Category Archives: Jan’12 | Daily Eats

Whole30 Monthly Meal Plan | Whole Family

On our last Whole30 I planned ahead each week with a meal plan. Making a meal plan made my life so much easier and 10x’s more organized. Of course, there were times where we deviated from the plan or we were lucky enough to have enough leftovers that meals got pushed back but overall my meal plans were a lifesaver.

If you’re in need of some meal planning, not sure where to start, or are like me and like to browse how other people plan, check these out.

I hope they serve you as much as they served me.

Week 1 Meal Plan

Week 2 Meal Plan

Week 3 Mexican Meal Plan

Week 4 SIMPLE Meal Plan

Last day at the beach… Goodbye Whole30

Even though our Whole30 is over we had one more full day left at the beach that we wanted to share. I share this to say that even though the Whole30 is over, we are still eating good food and even though I am no longer sharing our every move, we are still hanging out having a fun time as a family. I also share because we live in New Orleans and our families live everywhere but. Blogging about our fun experiences allows our families to feel closer and more connected to us. It’s wonderful all around. I hope you enjoy seeing pictures of our last day at the beach as much as we enjoyed being there.

For breakfast I made an egg casserole of acorn squash, salmon and eggs.

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Day 30 Eats!!! Day 5 Beach!!!

Day 30!!!!!!! We made it!!! So proud of everyone that achieved this amazing goal!!! So proud of everyone that fed their family better than they ever have and have made some wonderful and amazing strides towards wellness!!!

Our “Whole Family” ate extremely well for 30 days and we feel great. What do we do now? Are we being thrown off the wagon? No. Now, we live our Whole9 life, with the exception of the times that it is really worth it to eat something off the paleo wagon. And then we get right back on it.

We are all pretty aware of what grains and dairy do to our bellies so we are not running for the mac and cheese or the donuts. But we are REAL. We do like an occasional dessert, an occasional drink, an occasional dinner of fondue. Like I said, we’re REAL! And I like it that way.

So what did we do on our last day? On our Day 30? We shopped.

Let’s start from the beginning.

For breakfast I made an egg casserole of leftover salmon, brussel sprouts, plantains, and eggs. Go figure that everyone loved it! Continue reading →

Day 29 Eats! Day 4 Beach!

I know I sound like a broken record but yay for another fun day at the beach! And yay for great Whole30 approved food! I can’t believe we’re already at Day 29 of our Whole30. It didn’t necessarily “fly” by but it was a very real, good, refreshing Whole30. Can’t wait to share our progress and our new goals in a future post.

Day 4 at the beach started with a delicious breakfast of eggs over easy, sautéed acorn squash, and some absolutely incredible green onion sausage from the meat market.

A good breakfast always starts the day off right and today it certainly did the job.

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Day 28 Eats! Day 3 Beach!

We are nearing the end of our Whole30 and we are having a nice and relaxing time at the beach. When we first arrived we spotted a farmers market and our plan today is to go back.

First though, we started our day with a scrumptious yet SIMPLE meal of farm fresh eggs and acorn squash.

After breakfast we finally made it back to the farmers market. The kids were so excited, although I think I was more excited than they were. The market also included a bakery that they are hoping to return to on our way back to NOLA.

It felt so nice, so homey, to be at the Burris Market. To have so many clean fruits and veggies in one place, ripe for the picking, calling out to us, begging to be eaten… we were like kids in a candy store. Continue reading →

Day 27 Eats! Day 2 BEACH!!!

Our first full day at the beach and we are up and ready to get out there!

Of course, we started with a great breakfast….

Salmon, eggs, peppers and mango. A wonderful beach breakfast!

As we we getting ready I thought about the changes that we have had in our lives in the past few years. One of them being our physical appearance. Check out Shiloh and I from 3 years ago and then today.

Crazy, huh?!

I love that I now have the energy to run after the kids, play with them, and go until they tire out…not the other way around. What a difference eating right and exercising makes!

The kids could barely hold in their excitement about getting to the beach!

They had buckets and buckets of supplies!

Love them!!!

This is Levi’s first trip to the beach…can you tell?

The second we got off the boardwalk and his tiny toes touched the sand Levi FREAKED!

All he would say over and over and over was, “OW!!! OW!!!”  and he wouldn’t let his feet touch the ground. 

It was absolutely hilarious! We were all cracking up. He looked so cute!

I did finally get him on the beach and this is all I got. He was in a silent protest.

On the other side of the coin, Jeremiah and Shiloh were like fish who had come home.

Their smiles were plastered on their little faces.

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Day 26 Eats…on our way to the beach!!!

We’re going to the BEACH today!!!!! Are we’re so excited!!! Can you tell?!?!!!

But first…breakfast!

I had to take a picture of our farm fresh eggs and our lucky green one. Aren’t they just the prettiest things ever?!

For breakfast I was still trying to use up leftovers so I made a casserole of shredded pork, tomatoes, spinach and eggs.

It was totally off the cuff and totally delicious.

Can you tell Levi enjoyed his breakfast?

After breakfast Levi, his big belly, and the rest of us said bye-bye to Daddy. We finished packing the truck, picked up the keys to the condo, ran by guitar practice, and headed out to the BEACH!!!

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My kids love tuna salad. Jeremiah has even become really good at making it. Since tuna was on sale this week I bought a whole bunch of cans and made a huge bowl of tuna for lunch, and for many more lunches. They loved it.

On our way in guess what we spotted?! A wonderful, huge, year-round, daily, gorgeous Farmers Market!!!

The kids and I could barely pick our jaws up off the ground as we walked around goggly-eyed looking at all the fresh produce.

There were aisles and aisles of fresh beauty!

Talk about being tempted to buy one of everything!

We really only got a small bit but stay tuned…we will be going back soon!

Drumroll please….we made it to the BEACH!!!

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Day 25 Eats!

With the help of our Facebook friends our “Whole Family” (minus the hubs who unfortunately couldn’t get away) won a trip to the beach thanks to http://www.rickcrozier.com!!! We were so excited and thankful and only had a day to pack! Due to our crazy day, our meals were fast and full of leftovers and a little odd, but that’s okay…we were packing for the beach!

Breakfast on our crazy day was leftovers of sweet potato slivers and chorizo sausage. Yummy even the second time!

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Day 24 Eats!

Day 24 was full of oldies and goodies……..

Breakfast was chorizo and egg (the oldie) along with sweet potato cinnamon hashies (the goodie). 

Jeremiah actually took this picture of his chorizo and eggs and was so proud of it that he begged me to put it in. I told him of course.

The hashies were so good they didn’t even make it to the kid’s plates. They just kept coming up to the serving plate over and over and stealing them. Apparently they liked them!

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Monday, Monday | Day 23 Eats!

Monday brings us back to work, back to school, back to routine. Does it bring us back to boring food? Um…NO! No matter how “routine” of a day, our food is never routine. We had a great day of eating wonderful food that was wonderful for us. 

We started our morning off wonderfully with the kid’s long awaited breakfast of breakfast pizza. Not only is it full of vitamins from the eggs, the protein, the veggies, and the fruit…but it tastes incredible too!

Check out the recipe here and go make it for your family. They will love it and love you for it!

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Lunch was leftovers of pork carnitas and it was just as yummy as the first day.

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Whole Family | Week 4 SIMPLE Meal Plan

I am planning ahead of time to have a low-key week. I know already that Tuesday night is basketball, Wednesday night I am getting together with my small group women to help a friend unpack in her new house, Thursday is cheerleading and my bible study night, and Friday is an early bedtime because of an early basketball game Saturday morning. Our nights are full this week so I want to keep as much of our day as SIMPLE as possible. My only goal is to try some new meals from new places. I will be using a recipe from Nom Nom Paleo, Eat Love Run, Chowstalker, and hopefully more.

Bring on the week! 

Monday: 

Breakfast- breakfast pizza

Lunch- leftovers: carnitas

Dinner- Spicy coconut shrimp with spanish “rice”

Tuesday: 

Breakfast- Eggs and sweet potato hash

Lunch- Salmon patties, a knock-off of Nom Nom Paleo’s crabby patties. Sure to be great!

Dinner- leftovers: carne asada

Wednesday: 

Breakfast- Eggs and veggies

Lunch- chorizo and sweet potato coins

Dinner- Pork and cabbage stir fry from Eat Love Run

Thursday: 

Breakfast- Frittata

Lunch- Tuna salad on tomatoes

Dinner- Salmon from Chowstalker

Friday: 

Breakfast- leftovers: frittata

Lunch- homemade raw sushi

Dinner- leftover cabbage stir fry

I hope my SIMPLE meal plan inspires you to feed your family good, whole, SIMPLE foods this week as well. Eating well doesn’t have to be hard, it doesn’t have to be complicated, it doesn’t have to take a long time with a lot of ingredients. It just has to be good. And it will be. Feed your “Whole Family” good food.

There will be “thank you’s” all around….

Whole Family | Lazy Sunday | Day 22 Eats!

I’m sure I say this every Sunday, but this Sunday really was a LAZY Sunday. Brandon had a work function he needed to be at so the rest of us decided to sleep in. And did we sleep in! We all slept in until 10 and I finally woke Levi up at 10:30. Apparently we needed our sleep and it felt really good.

Because of our late wake-up we had “brunch”. The new idea of “brunch” very much confused the kids since we’ve never done this before, but they adjusted quickly. And it tasted pretty darn good!

I had previously slow-cooked a pork roast to use for our weekend meals. It was great to know the main component of our meals was done for us and made the weekend cooking much more SIMPLE. For brunch I used that pork and made carnitas. Carnitas literally means “little meats” in spanish and that’s exactly what it was. I had slow-cooked the pork on low all day with comino, onion powder, garlic powder, cayenne pepper, dried oregano, salt and pepper. After simmering in it’s own juices all day it was beautifully tender and falling apart .The perfect meat for carnitas.

I plated the carnitas with the obvious lettuce, onions, tomatoes and avocados. The perfect light brunch for the “Whole Family”.

Levi loved it too, I promise. This face was the “I’m not going to look at you or smile because I wanted a fourth plate and I am not okay with you telling me no. So humph.” Really!!!

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Day 21 Eats!

Our day 21 started out really early as Jeremiah had an 8am basketball game and Shiloh had cheer duty.

Thankfully everyone loves chorizo and eggs and it is a really fast and easy breakfast to make. You can see by their faces they were still a little groggy as they enjoyed their breakfast.

After breakfast we rushed out to cheer on the Green Wave, Jeremiah’s upward team and to watch Shiloh cheer. They both did a wonderful job and were really cute doing it.

Levi “happily” sat on the sidelines cheering his big brother and sister on.

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Whole Family | Day 20 “Mexican Train” Eats!

It seems we have been having some rather slow days lately but let me assure you, this was NOT one of those days! We ate GOOD today people!

Breakfast was your basic chorizo and egg. I say basic because it is the easiest and fastest thing in the world to make. I have been eating it for breakfast since my pediatrician released me to eat real food around the ripe old age of 1. Seriously. Chorizo and egg was a staple in my Mexican home growing up and I will say again how GLAD I am that it is such a basic food that I can enjoy it even while eating well. I am also very GLAD that my kids can’t get enough of chorizo and eggs like their momma. Must be the Mexican in em!

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I knew going in to lunch that I was taking a risk. A big risk. On many levels. What was the risk I was joyfully walking in to? Stuffed poblano peppers. Why is this a risk? Well, first of all I’ve never made them. Second of all, I’ve never eaten them! Yes, I know, it’s humiliating. I was not the most risky of an eater growing up. I was the kid who went to a mexican restaurant and ordered the chicken strips. Sad. Very sad. As I grew up and matured by leaps and bounds I began trying, and loving, new foods. One food I never did get around to trying was stuffed poblano peppers. Well, I guess I can’t say that anymore. I know not only have made them, I have EATEN them too!

Oh, to get back to my risks. The third reason this meal was a risk? The kids. I am blessed with non-picky-for-the-most-part kids but stuffed poblano peppers? I really was happily trudging along until I took a bit of one and realized DANG, these have a kick to them! Yeah, the kids...it was now an issue of would these be too hot for the kids?!

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Day 19 Eats!

The days are flying by aren’t they? It’s like with our kids, you blink and their pants are an inch shorter! To think we are already 2/3′s of the way to our goal and already seeing such great results is pretty amazing. Brandon’s pants are getting looser everyday, my stomach is not doing the whole preggos thing but staying flat like it should, the kids are feeling great and doing great in school, and Jeremiah’s blood sugar numbers are staying level.

Not only that but we are encouraged by the “grand”-whole family and how amazing they are feeling! My mom said she put on her normal pants this morning and had to change because they were falling off of her! Now that is a great problem to have. Even my sister, who is not on the Whole30, called me this morning. Even though she is not on the Whole30 she has been eating pretty much paleo because she is hanging out with my parents and other sister who are. Well….last night she had a bowl of pasta and today? Today she is feeling the “reward of wheat”. It’s not pretty!

All of our bellies are feeling great and we are very thankful for that. We are also thankful for CHORIZO!!! Again, I must say, I am so so so so so glad that chorizo is a Whole30/Paleo approved food! We all love chorizo with it’s rich and spicy flavor, we just can’t get enough of it. So, obviously, our breakfast this morning was chorizo and eggs, my all-time favorite breakfast food.

Looks like Shiloh was enjoying it too as she shoveled it with fork and fingers in her mouth!

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Day 18 Eats!

We had a low-key day over at the “Whole Family” casa on Day 18.

Jeremiah caught up on school and made some wonderful grades, Shiloh worked on her letters that are looking prettier and prettier, and poor Levi just tried to keep from being bored…and out of trouble.

Isn’t he funny? He also loves to sneak oranges when I’m not looking. Too cute.

Like I said… a low-key day.

For breakfast I tried something new. Growing up tortillas we a staple for almost every single meal. It is a little weird now to not have them so this morning I tried for something close. Breakfast burritos made with egg, chorizo, onions, bell peppers, and tomatoes. They were a BIG hit!

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Day 17 Eats!

Viva Mexico!!! We are full swing into our week of mexican cooking and LOVING it!

To me, mexican food is home. Mexican food is comfort. Mexican food is all the spices that you smell when you come home from a long time away and things have changed but the smell hasn’t. Mexican food is where it’s at. Mexican food brings everyone into the kitchen to cook together, to yell, to laugh, to turn down burners, to turn them up, to add a little bit of this and a little bit of that, to teach, to learn, to be a part of tradition. Mexican food brings the family together in a common bond: amazing comfort food.

So what are we doing this week? What are we trying to achieve? Amazing HEALTHY Mexican comfort food.

We started our morning with the breakfast that I had the most often growing up, the most times by far than any other breakfast, the best everyday yet wonderful breakfast: chorizo and eggs. Let me say that again with a little umph. CHORIZO AND EGGS!!! I am so excited that I don’t have to give up my favorite comfort-food breakfast but I can still enjoy the amazing flavor and aroma of a staple in my mexican kitchen. I am overjoyed! And you should be too. Go try it. You will never look back.

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Whole30 Day 16 | Crossfit & Eats!

Started my Monday off bright and early, actually dark and early, at the Crossfit gym. I am loving Crossfit and loving that I have a great group of girls to do it with. We’re learning all kinds of new moves and feeling stronger after every workout. I’ve got to say that the best part is how we are blowing our coach away. We came in being “newbies” just last week and now we are right in there with the rest of the pack and she can’t keep from telling us how great we’re doing. It’s really nice to know that all our hard work on the TRX has paid off and we can hang with the ‘big guns’.

Our WOD was “The Seven”. We did seven different exercises, 7 times each, for 7 rounds. Crazy intense and very cool. We warmed up with 1,000m row and cooled down with some planks and handstands. Dang.

I have never been a gymnast type person so a handstand kind of scares me. It just doesn’t seem natural to be hanging upside down. Be real people! My feet were meant to be planted firmly on the ground. I did give it a try although it was a very much failed attempt. I will definitely be working on it. My girls however were solid hand standers. Marcy kicked her legs up and held it for what seemed like half an hour! Well, maybe just a couple minutes, but dang! Pam and Melanie also rocked the handstand which only made me want to show them up next time even more. I’m not competitive at ALL, am I?! Check Melanie out:

I kept my feet on the ground for this workout but I still managed to rock my new Geaux Crossfit tank that I got from the Whole9 workshop. Can’t wait to have some massive weights on that bar!

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Lazy Sunday | Day 15 Eats!

I call it a lazy Sunday although looking back, it wasn’t all that lazy of a Sunday. We went to church at Lakeview and then Shiloh and I went to a birthday party for one of her little friends. We got home around 5, in time to fix dinner and hit the sack. So even though we were moving all day, oddly enough it felt pretty relaxful at the same time. Especially with my very early bed time of 6:30. Really. I made a goal this month of getting good sleep and somehow my body is not wanting to cooperate with my goal. Everyone else is doing pretty good, but somehow sleep is not working so hot for me. Sunday night I decided that my only focus, would be to sleep. And I did. And it felt good.

Here’s how our eating for the day went:

Breakfast was a nice combo of roasted kabocha, scrambled eggs, and homemade breakfast sausage. Our friend Jourdan had spent the night to be with the kids while we were out pretending to be young and hip at the bowling alley, so she joined us for breakfast. It was her first time having kabocha, which she loved of course. Score!

Isn’t she great?! Jourdan and her family also eat paleo so she fit right in with us crazies. Haha!  Continue reading →