Paleo Me

Healthy eating, everyone thinks, "I should try that" right? It's true. Most of us make resolutions (which is where we start having a problem, more on that next) to eat healthier every New Year's Eve. That's nice and all, but what happens usually? You eat better for a few days, have a bad day, eat crappy food, and then say to yourself, "Oops, I failed, I'm all done trying this healthy eating thing." And it's back to fast food and pizza and Ramen Noodles (or is that just me?).

My non-Paleo child says no to steak.

The most effective way to make a long-term change is to integrate the new view of yourself (as a healthy eater) into your identity. If you don't, it's very easy to "slip up" and not get back on the healthy wagon (reminds me of the cheese wagon wheel guy from old cheese commercials). But if you think of yourself as a healthy eater, you're more likely to "fix" it if you have a bad eating day. The same is true for any long-term identity change (exercising, quitting smoking, etc.).

For the past few months I've been watching my friends in a certain Facebook group eat the Paleolithic (or Paleo) diet and seen them post about the benefits. Weight loss, feeling more energy, decreased skin problems...hm. So a month or so ago I did some research and Daddy and I decided that we would eat at least 1 paleo dinner per week. So we've been doing that. But we weren't 100% bought in. If we were, we'd have changed our whole day of eating, not just one dinner per week. Last week I sat down with some websites and looked at a) staples of a paleo kitchen, b) easy/quick meals without "crazy" ingredients that we couldn't find at our local market, and c) breakfast ideas of paleo eating that I could make beforehand so that I could "grab and go" when I start back to work on January 14.

Daddy cooking the steak

One thing I learned - the ideas that we have about what foods are for what meals are pretty funny. Think about it. Eggs are mostly for breakfast, veggies aren't really for breakfast...these are all things that I thought before I started looking around. But what I realized is that, yeah, you can pretty much eat whatever you want (in terms of type of food) for any meal and/or snack. Pair protein with a veggie, and you have a meal pretty much.

One hang up for me was thinking about the things I enjoy and how I couldn't have them. For example, Thursday night at our house is pizza night. If whole grains aren't so hot, then frozen pizza? No bueno. But wait, Mr. Google tells me there's paleo pizza?! For real?! So ok, we can have pizza night. Sweet.

So it's time for The House to think about their food differently. I will say that I will offer Silas (now 32 months or almost 3) what we're eating but also have his "likes" on hand because I've seen him deny a perfectly tasty steak. And Sage, well, he's still on pureed solids (sounds like an oxymoron) which actually makes him a vegetarian (ha!).

My paprika-covered eggs. Mmm.

On Tuesday, the first night of our full-time venture, we made steak and eggs for dinner. Daddy was surprised that "that" could "just" be dinner. The recipe I had read (a recipe? really?) said to put paprika on the eggs so I did and Daddy just about had a heart attack (I grew up meat and potatoes, no spices), but it was good. Yes, I'd do it again. Silas ate the eggs. He denied the steak. Wednesday morning for breakfast I had an apple, some scrambled eggs, some avocado slices, and some tomato slices. I worried that I would feel unfull or that it would get to like 10 a.m. and I'd be starving, but not so much. I'm still searching out muffin-type recipes for when I go back to work, but I could easily breakfast out of the fridge as long as the fridge had fruits and veggies (and some protein) until I go back to work. I've found a few recipes and will share my experiences with those here when I get a chance.

Do you have favorite paleo recipes? I'd love to see them. Link them here or post them to the Facebook group.