Apples, Apples, So Many Apples!

Long time no see! It's been crazy around here with graduating from college / moving twice (three times) / getting married / going on a honeymoon / working on my photography business! Luckily, life has slowed down a bit. I've been spending my days working on photography - whether that be promotions, booking shoots, preparing a website. It's time consuming but I can hardly consider that work!

Braden and I have been keeping life pretty low key, at least for these first few weeks of marriage. This past Sunday we were invited to join his family at Sky Top Orchard in Asheville, NC. Since we didn't have any plans holding us back, we accepted and made the drive up to NC.

Our basket didn't seem very full, but we ended up leaving with more apples than I know what to do with (in addition to the apples we already had)!

This apples overload lead me to some baking frenzies. So many apples so little time. We had a good friend coming over for dinner on Monday so I decided to go the dessert route, Apple Crisp!

I wanted something simple and I stumbled upon this recipe. The only thing that took a little time was chopping up the apples, but other than that it was super simple and quick.

Apple Crisp

*Preheat oven to 375°

What you need:

6 apples cored, peeled, and sliced

2/3 cup all purpose flour

2/3 cup brown sugar

1/2 tsp salt

1/8 tsp nutmeg

1/8 tsp cinnamon

1/2 cup cold butter

2/3 cup oatmeal

Method:

1. Grease 9" pie plate

2. Add sliced apples evenly on pie plate

3. In a mixing bowl, combine flour, brown sugar, spices and salt.

4. Using a mixer, cut butter into the dry mixture

5. Stir in oatmeal

6. Sprinkle mixture on top of apples and bake for 35-40 min!

I've been walking more often, but walking by yourself just isn't that fun. We've become great friends with our pre-marital counseling couple Susan and Kent. They treat us like family, so we feel as if we are add-ons in their family! They have given me permission to take their "other" children for walks during the day, so of course I'm taking them any chance I can.

Meet Charlie and Nana, our adoptive children.

After my walk I contemplated what else I could make with our leftover apples. We love brinner, but try to save it for Sunday nights. However, every Sunday we've been back has been busy. So, I decided to incorporate apples into sweet potato waffles. I didn't know how great the combination would be, but WOW, I think we nailed it!

Paleo* Sweet Potato and Apple Waffles

What you need:
2 apples
2 small sweet potatoes
3 eggs
2 tbsp raw honey
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 cup almond milk (or other milk)
1.5 cup almond flour

Method:
1. Microwave sweet potatoes for 5 minutes, let cool.
2. While sweet potatoes heat up, core, peel, and slice apples - place in separate microwaveable bowl.
3. Add eggs, honey, almond milk, salt, cinnamon, and baking soda into a blender.
4. Cut sweet potatoes open, scoop out the insides into the blender with other ingredients - blend well.
5. Add in almond flour.
6. Use almond milk to thin out the puree, you may need more or less than 1/4 cup.
7. Sprinkle cinnamon on apples, then microwave for 2 minutes. Stir apples into puree mixture.

In a preheated waffle iron, add about 1/2 cup of mixture. This recipe made about 6 waffles!

We topped them with some Trader Joes Shortstack Syrup - YUM. These were SO good, we will definitely be making them more. Knowing us, we will make them in bulk and eat them throughout the week :) Did I mention that these are paleo?!

So what's the plan for the REST of our leftover apples? Only time will tell. Braden mentioned that he thinks we should juice them. I'm not complaining about fresh apple juice.

I like the idea of using one fruit and making multiple different recipes. Next on the list, pumpkin!

As Much As I Hate Defeat...

Let's just say that my paleo sugar detox did/did not go according to plan. I completed week one of the detox a few days shy of 7. You know how things go.. snack attacks while studying, road trips, and Easter didn't help me stay on track! For the 5 days that I did stay on a strict sugar detox, I felt incredible.

I felt so sluggish the few weeks prior to the detox. It took a lot of will-power to get off the couch and get moving, especially when it came to working out. I would get tired by 8pm, but still couldn't fall asleep until well after 12. My body was out of whack.

I never really craved sugar during the first week. As a matter of fact, I felt great without having any sugar. My body had been craving lean proteins and vegetables. A week of giving my body what it wanted did wonders for my metabolism, mood, and motivation (I love alliteration). Although numbers aren't super important, I went from 122.2lbs down to 118.6 after those 5 days on the sugar detox. For someone of my size, I'd say that's pretty significant in a 5 day period.

I've reintroduced artificial sweetner with my morning coffee. I'm a personal fan of Stevia and sugar free hazelnut creamer. I have also only been having one serving of fruit a day, not because of a detox, but because I really have not craved fruit that much. For those of you who know me, I'm a fruitaholic, so this is pretty out of the ordinary for me.

I hate to admit defeat.. but I must say, 5 days of the detox were plenty to recharge my body! I would still recommend the detox to anyone who is looking to jump start eating Paleo, or even those who just want to jump start eating healthy period. You would be surprised at how much your body craves meat and vegetables.

I may do a week sugar detox once every other month just to put my body in check, but I am not looking to do anything outrageously crazy in the next coming months. I plan to eat mostly strict paleo, with an occasional treat now and then - we all deserve that!

Hope you all are having a great week!

Spring Cleaning {internally}

I've been quite the stranger to blogging recently. Let's just go ahead and say life got in the way of all my extra time. I'm currently balancing 3 "mini" jobs, in addition to class 4 days a week. Needless to say, I stay busy every day from the time I wake up until the time I go to sleep!

After all of the schedule craziness, I was more than excited about heading to Daytona for spring break. We flew down to Florida last Monday and stayed until Friday. The weather was a bit chillier than any of us had anticipated, but it was still wonderful to get away for a week and relax.

We climbed 203 stairs to the top of the second tallest Lighthouse. I'm terrified of heights but I was encouraged every step of the way. I will admit.. I didn't look over the edge!

With relaxing comes eating, and with eating comes laziness, and with laziness.. well you get the point.
I've mentioned before that I did a strict month of eating Paleo. That month transformed my metabolism, my attitude, and my body. After a month of eating so well, led to a few weeks of eating well with a "little bit of this, little bite of that" of things that aren't so great (treats, sugars, etc) and I started getting extremely sluggish. My body was yelling WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!? I decided to have one last "free for all" week of eating at the beach during spring break, after all, what's a vacation without dessert every day?

I want to go back to strict paleo, but needed a little jump start to get me there. After a week of eating anything and everything, I decided to go on a paleo sugar detox.

I am doing a 3 week detox that goes back to strict paleo in the third week. The objective is to cleanse the body of all sugar, and to gradually start adding elements back in to reset my body and stabilize hormones. Have I mentioned that when I was eating poorly I had minimal to no energy. This cleanse should rid my body of any cravings and clean out my system to start eating strict paleo again. I've got to get ready for a wedding  in 5 months!

The rules for each week are slightly different. Week one is supposed to be the worst.

Following are the rules specifically laid out for each week…

Week 1 

No Sugar (including fruit), No Dairy, No grain, no legumes! No sugar includes artificial sweeteners, stevia, honey, agave.  NO Fruit.

Vegetables

Artichoke Beet greens Bell peppers Brussel sprouts Carrots Celery Cucumber Eggplant Green onions Mushrooms

Onions Parsnip Radish Seaweed Tomatillos Turnip greens Asparagus Beets Broccoli Cabbage

Cauliflower Collards Endive Lettuce Mustard Greens Parsley Spinach Tomato Turnips

Proteins

All fish Shellfish Any Game Meat Eggs

Lean Pork Lean beef Lean Poultry No Processed lunchmeat or bacon week 1

Fats

(with cutting out sugar and fruit will need fat as energy) Still don’t overdo !!!

Olive oil Coconut oil Avocado oil Almond oil Walnut oil Flaxseed oil Almonds Cashews

Pecans Pine nuts Pumpkin seeds Sunflower seeds Macadamia nuts Pistachios Sesame Seeds Walnuts

I am on day 3 of week one. I'll admit that I've missed my normal coffee and stevia every morning, but I've actually felt pretty good just eating protein, vegetables, and fats. Cutting out fruit for a week hasn't been as tough as I thought it would be, but I am still not even half way through the week. I've had a few minor headaches due to lack of sugar and caffeine, but nothing too unbearable.

On the brighter side, I've felt so much more energized and don't feel so weighed down by all the junk I was eating. Going strict again has led to new recipe discoveries, like my new personal favorite, kale chips (thanks Katie!) I'm also going to be trying some paleo pizzas later this week.

Check back in for another week 1 update! I'll also be blogging about weeks 2 and 3. Anyone care to join me?!

Happy cleansing!

When "Whoops" Turns into "Wonderful"

Do you ever have a hankering for something sweet, to the point where you'll search for an hour to find that "perfect" recipe that sounds incredible right in that moment? Yeah, me too. The only obstacle I've had lately is finding Paleo recipes that are just as delicious as the real thing. I've had my share of flops:  knock off chocolate cupcake made out of eggs and cocoa powder.. you do the math. But, I've also had my share of triumphs:  chocolate zucchini bread, chocolate mug cake, and the list goes on. 

Let's get real though, I'm always in the mood for cookies. Or anything sweet for that matter.

I stumbled upon a Paleo chocolate chip cookie recipe that sounded promising, so Braden and I decided to give it a try with a few twists of our own. Well.. the cookies were supposed to turn out like this..

But ours turned out like this..

How did we deal with this dilemma? We called them Paleo chocolate chip muffins, problem solved! They were so light and fluffy, much different than I expected. It was rather surprising.. and made both of our tummies happy! To see the actual recipe, skip on over to Delighted Momma's recipe. 

If you're aiming for some muffins, I've got you covered!

Paleo Chocolate Chip Muffins

What you'll need:

1 cup almond flour

1/2 cup coconut oil (or vegetable oil)

3 tbsp honey

4 eggs

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Pinch of salt

3/4 cup chocolate chips (we used 60% Cacao chips)

Method:

Preheat oven to 375°

2. Melt honey and oil together in microwave for 15 seconds

3. In mixing bowl, mix together:  oil, honey, eggs, vanilla, and salt

4. Stir in almond flour and chocolate chips

5. Pour batter into muffin tins (we made 12 muffins)

Bake for 12-15 minutes :)

We loved these muffins, there's only a few left and they were just made yesterday! It's not very often that a baking recipe turns out wonderfully when you do something wrong, I'll take it as a win. Has anyone else had a recipe flop and end up turning into something great? 

I'm off to do a little Christmas shopping! I hope you all have a wonderful day. Hooray for Thanksgiving Break!

Recent Happenings

I've really jumped off of the blogging bandwagon, and I really want to hop back on. With writing being a passion of mine, I really need to get better at keeping up with this! I've mentioned before that I have some catching up to do! What better way than to catch up in pictures?

I'm always in the mood for pancakes, and I've posted about them before in sweet potato form. I wanted to make my life a little simpler and have a little less prep time.

Enter egg and protein powder pancakes, probably the easiest combination in the world! Mix 1 scoop of protein powder, I use Sun Warrior vanilla, with 2 eggs and 1/2 tsp baking powder. They're much fluffier than I expected. I've been throwing in different mix ins (blueberries, strawberries, sunbutter, etc) but chocolate chips have definitely been a recent fav.

Another recent fave that I've mentioned before is the chocolate mug cake. I wanted to make a knock off version of PaleOMG's chocolate mug cake. Her cake is wonderful, but I felt that it could definitely be modified to be "one serving friendly."

Mix together:  1 egg, 2 tbsp cocoa powder, 1 tbsp almond flour, 1 tbsp honey, 1 tsp oil, and a pinch of cinnamon. I always throw in a few chocolate chips to make it more of a treat. Microwave for 2 minutes!

This past weekend was filled with fun with friends. Friday night I went to Tigerama, a pep rally held by Clemson, for the very first time. Yes, the first time I got to go was my senior year.. and I loved it! My favorite part was when a few of our guy friends, the "320 Blues," performed the national anthem. After hanging out at Tigerama for a few hours we decided to play a few rounds of Catch Phrase, and it got INTENSE. Guys v Girls never fails to be entertaining. A fun night with friends isn't complete without some type of treat, so the girls and I headed to the store and got a huge package of cookie dough and vanilla ice cream.

Can you guess what we made?

Yep, you guessed it.. PAZOOKIE

It was totally dominated in a matter of 3 minutes, tops.

Saturday was the Clemson v Maryland game, also known as Homecoming. We spent the day tailgating around campus and eating our little hearts out. I love game days:  football, food, and friends are just a few of my favorite things. Might I add that I have the best (sassiest) friends on the planet?

Seriously, I couldn't ask for a better group of encouraging and fun people!

That's all for now!

Until next time, Happy Tuesday!

What's Baking Wednesday

I thought it'd be pretty fun to start a little weekly blog post about recipes I've tried or made that week. We'll see how this plays out after a few weeks, but for now I like the idea :)

Two things I have been missing since starting Paleo are sweet breads and the sweet crunch of cereal with berries in the morning. So far this week I've tried two new Paleo recipes:  Chocolate Zucchini Bread and Paleo Cereal!

So here's how it went down.

I stumbled across this recipe for chocolate zucchini bread and was dying to try it! I'm a huge fan of regular zucchini bread, so adding chocolate into the mix definitely appealed to me.

Chocolate Zucchini Bread

• 1 medium zucchini, shredded (equal to 1.5 cups shredded zucchini)

• 2 eggs, whisked

• 3/4 cup sunbutter (or nutbutter if you prefer)

• 1/3 cup raw honey

• 1/4 cup cocoa powder

• 2 tablespoons coconut (or almond)  flour

• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract, teaspoon cinnamon, 1/2 teaspoon baking powder, 1/2 teaspoon baking soda, pinch of salt

First step:  Shred your zucchini with a cheese grater. Once the entire zucchini is shredded, place onto paper towels and squeeze out excess water.

Second step:  Mix together all ingredients without the zucchini, once elements are combined well, then add in the shredded zucchini.

Step 3:  Pour into an 8x5 loaf pan and bake at 375° for 25-35 minutes. I checked mine periodically with a tooth pick to make sure it wasn't over baking.

The bread was so moist and delicious. I definitely recommend this if you're craving that sweet bread you've been missing!

I used to eat a bowl of Kashi Go Lean or TJ's bran flakes topped with frozen blueberries every single morning (I'm a creature of habit). Since Paleo took over, I have either protein pancakes or a turkey bacon omelette every morning. The pancakes take care of my sweet fix, but for some reason I've specifically been craving some cereal with milk.

Enter the Paleo cereal phenomenon.

Paleo Cereal

• 1/2 cup slivered almonds
• 1/2 cup walnut pieces
• 1/2 cup unsalted sunflower seeds
• 1 tbsp sunbutter (or nutbutter of choice)
• 1 tbsp almond butter (or nutbutter of choice)
• Drizzle with honey and cinnamon

Mix together all nuts, nutbutters, honey and cinnamon.

Put in baking dish (I used a pie pan) and pat down mixture.

Bake at 350° for 15 minutes. Side note, this makes your house smell delicious!

Add in some frozen or fresh blueberries and coconut milk (or almond milk) and enjoy!

I'm heading to workout at Crossfit. Today's workout is 200 double unders for time, and a 5 burpee penalty every time you mess up.. YIKES. It looks like I'll be doing a lot of burpees, which is never ever a good thing. 

Hope all of you are having a fantastic wednesday, we're half way through the work week!

Paleo On The Go

Since starting Paleo I've been trying to make recipes that Braden would enjoy, and ultimately gain his approval for Paleo-esque foods. After a few weeks he finally jumped on the bandwagon with me, so we are doing our Crossfit gym's 30 day Paleo challenge. Naturally, as soon as we decide to do a whole foods only diet we also decide to go on a week trip to three different beaches.

At first I was a little intimidated because food for me is usually a task, but making food for two.. and for someone who eats twice as much as me, now that was a challenge!

Friday night before we were leaving for beach stop #1 we went on a food shopping spree. We decided that breakfast and lunch meals were crucial, but dinner could be more flexible since we were going on vacation after all.

We packed a few of the usuals. 

After putting together the obvious essentials we needed, we embarked on our cooking extravaganza! I've never really made food in bulk but I've got to admit that I was pretty excited. We bought a montage of things at the grocery store, and we decided to make a few recipes I've mentioned in previous posts.

We started out with egg, sausage, green pepper, and spinach fritattas. These were super easy to make! I got the idea from Katie's recipe and modified it a little to add in some more protein.

We made a big batch of protein pancakes. These ended up being eaten at every point in the day.. breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks! They're so good cold or reheated. The next trip we take I know to make more pancakes, they're essential for travel ;)

We also went round two on the sweet potato and spinach turkey burgers. These were great reheated, we had them for lunch one day while at Pawley's Island. Still great paired with some dijon mustard ;)

Last but not least, I heated up a large spaghetti squash and packed half of it for the road. I made a turkey marinara from tomato paste, basil, oregano, garlic salt, and ground turkey. We never ate any of this meal which is kind of disappointing, but I know that it would have been delicious!

It was so great knowing that we always had food on hand, and that we were also saving a ton of money by not eating every meal out. Each night we ended up getting dinner out with friends, but we still stuck to our strict Paleo style eating. 

I'm glad we prepared all of our meals, but I was happier about spending some time with Bray and getting to have some quality cooking time with him!

That's all for tonight, be on the look out for a recap of our 4 day road trip to South Carolina beaches!

I'd Like That Paleo Style

I've been eating Paleo for about two weeks now, and it has been so great for my body. I've had much more energy and I'm always satisfied after meals. Emily jumped on the band wagon this week, and she wanted to make a Paleo style dinner for the first time. Naturally, I was super excited about embarking on this journey with her, plus I have a Paleo cooking partner now!

We decided on sweet potato and spinach turkey burgers with a side of asparagus.

Yep, they're as delicious as they sound!

What you'll need:

1/2 medium sweet potato

1/2 red pepper

2 1/2 cups spinach finely chopped

1 lb ground turkey 

1 egg

2 tbsp almond flour

1 tsp dijon mustard

1 tsp garlic seasoning

1 tsp chili powder

1 tsp rosemary & basil

Step 1: Heat a large skillet over medium high, spray with cooking spray, add chopped red pepper

Step 2: Peel and chop sweet potato into cubes, then add to skillet with red peppers

Let sweet potato and peppers cook for 4 to 5 minutes

Then, add in spinach and cook 2 to 3 minutes until wilted

Step 3: While the mixture cooks on medium, put asparagus in the oven and let cook for 20 minutes

Step 4: Put ground turkey to a large mixing bowl. Add egg, spices, and almond flour. Mix ingredients until well combined. Once mixture is combined, divide into 6 to 7 patties. 

Step 5: Cook patties until a slight golden crust forms, about 5 to 6 minutes, then flip to the other side until cooked all the way through.

Remove cooked patties and distribute between those eating. Each of us ate two patties and asparagus, it was incredibly good! I dipped mine in a little dijon mustard on the side, which added a little kick. 

Cooking with Alex and Em is always entertaining, we definitely had our share of laughs throughout this entire process. I'm looking forward to our next Paleo cooking adventure, because we definitely started out with a bang!

Sweet Potato Pancakes

I don't know about yall, but I LOVE sweet potatoes. Baked sweet potatoes, sweet potato fries, you name it and I probably love it. I've been exploring with pancake recipes and came across this one, and it's actually really good!

The first time I tried making these I just mashed the sweet potatoes.. I wouldn't suggest it haha. Definitely puree or blend the ingredients before you put them on the griddle.

Sweet Potato Pancakes

What you'll need:
1 small sweet potato
1 scoop vanilla whey protein
1/2 cup egg whites
Cinnamon
1 packet Stevia or Splenda to taste

Step 1: Put sweet potato in microwave for about 5-7 minutes
Step 2: Add egg whites, protein powder, cinnamon, and Stevia in blender (in that order!)
Step 3: Peel skin off sweet potato (careful, it's hot) and put everything but the skin in blender
Step 4: Blend/puree well, then spoon batter onto griddle

Spray with non-stick cooking spray -- Keep griddle on medium heat

The pancakes are ready to flip once edges firm up. Cook another 2-3 minutes until the undersides are also golden brown. Sometimes they'll get a large air bubble, no worries, just press it down with a spatula!

Mmm sweet and healthy, drizzle with maple syrup and enjoy!

Grapefruit goodness

I'm currently on a grapefruit kick - and I'm talking a breakfast, lunch, and dinner kick haha. I have a new favorite food at least every month! I figured since I'm eating so much of this tangy goodness, that I might as well see what the health benefits are. 

What I've found is that the power fruit has a high water content which an increased amount of water consumption can help increase metabolism.  It's a rich source of Vitamin C.  Grapefruit is rich in lycopene (the red color pigment) which helps to prevent the occurance of a tumor or cancer.  Grapefruit helps in cases of gallstones, colds, Pneumonia, and fever. The list goes on and on and on.

Needless to say, I'm totally okay with continuing this little grapefruit eating cycle I have going.  After looking at the benefits - how could you not want to grab a grapefruit and a spoon and have a yummy snack?!