Cheap, easy and a quick go-to meal, if you ask me. Who needs bread, when you can knife-n-fork it? You’re not losing any flavor, just a bit of texture–but really, who likes soppy, gloppy bread? No one. Skirt steak is substituted for the normal cheesesteak meat: ribeye. Skirt steak is cheap and equally as tasty. If you can’t find skirt steak, use ribeye, if you can afford it, or use flank, sirloin or london broil–just make sure to slice it as thinly as you can. And oh, did I mention, leftovers galore?

This is a serious multi-tasking kind of recipe. I don’t typically make/write recipes that require dirtying lots of dishes or require multiple steps or too many ingredients, because I know most people (including myself, most days) just want to eat something a.) that tastes good b.) is good for us and c.) doesn’t require washing more than 3 dishes. I absolutely, positively abhor washing dishes. Let me get back on task here, what I’m trying to say is…I’m not trying to scare anyone off, but this should be made on a “I can’t wait to cook an awesome meal” kind of day. We didn’t need a roux for this recipe. I thought I would have to experiment with some arrowroot powder but the okra does a nice job of thickening the gumbo. Oh and let me mention, this makes a TON…get ready for leftovers!

So it’s 9:00 p.m., I have nothing planned for dinner, as we just got back into town that afternoon and, we’re both pretty darn hungry. I try to keep my pantry and freezer well stocked (post about this to follow), so that I can always have something to throw together in a pinch. Turns out, most of my “pinch” proteins are sausage. Brandon says to me, ” You can’t post that! These people have got to be tired of sausage!” I’m like, “Impossible!”  Are you guys tired of sausage? I love sausage. Let me count the ways:

1. You choose the size: crumble it, patty it up or links
2. Economical
3. Lots of flavor without having to add spices or herbs
4. Tons of different types of flavors:  Sweet, Smokey, Mediterranean, etc.
5. Any ground meat can make a sausage: duck, chicken, turkey, beef, piggy
6. You can’t overcook it

Most people eating Paleo or low-carb are already aware of the glorious spaghetti squash. But I do believe, and please correct me if I’m wrong, most people only use this squash for traditional spaghetti with marinara sauce. So I thought, let’s see how it takes to other dishes that are pasta based…hmm, carbonara. Traditionally it’s sauce is egg yolk based, but since spaghetti squash is rather wet, I figured we could nix the yolks and still end up with a relatively creamy sauce. Success!

Ingredients

• 1 spaghetti squash
• 1 lb. bacon
• 1 yellow onion, chopped
• 4 gloves garlic, minced
• 2 handfuls of walnuts, roughly chopped
• Parmesan cheese to taste
• Red Pepper flakes or black pepper, to taste

Method

Heat the oven to 400ºF. Cut the squash in half and pick out all the seeds. Don’t be anal about getting out the stringy stuff, you can’t even tell it’s there once the squash has roasted. Lightly coat the inside of the squash with some oil and place cut side down, on a baking sheet, in the oven for 20 minutes. Flip each half over, and roast for another 20 minutes–0r until the squash is easily shredded with a fork and add it to your serving bowl.

While the squash is roasting, start the sauce. With the bacon placed horizontally on your cutting board, cut the strips into 1/2″ pieces. Don’t worry about separating the strips, just cut away. Add the bacon pieces to a saute pan that’s on medium heat. Cook the bacon until it’s browned and add to your serving bowl. Remove 3/4 of the bacon grease and reserve for another use. Place the onion and garlic in the pan and cook until translucent. Add them to your serving bowl. Toss the walnuts into the pan and toast until slightly brown. Add them to the serving bowl. Add pepper and grated Parmesan cheese to taste.

Serve immediately.

Brandon and I just got home from a wedding in Asheville, NC. We did not eat well. We can markedly feel a difference in our moods, quality of sleep and energy levels, when we eat carbs/sugar again. Should I expound, so you know we’re not perfect?  Okay. Here it is. I’m ashamed. Dunkin Donuts bagel sticks (some new fangled breadstick-like confection) with cream cheese, pesto tortellini, penne with vodka sauce, biscuits with gravy, grits, fried potatoes (that tasted like Arby’s curly fries), sweet potato pancakes and wedding cake (carrot! hmmm, moist!). Time frame: 24 hours. Hahaha! So needless to say, we were anxious to get back to our high-fat, high-protein diet…and I wanted to start it off with flavorful Mexican comfort food. I roasted the peppers instead of frying them in batter and added meat and veggies, instead of just straight up oozy cheese.

Ingredients

• 5 poblano* peppers
• 1 lb. fresh chorizo**, casings removed (slit the back of the sausage with a knife and unwrap the meat from the case) and crumbled
• 4 oz. mushrooms, diced
• 1 small yellow onion, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
• 3 oz. raw sharp cheddar
• 2 oz. goat cheese
• 2 avocados
• 1 lime, juiced

Method

Preheat your oven to 450ºF.

Slice the tops off your poblano peppers (reserve them, minus the stem) and take out the seeds. Coat in a little bit of fat and place in the oven to soften. We’re trying to roast them and get the skin off, so this should take about 20 minutes.

While the peppers are working in the oven, saute the chorizo, onions, garlic, mushrooms and the chopped pieces of the poblano pepper tops, until everything is soft, about 25 minutes. Remove from the heat and stir in the cheeses.

Remove the peppers from the pan and wrap them in one big piece of plastic wrap, leave it on for about 5 minutes. This will steam the peppers, thus making the skin easy to peel off.  Remove the plastic wrap and peel the skin off of the peppers with your fingers, if it’s not REALLY easy, wrap them back up and let them steam for a bit longer.

Using a spoon, stuff the chorizo filling into each pepper and place back into the oven to melt the cheeses and warm everything up.

To make the avocado cream, use a fork to mash up the avocados with the lime juice. Serve with the rellenos.

*Poblano chile peppers are mild mexican chiles. Think of it as the less bitter, mexican version of green bell peppers. They’re found at most grocery stores, around the other chile peppers.

**If you can’t find fresh chorizo (dried chorizo is hard and usually labeled Spanish, fresh is soft and usually labeled Mexican), you could substitute fresh andouille or make the chili recipe from the chili cheese dog recipe.

Groots are our take on grits, Paleo style. It’s celery root, hence the g-roots, pureed with a little fat and some stock. Oh how creamy, dreamy it is. It has a slight celery flavor, but a texture similar to creamy grits. All you non-Southerners out there, grits are ground up corn–prepared like rice, but takes literally 5 minutes to cook–think polenta.

Ingredients

• 1 lb peeled, deveined shrimp
• 2 medium sized celery roots
• 1/2 c chicken, beef or veggie stock
• 6 slices bacon
• 1/2 onion
• 2 gloves garlic
• 1 T tomato paste
• 1 T chili garlic sauce (any other hot sauce will do)
• 2 oz cheese (optional)
• 1 T minced thyme
• S&P

Method

Cut the ends off the celery roots and slice the skin off (see pics). Slice the root into 1/3′s, then rotate and slice into thick sticks, then slice into rough squares. Toss the roots into a pot of salted water and boil until softened, about 10 minutes. Get out your blender and place the roots inside, along with the stock, cheese and 2 T of bacon fat from the saute pan (see below). Pulse until you reach a smooth consistency. Stir it around and/or add more stock if the mixture isn’t cooperating. S&P to your liking.

Cook your bacon in a saute pan. Once it’s browned, remove the bacon and crumble. Add the onion and garlic to the pan. Saute until softened, about 6 minutes. Add the shrimp, tomato paste, thyme, crumbled bacon and hot sauce. Cook until the shrimp have turned pink.

Place the “groots” into a bowl, add shrimp, crumbled bacon and many, many spoonfuls of the tomato gravy.

You’ll never want a chili cheese dog in a bun ever again after you’ve had a sweet potoato “bun” . The combo of sweet, salty and spicy is my absolute fav-o-rite. We had enough leftover to heat-and-eat for lunch and let me tell ya, it was even better than the night before. If you’re in a hurry, forgo the sweet potato “bun” and you’ve got yourself a quick frank & beans style dinner. BUT!!!! The sweet potatoes do double duty in this recipe. I scoop out the insides, like you would a twice baked potato, and use them for a sweet potato protein shake. Recipe to come! The chili part of the recipe is designed to be quick and dirty, packing a ton of flavor without a long simmer time or big chunks of tomatoes…I hate that. And by the way, before you even try, let me warn you, these are knife-n-fork kind of dogs, wouldn’t recommend using your hands–unless you wrap yourself in paper towels.

Ingredients

• 3 sweet potatoes, sliced in 1/2 length wise
• fat, you choose
• 6 hot dogs (We used Sugar Free Dogs from US Wellness Meats, you could also use sausage)
• 1 lb. ground beef
• 1 15 oz. can fire roasted tomatoes, liquid drained, chopped finely
• 2 Chipotle peppers in adobe sauce, chopped
• 1/2 red onion, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 T chili powder
• 1/2 t cocoa powder (optional)
• S&P
• 3 oz. raw sharp cheddar cheese, grated

Method

Get your oven to 450°F. Coat your sweet potato halves in a couple tablespoons of your fat choice. Stick on a baking sheet and roast in the oven until the skins have slightly charred and the insides are soft, about 30 minutes.

While the sweet potatoes are roasting, start the chili.

Add a few tablespoons of fat to a saute pan. Let it get nice and hot, and then add the onions and garlic, saute until softened, about 10 minutes. Add the chopped chipotle peppers, tomatoes, chili powder, cocoa powder and S&P. Using your hands, crumble the beef into the pan, making sure to break up any big crumbles with a spatula or whatever. Let the beef cook through and simmer the chili until everything else is done.

Once the potatoes are done, remove them from the baking sheet and place the hot dogs on the same baking sheet. Throw them into the oven and let them blister and get hot, about 7 minutes.

While that’s happening, grate your cheese and scoop out the insides of your sweet potatoes. Save the inside mush for an awesome post workout protein shake.

To assemble, place the sweet potato skin on a plate. Place a hot dog on top, spoon on a bit of chili and top with some grated cheese.

You can’t be  fat-phobic with this recipe. But since you follow this website, you’re probably not. WooHoo! Chorizo releases a lot of drippings. It’s imperative to leave these in the pan so the sweet potatoes will cook up really quickly. I made this meal in one pan–something that’s very important when you’re thinking about clean up.

Ingredients

• 1 lb. sirloin steak
• 3 T fresh ground pepper
• 3 T olive oil
• 1 onion, sliced as thinly as possible
• 1/2 t sugar
• 2 c shitake mushrooms, stems removed and sliced
• 1 T butter
• 2 heads romaine lettuce, chopped
• 3 green onions, sliced
• 3 oz. raw blue cheese (I used Point Reyes)

Method

For the Steak:

Place the ground pepper on a plate and lay each side of the steak in the pepper. The harder you press the steak into the pepper, the more pepper will stick; therefore, the spicier the steak. Grill or saute the steak to your likeness. Once the steak has rested for at LEAST 5 minutes, slice it thinly against the grain for maximum tenderness.

For the Onions & Mushrooms:

Place 3T oil in a saute pan and turn the heat on medium-low. The secret to caramelized onions is patience–which I have very little of. Once the oil is warm, throw in the onions and sugar and toss around to get everyone coated. You don’t need to constantly stir the onions, but keep an eye on them and toss them around the pan every once in a while. You will eventually see the color start to change from white to yellow to gold. If the onions start to brown, you either have too little oil in the pan or the heat is too high–fix accordingly. The total process will take about 20 minutes. Be patient; or don’t be, and take the onions off the heat early–the result will still be sweet & tasty.

Once the onions are out, melt 2T butter in the pan and crank the heat to medium high. Toss in the mushrooms and let them saute for about 10 minutes. Make sure to scrape up all the onion bits that were left on the bottom of the pan.

Assembling the Salad:

While the onions are sauteing, chop, wash and dry the romaine lettuce. Place in a bowl, along with the green onions and some blue cheese crumbles, if you’re using it. Add the onions and mushrooms and top with the sliced steak.

For the Dressing:

2T      whole grain dijon mustard

4T      red wine vinegar

6T      olive oil

S & P

Place all the ingredients in a container with a screw top lid or into a bowl and shake/whisk the heck out of it until it comes together. Pour on top of the salad.

{Don’t pour the dressing directly into the serving bowl. If you end up having leftovers, the dressing will make the salad  disappointingly soggy and slimy.}