Smooth E Operator

I know its been few and far between that I've been able to post anything.  The short story of it all is that we're short staffed at my work and I've been working 13 hour days (that's right people, I'm gone from 5am to 7pm)  The sad side effect is that I've been eating out for all my meals because I leave so early and come home so late I'm to exhausted to prepare anything.....and now I've gained back all the weight I'd lost plus some more.  BOO.

Upside, Hubby bought me a Ipad so in my down time at work I've been on Pinterest, pin pin pining away paleo recipes.  By some miracle I had 6 days off in a row and decided to actually try some of these recipes and really try to get back on track with paleo eating.

These are my trusty tools:  IPAD and Blender.  I also picked up this snazzy mortar and pestle at Costco, a few of these recipes called for ground flax seed.  I also heard that ground chia seed helps thicken smoothies and is amazing in Omega 3.

This did take quite a while to cut up all the fruit and read each recipe so I don't have pictures of them all.  Instead I'm posting the pretty pictures from the blogs they came from, followed by my modified recipe, when you click on the picture it will link you to the original recipe.

Why modified you ask?  I'm allergic to banana (the base of most smoothies), I had to use the fruit on hand and some had to be paleo-fied.

Strawberry Sunbutter & Spinach

http://www.coffeeandquinoa.com/2013/03/strawberry-spinach-sunbutter-smoothie/

• 2 cups frozen strawberries
• 2 large handful spinach leaves
• 3 Tbsp sunbutter
• 1cup unsweetened almond milk
• 1.5 Tbsp maple syrup
• 1Tbsp ground flax seed
• 2 tsp apple cider vinegar
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon

I doubled the original recipe and it filled 2 mason jars perfectly.   This smoothie is pretty delicious, especially if your a peanut butter lover like my hubby is.  Sun butter is the perfect sub, Trader Joe's has a pretty yummy jar for under $5.

Mango Orange

http://oursavorylife.com/a-super-hydrating-paleo-smoothie-recipe/

1 cup frozen mango's

1 orange, peeled

2 apricots

1 cup almond milk

1/2 cup 100% pure coconut milk

Chia Seed and Ground Flax optional

Bright citrus flavor, the apricot didn't blend down to well though.  If you don't like chunky smoothies I would leave it out.

Pina Colada

http://www.vegalicious.org/2011/02/04/pina-colada-smoothie/

• 2 cups pineapple (I used frozen from Trader Joe's)
• 1 cup mango
• 1 can coconut milk
• 1 cup pineapple juice
• Chia Seed and Ground Flax optional

This was my favorite, the only down side was it was a little to acidic drinking it all at once, but that could just be me. I still have one more jar of this so I'm going to definitely try again.

At this point I was feeling pretty confident in my smoothie making ability's and decided to wing it.  I had purchased some pre cooked beets at Costco, super healthy....super disgusting.  Picture me, dumping 3 juicy beets in the blender, dancing in the kitchen singing "turn the beet around, blah blah blah, the passion".  It didn't matter how much fruit I put in the blender it was not going to cover that taste.  I even dumped half out and tried to salvage it.  No Bueno.

So we scrapped that batch and moved on.

Very Berrylicious

http://www.thegraciouspantry.com/clean-eating-super-berry-smoothie/

1 cup blueberries

1 cup strawberries

1 cup blackberries

2 big hand fulls of spinach

1 tablespoon chia seeds (I added ground flax too)

1 cup unsweetened almond milk 

Another fav of the Hubby's, he loves anything berry and definitely better than beets!

Here are my little beauties in the freezer, each batch filled 2 jars. My mom bought me blue ball jars at Target.  I also bought larger jars to make salads in more on that to come and more smoothie recipes too.  I found some with avocado base, that should be interesting.

Paleo at Sprouts

One of my favorite things about the Foodee blog is that you can save recipes you like and it will make a grocery list for you.  I picked 11 meals that I wanted to try along with some basic needs I've read about like Coconut Oil, Aminos and Milk.

After searching for the local Whole Foods store I found the closest one to me was about 40 mins away.  No Bueno.  Then I remembered there was a Sprouts on my way home from work.

I'd only gone to Sprouts once before, honestly its pretty daunting walking in.  Its not set up like a typical grocery store and I spent 2 hours there!  Slowly strolling up each aisle hunting down my items and reading labels.  You would not believe how many things they sneak sugar and soy into.  It took me a long time to figure out which was the "right" kind of almond and coconut milk to drink.  Still have to do a little research on brands.
Here are some photos of my "Haul"
Coconut Oil, Milk, Aminos and Water.  Chicken Stock. Almond Milk.  Stewed Tomatos.  Apple Sause (not shown) and Apple Cider Vinegar.  I'm going to try my hand at making my own Mayo!

Spaghetti Squash, Strawberries, Cauliflower, Onion, Shallot, Cranberry, Flaxseed, Almond Meal

and that funny thing on the right is a Jicama.  Apparently you can treat it like a potato.

Green Stuff: Basil, Mint, Cucumber, Celery, Kale, Chard, Scallions

I felt very silly standing infront of the greens totally stumped at what I was actually looking at, found a very nice man who told me which was chard and kale.  He even brought me a Ad and coupons.

Googled how to prepare chard to learn how to cut the beast apart. 

There was SO much prep work for veggies. 

Hubby made some perfect steaks for dinner.

Last but not least I tried a recipe I saw on facebook for a green drink. 

(Using their pix, my shaker cup was not as pretty)