Bacon Sausage Serrano Skillet

Don’t you love a delicious and healthy skillet meal? Easy clean-up is something I try to help everyone with as I share Paleo and Paleo-ish meals. Hey, we are all busy and the better we eat, the more we can accomplish.

Seranno peppers are filled with capsaicin and trigger a flood of endorphins which are natural pain-killers. They also are extremely high in vitamin C. Pick up a couple and try them out in this amazing skillet concoction.

I boiled 2 sweet potatoes in a pan in water until tender when stuck with a fork.

I diced 1 small white onion and 2 serrano peppers and cooked them until tender in a small skillet along with 1 TBSP coconut oil.

While that was cooking I opened a 1 lb package of uncured bacon. I cut it into one-inch pieces with my kitchen scissors and dropped them into a large skillet. I added 1 lb of sausage and cooked that all together until browned.

Now, all I had to do was put this skillet meal all together. 

When the sweet potatoes were soft, I poured off the hot water and covered them with cold water so they would cool enough for me to peel and then cut into chunks.  

I drained a little of the bacon/sausage grease out of the large skillet. I added the sweet potatoes and the pepper/onion mixture to the large skillet.

I added:

1 tsp smoked sea salt

1/2 tsp smoked paprika

freshly ground pepper, to taste

Paleo Honey Mustard Chicken Breasts

I've been taking boxed up dinner to Ger and Cassie at the box lately since Ger didn't want to eat after 7 pm and he's not home by then.  This is his last week with me, so if people think I am spoiling him by "Feeding Ger Sasser" AND delivering his dinner to the box, then so be it.   I want to send Ger and Cassie out well-fed - they have so many details to take care of right now, it's the least I can do!

Have I shared with you all that he will be flying out on Sunday (the day after his wedding) to play for the NPGL's San Francisco Fire?  Thank you for the proud mom moment.
Now, on to the recipe:

I rubbed coconut oil on a 9 x 12 glass baking dish.

I mixed the following ingredients in a small bowl:

1/4 cup organic brown mustard
1/4 cup honey
2 TBPS melted coconut oil
2 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 tsp basil
2 tsp smoked sea salt
freshly ground black pepper, to taste

I placed 5-6 chicken breasts in the baking dish and poured the honey mustard mixture on top. I made sure all of the chicken was coated, using a silicone brush.

I baked the chicken in a 350 degree oven for 50 minutes.  (You might want to cut into the thickest part of the biggest chicken breast to make sure it is cooked through.)

This is how the boxed dinners looked. The chicken was delicious with zucchini and yellow squash cooked in a skillet with coconut oil and    Bacon Wrapped Pineapple:

http://feedinggersasser.blogspot.com/2014/07/bacon-wrapped-pineapple.html

Food is our fuel. Let's fuel up!

Paleo Cantalope Whip

If you love cantaloupe you will love this Paleo Cantaloupe Whip. (If you don't love cantaloupe this probably won't fix that....) Anyway, they are incredibly sweet and ripe this time of year at the farmer's markets and I hope you will try it.  Also, I have MANY different Whip recipes here - find your favorites!

I cut the cantaloupe into bite-sized pieces and put them into a gallon freezer bag.

Several hours later, I put 1/2 the cantaloupe chunks into the food processor.

I added:

 1/4 cup coconut milk (from a can)

1 heaping TBSP raw honey

I blended until there were no lumps and served immediately. Then I did the other half of the cantaloupe the same way and put it into small serving containers for the freezer.  

Melons are so good for you!

Paleo Saucy Burgers

These are my Paleo Saucy Burgers and they are so flavorful!

I put 1 TBSP of coconut oil into a skillet.
I made 8 burger patties out of two lbs of grass fed burger and placed them into the skillet over medium heat.

I sprinkled the burgers with:

Cherry Wood Smoked Sea Salt (salttraders.com)
freshly ground black pepper
turmeric
smoked paprika
basil
Garlic Gold Nuggets (garlicgold.com)

Only one side got all these spices.  I flipped them when they were browning and added 1/4 cup marinara sauce. The sauce blended in with the spices as I flipped the burgers again and became this thick saucy sauce.

I served these Paleo Saucy Burgers with salsa and avocado on top, along with my Roasted Butternut Squash with Grass Fed Butter and Balsamic Vinegar. You can see this great combination in the top photo. I didn't have time to make my own salsa, so I added fresh sliced roma tomatoes to Jack's fresh salsa so it would be much more colorful.

It was delicious and the end of a perfect day!

Roasted Butternut Squash with Grass Fed Butter and Balsamic Vinegar

This recipe is for the top half of this lovely dinner I took to Ger and Cassie at the box tonight.  It was a great combination so I decided to use the photo of the both. I'll blog the "Paleo Saucy Burgers" next.

I took a big butternut squash from the Farmer's Market and cut it in half the long way. I scooped out the seeds and discarded them.  I placed the two squash halves cut-side-down in a 9 x 12 glass baking dish and added 1/2 inch of water.

I roasted the squash in a 450 degree oven for 40 minutes. I poured off the water and flipped the squash over until it cooled enough to peel and cut into bite-size chunks.

I placed the servings in containers and topped them off with grass fed butter and a generous amount of balsamic vinegar. Have you tried the ones from The FLYING OLIVE They are just amazing. If you're in the Cincinnati area, you should go check them out, to save yourself the shipping.

Constantly Varied Vegetables

Sometimes people get stuck in a rut on the side dishes to make. Sometimes they are increasing their vegetable intake for health gains, or to cut weight, or if they are doing a however-many-day-paleo thing.  This one got compliments. This one they said, "Blog this one." It is seen in the photo along with my       http://feedinggersasser.blogspot.com/2014/03/paleo-salmon-croquettes.html.

I put the following ingredients into a large skillet:

1/4 cup chicken stock (read the ingredients - some stock has a lot of junk...)
1 tsp Garlic Gold oil (garlicgold.com) or 1 tsp coconut oil and 1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp chipotle chili powder
1/2 tsp smoked sea salt (salttraders.com)
freshly ground black pepper, to taste

1/2 of a white onion, diced
1 zucchini, cut into chunks
1 sweet green pepper, deseeded and cut into chunks (add a jalapeño if you want, too)
2 banana peppers, deseeded and cut into chunks
1/2 of a bunch of asparagus, woody ends discarded, then cut into bite-sized pieces

I cooked this over medium heat for 10-12 minutes, stirring now and then.
When the constantly varied vegetables (lol) were crisp-tender, I added sugar-free pasta sauce (again, read those labels....)

I cooked another 5 minutes, on low heat, to blend the flavors and thicken the sauce.

Good stuff!

The MOVEstories guys got some nice shots when they were here in February - I appreciate them so much!

Bacon Wrapped Pineapple

If you type  - Bacon Wrapped - into the search box on this blog you'll get 10 different recipes......and this recipe is the 11th. What can I say? We like things wrapped in bacon.

I cut a fresh pineapple into big bites from the spears I'd bought.
I took my kitchen scissors and cut a package of uncured bacon in half.

I covered a baking sheet with big Reynold's Wrap because I am all about the easy clean-up.
I wrapped each piece of pineapple with a half-piece of bacon and laid it on the baking sheet with the end of the bacon on the bottom. (This prevents them from unwrapping themselves.)

I baked them in a 350 degree oven for 20-25 minutes. Different bacon thickness and different oven temps can affect the times, so take a look at yours and if they don't look crispy, go a little longer, right?
You can't beat this combination. We ate them up pretty quickly. 

Hazelnut Cinnamon Raw Chocolates

Sometimes chocolate is just a craving. The least we can do is choose the best way possible to indulge. That's why I worked on this recipe today. It's cocoa, coconut oil, hazelnut flour goodness in little muffin papers. The roasted hazelnut on top makes the whole thing just sing..... and it takes 5 minutes to get them into the fridge!


I stirred the following ingredients up in a small bowl:

2/3 cup coconut oil, warm
2 TBSP cocoa powder
2 TBSP real maple syrup
2/3 cup hazelnut flour  (Other nut flours work also, like almond flour. You can also make your own   hazelnut flour in the food processor with hazelnuts.  I get mine from nuts.com)
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp cinnamon
pinch salt

I put 12 mini cupcake paper liners in my mini cupcake pan.
I spooned the mixture into the liners and put them into the fridge to solidify.

I put a few whole hazelnuts into a 350 degree oven for 6 minutes. When they cooled off just a little, I put them on top of the raw chocolate treats. Yum!
Toasted coconut would be wonderful on top, too.

Paleo Fried Yellow Zucchini

Yes, you read that right - yellow zucchini.  A farmer at the farmer's market this week pointed them out to me and they were delicious. If you see any, get them!
This recipe works the same for green zucchini, yellow squash, and for Paleo Fried Green Tomatoes, too.

I put some coconut oil in my grill pan and heated it up.

I washed and cut 2 yellow zucchini. They were about 1 cm thick.
On a small plate, I mixed:

2 TBSP almond flour
1 TBSP coconut flour
1/2 tsp basil
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

I laid both sides of the zucchini into the mixture and then put them into the pan. I cooked them 3-4 minutes on each side until tender and delicious.  Quick and easy!

                    Yellow squash on the left - yellow zucchini on the right.  See the difference? 

Paleo Raspberry Dessert Cups

I love raspberries. Do you?
I used them in this easy paleo treat today. This photo shows 8 of them.... because 4 of them were eaten at this stage while they were setting up in the fridge:

Check out how easy it was!  (You may choose to warm the layers in the microwave instead, but I've given up the microwave - all those other countries can't be wrong....)

I  put 12 cupcake liners in a cupcake pan.


I put a big skillet with a little water on the stove over medium low heat. (If you have a double boiler, you could use that instead.) I placed a corning ware dish in the water and added the following ingredients so that they could heat up and blend slowly:

3 TBSP coconut oil
3 TBSP almond butter
5 TBSP cocoa
1 TBSP + 1 tsp raw or local honey
1 tsp vanilla
2 TBSP coconut cream concentrate (coconut butter)
1 TBSP cinnamon
pinch of sea salt

I stirred this up and put a heaping TBSP into each cupcake liner. I pushed this mixture down a little in each one so that it covered the bottom. I put the cupcake pan into the fridge so that this layer could harden while I worked on the next.

I rinsed the corning ware dish so I could just use it again for the coconut layer.  It DOES need to be in the skillet of water again! I added the following ingredients into this dish:

2 TBSP coconut cream concentrate (coconut butter)
2 TBSP coconut oil
2 TBSP pasture butter from grass fed cows
1 TBSP raw or local honey
1 tsp vanilla
1/3 cup fresh raspberries, smashed with a fork and juicy

When this mixture was melted and blended, I removed the corning ware dish from the heat and added:

 1 1/2 cups unsweetened coconut chips (the big chunky stuff) and stirred until well blended. 

I took the cupcake pan out of the fridge and added the raspberry coconut mixture layer onto the cocoa layer.
Then I put it back into the fridge for 15 minutes.

The last "layer" was 24 dark chocolate chips and 1/2 tsp coconut oil, melted and stirred. I drizzled it over the top of each of the 12 little desserts evenly. I put one fresh raspberry on top of each serving.

Isn't that pretty? They're great with coffee - I just had one.
 Ger thinks they are ONE-BITE dessert cups! Ha!

Acorn Squash Sausage Bowl

Sometimes I just want dinner to be very simple, very easy, and very healthy. This was one of those nights.

I split an acorn squash in half and scooped out the seeds and stringy stuff. I placed the two halves face down in a square glass baking dish and added 1/2 inch water. I roasted the squash in a 400 degree oven for 40 minutes.

Meanwhile, I cooked 1 lb of local farmed pork sausage in a skillet over medium heat, stirring often.

When the acorn squash was tender and cooled off just enough to work with, I loosened the squash flesh form the rind and placed the squash in a bowl. I sprinkled it with smoked sea salt and black pepper.
I topped that off with some of the crumbled sausage that I'd put on paper towels to catch the grease.

I choose a ripe avocado and sliced it for the top layer.

Done.
Simple.
Interesting flavor combinations and very satisfying indeed.
You know you can do this one!
It was SO good with a green Synergy kombucha with chia.

Layered Fruit Popsicles

The Crossfit Kids classes at Crossfit Countdown have been doing a great job this summer and I thought they deserved a treat.   I also figured it was a perfect way to get eleven taste-testers in one place!  After they finished up all that hard work, I helped them out with a cool-down - nine kids plus Cassie and Ger - didn't that turn out just perfect?

So here they are earning their treat:

Here they are enjoying their Layered Fruit Popsicles and identifying the flavors right before they wrote in their journals.

Here's how I made them, in case you want to treat some kids. (big or small)

First, I made sure I had a place in the freezer to put a baking dish.
I put 11 little plastic cups in a baking dish and put a popsicle stick (or craft stick) in each cup. These sticks were on the diagonal, but it didn't matter at all.

I poured some "Limeaid" (fresh lime juice, coconut water, and honey) in each cup, about 1/2 inch. I set the baking dish into the freezer for 30 minutes so that the layer could begin to freeze.

Next, I put frozen peaches, coconut water, (I didn't measure these - just make a good guess) and 1 tsp honey into the food processor and pulsed until smooth.
I took the popsicles out of the freezer and spooned the second layer onto the first layer, pushing it around the stick, until each one had a peach layer about 1/2 inch deep.

I put them back into the freezer for another 1/2 hour.
I rinsed the food processor parts and put it back together. Then I added 8 strawberries, one banana cut into bite-sized pieces, some coconut water and 1 tsp honey.

When the second fruit layer was frozen, I poured the last layer into the cups evenly and put them back into the freezer until time to go WOD.

If you make these, you can cover the tops of the ones you don't eat immediately with plastic wrap. Just poke the stick through the plastic wrap.

You could do lots of other layers, too. The peach layer was guessed as mango by Gavin, which sounds like a great idea to me. Grape juice would look good, too.....

Paleo Butternut Squash Tomato Soup

Ger said this soup was REALLY GOOD, MOM. I was glad to hear that, of course. He's marrying Cassie and moving in twenty-some days and I won't hear that as often as I've been hearing it. I am so happy for them - I see how happy they are, making plans and moving forward with their lives. They make quite a team!!!!!

Anyway, here's how I made this awesome soup.
I halved and seeded one butternut squash. I rubbed coconut oil on a 9 x 12 glass baking dish and placed the squash cut side down and roasted it in a 400 degree oven for 45 minutes. Then I took it out and let it cool enough so that I could scoop out the butternut squash flesh from the skin and set it aside.

Next, I diced one small onion.
I put 1 TBSP coconut oil in a stock pot and added the onion. I cooked this until the onion was tender, about 5 minutes.
I added:
1 tsp Garlic Gold nuggets   (garlicgold.com) or however you like to add garlic. Fresh works, too.
1/2 tsp dried ground ginger
1/2 tsp dried basil
1/2 tsp turmeric
2 TBSP balsamic vinegar
2 tsp smoked sea salt  (salttraders.com) or other sea salt
freshly ground black pepper, to taste
2  15 oz cans diced tomatoes
2 cups organic chicken stock

I added the roasted butternut squash flesh last and then simmered for 15 minutes so that all the flavors could blend together.

Really good soup.  (If you want to have a smoother soup, use a mixer, immersion blender, or the food processor in small batches. We liked it a little chunky.)

I served this with my Rotisserie Style Crock Pot Chicken       http://feedinggersasser.blogspot.com/2013/06/rotisserie-style-crock-pot-chicken.html

Banana Protein Pancakes

These beautiful pancakes aren't completely paleo - they have a little old-fashioned oats in them. I wanted to tell right up front. But, there's no sugar in the oats and they don't spike your insulin levels.

I put these ingredients into a mixing bowl:

2 scoops vanilla protein (I used Progenex Tropical Vanilla)
2 bananas
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon
pinch of sea salt
2 eggs
1/3 cup old-fashioned oats

I used a mixer to blend and then fried them in coconut oil in a pan over medium heat. I flipped them when little bubbles started to show in the batter.

I served them with KerryGold butter from grass fed cows, a touch of pure maple syrup and uncured bacon on the side.

There were pancakes left (Ger wasn't home - ha!) and I ate them later with raw almond butter on them. Delicious!

I realized (thanks to Cindy) that all of my kids were at the box for the July 4th celebration so it was a great time to get a photo. Cassie will be "official" on August 2, but she's always felt like mine.....ever since she walked into the sushi restaurant in the color-block skirt and black boots and Ger grinned like never before. 

Paleo Fried Cabbage

I like this new recipe cooked down a little bit more than in the photo, but, like so often happens around here, we ate it and didn't get a photo of the finished dish.  It was a little softer and a little browner.
Thanks for sharing your cabbage, Shannon Luther.  I love fresh local-grown garden produce!

I chopped 1/2 of a cabbage and put it into a large skillet, along with 2 TBSP coconut oil. (I'm trying 1 TBSP coconut oil and 1 TBSP bacon grease next time....)
I chopped 1 red pepper and added that into the mix.
I opened 1 can of whole green chilies, drained them, and gave them a quick chop. I added these to the skillet along with the following seasonings:

1/4 tsp turmeric
1/4 tsp mustard
1/4 tsp smoked paprika
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

I cooked and stirred over medium heat until it was cooked down and tender, flipping with a spatula often.

It was delicious with grass fed burgers and artisan lettuce, and very colorful. Ger and Cassie had guac and salsa with theirs, too.

Kerry Artis got some nice shots of Ger at the 2014 Crossfit Central East Regionals. Keep them coming, Kerry!