Dinner Last Night: Green Curry & Lime Chicken

I recently checked out Diane Sanfilipo's Practical Paleo cookbook for the library, and my mind is blown!  This is one of the most comprehensive Paleo resources I've ever seen.  It is beyond a cookbook, it gives a thorough explanation of of how eating a Paleo diet benefits numerous lifestyles and medical conditions.  It gives suggestions on lifestyle changes, and a meal-by-meal plan for beginning your journey to clean eating.  I perused the book cover to cover and I barely scratched the surface.

Anyway...I'm all about Diane's methodology, and since I've jumped on her bandwagon, I decided to start bookmarking recipes, among which included Thai Green Curry and Lime Chicken.  The marinade is savory, tart, and packs a citrus punch.  We left it in the broiler a bit longer to crisp up the skin for extra crunch.  Eaten with our favorite coconut rice and tamari-roasted broccoli, I think it's official we've added a new favorite to the dinner rotation.

image/balancedbites

Weeknight Baking: Pumpkin Banana Bread

What do you make when you have an abundance of browning bananas in October?  Well...after googling "pumpkin banana bread," and deciding it's a legitimate thing, that's what!  Why have I never tried this combination before!?  I used the Pioneer Woman's recipe, because she's proven to have a pretty good track record, so why not?  Oh, and I added a handful of chocolate chips for good measure.  Again, because...why not?  It's not quite as nutmegy or clovey as my usual go-to pumpkin bread, but it still retains the flavors of fall plus the added moist density of banana bread.

Happy fall!

image/pioneerwoman

Dinner Last Night: Beef & Eggplant Fatteh

While perusing Nigella Lawson's At My Table, I came across a recipe for Beef and Eggplant Fatteh,. I was unfamiliar with the word "fatteh, but intrigued by the picture looked quite delicious. The base is pita bread, layered with cumin-coriander ground beef and eggplant, garlicky tahini-yogurt sauce, red pepper flakes, pomegranate seeds, toasted pine nuts, and shredded mint.  Even my husband who is an eggplant skeptic, devoured it before he even recognized eggplant as a primary ingredient.  Now, we ate this for a date dinner - so kids didn't have an opportunity to weigh in with their particulars, but in the future, I fully intend to brand this as Middle Eastern nachos to win them over.  

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Quote of the Week

"Travel isn't always pretty.  It isn't always comfortable.  Sometimes it hurts, it even breaks your heart.  But that's okay.  The journey changes you; it should change you.  It leaves marks on your memory, on your consciousness, on your heart, and on your body. You take something with you. Hopefully, you leave something good behind."

~ Anthony Bourdain

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Fall Favorites: Crockpot Applesauce

I've tried lots of applesauce recipes - and this recipe is by far the favorite.  Maybe it's the tartness of the granny smith apples or the richness of the apple cider, or the dash of salt just for good measure, but it's tart + sweet + smooth all at once.  Plus, it couldn't be easier to throw together.  God bless the crockpot.  Hands down, it's a fall favorite.  Eating this with oatmeal on a crisp fall morning feels like an indulgence, I hope you get a chance to try this for yourself this season.

image via sayyes

Stink Documentary

Check your labels.  If you see the word "fragrance" listed as an ingredient on your shampoo, conditioner, lotion, detergent, and cleaning product labels - beware!  This is the loophole that companies can use to hide chemicals in your products.  "Fragrance" could mean 5 chemicals, it could mean 10.  It could mean 100.  And often, it really is 100.  People think there's a safety net, an FDA or similar unit to prevent this from happening.  The truth - there are currently NO rules or regulations to prevent this from happening.  Beautycounter is trying to change that.

For more information, check out this 2015 documentary, Stink, by Jon Whelan, a single dad who made it his mission to expose this fragrance loophole after purchasing pajamas for his young daughters online, that when opened, reeked of chemicals.  This prompted him to investigate what chemicals companies would put on children's pajamas and what he found is rather frightening.  You deserve to know what you're putting in and on your body.

Cookbook Crush: At My Table

I have a lot of cookbook crushes these days - after months of lingering in my library queue, it seems that all the new cookbooks arrived ready for pickup all at once.  So gear up friends, this is likely to be the first of many new cookbook crush posts!

At My Table is the most recent cookbook by Nigella Lawson.  Truth be told, it's the first cookbook I've ever read by her, despite the fact that she's quite popular on the food scene and has a smattering of bestselling cookbooks over the past 15 years.  It might be high time I add her previous publications to my library queue, as every recipe in At My Table is pure gold!  It's packed with comforting, healthy-ish that dishes are hearty, flavorful, and relatively easy to concoct.  In addition to the fact that they don't require too many unusual ingredients, always a plus. Pretty much every page sound utterly  satisfying and delicious!

Thus far, I've made the beef and eggplant fatteh and bookmarked include turmeric rice with cardamom and cumin...  So many good recipes, so little time.  Christmas wish list cookbook perhaps?

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