Paleo Skillet Cabbage

I'm trying to pull recipes that I liked and can still have off my old blog..... The Mr. loved cabbage.  Cabbage isn't my favorite thing to eat, and I don't normally cook things I don't like, but sometimes I still make it for him. 

1/4 stick of ghee or coconut oil
1 medium onion, diced
1 medium head of cabbage, chopped
1 lb sausage, sliced into round pieces (get the paleo-est kind you can find!)
1 can rotel
Salt & Pepper to Taste

Melt ghee or coconut oil (or your paleo fat of choice!) in skillet.  (I used a large sauce pan!) 

After your oil is melted, add in onion and cabbage.  Cook for about 5 minutes, stirring often so it doesn't stick to the bottom.  The oil will coat the cabbage nicely!

I chopped up the sausage while the cabbage and onions where cooking!

Add in sausage, rotel, salt & pepper.  I found that this required quite a bit of salt.  So, start off with a teaspoon or so, then as it's almost finished, test it and see if it needs more. 

Put a lid on your pan and let it cook away.  I didn't stir it much, just here and there so it cooked evenly.  It will take about 20-25 minutes to cook through.  The cabbage should be soft, but not mushy!

Serve it up and Enjoy!!!!

Paleo Beef & Broccoli {Recipe}

 

Ingredients:

 

1 lb meat (boneless round steak, deer meat, chicken, whatever floats your boat.  I used deer meet)

1 Bag Frozen broccoli florets (I usually buy by broccoli from Aldi, but Kroger had theirs on sale, so  I tried them out....more stems than florets, so I'll be switching back to Aldi!)

1 onion sliced

1 red bell pepper

1 container mushrooms, sliced

1 clove garlic

1 tsp ginger

1/2 c. water

1/2 T Coconut Aminos (Here's the catch, if you're not going for gluten free, use Soy Sauce!)

2 T Coconut Oil

Sea Salt & Pepper to taste

 

Of course, this recipe gets served over ..... BRUSSELS SPROUTS!  Before last night you couldn't have convinced me to try those mini cabbage looking things, but......they are pretty good!

 

1 1/2 lbs Brussels sprouts (I may or may not have use just a bag of frozen ones!)

2 cloves of garlic

Sea Salt and Pepper to taste

Paleo Cooking oil (Coconut Oil, Ghee, or just use some butter, ya know, whatever!)

 

I think one of the best parts of this dinner, is that it a 1 pan dinner! 

 

In your cast iron skillet...(If you don't have one, go get one and stop using those Teflon Non stick pans!) ... warm your Paleo cooking oil, add the minced garlic and sauté for 2-3 minutes. Make sure to not get your skillet too hot, or everything will start to burn, medium usually does the trick for me, sometimes medium high!    When the garlic has browned toss in the Brussels Sprouts.  (If your like me and used frozen ones, make sure to thaw them first!).  Season to taste with salt, and pepper, and cook until they are soft, (approx.. 15 minutes.) Remove the sprouts from skillet and set aside.

 

 

Melt the coconut oil, or other paleo oil, in your skillet and cook your meat.  I always season my meat a little bit when I'm cooking it as well!  When the meat is cooked to your liking, remove the meat from the skillet and set aside!  (If you prefer to have a thicker sauce, before you set the meat aside, sprinkle 3-4 T arrow root powder over the meat and mix it around.  When you cook the vegetables and add the meat back in the arrow root powder will serve as a thickening agent and you'll get a thicker sauce that stick to everything instead of a watery mix!)

 

In the same skillet, cook onions, broccoli, red bell peppers, mushrooms, and sauté until broccoli is soft.  While this is cooking, mix together water, coconut aminos (or soy sauce), ground ginger, garlic, salt and pepper to taste. 

 

When Broccoli is done, add the meat back in and pour the liquid mixture over the stir fry, cooking for an additional 2-3 minutes.

 

Serve the stir fry over the Brussels sprouts and Enjoy!

 

This recipe is pretty easy to play around with.  If you know me at all, you know that I rarely follow a recipe as is, and I'm always tweaking it a little bit here and a little  bit there, and very rarely do I measure while cooking.  But always remember when tweaking.  You can always add more...but you can't take it back out!

Here we go .... again.

I have some how managed to lock myself out of my old blog, A Whole Awful Lot.  I was trying to change my log in e-mail, and now I can't log in with any of my e-mails.  Genius.  I know. 

So here we go ... ... again.

Life lately....

Infertility.  It's such a scary word.  But it's one the Doctor's have been using for the past year.  I was diagnosed with PCOS in January.  My Obg/yn uses NaPro technology, and I have using the Creighton method of fertility tracking since March.  I started a low carb diet in the middle of July and lost 30 pounds in less than 2 months.  My cycles also started to regulate themselves out.  I finished up a complete month long hormone profile last month.  My progesterone never got about 2.9, and it should have been upwards of 17, which is indicative of not ovulating.  I go to the Doctor TODAY to get the rest of the results of my hormone profile and hear what his treatment plan is from here.  2 years is far to long to not have a baby in my arms.

Hashimotos.  No idea what that means?  I didn't either until 2 years ago.  Basically I have an immune system that beats up on my thyroid.  This causes my thyroid to be SLOOOOW... Not having enough thyroid hormones causes everything else in my body to go all out of whack, like my hormones, weight, energy levels, sex drive, memory, ability to focus...and the list goes on for about 294 more symptoms.  I have a GREAT Primary care physician that has my thyroid numbers in a pretty optimal state.  I still struggle with some of the symptoms though. 

Diet. Lifestyle modification.  So, my cycles were CrAzY.  They had me on progesterone because I would go 3-4 months without a period, and I was having continuous fertile cervical mucus, which is not a good thing, especially with having to chart it.  I basically follow a Low Carb Paleo lifestyle.  I try to keep my carb intake under 50 grams, but closer to the 30 range.  I don't eat fruit, other than berries.  No Diary.  No grains. Grains people, not just gluten.  No Rice, Wheat, Corn, Oats, etc.  No Eggs.  I am actually allergic to these puppies, and Duck eggs are EXPENSIVE!  No Legumes.  This includes Peanuts. No Potatoes.  However, once in a while I will cheat with some sweet potatoes!.  No Almonds.  Again, I'm allergic.  NO SOY.  I already have hormone problems, why add something that your body sees as estrogen and throws your hormones more out of whack???)  No sugar.  If I really need something sweet I use Honey or Maple Syrup.  I did fall off the bandwagon in September.  I remained gluten free....but just about everything else was game on.  Popcorn & Coffee Creamer are my worst transgressions. 

Exercise. Did you just start laughing?  Cause I did!  I am terrible at being consistent with working out.  I did great from July 15th-the end of August.  Then my Grandpa died and I was in Florida for a week.  Then we went back to Florida for a vacation in Destin.  And I completely fell off the band wagon.  With my eating and my exercise. 

Husband.  My husband decided on Saturday that we was ALSO going to go paleo.  If you aren't laughing, I laughed enough for both of us.  I have been TRYING to get him to cut out some of his grains for MONTHS, and every time I do it causes a fight, so I just gave it up.  Then, he goes on his bi-yearly trip to the NASCAR races in Talladega and comes back decided that he is going to start being paleo.  He said he saw all the fat people down there and decided he needed to make some changes.  He's done really well for the past 2 1/2 days. 

Address.  My address is changing.  Again. This will be my 11th move in 10 years.  We put my house on the market last week.  We will be moving back to the "little house".  It's a 900 square foot house that his parents own.  They are giving it to us, and we are going to add on to it.  It's a huge blessing.  Now my house just needs to sell so I can get rid of the mortgage payment.  Don't mistake this move as I didn't like my house, or we couldn't afford it.  We are doing fine financially.... but I want to be at home when we have babies.  So the house has to go.  I'm over the sadness of it, and now I just want it to sell so I don't have to look at it anymore.  Whenever I think about what I'm giving up I get so sad! I have to remind myself of what I am gaining in it's place.

My Life is just a whole bunch of combines pieces that all tie together.  You take out or add one piece and everything else shifts.  This little blog of mine isn't just about one aspect of my life, it's about all of them!  I'm hoping to blog a little more consistently.  At the end of the day, this blog is really for me anyway.  Well, I guess it's for you too.  Maybe someone out there is searching for answers to infertility, or thyroid problems, and they will stumble upon my little place on the internet, and they will find something that will help them.