The Paleo Mama

Homegrown and Handmade

Paleo Toddler

Sh*t Paleo Kids Say

by 18 Comments

Kids really do say the funniest things! Well, add Paleo to that and a little bit of crunchy and you got your self a hilarious mess!

 

Stealing my Kombucha!

 

kombucha4

Here are a few things I have heard (and innocent bystanders) my kids say that make me literally LOL:

1. “Can I have my seaweed chips, MOM?”

2. “Mom, can you stop hogging all the KUMbucha and share?”

3. “Can I have some olives?”

4. “Mom, can you give me some coconut water?”

5. “My brother was born in a bathtub.”

6. “Can you wear me this time and not Frankie? I’m tired.”

7. “We drink milk from the hairy coconut.”

8. “My mom puts vinegar in my hair.”

9. “Why do we come to McDonalds to just play and not eat?”

10. “Mom, this milk is GROSS.”

“Oh honey, that is baby milk.” (pumped breastmilk)

11. “Mommy, I didn’t have my honey today yet.”

12. “Stop putting garlic in my ears”

13.  “Stop putting onions beside my bed.”

14. “Can I have my vitamin d drops?”

15. “Can we have brussel sprouts tonight?”

16. “Why is he eating French fries and I have fruit?”

17. “Mom, there’s a diaper in the toilet. I need to go potty. Can you wash this diaper?”

18. “There’s a dryer ball in my pile of clothes.”

19. “There’s a soap nut in my pile of clothes.”

20. “Mom, can I have some more bacon?”

21. “Can I have some more bone broth?”

22. “Can I have some more almond butter on my spoon?”

23. “Why are you putting coconut oil in your hair?”

24. Why are you putting coconut oil on my toothbrush?”

25. “Why are you putting coconut oil on my butt?”

26. “Why are you putting coconut oil in my smoothie?”

27. “Daddy got poop in his eye when he was using the diaper sprayer!”

28. “Papa gave me lots of candy today. Am I in trouble?”

29. “Can I hold those chicken feet before you throw them in the soup?”

30. “Why do people call me weird?”

 

What do your Paleo kids say that you find funny?

 

Choosing the Right Coconut Milk (for weaning babies)

by 37 Comments

coconutbabies

My son, Frankie, is almost 15 months old. We weaned him from breast milk about a month ago because my donated freezer stash ran out, so I figured this would be a good time to wean him onto something else. He was on donated milk for almost a year! Incredible, eh? Well, I think so. It was a miracle, actually, and an answer to my deep cry out to God in prayer. You can read why we needed donated milk here.

First off, let me start this by saying I am NOT a professional, nutritionist, or medical provider. I am just a mom who has done extensive research in what to use as a milk alternative. I am also just going to address dairy-free alternatives and what has worked best for my family.

I am very confident in my children’s nutrition and that they are eating a balanced diet. So, milk, for us, is just a compliment to their diet; a treat. I don’t count on it for calcium, protein, or Vitamin D. In fact, there are many days that we go without milk. Even Frankie only gets milk twice a day now. When we weaned him from breast milk at 13 months old, he was drinking about 30 ounces of breast milk a day. So, my challenge was to get him used to the taste of water now. I kept offering less and less breast milk and more water and coconut milk. Coconut milk is what we chose to wean onto. I didn’t expect Frankie to just stop drinking milk when that is all he had for nearly 14 months. I looked at all my choices: hemp milk, coconut milk, almond milk, soy milk, raw milk, and store-bought organic milk. Coconut milk seemed to be the most nutrient-dense, dairy-free choice.

The hardest part about choosing coconut milk was the fact that EVERY single store-bought coconut milk had some terrible ingredients in the carton. The worst of these is Carrageenan. As quoted here off Cornucopio.org, “Carrageenan, a seaweed derivative used as a stabilizer and thickener in foods, has been found to be contaminated with a substance (degraded carrageenan) that is classified by the WHO’s International Agency for Research on Cancer as a “possible human carcinogen.”  Research funded by the National Institutes of Health raises serious concerns about harmful effects of carrageenan as an inflammatory agent on the human gastrointestinal tract.”

Homemade Coconut Milk

Method #1: Using Coconut Shreds

Cost: $2 for a half-gallon

So, I tried a few methods of making my own homemade coconut milk. The first way that I experimented with was using Bob’s Red Mill Flaked Coconut Unsweetened, 4 – 12-Ounce Bags to make the milk out of. This was MESSY and not so easy. However, the milk tasted amazing and it was pretty cheap. I used this recipe here and quadrupled it to make about a gallon. It cost me $2 to make a half-gallon of fresh milk…$4 for ALMOST a gallon. However, you need to make sure you get high quality unsweetened coconut shreds because with shredded coconut, the majority of the time the milk has already been expressed out of the shreds. Also, you may want to invest in a “nut bag” to help with the squeezing the milk because this is very messy.

Method #2: Using Whole CoconutCost: $4 for a half-gallon

The other method I did was I used a whole coconut and followed this recipe. According to this recipe, one whole coconut makes a about a quart of milk. The average coconut is around $2 so this method costed me about $4 for a half-gallon of milk…twice as much, however it was delicious! It was much richer than just using the coconut shreds and I could have probably diluted it a bit more with filtered water. However, we liked the richness of it and so did Frankie!

Method #3: Coconut Milk Tonic (using canned milk)

Cost: $4 for a half-gallon

The last method that I tried was this one. It is taken from the book, Eat Fat, Lose Fat. Here’s the recipe:

Ingredients

14 oz can of full fat Native Forest Organic Classic Coconut Milk, 13.5-Ounce Cans (Pack of 12)

2 1/4 cups filtered water

2 TB Coombs Family Farms 100% Pure Organic Maple Syrup Grade B, 32-Ounce Jug

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tsp Kal Dolomite Powder — 16 oz

Instructions

Mix all ingredients together in a medium saucepan over medium to low heat until all the dolomite is dissolved.  Serve immediately or refrigerate.

I didn’t have any dolomite powder and am confident that my kids are getting enough calcium from other foods so I didn’t add this. I just mixed everything up in a half-gallon mason jar and shook it! The milk separates from the water as it’s sitting in the fridge so you have to give it a little shake every time you use it. We really like this one too! It was rich, creamy and frothy! I even used it in my coffee a few times.

WHICH METHOD DID I LIKE BEST?

Taste-wise: Method #2, using a whole coconut was the best with method #3, the tonic following very closely behind.

Conveniency: Method #3, the Coconut Milk Tonic was the most convenient and easiest to make. Method #1, using the shreds was messy, took forever, and the taste didn’t even come close to the other two methods. The reason why, is because the process of making coconut shreds, takes a lot of the “milk” out. So, you have a much more watery taste to the milk.

Cost-wise: Obviously, the shreds was the cheapest.

WHICH METHOD DO I NOW USE?

I am using Method #3 and mixing it with a clean Almond milk that I found. Kroger is now making Almond Milk and the ingredients look pretty clean to me. It has no Carrageenan in it and the half-gallon only costs $2.50. So, I am mixing this 50/50 with my Coconut Milk Tonic. This way, it’s not costing me $8 a gallon to make the Coconut Milk Tonic. It’s only costing me about $3 to make a half-gallon of the coconut/almond mixture. Geez, I hope I didn’t just confuse you!

 

 

Paleo Kids: What to feed them?

by 9 Comments

My new friend over at Living Crunchy invited me to write a guest blog post on how to feed real, clean food to kids. Today, I’m going to share with you the post that I wrote and I hope it can help you on your Paleo journey as a family!

As a mother of two Paleo kids  I understand this very common question. Kids love junk. They love candy. They love bread. They love anything that isn’t “healthy”…right?

If I was to tell you (and I’m not bragging here, I just am proving that feeding kids Paleo is possible) that my kids love veggies, boiled eggs, slices of avocado, bone stock, olives, and every kind of meat; would you believe me? They can down a steak faster than a grown-up, and nothing quenches their thirst like water. They don’t even know what cereal is. They thrive on what I eat, and that is meat, eggs, veggies, nuts, fruits, and healthy oils.

Yes, it can be done. When I hear mothers say that they can’t get their kids to eat anything but mac n’ cheese, hot dogs, chips, crackers and cereal, I wanna ask them, “Are they the ones doing the grocery shopping?” Seriously, who is buying it? If you don’t buy it, it won’t be there to tempt them, but mostly, tempt yourself to throw something easy at them that you KNOW that they will eat and won’t fight about.

Here are two ways to start the process of eating healthier:

1) ease into it. Slowly eliminate the junk foods in your house and start by buying healthy alternatives. Let your kids finish the cereal, let your husband finish his stash of chips, but don’t buy anymore. Or…

2) you go cold turkey. This is how I did it. I bagged up all my junk food, grains, cans of soup and fruits, and I donated them. My personality is all-or-nothing. So this just worked for me. I don’t overwhelmed easily some could handle this more intense transition. Some people, can’t do it this way. For example, the working mom may find it really difficult to make so many changes all at once.

Either way, you are making healthier choices for your family. I had to stop looking at food as a means to an end (hungry—> so satiate that hunger) and look at it as a way to heal my body, grow my children’s bodies, and energize my life.

My kids never get a separate dinner. If we are having bone broth soup, so are they. If we are having grilled veggies and grilled chicken legs, so are they. And let me tell you how adorable it is to see a baby tear apart a chicken leg with his little mouth!   Once you break YOUR bad habit of feeding them the easy food, you will see that raising Paleo kids is just as easy as raising non-Paleo kids.

I’ve had many Paleo mothers ask me what to send in their school lunch. For me, packing my daughters lunch for preschool has really made me tap into my creative side. I bought a Planetbox lunchbox, which is a bento-style stainless steel box, to help me be diverse and make the whole “lunch dilemma” more of a fun thing that me and Arianna do together in the mornings.

I try to make her lunches creative, colorful and tasty. She eats some dairy, like cottage cheese and Greek yogurt on occasion because she loves it. I try to always include something in her lunchbox that she loves. This keeps her happy and looking forward to seeing what I included. She loves roll-ups, which is simply deli-meat rolled up.

Sometimes I cut the roll-up in 5 sections and neatly place them in her box. Some other protein-rich foods I put in her box are, boiled eggs, slices of avocado (drenched in lemon juice), beef jerky, pistachios, shredded chicken, and leftover steak. Then I try to add one or two veggie items. This is usually sliced cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, or carrot sticks.

Now, if you have a toddler, then you know that they love to dip. So, I include a little container of almond butter or olive oil/balsamic vinegar that she can dip her veggies in. I always try to add a healthy fat. Sometimes this is the olive oil/vinegar dip but other times it is olives, nuts or avocado. Then I give her a fruit. It’s whatever I have on hand. I throw other things in that she loves like fruit leather, dark chocolate for a treat, Nut Thins, or a Lara Bar. And that’s it! It takes me about 5 minutes to make her lunch in the morning.

I started a group on Pinterest called, “Arianna’s Lunches“. When I remember, I upload a picture of her lunch I made for that day.

The greatest lesson I have learned as a mother is that there are three things that we cannot FORCE upon our children: input (food), output (toilet), and sleep. In trying to “break” our kids and get them to conform to our will, we end up hurting the relationship even more. However, what we can do is give them options. Kids love to feel like they are in control too.

They are, indeed, little humans and have the same strong will that we have. Limit your food options to healthy choices and let them choose. Let them feel like they are choosing for themselves. Let them feel like they are in control of their own bodies. That’s the goal, right? To raise healthy children that will one day grow up and make healthy choices for themselves.

Great recipes from The Paleo Mama:

Fruit Gummy Snacks

Paleo Mac n’ Cheese

Baked Avocado-Coco Fries

 

Fruit Gummy Snacks

by 29 Comments

My 3 year old LOVES gummy snacks. I’ve been getting the Cliff Rope Twist from Sam’s at a decent price but I wanted to see if I could create something that was similiar, but homemade. I love having ingredients on hand so that when we run out of something, I can just whip it up. In comes my new love with Great Lakes Gelatin.

A friend of mine told me about this gelatin that is made from grassfed beef. I was immediately fascinated and wanted to give it a try. I’ve been trying to create a fruit gummy recipe for a few weeks now but I wanted to avoid commercial gelatin because of the ingredients and dyes that are in it. Great Lakes Gelatin is a wonderful source of protein too, so how cool that I could give my daughter her gummy snacks, and also sneak some protein in!

Here’s the recipe that I came up with. It is very versatile.

Homemade Paleo Fruit Gummies

2/3 cup of fresh berries (I used strawberries, blackberries, and blueberries)

1/2 cup of water

1/3 cup of Great Lakes Gelatin or another unflavored gelatin

6-10 drops of Stevia or a few TB of honey

Throw the fresh berries in a blender and add a few splashes of coconut water to boost the nutrition even more ( you can use regular water). Puree  it till it is the consistancy of runny yogurt.

Next, pour the berry mixture into a small saucepan, put the heat on medium, and slowly added the gelatin. Stir the mixture till all the gelatin is disolved.

Pour the mixture into cute molds, ice cube trays, or just a small 8×8 Pyrex pan. Pop it in the fridge until it sets. It took about 30 minutes for mine to set completely. Since I used a 8×8 Pyrax dish, I then used little cookie cutters and cut out shapes.

Tada! You have a ridiculously healthy fruit snack…especially if you used the Great Lakes gelatin and coconut water! Even if you didn’t it’s still far surpasses the fruit gummies you buy in stores!

Enjoy!

Paleo Mac n’ Cheese

by 15 Comments

I have been trying to create a mac n’ cheese recipe that is Paleo-friendly for quite some time. I really don’t like to “Paleo-fy” foods much, but both my kids just go nuts over mac n’ cheese. What kid doesn’t?! Mac n’ Cheese is a rare treat in our house since we are Paleo. I don’t buy cheese and I, definitely, don’t buy noodles. However, I will confess that when I am in a hurry or when I leave my kids with the hubby for a night, I will leave a box of Annies gluten free mac n’ cheese on the counter. I know…what a terrible Paleo mama.

I looked over many dairy-free alternatives to Mac n’ Cheese, but a lot of them used ingredients that are not Paleo (rice flour, vegan butter, etc) which made it even more difficult for me to find a recipe. So, I thought I would just make my own. It’s been rough, because what is mac n’ cheese without noodles and cheese? So, don’t think it’s going to taste like your mama’s mac n’ cheese, however, I do think it tastes cheesy and a great alternativ.

And I have to admit, this is pretty darn good. It’s very versatile. You can use several different kinds of “noodle” to pour the “cheese” sauce over. I just happened to use Spaghetti Squash, but you can also use zucchini noodles, cauliflower, or that Asian sweet potato noodle (or cheat and get some brown rice pasta or quinoa pasta). This cheese sauce would also be great to make broccoli and cheese with or to use as a dip.

Jackie’s Uncheesy Sauce

(double recipe for a 9×13 dish)

4 TB of coconut oil

4 TB of Arrowroot Powder

2.5 cups of full fat coconut milk

1 heaping TB of tahini (some recipes use Almond Butter but I used Tahini)

2 heaping TB of gluten-free nutritional yeast

1/2 TS Dijon mustard

2 TB Rice Vinegar (yes, this is Paleo)

1 TS sea salt

1/2 TS garlic powder

1/2 TS onion powder

1/4 TS nutmeg

3 TB white wine

1/2 TS Paprika for the orange color

couple handfuls of almonds

Directions:

Cook your “noodles”. I used Spaghetti Squash and cooked it in the microwave for 10 minutes. Other ideas for noodles are zucchini “noodle’s” or sweet potato noodles which I buy off Amazon.

In a medium saucepan, heat the coconut oil and stir in the arrowroot. Arrowroot is a thickening agent that has no flavor to it. Whisk the arrowroot for about 20 seconds and then slowly add in the coconut milk. Make sure you whisk and blend the paste really good. This is called a roux. Bring the roux to a bubbly boil and then reduce the heat to low.

Add the tahini, nutritional yeast, Dijon mustard, rice vinegar, sea salt, garlic powder, onion powder, nutmeg, and white wine. Add the paprika for color, if desired. Whisk it all together really well. Remove from heat and set aside.

Add the cooked “noodles” of your choice to a 9in square casserole pan. Pour the uncheese mixture over and lightly blend. Grab a few handfuls of almonds and pulse them in a blender (or use sliced almonds). Spread almonds over the dish and sprinkle some basil on top.

Bake at 350 for 10-12 minutes.

Serves 4!

25 lbs down and some before and after!

by 6 Comments

I thought it was time to write about how I am actually feeling and doing on Paleo. It has been nearly 6 months since I started my own personal Paleo journey. It’s been 3 months since my whole family has been eating Paleo. Since I started in October, I have lost a total of 25 lbs!!! My husband has lost 31 lbs since he started January 1st and has lowered his cholesterol enough to come off his statin drugs! I have noticed huge behavior changes in my 3-year-old daughter since we took gluten, sugar, and dairy out of her diet. And my 8 month old son, who weighed in at 20lbs a month ago, is thriving, happy, content and such a joy to be around. He eats everything I give him. His recent favorites are Paleo chicken nuggets, roasted asparagus, and grilled squash.

So I’m going to show my current before and after pictures. Seeing these are motivation in itself to keep going!

BEFORE
AFTER

I tell people all the time that I feel amazing. I really do. There is no other way to describe how I feel with our new lifestyle. I have so much energy throughout the day…much needed energy since I’m chasing around a highly energetic 3-year-old and an 8 month old army crawler! My mind feels clearer. I haven’t had a headache since I started Paleo. This is now such a part of our life that I NEVER want to go back to what we were before. It’s become second nature and easy.

Do I cheat? Hmm, I like to call it indulging and, yes, I do indulge once a week on one meal. This week I had chips, dip, and Mojitos with my girlfriends and it was GREAT! Last week I had wings and pizza.

Do I let my kids cheat? I am not going to be able to watch every, single thing my kids put in their mouth. I’m also not going to be so strict that I don’t let them indulge in something that they love. Geez, I do! So, yes, I let my daughter eat gluten snacks at her preschool. I let her Papa give her ice cream every day that we were home a few weeks ago. I let my son have those organic puffs when I see them on sale. Life is too short to not have a little bit of indulgences in our life when it comes to food. You have to be able to find that balance to where you can indulge and be done with it. It took a few months for me to be able to do that without being tempted for more or without my body telling me I need more.

Do I workout? If you mean “going to the gym working out”, then no. I just love to be home with my kids. Our mornings are so great together and Frankie is in such a routine with his morning nap that I just don’t even want to mess that up. However, I am on my feet ALL day. So, I wouldn’t say that I don’t exercise, I just don’t do strenuous exercise. And I’m ok with that. Obviously my body is ok with that because I’m losing weight. I cannot devote the time to do any kind of crazy workout schedule, that’s why I could never do a diet that requires me to. Another reason why I love Paleo. It works with your body like nature intended.

What the heck do I eat if I can’t have gluten, diary, or sugar? LOTS!!! I have so many different types of new foods these last few months that I have never tried! I used to just make side salads to go with dinners before we were eating Paleo, but now I am making so many different types of vegetable dishes! We’ve had things like: coconut-almond green beans, roasted Brussel sprouts, kale chips, marinated and roasted beets, creamy cucumbers, mashed cauliflower, cauliflower rice, spaghetti squash, squash fries, sweet potato chips, roasted turnips, parsnip fries, leeks, fennel salads, Jicama home fries, and SO MUCH MORE! Does that sound restrictive to you? Eating Paleo has opened up my eyes to so many new kinds of foods. Once you get out of the “American” way of thinking that every meal needs bread, or that sweets can’t taste good without sugar, you can really start to see that there is so much more to food than starch and sugar. Eating Paleo has also liberated me. I have gone through times where I was obsessed about the number of calories I ate, or the amount of fat something had in it. I now know that fat-free means LOADED with sugar…and that fat is not bad for us. I have lost 25lbs eating fat. I eat lots of fat. I cook with coconut oil liberally. I eat avocados. I don’t feel guilty for reaching for a 3rd or 4th piece of bacon. I even sometimes don’t trim the fat on our steak off. Fat is good. Our brains are mostly fat. Our bodies need fat.

Do I spend more money on food every week? If you are comparing our weekly budget to what I spent when I was crazy couponing a few years ago, then yes. I spend much more. If you compare our budget to what I spent when we were eating real, unprocessed (but not completely Paleo) foods, then no. I spend the same. Thankfully, I do not have to be really strict with our budget. We are extremely frugal in many areas of our life. We buy everything used. We sell things we don’t use. I also try to live very naturally, so I make a lot of our cleaning and daily hygiene products from scratch. If we spend more than $100 one week, I don’t freak out. I spent $150 this week, which is on the higher end of what I spend weekly, however, we needed things like toilet paper, a few cleaning products, and paper towels (which we mostly use for the animals and our new, litter-training kitty is burning through them). I haven’t been able to convince my husband to give up toilet paper yet!

Do I eat all organic? Nope. In fact, I would venture to say that I eat mostly “un”organic. I do get organic vegetables IF they are on sale. We do eat grass-fed beef because we bought a whole cow and split it with a few families keeping 1/4th of the cow for ourselves. This costs us $4.50lb and will last us all year. I sometimes find pastured chickens on sale at a nearby grocery store and I snag a few. Thankfully, we don’t have to worry about dairy anymore. I buy the So Delicious or Silk brand of coconut milk for my daughter to drink a few times during the day and for us also to use in our smoothies. I transitioned my daughter from raw cow milk to coconut milk when we went Paleo. Our eggs come from a local farmer (the same one we get our grass-fed beef from) that has free-range chickens and costs $2.50 dozen. We go through about 10 dozen eggs a month.

How do I feed my working husband? I boil eggs every week for him to grab. I have fruit always handy and ready to grab on the way out the door. I make a larger dinner and he takes the leftovers to work for lunch. I make hash, egg cupcakes, meat and spinach muffins for quick breakfasts on the go.

How do I have time to cook 3 meals a day and spend time with my kids? We eat easy breakfasts together. I grab our griddle throw things on it for breakfasts like eggs, bacon, sausage, or ham lunch meat. If we don’t have a griddle breakfast, then I usually make a smoothie for everyone. Even my 8 month old enjoys these. I always have frozen bananas or strawberries on hand and I just make a simple smoothie. I sometimes sneak in coconut oil, flax-seed, or raw egg yolks for added nutrition.

What do we drink? That’s easy…LOTS of water and an occasional milk. Me and my husband take a Fiberblend every night and we use apple juice for that (only because we CANNOT take it without juice…it’s really disgusting, like dirt). Our 3-year-old loves her coconut milk and I give her that about twice a day.

What do we snack on? Honestly, we don’t snack anymore. Our 3-year-old does, but me and my husband find that our protein and veggie packed meals really keep us full for a long time. For my 3-year-old I keep beef jerky, nuts, fruit leather, and fresh fruit on hand for when she is hungry. Her preschool teacher had a little meeting with me last week and told me that she has never seen a 3-year-old eat so much and so many kinds of healthy foods. She agreed that kids will eat what you give them, especially if you start them off right when they are young, like we did with Arianna. If interested, you can see some great kid lunch ideas on my Pinterest page: https://pinterest.com/jackieritz/arianna-s-lunches/ .

So there…there’s a look inside some of our Paleo life. I hope it helps you, encourages you, and motivates you to make some changes in your life, or to continue on the path you are on!