Guilt-Free Friday: Pizza!

Lately I’ve been interested in the Paleolithic diet, or Paleo diet for short.  It’s basically the “original” human diet, or the caveman diet, Stone Age diet, whatever you want to call it.  It comes from the Paleolithic era, which is a span of about 2.5 million years that ended about 10,000 years ago at the beginning of agriculture.  What did we eat before baked bread or elbow macaroni or hot dogs and hamburgers and french fries?   What did the human race use to fuel their bodies to evolve or develop into what we are today?  Whatever nature provided, of course - meat from the animals, fish from the seas and rivers, vegetables from the land, fruits from the trees, berries from the bushes, nuts and seeds and roots all that good stuff!  This diet gained popularity in the mid 1970s by Walter Voegtlin, a gastroenterologist.  It’s based on the idea that the human digestive system is designed to eat what’s been available to us since the dawn of time, which is why we are seeing so many diet-related problems, disorders, and diseases today – all the processed junk, the additives and preservatives, the artificial coloring and flavoring, the added hormones, steroids, and antibiotics to our meat and dairy, etc. – it’s in practically everything we eat.  I personally feel like this is the leading cause in the majority of our health problems today.  I’ve read a lot of articles that I feel confirm my suspicions, too, but at the same time I feel it just makes sense – if it’s not food, don’t eat it!  And expanding on the Paleo diet, I’m adding to that statement – if it isn’t available to us through nature, are we meant to eat it?

Now, I’m not a religious person, but I do believe in a Maker, a Creator, whatever you want to call it, but since most of you call it God, we’ll use that.  So if God put us on this planet to thrive as a race, don’t you think He/She/It would have made available to us everything we need to stay nourished and grow and procreate?  As a side note, I also believe that God made available through nature everything we need to keep us well in case we get sick, but I’ll expand on that in a future topic!

Everything we need to thrive is right here for us!  It has been all along.  To ME, it makes sense not to tamper with a perfect design.  But unfortunately, we humans felt the need to tamper with it, and in so doing created bread, pasta, pastries, and all kinds of other yummy things that have been known to lead to several, if not many, health problems.  But the biggest problem is: IT’S YUMMY!!  Most people don’t WANT to forego all the modern pleasures of culinary evolution, myself included… But as you know, I tried it for a month or so, and I felt SO good (not to mention thinner!!), and each time I ate bread or pasta or things high in sugar after that, I didn’t feel so good…  So now that I know this about my body, and everything else I’ve learned about how the digestive system works and handles these “unnatural” modern foods, I’m determined to try to stay with that lifestyle.

As you may remember, I already found a wonderful substitute for pasta in the spaghetti squash, but that’s pretty simple and basic.  Well today you’ll be happy to hear I found a substitute for pizza.

Yes, pizza.  Well, the crust anyway, since the toppings aren’t really bad for you since they mostly consist of meat and veggies (just be careful with the cheese, that’s where you can find those added hormones and junk!).  It’s crazy, I didn’t think it would work, but I found this exact same recipe in several different locations, and all the reviews were going on and on about how it really tastes like pizza, and people were even fooling their kids!  What’s even crazier is that the main ingredient is CAULIFLOWER!

Say what??

Not kidding.  I had to try this.  And so I did.  Twice.  Holy crap, it’s almost too good to be true…  Every bite I took I thought, “Is this really happening?  I’m eating pizza, that tastes every bit like pizza, but doesn’t have a single bit of bread in it at all…”  My senses were so confused… my house smelled like a pizzeria as the crust baked, my eyes saw a crust with pizza toppings on it, my mouth tasted something that sure seemed like pizza, and my stomach got nervous – “Is this going to weigh me down?” it wondered.  “Is this going to make me have to work too hard?”  My hips were getting nervous too…  But no, it’s a vegetable, not bread!  :D  Relax, hips and stomach!  Just enjoy!

Oh, and it gets better.  This is easy too!  The only time consuming part is grating the cauliflower.  The rest is pie!

Here’s how it’s done:

2 cups grated or chopped, aka “riced”, cauliflower (about ½ head) (can be done in a food processor as well)

1 egg, beaten

1 cup mozzarella cheese

¼ tsp caraway seeds

½ tsp fennel seeds

1-2 tsp oregano

1-2 tsp basil

The crust, fresh out of the oven!

Microwave or saute the grated cauliflower for 8 minutes to soften it up.  Mix in the beaten egg, cheese, and spices and stir until a “dough” forms.  Press out into a thin layer onto a pizza stone or a baking sheet that’s either greased or lined with parchment paper.  Bake at 400°F for 25-30 minutes until golden, crispy, and cooked through the middle.  Let cool completely, then add toppings.  Side note: the more toppings you add, the more likely you’ll have to eat your slice of pizza with a fork – the crust doesn’t hold up well to too much weight.  Still tastes good though!  Broil for about 5 minutes until toppings are heated through, and enjoy!

No big deal if you don’t have caraway or fennel, but if you do, I’m pretty sure that’s what made my house smell like a pizzeria as the crust was baking.  Yummy!

Hawaiian style!  My favorite!

We had this one night just the three of us, and loved it.  Harlee scarfed it down and enjoyed the leftovers just as much the next day, and I felt good that he was eating lots of veggies!  After great success we made it again with some friends (actually, the one who inspired me to search for a pizza recipe in the first place, as we both didn't like the thought of having to give up pizza in pursuit of a low-carb diet!), and we didn’t tell anyone until AFTER they look the first bite that the crust wasn’t actually bread.  Everyone enjoyed it, and had no idea they were eating cauliflower!  I’ll definitely be making this anytime I’m craving pizza… which happens often… :)

Antibiotics: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

I strongly dislike antibiotics... For such good intentions they might carry, they're pretty harmful... but... what scares me is that not many people know how dangerous they can be!  Some people do, but there are SO MANY people that are hacking up a lung and saying, “Don’t worry, I’m on antibiotics, so I’ll get better soon.”  Or, “My immune system must be pretty great with as many antibiotics I’ve been on!”  That one about knocked me over.  And I’ve heard it SEVERAL times.

Antibiotics are very dangerous things.  Let me tell you what’s going on in our guts:

Adult humans have about 3-4 POUNDS of bacteria and yeast in our intestinal tract.  Yuck, right?  Wrong actually, you may think of bacteria as a bad thing, but in this case, they’re very very good!  They do a lot of things for us, one of them being create Vitamin B out of the food we send through our intestines.  They also keep the yeast in check, which is a very good thing, because if those little guys get out of control, oh boy… look out… Trust me from my personal experience, it’s not pretty.  These guys can eat away at your intestinal walls too, changing the very structure of them, and leaving you weak against things you used to be strong against (they can lead to food allergies!), and to make matters worse, they cause us to crave unhealthy things like sugars and carbohydrates in breads and pastas, as these are the very things the yeast feed off of to grow.  See how important it is to have the good bacteria in your system?  These little wardens are keeping the balance to help you stay healthy.  Some examples are Lactobacillus and Acidophilus, which are acid-forming bacteria you can find in yogurt.  There are some that are good AND bad too, like E. Coli, which is in EVERYONE’S intestinal tracts and even on our skin!  It helps us extract nutrients from the food we eat.  But if we come in contact with it in bad meat, then it’s not such a nice bacteria…

Unfortunately, some bad bacteria can find their way in that you never want there in the first place, such as Streptococci (which causes strep throat) or Pneumococci (which causes, you guessed it, pneumonia).  And we get really really sick, which is no good and no fun.  Enter in antibiotics.  Okay, okay, so in these cases I guess they’re a blessing in disguise, until we find safer ways to combat these dangerous illnesses.  I would experiment with it and look for natural remedies to fight off the dangerous bacteria, buuuutttt that’s way too big of a risk to take right now.  I’m much more comfortable experimenting with the common cold, or things that won’t kill me.  In the meantime, I guess I’ll take an antibiotic if I contract something evil and deadly.  I had to recently, actually.  I came down with a urinary tract infection (horray for the life of a new mom…) and did everything I could think of to fight it off naturally (which, by the way, has worked in the past) such as cranberry pills (since I hate cranberry juice, yuck), Echinacea and vitamin C, increased probiotics (getting to that in a moment), and mannose supplements I found at the health food store in town.  Nothing was working.  And I know not to mess around with these things – these infections can travel up your ureter and into your kidneys, and then you’ve REALLY got a problem.  So I finally, reluctantly, went to my OBGYN (not to an MD, partly because I don’t have one of those and didn’t want to go through the process of becoming a new patient, and mainly because after my penicillin incident I’m a little leery of MDs…) and she ran a culture, and E. Coli happened to be the intruder.  And it was getting pretty out of control.  So out came the antibiotic prescription (NOT penicillin, since that can kill me now) and off to the pharmacy I trudged.  With a pretty little snarl on my face.

So, if these antibiotics can kill off those evil deadly bacteria, why do I harbor such a hatred towards them?  Because they don’t JUST kill off the bad bacteria.  They kill off ALL the bacteria.  EVERYTHING.  Even those happy little guys keeping the yeast in check and making us some nice vitamin B.  Dead.  Now if you’re someone that rushes to get an antibiotic for yourself or your kid at the first sign of a possible infection, think about what your intestines must be looking like by now… Craving some pasta or candy, are we?  Or getting sick more often than you think is normal?  Know what else can happen when these bacteria are all gone?  Your whole system can lose balance.  Dormant cancer cells (yes, we all have them) don’t have anything to keep them dormant, and they are free to fester and grow.  Food allergies you may have developed from the lining of your intestines getting messed up can develop into things like diabetes or Crohn’s disease or what have you.  Or horrible yeast infections (*raises hand to represent*).  Scary, isn’t it?  And if something this serious doesn’t happen to you, you still risk missing out on important nutrients your body needs to stay healthy because the good bacteria aren’t there to extract it from the food you eat.  You also risk getting sick again and again and again, as there’s nothing to help your body learn how to defend itself on its own to prevent sickness the next time around.

Okay, so what do we do about this?  Well, first of all, don’t jump to take antibiotics so quickly unless your life is in danger.  Find alternative methods to get well.  But if you have no immediate choice other than to surrender to antibiotics, like I experienced when I was at risk for my situation turning into a kidney infection if left unchecked, then what? Replenish the good bacteria, of course!  Now you already learned that good bacteria is in yogurt, but you’re going to need to eat a LOT of yogurt to get your gut back in check – eating yogurt kind of only gives you a maintenance dose of probiotics.  Fortunately, you can get them in capsules in the refrigerated section of your local health food store.  I take a multi probiotic, the bottle says there are 20 billion live cultures in them… that’s a lot!  And when I was on antibiotics, I was taking about 8 capsules a day.  Hopefully that was enough…  Another good idea when you’re on antibiotics is avoid sugar (yes, carbohydrates too, they break down into sugar), since yeast feeds on sugar and without the friendly bacteria keeping them in check, you don’t want to help their situation that much more.  Taking immune-boosting supplements like Echinacea or garlic are good too, to help feed the good bacteria and nurse them back to health so they can report to duty and keep those yeast at bay.  But definitely definitely definitely take probiotics!  If the antibiotics are killing everything off in the first place, then your immune-boosting supplements have no good bacteria to support, and avoiding sugar will only give you grief.  Take those probiotics!!

Are they safe for kids?  Absolutely!  I’ve got Harlee on one every day and have since he was born.  When he was a baby I only gave them to him if he was taking a bottle of my pumped milk by pouring half a capsule of the probiotic powder into the bottle with the milk and shaking it until it disperses.  It wasn’t all that often, but being breastfed helped his system anyway so I wasn’t that strict about it.  If you’re doing formula they actually make probiotics for babies that you can mix in with it.  Now that Harlee is a little older I’ll put a whole capsule into his juice or milk every day.  He’s been going to daycare, playing outside as the weather has been dropping, and carrying on his daily life with nothing more than a bit of a runny nose.  Knock on wood!

A side note, before I wrap this up, think about where else antibiotics are used… Yes, in livestock.  Sure, it makes the farmer’s life easier not having to worry about their cattle dying from infections, but these antibiotics lock their evil little bodies into the cattle’s bodies, and also pass through their milk… So think about that when you buy that sirloin steak for dinner tonight, or that carton of milk for you and your kids to drink.  You’re consuming all the antibiotics (and steroids, and artificial growth hormones, but I’ll save that for a different day) that were injected into that animal while it was alive.  And they can have a similar effect on you as though you just got a bottle from the pharmacy.  Yummy!  In this case I feel it’s worth the extra few bucks to buy organic milk rather than the cheaper, “regular” stuff.  Grass-fed, organic meat too.  Fortunately my hubby is a deer hunter and stocks our freezer fairly well every year, and I’m pretty sure nobody’s out there shooting antibiotics into the wildlife!  I’ll admit I’ll take the easy way out and not buy organic when it comes to beef or pork or chicken… but I (hopefully) justify this with the thought that we don’t eat it THAT often… I’ll probably end up doing a little more research on this and decide to only buy organic meat too, even if it means driving an hour to Whole Foods to get it!  I do buy organic milk, though, because (thank God) IGA stocks it.  I need to ask them to stock organic meat too…

Anyway, just some food for thought!  Here’s a great article to read about bacteria and antibiotics, and a little history too.  Now go get some probiotics and boost your immune system!  It is cold and flu season, after all!

Guilt-Free Friday

I’ve read other’s blogs and a lot of them have this really cute “theme” idea, where one day they’ll focus on the same topic each week, like a joke on Monday or a recipe on Wednesday, or Confession Friday is one I’ve seen a few times.  All these cute ideas.  I’ve decided to copy off of all of you with your cute ideas and have a theme of my own.  Welcome to Guilt-Free Friday!

This is stemming from my attempted lifestyle conversion.  I just want myself and my family to be healthier, at home first and foremost but eventually even when we’re out and about too.  I’m just tired of living the Standard American Diet.  Or SAD for short, ha ha ha.  All the processed crap, the refined crap, the GMOs, the artificial colors and flavors, the Yellow dye #50 or whatever.  What is all this crap and what is it doing in my food?

It all started at the end of spring this year when Justin and I decided to cut out [bad] carbs for about a month or so.  We were eating meat and veggies and fruits every. single. day.  We threw in some cheese or sour cream or different oils like olive or coconut to mix things up a bit here and there, but other than that it was bye-bye sandwiches, dinner rolls, pizza crusts, crackers, pastas, potatoes, cakes, cookies, etc.  It sounds painful and torturous I’m sure, but it wasn’t too bad, I’ll admit, especially going at it with a buddy.  And Harlee’s fortunately a really good eater, he loves veggies anyway so we didn’t have any trouble with him, he just joined in the fun and didn’t think anything different of it.  We dropped so much weight.  My pre-pregnancy pants were feeling loose!  I felt so GOOD!  I felt clean, healthy, more energetic… But then we went on vacation, and “enjoyed” all the guilty pleasures of before, and blew our diet all to hell.

Now it’s fall and I’m ready for that “season of change” thing.  I joined an exercise program, but diet has SO much to do with it too, and I want the exercise to pay off, so therefore I need to eat better.  Well, I already know what works, for me anyway, so I need to get back on that.  But somehow it’s not as easy as it was before…  I’m finding myself MISSING all those guilty pleasures… I don’t WANT to give up pasta and pizza and biscuits… What if I want pancakes for breakfast?  What about Christmas cookies??  This is too intimidating now!

But being healthy is more important.  Don’t worry, this research-a-holic already looked up why avoiding carbs is so good in the first place.  Allow me to share what I’ve learned!  There are good carbs and bad carbs.  Good ones are found in what Mother Nature provides: fruits, vegetables, brown rice, whole grains, sweet potatoes, oatmeal, beans, seeds and nuts for example.  Bad ones are found in things Man and Technology got their paws on: flour, milled corn or white rice, fruit juices, sugared soft drinks or other beverages with sugar, and processed foods like chips and cookies and white bread, and alcohol (everyone make a sad face with me… *:-(*).  Carbohydrates are the body’s main fuel source for energy.  There are simple carbs and complex carbs.  The complex carbs are made of longer chains of sugar molecules that take the body longer to break down and digest, which gives you a more even amount of energy throughout the day.  Simple carbs are basic sugar molecules that are quick to digest and don’t provide much value to your body.  That’s the basics!  From here on out, when I refer to or mention carbs, you may assume I’m talking about the bad ones – the sugars and white flours and cakes and cookies and whatnot.

Okay, so back to my mission of eating healthier.  I needed to solve my problem of pancakes and pizza and Christmas cookies! :-(  So I’ve started looking for substitutes – sticking with what nature has to offer, avoiding weird additives, steering clear of bad carbs, and still achieving the desired result of yummy “guilty” pleasures.

Last Sunday I shared muffins made of coconut flour, but I’m sure that’s not something everyone has just lying around.  On Guilt-Free Friday I’m going to try to offer recipes with ingredients that everyone should have easy access too, or may already have stocked in their pantries.  Otherwise I’ll try to offer insight on where to find certain ingredients, to help you out.

Today I’m going to feature pasta.  One of my favorite pasta substitutes is the spaghetti squash.  It mimics spaghetti noodles, but it’s a vegetable!  It’s bland in flavor, and works wonderfully with whatever sauce you like!  Ah that thing has been a lifesaver for me…

It’s really simple to prepare, too!  Just cut it in half, scoop out the seeds and gunk inside, place cut-side down in a baking pan filled with about a half inch of water, cover with foil, and bake at 375°F for 20-30 minutes (depending on how al dente you want the “noodles”).

Let them cool a bit, then drag a fork through the meat and be amazed as spaghetti-like strands form before your eyes!

Dump all the noodles into a pot and mix together with your sauce of choice – spaghetti sauce with meatballs, alfredo sauce with chicken and/or broccoli, cheese sauce either by itself or with chili on top, the sky’s the limit!

Can’t beat eating vegetables when it feels like you’re eating pasta!

Guilt-Free Cinnamon Roll Muffins

These are super good... And Harlee ate like 3/4 of a muffin with Mom's approval!  I already ate, like, three muffins myself... But the greatest thing is I don't FEEL like I ate that many, because nothing in these weighs on you heavy and makes you feel like crap!  Yay!

We've been trying to make better eating choices at home lately... Ever since I cut out carbs for about a month and lost quite a bit of weight from it I've been feeling more motivated about making this a lifestyle change.  But it sucks not being able to enjoy all the guilty pleasures my former carb-a-holic lifestyle allowed me to eat like pastas and breads and pastries...

So I started looking into ways to still enjoy these things without "breaking the rules".  I mean, this is just a choice for me, but there are people out there who HAVE to live this way due to health reasons.  I'm sure they don't want to feel restricted, so what do they do?  I discovered the blog Against All Grain which was written by exactly that kind of person - a woman with a health issue who didn't want to feel restricted.  She's got some great recipes!  From there stemmed a search for other recipe sites, and there are tons out there!  Suddenly I'm feeling more ambitious about this - a whole new avenue of cooking/baking has been opened up to me!  I'm experimenting with almond flour and coconut flour, which are great alternatives to wheat flour and they're gluten free (and carb-free :-D) and baking with stevia or other alternatives to refined sugar.  But NOT Splenda or Sweet 'n' Low or Equal or Nutrasweet or whatever.  Those are man-made and not good for you.  Just because they're zero calorie doesn't mean they're not having any affect on your body!  Aspartame is in a lot of those zero calorie sweeteners (and diet soda too).  Here is a great article about the dangers of aspartame and how it damages brain cells and leads to all kinds of problems, the least of which are headaches and migraines.  But anyway, this post isn't about all the scary crap that's in the food we eat, I can save that for another day or two!

This is about some yummy cinnamon roll muffins I made today with coconut flour and butternut squash.  I took the recipe from Paleo in PDX, and here it is:

Topping:

• 2 Tbsp melted butter, ghee or coconut oil (I used coconut oil)
• 2 Tbsp raw honey
• 1 Tbsp cinnamon

Combine all ingredients and set aside.

Muffins:

• 1/2 cup butternut squash puree (fresh or canned, but to make fresh just halve the butternut squash, scoop out the seeds, place cut-side down in a baking pan of 1/2 inch of water and cover with foil, and bake at 375 degrees F until soft, about 30-40 minutes.  Scoop out the "meat" and puree in a blender)
• 1/2 cup coconut flour
• 3 eggs
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/4 tsp sea salt
• 1/2 cup melted butter, ghee or coconut oil (I used butter)
• 1 Tbsp pure vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup raw honey
• 1/4 – 1/3 cup raw pecans for topping, optional

Directions:

1. Combine all ingredients together — except pecans–in the food processor and process until a smooth, fluffy batter forms. Alternatively, you can mix all the dry ingredients together, whisk the wet ingredients together in a separate bowl, and then whisk the wet ingredients into the dry.
2. Grease muffin cups or line with parchment paper liners. Fill each with approximately 1/4 cup of batter.
3. Spoon cinnamon mixture over each muffin and top with pecans, if using.
4. Bake at 350 degrees F for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the muffins comes out clean.

Enjoy!   Justin suggested I find a recipe for a cream cheese frosting to put on top next time... I think I agree with him!  I think next time I'll also mix cinnamon into the batter as well, so the flavor is more even throughout, though they were pretty yummy already anyway.  And now my house smells yummy too!