America's Healthiest Fast Food Breakfasts?

I received this link in my inbox this past week: America's Healthiest Fast Food Breakfasts, via CNN. My mind immediately went to predict what they would hail: dry, rather unappealing egg-white based breakfast sandwiches. I was somewhat right. Other items on the list included sugared-up oatmeals and a soy-milk based Jamba Juice smoothie. Eeeek.

The article went on to make suggestions as to how to further "healthify" the options on the list - and a couple of discussion points had to do with ways to reduce fat. The case of the McDonald's Fruit & Maple Oatmeal was the only "healthify this" suggestion that dealt with how to avoid any blood-sugar-spiking carbohydrates - and that was by omitting the option to add brown sugar! In fact, the "healthifying" suggestion for the Denny's Scrambled Egg Whites, Chicken Sausage and Fruit plate is to add a slice of whole grain toast. Ack!

But one spread on the list that caught my eye - the Starbucks Protein Artisan Snack Plate, said to include: "...hard-boiled egg, cheddar and apple slices, multigrain muesli bread, grapes, and honey peanut butter spread..." Wow! What a pleasant surprise. Especially if we were on a family road trip or in an airport, it is great to know that this could be a reasonable travelling option for us because a) it is based on whole foods - I'd just chuck the grain-based muesli bread - and b) Starbucks locations are becoming more and more ubiquitous.

Do you know of any other primal and paleo friendly fast food breakfast options for those times when you're on the go?

Bonus Lunch: Mama's!

Today, my lunch was:

• Lamb, and lots of it. Simmered in tamari, butter, and red wine vinegar.

Lunchbox #55

No pictures of this day's lunch, though it was strikingly similar to the previous days:

• Cheese omelette
• Fresh strawberries
• Clementine

Lunchbox #54

Today, my preschooler's lunch featured (clockwise):

• Leftover eggplant lasagna, made with Victoria tomato basil sauce, cut up
• A Clementine
• Fresh strawberries

Menu Plan, and Some Primal / Paleo - Friendly Pasta Sauces

A bit late this week to my usual menu plan. I didn't make it to Giant until today after yet another preschool snow delay -- until that point we were limping along with leftovers here and there, letting eggs and omelettes bridge the gap.

Now that my daughters are in bed tonight, I'll be making a batch of eggplant lasagna. It's one of those recipes that I always do a little bit differently, depending on my mood and what ingredients I have on hand. The core of recipe requires a bit of time - you slice the eggplant thinly, salt it and let it "weep" bitter juices for about half an hour, then pan-fry both sides of the slices in butter, and layer them with cheese and your favorite tomato sauce and bake. While it's a terrific recipe fresh out of the oven, not much is lost in eating it reheated, and it's so much less intense for me to tackle it without little ones also demanding my attention. So, we'll all enjoy it tomorrow for dinner!

By the way, now that Italian is on the brain, I thought that I'd describe the three pasta sauces that I currently have in rotation:

• Gia Russa vodka sauce, which I found at the Super Wal-Mart about 15 minutes away from our house (6 g. carbs per half cup, see link for my pics of the ingredient list).
  
  
• Trader Joe's Organic Vodka pasta sauce. 12 g. total carbs per 1/2 c. serving. Ingredients:
  
  Organic tomatoes, organic tomato puree, organic heavy cream (milk), organic sweet whey, organic onions, salt, organic parmesan cheese (milk, salt, cheese cultures, enzymes [microbial]), organic extra virgin olive oil, organic garlic puree, organic lemon juice concentrate, organic basil, organic vodka (potato), organic oregano.
  
  A word of advice: Not all Trader Joe's pasta sauces are this compatible with primal and paleo-style eating; in fact many have soybean oil and other less desirable ingredients. If you're shopping TJ's for pasta sauce, just be sure to read every label's ingredient section!
  
  
• Victoria pasta sauces. These are my go-to. They're available at Giant, they're low carb, they have the simplest ingredient lists of any pasta sauces I've ever seen, and right now all Victoria varieties are on sale for $3.99 for a HUGE 24 oz. jar - through March 3. If you're near Giant or its sister store Stop & Shop, check out your pasta sauce section and see if there are any available.
  
  

  

  Hrm, suspiciously similar
  label compared with
  theTomato Basil Sauce! ;)

  

  
  

  Maybe there's just more basil...?

  Most Victoria sauces have exceedingly short and pure ingredient lists, but always check your labels; for example, their vodka sauce ingredient lists are surprisingly complicated. But here are two of my favorites - the basic marinara, and the tomato basil sauce, both just 4 g. carbs per half cup, the lowest carb count of any commercially produced pasta sauces I've ever seen!
  
  Victoria is what I'll be using tonight.

I can't be the only one out there waiting until "after hours" to do up some of my favorite recipes undistracted.

***
ETA 7/17/2011: I've also blogged about having fallen in love with Giant's in-house Simply Enjoy pasta sauce. It's nearly identical to Victoria, down to the ingredients, and about half the cost at $4 for a 28 oz. (very large) jar.
***

What recipes do you like waiting to cook until you can devote full attention to them?

Feel free to link to those recipes in the comments.

Meanwhile, here's my menu and workout plan for the rest of the week:

Wednesday:

Breakfast - Omelettes, Clementines for the girls

Lunch - Leftover stewed beef, baby carrots

Dinner - Eggplant lasagna, rewarmed in the oven. Yum!

Workout - Kettlebell swinging

Thursday:

Breakfast - Bacon, fried eggs

Lunch - Leftover eggplant lasagna, if there is any. :) Otherwise: Lamb.

Dinner - Crock pot whole chicken with cabbage in a garlic ginger broth

Workout - "Rest" day, though I may be cleaning and doing laundry like a maniac

Friday:

Breakfast - Smoothies! Mine will be high fat, high protein, lowish carb

Lunch - Leftover chicken and cabbage, served up in its broth as a soup

Dinner - Since we'll have company the next day and I'd like to keep the kitchen relatively clean, might grab a bunless cheeseburger from our local burger joint

Workout - Kettlebell swinging

Lunchbox #53

Today, my preschooler's lunch featured (clockwise):

• Bacon, cheese, and spinach omelette (I cut this up in pieces for her after photographing)
• A Clementine
• Whole milk organic yoghurt with a honey straw's worth of honey drizzled on top

Planning a Dirty-Kneed Grass-Stained Spring and Summer

Don't be a Bubble Boy (or Bubble Gal);
take advantage of warming weather and get out!

Last year, I was way too much of a hermit. I'll own it: I love climate control. I love watching peaceful snowfalls from a warm house in the winter, and I really love me some AC in the summer. But I recently came to the conclusion that me staying indoors as the weather warms is not the example I'd hope to set for my daughters. Now that my youngest is walking, though unsteadily, I am really looking forward to a full springtime and summer. Some of the things that are on my mind:

• I will try not to freak out as much over dirty hands, fingers, knees, and feet. Related: I will stock my car's trunk with a few clean outfits for each of my girls, and for me!
  
  
• I will allow a little bit of sun exposure. Anybody who knows me knows that this is a huge and personal concession. Why? I'm a survivor of malignant melanoma. Sun exposure/Vitamin D creation is therefore the aspect of primal and paleo living with which I am the slowest in agreeing. But I've done plenty of reading on it, and Robb Wolf even recommended "baby steps" of sun exposure to a melanoma survivor in a recent podcast (starting around minute 54:50 of the podcast). I am finally coming around to the idea that lack of Vitamin D due to a hermit lifestyle could actually endanger me and my girls (in terms of immediate immune function and long-term avoidance of a host of other cancers), so this year I will give my skin and my girls' skin a chance to manufacture a little bit of Vitamin D before slapping on the SPF - I'm guessing about 10-15 minutes' worth of sunshine daily, in most cases.
  
  
• I will get us out of the house to explore nature while walking and hiking. Another couple of mom friends of mine have each offered to show us some local hiking trails this summer. New places, fresh air, nature, and exercise, plus a potentially longer naptime later on? I am so in.
  
  
• I will get to know some farmers. I don't have a CSA package, I haven't bought from a local source of beef or other animal protein yet, and I don't know my local farmers. Ack! Consider me a primal padawan in this respect. But I went primal last summer, so I'm still on the learning curve in a lot of ways. One practical way of dipping our toe in the water is checking out some local farms and farmers. I saw a pick-your-own-strawberries patch just a little drive from us, so there's one outing I can already pencil in for the springtime.
  
  
• I will get us walking around the neighborhood. This is easier said than done, as any mom of small children will probably attest. Reasons:
  
  == It takes at least half an hour to get ready. First, you make sure that everybody is fed. Then, you attend to any diapers that must be changed, and make sure that all potty trained individuals make a trip to the bathroom. Find weather-appropriate clothes, shoes and socks, bottled water, insect repellent, sunscreen if we might be be out more than half an hour...you can see how this gets a little tedious.
  
  == Then once you actually succeed on getting out the door, you're 10 minutes into the walk, and the squawking begins: I'm thirsty. I'm tired. I have to go to the bathroom. And that's just the preschooler! The baby has a whole separate set of opinions of her own, too. :) Needless to say sometimes a family walk for us in this stage of life lasts about 20 minutes - in other words, less than the actual time invested in getting ready to leave the house.
  
  These obstacles notwithstanding, I want to persist in family walks because I want the walk ritual to be very much ingrained. For my kids to think: We eat dinner, then we go for a walk.
  

Are you hoping to get out more this spring and summer? What are YOUR plans to take in some more sunshine, fresh air, and wide open spaces?

Lunchbox #52

Whoops! My first lunchbox feature without a picture. Turns out Thursday morning my youngest daughter needed a visit to the doctor's, so between that and getting my oldest off to preschool I dropped the ball on photographing the lunch.

In any case, my preschooler's lunch featured:

• Butternut squash, which had been roasted the night before with cinnamon and Kerrygold salted butter
• Part of a cheese omelette
• Slices of organic gala apple

Lunchbox #51

Today, my preschooler's lunch featured (clockwise):

• Leftover finely shredded roast beef
• Whole milk organic yoghurt with 1 honey straw's worth of honey
• Bite of banana
• A Tootsie Roll - a leftover from her class's Valentine's Day celebration the day before
• Reduced sugar ketchup
• Cucumber sticks
• 2 slices of cheese

Menu Plan

I made a dynamite super slow roasted beef loin in the oven today - a very large one! The long cooking time left the meat very tender, and the flavor very concentrated. Fortunately (because it's so huge), I'm really looking foward to leftovers tomorrow!

Here's what's on the menu this week:

Monday:
Breakfast - Steak, plus fruit for the girls
Lunch - Leftover blueberries, leftover sweet potatoes and pot roast from Sunday
Dinner - More steak! Plus a veggie stir fry of squash, carrots, and asparagus

Tuesday:
Breakfast - Leftover veggie stir fry, whole milk yoghurt
Lunch - Kerrygold Ballyshannon cheese, warm banana pudding
Dinner - Beef loin roast

Wednesday:
Breakfast - Leftover beef roast and apple slices for the girls
Lunch - Fried eggs
Dinner - Roasted butternut squash with cinnamon, romaine salad topped with shredded cheese and shredded leftover beef roast
Workout - Walking, and lots of it

Thursday:
Breakfast - Mashed boiled eggs with Kerrygold
Lunch - Creamy tarragon asparagus soup
Dinner - Sausage, bacon, and cheese quiche
Workout - Kettlebell swings

Friday:
Breakfast - Garlic, onion, and cheese omelette
Lunch - Leftovers, whatever they may be
Dinner - Roast whole chicken, baked potatoes on the side
Workout - Lap swim

Preschool lunch ideas:
Lunchbox #50: Apple blueberry whole milk yoghurt, leftover stir fried veggies, sliced cucumbers, cherry tomatoes
Lunchbox #51: Chilled banana pudding topped with walnuts, leftover beef roast, whole milk yoghurt
Lunchbox #52: Boiled egg, leftover butternut squash, salad

Lunchbox #50

Today, my preschooler's lunch featured (clockwise):

• Leftover sauteed veggies from the night before (asparagus, zucchini, carrots)
• Cherry tomatoes
• Sliced cucumber
• Whole milk organic yoghurt swirled with Sprout Organic Apples & Blueberries Baby Food - this is one quick and easy way that I offer "sweetened" yoghurt in our house. The Sprout baby food is a puree of organic apples and organic blueberries, in a resealable 3.5 oz. BPA-free pouch. I bought it on Subscribe and Save on Amazon (you can cancel Subscribe and Save immediately after placing your order and still get the savings on the first and only shipment) - so it was ~$0.70/pouch.

Disclosure: This post contains an Amazon affiliate link. Thanks for supporting Primal Kitchen at no additional cost to you!

Lunchbox #49

Yet MORE school cancelled this week due to wimpy amounts of snowfall, thus two lunches instead of the usual three.

Today, my preschooler's lunch featured (clockwise):

• 2 slices of papaya
• 2 slices of ham
• Baby carrots
• Honey straw (by the fork)
• Kerrygold Dubliner cheese
• 1 boiled egg

Lunchbox #48

Today, my preschooler's lunch featured (clockwise):

• Kerrygold Dubliner cheese (sliced)
• Baby carrots
• Cubed cantaloupe
• Blueberries
• Slices of ham
• Almonds and macadamia nuts

Staying Primal / Paleo with Healthy Eating During Church & Social Gatherings

I see primal / paleo-style eating as the best way to take care of the bodies that God gave me and my family; it's a matter of stewardship.

That said, it's not a huge leap to start wondering:

How do I keep to my primal / paleo-style eating goals within an active church and/or social life?

I've been what I'd describe as a fairly active churchgoer throughout my adult life, and the broad point is: in order to avoid blood-sugar-spiking grains and sugars, you plan. Here are some tips that dig a little deeper in this bit of advice on navigating church and social events that could otherwise derail your eating goals:

Teas, coffees, breakfast events: These are very common in American church life. Prayer breakfasts, men's sunrise breakfasts, pancake breakfasts, women's tea-and-testimonies, brunches, breakfast potlucks, and Sunday morning gatherings (like Sunday School/Adult Bible Fellowships) can be nutritional minefields. At best, you might find a relatively unadulterated fruit tray straight from the grocery store's produce section. But more typically, you'll find muffins, cookies (yes, cookies!), even cakes leftover from some prior event. Add to that pancakes, French toast, scones...sounding familiar? Get to the coffee/tea end of things, and what is on hand? Sugar, non-dairy creamer (which is full of hydrogenated oils, aka trans fats!), and (blech) Sweet'n'Low.

When you had a chance to plan ahead:

• Eat protein before you get there. Sure, you might find a sausage quiche or egg casserole at the event. But odds are good that it contains gluten via added bread or a crust. Save yourself the trouble by having a little quality protein before you leave. If it's an early event and you're pressed for time, plan the night before: make a batch of bacon so it's ready to grab and go, and you can even have a couple of pieces on the drive over. Other pre-event protein options are: a bowl of whole milk yoghurt or cottage cheese, pieces of cheese, or leftover meat from the night before.
  
• Bring reinforcements. A little bag of macadamia nuts. A Tanka bar. Whatever high fat and/or protein-heavy snack you need to nourish yourself! And if you're worried about others' reactions, don't. The truth is people are so preoccupied with their own meals/snacks that they are very unlikely to notice or ask about yours. And if they do? Shrug your shoulders and cop to having food sensitivities. You might get a few pitying looks, but the conversation is likely to move on from that subject pretty quickly.
  
• Bring your own coffee. Brew yourself some coffee at home in a travel mug or disposable coffee cup, add a hefty glug of heavy cream, and head to your event! You'll get a good dose of steady, filling energy.
  
  When you didn't get a chance to plan ahead:
  
  
• Eat condiments. Well, this sounds a little sillier than it is. But if you didn't plan ahead, and find yourself in a tight spot and feeling hungry and tempted, a few spoonfuls of the plain full fat cream cheese brought with the bagels, or the peanut butter set by the toast is way better than eating the bagels or toast themselves! (And yes, I know peanuts don't qualify as primal given their legume status, but they're still a whole lot nutritionally superior than sugar or grains for a person in a moment of weakness.)
  
• Fast. If you are used to primal / paleo-style eating, by now you might have had some success with fasting. Especially if it's an early-morning event, you might have luck with this. Say, "Hi!" to someone you haven't caught up with in a while when others are milling through the food selection. Or take your seat, and if grilled, just say that you sometimes don't get hungry until later in the morning.

Spaghetti Dinners/Bake Sales/Fundraisers: The carb train just keeps coming. And what are these events for? To raise money for very worthwhile causes. My advice? Just give the money, don't eat the food. You've helped them to raise funds and to skip the overhead of feeding you a whole load of cheap, insulin-spiking grains. Win-win!

Cookouts and pot lucks. From the first warm rays of spring through the start of the school year, cookouts and BBQ events abound. Here's how to handle them:

• Skip the buns. Bring a plastic fork if you have to, just don't eat the buns. Have your hot dog, brat, burger, whatever! Mustard is the safest condiment pick, blood-sugar-wise. Mayo is OK, but don't go nuts because of the omega-6-overloaded soy and/or canola oil that commercial mayo contains.
  
• Bring what you can eat. Some foil-wrapped salmon to set on a corner of the grill, a few premarinated chicken breasts, or whatever else strikes your fancy. Be sure to offer to do some time turning things at the grill yourself lest you saddle somebody else with the duty of cooking your dinner!
  
• Look for the veggie tray, then the chips and dip tray. There is almost always one of these around at a larger event. Stock up on those, especially the celery sticks that noone else eats, and then head over to the chips and dips. Skip the chips but load up on whatever dips you can judge as not containing gluten (queso, guacamole, salsa, etc.). Now dip with your veggies!
  
• Find the cheese and cold cuts. Even if you have to disassemble an unwitting catered Croissan'wich to get to the meat and cheese, you're doing yourself a favor! Chuck the carby outside and nosh on the fat-and-protein-filled insides. And there is no shame in taking just the cheese from the cheese and cracker tray.

How do YOU navigate these kinds of gatherings while staying true to your eating goals?