary.  These are the times that work for my dinosaur crockpot.

Serve with chopped avocado, shredded lettuce, cheddar (if you eat cheese), hot sauce, salsa, whatever!  I served mine over paleo "grits", too.  Just because I had a lot of cauliflower in my fridge and not so much lettuce.

Crockpot Meatloaf

Ok, so I seem to make meatloaf kinda often.  It's funny; to me, meatloaf is total comfort food, but I'm not particularily fond of meatballs at all.  It's weird, I know.  I should just be able to make meatballs with my fave meatloaf flavours in there and voila--but no.  Not the same.

So this recipe idea originally came from the Wellness Mama, who did an entire month of blogging crockpot recipes (my hero--I love things I can throw in the crockpot and come home to a house full of good food smells and dinner waiting for me whenever I'm ready for it...).  But I was feeling saucy (aka cranky and tired and difficult) two nights ago, when we were trying to assemble whatever ingredients we could in advance so we could just stick it in the pot and turn it on the next morning.  I wasn't feeling particularily helpful, so when Steve asked me what I wanted in the meatloaf this time, I said, "I dunno, I don't care, get creative."  Hmm.  So he scowled for a minute while I emailed him a copy of the crockpot recipe to his laptop, and then he pulled out the dog-eared "Company's Coming Crockpot Recipes" book at the back of our cookbook cupboard and began asking me questions about which ingredients are paleo and which aren't.  So this is what ended up going into the meatloaf...

I'll be the first to admit that anything cooked in the crockpot, while delicious, comes out looking like crap.  It does not make food look pretty.  But slow cooking meat with spices draws out so much more flavour, all flavour, that less spices are needed, and the meat is fall-apart tender no matter what cut you use.

Ingredients:

2 lbs ground meat--I used beef
1 egg
3 tbs worchestershire sauce
1/3 c salsa
1 small cooking onion, or 1/4 large spanish onion, finely diced
1 5-oz can tomato paste

Directions:
Combine everything except tomato paste in the crockpot.  Steve literally packed it down to the shape of the crockpot and didn't even try to make it a loaf shape or anything.  Spread tomato paste all over top of crockpot.  Cook according to crockpot instructions--in my crockpot, its always low 10-12 hours or high 4-5 hours.

Now, the Wellness Mama suggested her kids liked their meatloaf with applesauce (whatever made them think of THAT?)  But the British in me loves anything even more if there's a sauce involved, so I thought, why not?  I have unsweetened applesauce in the back of my fridge--and wow, it IS better yet with applesauce.  I have a new love:  Applesauce with my meatloaf.  Who'da thunk it?

Crockpot Chicken Cacciatore

I first learned how to make Chicken Cacciatore in an "International" home-ec class in high school.  We had some pretty creative classes at my high school.  Know what else  I learned how to do in that class?  Debone a chicken.  And we used fresh ginger in the "asian" part of the course, something I would have never, ever seen at home since in my family we ate "foods from a box" with meat on the side.  Yea, I don't come from a foodie family.

Anyhow, I liked the Cacciatore so much that it became one of the first things I cooked for my family at home, over and over, because it was so damned easy.  It translates perfectly into the crockpot, too.  Now, when I made this on sunday, we gobbled it up so fast that I failed to take a picture of it.  So this very artistic photo is not my photo.  I wish it was.  I need to learn how to take such great photos...

Serves 4-6 (6 if you make paleo bread)

Ingredients:

• 2 lbs chicken (I used boneless skinless thighs this time, because that is what was on sale, but bone-in is actually better)
• 1 pkg muchrooms (I used cremini; they were on sale)
• 1 sweet pepper (I like to use yellow or orange because they're sweeter)
• 1/3 spanish onion
• 1 28-oz can tomatoes, drained
• 1 5-oz can tomato paste
• 1/4 c balsamic vinegar
• 1/4 c red wine, your choice (I'm a shiraz fan)
• 1 tbs italian seasoning
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 2 of my chicken "flavour cubes"

Directions:

Throw it all into the crockpot, stir, close lid and set at 5-6 hours on high or 10-12 hours on low.  You might be looking at the red wine and thinking of omitting it, and you CAN add more balsamic vinegar to compensate, but traditional Cacciatore uses red wine and it does impart an important part of the flavour.  Your choice.  The alcohol will cook off in the crockpot.

We decided to make some paleo irish soda bread to go with it, just for a bit of nostalgic bread-dipping.  It was totally unnecessary.  The food was awesome on it's own.  The kitchen was full of all these great aromas.  I love my crockpot.