All In One Pan Saturday Breakfast

Most of my favorite food combinations and recipes come when I'm not even trying. This morning was just that.  Just so you know I'm on a grated sweet potato kick.  My husband doesn't appreciate it.  I'm sure he's counting down the days for this phase to be over with.  He's not a fan of sweet potato.



This morning I made bacon for the whole family.  When the bacon was cooked I removed it from the pan and some of the fat.  I left maybe two tablespoons in the pan.

First I added a little bit of minced onion and let it cook for a few minutes.  Then I added maybe a cup of grated sweet potato (YAY!).  I left it in the pan until it was brown and somewhat crispy.  Then came some chopped spinach and some of that bacon I made earlier.


I topped it with fried eggs.


What's your favorite flavor combination?

Happy New Year 2014

Will everyone have that title today? I tried to come up with something unique and witty. Oh well.

From Thanksgiving until a few days ago I let my eating slip.  Ok maybe slip is being nice.  I ate anything I wanted to… We're talking cookies, burgers, fries, cereal, pancakes… Like I didn't even know the paleo diet existed.  I'm sure everyone gets those binges.  The thing is mine lasted a month.  It took a month for me to realize what I was doing to my body.  I gained 10lbs, my face was broken out the whole month, and now I'm sick… I never get sick anymore. As soon as I let my guard down (cookies for breakfast anyone?!) I get a cold.  It happens every time!

But hey… It's January 1st. It's a clean slate right?  I actually started my clean eating a few days ago.  I had a jump start on the new year.

For the past few days I've been back to eggs, greens, and ghee for breakfast.

(two eggs and kale cooked in ghee)

I've been coming up with new combinations...

(plantains fried in coconut oil, grass fed beef, guacamole, and salsa)

We've been eating new mish moshes in bowls.

(chicken thighs, carrots, broccoli, snap peas, and cauliflower rice all cooked with coconut aminos, sesame oil, and fish sauce)

And I'm back to eating leftovers.

(grass fed burger topped with ketchup, bacon, pickles, and paleo mayo on top of grated sweet potato cooked in coconut oil)

How do you recover from the holidays?  Do you stay strong and resist the treats?

Monterey and Christmas 2013

Whoa I took a pretty big blogging hiatus.  It wasn't planned.  It just sort of happened.

So since I talked to you last we moved across the country.  Directly across the country.


We drove for five days with four dogs, three adults, two kids, and a partridge in a pear tree. We started in Hampstead, North Carolina and ended in Monterey, California.  We stopped in Nashville, TN, Fort Smith, AR, Amarillo, TX, and Flagstaff, AZ.  When we originally mapped our route we tried to average eight hours of driving time each day, however, a snowstorm hit on our second stop.  Before the trip I was really hoping my kids would see some snow.  We didn't just see snow.  We saw winter wonderlands on our whole trip.  

There was a snow/ice storm in Arkansas, single digit weather in Texas, and a blizzard in Arizona.  We are from the beach in North Carolina.  We aren't used to the snow so it added quite a bit of drive time to a few days.  My husband and my sister traded off driving the kids car.  I never had to drive with the kids.  I think everyone agreed that was for the best.  So I got to drive my four dogs in my Honda CRV across the country.  I was told the kids were great.  My dogs have moved from North Carolina to Virginia, Virginia to Florida, Florida to Texas, Texas to Florida, and Florida to North Carolina.


They are PROS at riding in the car and sleeping in hotel rooms.

Overall our trip was great.  It was much easier and more fun than expected.  I'll talk more about Monterey in later posts.  


As soon as we got into our new house we immediately started Christmas.


Christmas was hard this year.  We didn't have any family and it felt like it was cut short since we moved the first week in December.  It helped that the kids were so excited and we did get to FaceTime with my family on Christmas morning.  I also got a bunch of new kitchen gadgets to play with!

So on to food…


I've gained 10lbs in a month.  For the past month paleo has pretty much gone out the window.  Any meal we've made at home has been paleo but it's been accompanied with Christmas cookies for dessert.  Plus we've eaten out more in the last month than the entire year.

I have some high expectations for myself in 2014.  I have crossfit, diet, parenting, and blog goals that are reachable but will take quite a bit of effort.  I'm all about New Years resolutions!  What a perfect time to set a goal.  You have such a clean slate ahead.

Tell me what you have in store for 2014.

Paleo Bakehouse

Oh man did I get some goodies in the mail.  There are two things that I just cannot resist when it comes to food.  Pizza and cookies.  My Whole30 didn't fix it.  If it's around I will eat it.  Paleo or not.  

In the past few days I've eaten cookies for breakfast.


Cookies for lunch.


And cookies for dinner.


All from Paleo Bakehouse.  Paleo cookies!  The hubs and the littles did some damage on the cookies as well.    They loved the Power Brownie Cookies and regular Chocolate Chip.  I loved the Freckled Almond.


All of their cookies are made with paleo friendly ingredients like almond flour, coconut oil, and almond butter.  These really have been a special treat this week!

What's your favorite kind of cookie?

RECIPE: Paleo Mexi-Meatballs

I'm gonna write a cookbook and it's going to be all about meatballs...  Seriously, I really love meatballs.


As I started typing this recipe out I realized it only has 5 ingredients!


Sure you could add more stuff... Chopped peppers?  Salsa?  Olives?


Oh I don't know... I really like the simplicity of these little guys.  They have great texture and are full of flavor.

Paleo Mexi-Meatballs

1 pound grass fed beef (mine was 80/20)
1/4 cup onion finely chopped (like little bitty pieces)
2 T taco seasoning
1 beaten egg
1/2 cup almond flour

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.  Mix all of the ingredients together in a large bowl.  I form the mixture into two inch meatballs but you can make smaller ones or bigger ones.  Just adjust the bake time.  Put the little guys on the baking sheet and bake for about 15-20 minutes.

They are SO good dipped in guacamole (I just do avocado, lime juice, garlic powder, and salt).

They are even better on top of cauliflower rice seasoned with more taco seasoning.