Baked Pears

Baked Pears
Recipe taken from CFSCC presents: EAT THIS!



This was a pretty tasty dessert. It did call for needed a little attention with checking it every 15 min and pouring the syrup over it. But it wasn’t too bad and was a great treat.

4 Pears
1 C Sweet, Fruity white Wine ( I used Sutter Homes Moscato)
¼ C Honey
1 t Vanilla Extract
2 Cinnamon sticks, halved ( I just sprinkled cinnamon over the pears)
2 Bay Leaves (I didn’t find this at the store, so I left them out (I didn’t look too hard, though))

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. Cut thin slices off the bottom of each pear, so they will stand up
3. Place pears in shallow baking dish or pie pan
4. Whisk wine, vanilla and honey in a bowl. Pour over pears
5. Add cinnamon sticks and bay leaves around the pears
6. Roast pears for about 45 min, basting every 15 min
7. Carefully transfer pears to a serving dish.
8. Pour remaining wine mixture into a saucepan. Bring to a boil for about 5 min, until thickened.
9. Drizzle over the pears and garnish with the cinnamon sticks and bay leaves.

The only thing I would have probably done differently is cut the pears into cubes and then cooked that way. I think it would absorb the flavor more. This had great flavor but really on the skin on the pear had the flavor. I will have to try this recipe again and I will let you know. However, leaving the pears whole made for great presentation.

Cocoa-Toasted Cauliflower

Cocoa-Toasted Cauliflower
Recipe taken from The Clothes make the girl



I made this last night for neighbor night. Julie brought over some bacon wrapped steaks that she had ordered online with a Groupon. These steaks were delicious, so moist. We did have to call our mothers to figure out how to use the broiler, but we figured it out and made some great steaks. This cauliflower recipe was a great addition to these steaks.

Mixing up the ingredients, I thought it was a rather weird combination. But it works. No flavor is to strong and it has just enough of a flavor not to just taste like plain cauliflower and it also looks pretty.

1 head of cauliflower
1 T coconut oil, melted
Garlic powder to taste
1 t Paprika
1 t Unsweetened Cocoa

1. Preheat oven to 400F and line a baking pan or sheet with aluminum foil
2. Break cauliflower into florets and place in bowl. Toss with melted coconut oil until well-coated
3. Mix Paprika and cocoa in a small bowl, then sprinkle over cauliflower and toss again. Mix it well
4. Sprinkle the cauliflower with salt and garlic powder
5. Bake until tender and started to get nice brown spots, about 25-30 min.

Very quick and easy to make. Just another way to make cauliflower a little more interesting.

Pumpkin Pancakes

Pumpkin Pancakes
Recipe taken from Just.like.mom.never.made.

These were the better of the Paleo pancakes I have tried. They were still a little heavy, but much better than ones I have tried in the past.

1 whole egg
2 egg whites
½ c Smooth almond butter
½ c pureed pumpkin
½ t Nutmeg
½ t Cinnamon
¼ t Vanilla
2 T unsweetened Applesauce

Put all the ingredients in one bowl
Mix thoroughly. A whisk works well.
Drop batter into a medium hot pan with a touch of coconut oil and cook about 3 minutes on each side.

This made about 4 regular size pancakes
I sprinkled cinnamon and honey over the finished product.

They were pretty tasty but still a little heavy, good thing I had them for dinner and not for breakfast.

This is why you train...

This is a great blog post to bring everything into perspective. Some of us train to stay in shape, some of us train to finish a marathon, some of us train to do an Ironman but most importantly we all train for LIFE..

http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=6028319520018578041

Spanish Chicken Skillet

This was a very quick and tasty dish.

Ingredients:
2 tsp Smoked Paprika
1 tsp dried Thyme
¼ tsp Black Pepper
¼ tsp Cayenne Pepper
½ tsp Crushed Red Pepper
2 Cloves Garlic (minced) I forgot to add this, oops. It’s nowhere below in the directions
Sea Salt to taste – I left this out
1/8 cup Coconut Flour
4 medium size chicken breasts – I cut the chicken in to small cubes
2 Tb Olive Oil
1 Green Pepper, sliced into thin strips
1 Red Pepper, sliced into thin strips
1 Sweet Onion – I used a red onion
1 (14.5 oz) can diced tomatoes, Undrained
½ cup chicken broth

Instructions:
1. Combine coconut flour, sea salt and all of the spices except red pepper
2. Use 2-3 Tb of this seasoned flour to coat chicken
3. Heat 1 Tb olive oil in a large skillet. Brown both sides of chicken
4. Remove chicken from pan
5. Add remaining oil, onions and peppers to the skillet and cook until tender
6. Stir in tomatoes, broth, remaining seasoned flour and red pepper flakes
7. Return chicken to skillet, reduce heat to low, cover and simmer for 10 minutes.

Served in a bowl over Fresh spinach

Recipe from: Weightlifting, CrossFit, Paleo and Randomness

Muffin Meatloaf

Recipe from Leah Goldstein’s Blog.

This is a way to keep the meals different and interesting. Just simple changes.

This picture doesn’t make it too appetizing but it tasted pretty well and was super easy to make.

Ingredients:
2 lbs of ground meat (I used one package of Jeanie-O’s taco seasoned turkey and one package of the Italian seasoning turkey)
½ cup of Diced Onions, Bell peppers and celery (the meat packaging was a little more than a lb each so I added a little more on these)
Olive Oil
Seasoning of choice (I used pepper, tony chachere’s and Italian seasoning or something {I have no idea what seasonings are good for what, so I normally just pick one})

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350
Sauté the veggies in the olive oil for about 10 min to soften then up.
Mix Veggies, meat and seasoning of choice together and then scoop into muffin pan.
Bake for 25-35 minutes.

As you can sort of see in my picture, I made a little foil tray to catch any run off grease. I also recommend not letting the muffins cool in the muffin pan, get them out of the grease they are sitting in. (lesson learned)

I served with mashed cauliflower

Update on Crosstopher

He had a rought night. I took him home from the Vet yesterday and he slept pretty good for about 3 hours. I was pretty excited. And then he woke up and then the flipping and flopping started were he couldn’t get comfortable.He would seen to rest a little if he leaned up against me. So there was no getting up to get me something to drink or to go to the bathroom until he moved. I didn’t want to disturb him.

Time for bed came and he rested maybe an hour or so and then it was on. From about 11pm to 3:30am I don’t think he sat still for then 10sec at a time. Trying to lay down, trying to sit down, trying to sleep sitting up leaning to one side and mostly dragging his butt around. This made him start to whine quite a bit.

Finally at 3am it was time to give him some more meds (this one was every 8 hours) So I gave him this shot of liquid in his mouth. That also took some wrestling with him. In no time I saw him sitting still and he just fell over. He was resting. Everytime he sat still I took that opportunity to try to sleep. I didn’t know how long it would last. It lasted for about 2 hours and then he was back up and whining.

He did go to the bathroom (1 and 2) this morning so thats good. I got him to eat a small amount of food last ngiht, but he wasn’t having any of it this morning or water. I have been giving him his meds in Kong stuffing and he was loving that. This morning he is over that.

So back to the Vet he went today. He is going to stay over night and see if they can keep him more comfortable. Him dragging his wound around isnt helping him heal. So they will probably do a better job of keeping him confined then what I do. I tend to try not to be the bad guy. Which might not be helping him in the long run. Its going to be sad at home tonight without him. But I hope this makes things heal a little faster.

Respect for Mothers

I have a new found respect for mothers of babies. I have a one year old maltipoo, named Cross who has been sick for 2 days. And it is tough and mentally exhausting.

He got an infection New Year’s Day. We spent about 6 or 7 hours at the Emergency Vet Clinic Saturday. Saturday night he was a little reatless, couldn’t get comfortable. Sunday he took long naps. Sunday night, he didn’t sleep at all. Which means I didn’t get much sleep either. I can hear him moving around, hitting that cone up against the wall, the bed and himself. It’s just a sad site. He would try to sleep sitting up. I guess that’s how he was the most comfortable. He would sit up against the wall and just stare at the wall. Every now and then he would just look at me with those sad puppy eyes and look like he saying “ are you going to do anything”. I felt helpless and so sad. He is back at his vet first thing this morning. They have given him some pain pills and some fluids, since he isnt eating or drinking he has gotten dehydrated.

I hope my baby gets well soon. I’m ready for him to make me chase him in order to get him to go outside. I want to see this smile on his face again and baking in the sunlight.