Free the Animal

Another Crustless Quiche

This one was way better than my last crustless quiche.

What I did differently was first, to use 1/2 cup of potato flour instead of coconut flour. This resulted in a wonderfully crusty skin. Carbs? Well, 1/2 cup of the flour is about 60 grams or so, discounting the fiber (about 5 grams). This gets cut into 12 portions, so you'll get 5-6 grams per slice. No big.

The other thing is that I used Swiss cheese instead of cheddar. The traditional French recipe calls for Gruyere, but that's about four times the price and it's not four times as good.

On the next go I'm going to try to make an actual crust with the potato flour, eggs, leaf lard, etc. I might try tapioca, and that's only about two-thirds of the carbs in the potato flour.

...Well, I'm off to catch a cruise ship in downtown San Diego.

Grilled Carne Asada

My father-in-law, Sam, grilled this up last night. The veggies were grilled too.

It was a great dinner, after having spent very nearly the entire day by the pool.

Real Chicharrónes

Picked up this morning by my father-in-law from a local Mexican market, Los Reyes, in Vista, CA. So good. Crunchy, but chewy all at the same time.

I Get So Much Help

As per usual, today, being a traveling day, I fasted from last night's meal (damn me that I didn't get a picture of the main course; it's quite special that Robert actually ground the curry himself, and I've been a bit obsessed thinking of it) until tonight.

So, bygones, and a mistake I'll not repeat; here's tonight's break-fast after a long drive.

 

Upon arrival, there was a roast beef with some onion having spent a lot of hours n the crock pot. In addition, squash cut into great big chunks as you see ( me likey) , carrots and cauliflower. They had organic, unsalted butter on hand, which I made substantial use of.

I had a second plate just like this. A couple more scotches/rocks, and I'm done.

Deviled Eggs & Salmon Roe

Just about to head out and hit the road, but not before this. Friends down the hall were kind enough to prepare dinner for us last night and served up a wonderful witefish in a curry sauce featuring home ground curry spices. Nice, and I wish I'd had the presence of mind to snap a photo.

I didn't come empty handed and presented this bit of an appetizer. Really super easy to make. I followed this recipe from Cheeseslave, and yep, this is a great way to get vitamin K2, MK-4, the form of K2 made by animals for other animals.

What I did differently from the recipe was that I included about a rounded tblsp of finely chopped shallot, and instead of mustard, I chopped about a rounded tbsp of nori (dried seaweed, such as you see as garnish) that's included in the egg. This one is definitely a keeper, for me.

Eating Out and Away

Mark Sisson has up a decent guide to eating out. He's right about the Mexican. While I might could go for the carnitas, or even the home made chicharrónes, I usually go for the fajitas, in the same style Mark suggests: ditch the tortiallas, rice, & beans. Gor for the grilled meat, veggies, guac & sour cream.

This is precisely what I did last Friday evening at a very old and popular Mexican restaurant.

Sunday we went to visit my dad & mom for fathers day. Got there about noon and I hadn't eaten since those fajitas right above. A bit hungry, and as it turned out, mom had made ground beef stuffed cabbage the night before, no rice. Perfectly primal.

I think I'll be giving this one a go. Ideas for variations include trying it with ground lamb, veal, or a combo. I also have one pack of ground venison left over from my brother's kill some months back, so this dish is a definite candidate.

Fast forward a few hours, mom set out some snacks.

Artisan salami, pickled herring, a camembert, smoked oysters, assorted veggies & cheese, and chicharrónes.

I'm very fortunate to have parents and other family who have seen the benefits of the primal, real food experience.

Saturday Dinner - Grilled Tri-Tip & Celery Root Purée

I finally got a grill that allows me very good temperature control, such that I can do the low & slow to achieve rare & medium rare roasts from edge to edge and not just the very center. It's a Char-Broil Infrared Gas Grill. Highly recommended. Essentially, I was able to easily create an indirect heating environment of only about 250 degrees. I used a temperature probe as well to know internal temperature. Then, once the meat was at 115 I used direct heat on high and turned the meat until 125. Then let rest. If you have juice draining after a couple of minutes, you know it's enough to make the fat juicy. Of course, the juice was reintroduced to the sauce.

To accompany the roast was a celery root purée which I've been dying to make correctly for about a dozen years (click the image for the full size). Tried a couple of times with bad results. You must have a full-fledged food processor. I'll not even go into the various ways I've tried. You must have a food processor to do it right.

Here's the recipe that I used. The changes I made were that I used 2 cups of whole milk (organic pasteurized is fine; you're gonna kill the milk anyway) and a cup of organic heavy cream mixed with the water for cooking. I also used a full stick of organic butter, along with 1/2 cup of cream (melted together in a saucepan) for the finish in the food processor. It came out smooth and really wonderful. Yep, there's one small russet to go with the 2-3 pounds of celery root. For 6-8 servings, it's a pretty minimal amount of glucose.

The sauce was a reduction of my standard bone stock and I didn't do much with it other than add a bit of red wine, and a pinch each of sage & rosemary. Because I was concerned with having enough for everyone, I thickened with about a tsp of potato flour right at the end instead of reducing more.

Our neighbor prepared a wonderful green salad with onions, real bacon bits, and dressed lightly with olive oil and fresh lime. I was remiss in not getting a photo, but, I did eat an entire plate of it after the above had been finished off.

Almost Paleo Country "Biscuits" & Gravy

This is one I came up with concurrently while thinking of last night's meal. I was actually a late comer to the love of country buttermilk biscuits & gravy, but fall hard I did. "Twas a time when, all the local cafes I frequented existed in a mental hierarchy based exclusively on my judgment of the quality of their country gravy.

But since going toward paleo two years ago, getting closer 18 months ago, and finding my stride and expertise now, it has been a rare cheat treat that I've maybe fixed only 3-4 times, all right up here in...the open country.

Well, I'm here to say that the gravy problem was easily solved, so, no more need of flour and starches and other nefarious ingredients. Seriously: coconut milk, country sausage, and whatever spices you like. Simmer and reduce gently. I used just a couple dashes each of chives, rosemary, parsley, and savory. I also added a quarter cup of heavy cream and 1/4 tsp of Kitchen Bouquet, just for color. Regular readers know that I do a lot of coconut milk curries (just use search to find them). In this case, fortunately, there is not a hint of coconut flavor. It works excellently.

Biscuits are a much harder problem. I was very limited in choices, here. No coconut flour at the local market, so, for six cupcakes, I used four jumbo eggs, 4 tbsp coconut milk, 1/2 cup of buttermilk, and 4 tbsp cottage cheese. (Note: that was a full can of coconut milk, and the remainder went with the 1/2 pound of sausage.)

I greased the cupcake pan with bacon drippings; and by the way, if you use bacon drippings, then always cook your bacon on very low heat. I'm patient, and my bacon never smokes, and so my drippings are always pretty pristine for later use. Also, the sausage was too lean, and so 2 tbsp of bacon dripping went in there, too.

350 degrees, and I initially tried 15 minutes, but a knife poke revealed way too much moisture. So, I kicked it up to 400 for another 10 minutes, which did the trick. I rested for 5 minutes in the tray, and then another 5 minutes turned over on the counter, letting moisture steam off. In the end, about as firm as quiche.

The biscuits are the weak link, and I'm anxious to try various things when I get back home, such as the cauliflower pizza crust, coconut flour, or some combination. For those who like country gravy on their scrambled eggs, this approximated that. If I can get the biscuits up to the texture I'd like, then I'll go the the trouble. Otherwise, I'll probably just do plain omelets with the country gravy poured on top.

Skillet Fried Pork Chops and Roasted Brussels Sprouts

This was perhaps my favorite preparation in quite a while. I really devoured it, even to the point of gnawing at every little bit of flesh on the bones of those chops.

Fist, though, let's talk about the roasted Brussels sprouts -- roasted with whole garlic and onions and tossed in a shallot & balsamic vinegar reduction -- a preparation I can't take credit for. This one was linked to at Mark's Daily Apple quite some time ago and I fixed it once. However, I blended a couple of recipes I found and ended up cutting the sprouts in half and also blanching them prior to roasting.

That was okay, but I decided to do it pretty much exactly by the recipe this time out, only I didn't have red onion or fresh rosemary. I used yellow onion and dried rosemary. Still, it came out fabulous and, if you don't like Brussels sprouts, I very much encourage you to give this recipe a shot.

So, now for the pork chops. Standard, bone in. I fried them in the skillet with mostly quite a lot of coconut oil and a bit of bacon drippings. I cooked them on low until pink and moist inside, then poured off most of the fat, turned up the heat and browned them well, leaving lots of good bits in the pan. I set them aside to rest, then deglazed with a real nice chicken stock, which I found at the local supermarket and was actually free range organic with no nefarious ingredients whatsoever.

Soon as the deglazing was done, I added more stock, a half-handful of chopped shallot, and a hefty handful of fresh blueberries. I crushed the berries, turned up the heat, and let it reduce. Once it neared completion, I added about three tbsp of fresh organic cream to finish it off and smooth it out. Finally, as I plated the chops, I added back in the drippings from resting.

In case I hadn't mentioned it, we're up at our cabin in Arnold, CA (Google Maps) for the week as Beatrice, junior high school counselor, just finished out the year.

Finally, if the photo presentation looks a bit improved, I've got to give inspirational credit to my friend and neighbor, Julie Olson, who does wonderfully artistic food blogging at Fraises Et Tartines. Her and husband Trevor are in Paris just now, and I'm horribly jealous.

A Sunday Brunch

Earlier today, I did a twitpic of the brunch Bea, I and friends down the hall prepared. Now, here's the plated version.

The quiche was crustless. Seven eggs, a cup of heavy cream, 1/2 cup coconut flour, 1/4 cup water, sea salt & fresh ground pepper.

Separately, about 10 slices of fairly thin sliced bacon, 1/3 cup chopped onion, 1/2 small package of baby spinach. I cut up the bacon, got it frying, added the onion, and at the very end added the spinach. Set it out on a paper towel, then all on the chopping block to chop finely.

Melted leaf lard in my fry pan, poured in the egg mixture, dropped in the bacon mixture, then a cup of grated New Zealand grass fed sharp cheddar, and then I gently stirred it all into the mixture.

About 30 minutes at 350 and a 5-minute finish at 400 to get a decent crust on top. Let rest for 10 minutes or so.

Simple Meals

Here's a couple of simple meals over the last few days.

First up, a simple grilled burger and salad. What makes it special is the bone stock reduction. It really turns a burger into a pretty sophisticated meal, considering all the nutrition and flavor in the stock. The salad is simply a vinaigrette using Greek Kalamata EVOOA, French Dijon mustard, and apple cider vinegar. As always, click the images for the full size.

Next up was grilled tri-tip last night, and the same reduction for the sauce, along with the drippings added in (can't get enough of this!). I grilled on the lowest temperature, then crisped it under the broiler for a couple minutes per side. Next to it are yellow onions fried at low temperature (takes a long time) in bacon drippings. The onions really shrink, so plan for about one medium onion per person.

Apps For Dinner

Last evening Bea and I broke out the bikes and headed downtown for some appetizers at McCormick & Schmick's, then over a block to see a film. In all, pretty damn paleo. All of these can be clicked for the full size versions.

Three grilled lamb chops, rare. The drizzle and the cup are greek live oil with some sort of leaves in them, perhaps grape, and I thought I also tasted a bit of sage, maybe savory. Anyway, totally excellent, as good as any rack of lamb I've ever had.

Here's Bea's shrimp cocktail.

Then I had a sashimi & sushi plate. The rice was easy to deal with, 'cause if you'll notice, the nori wraps around the fish and cucumber, so I just tore it off right there and left the rice.

The bread went easily untouched. I'd have used the butter on the lamb chops, but the olive oil was the bomb.

So, some restaurants are easier for paleo eaters by eating a-la-carte from the appetizer menu. Other choices on the menu that would have fit paleo were steamed mussels in a white wine broth, oysters on the half shell, and butter and garlic drenched clams.

Looks like I have something left for a another visit. At 5-minutes away by bicycle and no parking issues, it's a wonder I don't go there more often. Then again, there's about 2 dozen restaurants that meet the same criteria. I love living urban.

BBQ Spareribs

Last night's dinner.

I began this about 3:30. Use your favorite dry rub, and rather than really coat it, use a pretty light brushing, both sides. Then wrap securely in foil, place in a baking pan with a mesh so that it's off the bottom of the pan, and get it in the oven at 250 for three hours. I've done 200 for four hours and the results are similar.

When done, let it rest for 10 minutes or so, unwrap, move the accumulated juices (fat) to a saucepan, and begin reducing. I add in some chili powder, paprika, cayenne and sometimes some cumin, mustard, or various other spices. You can also do jalapeno, onion, garlic, and strain it or don't. I've also used a good quality bottled BBQ sauce, added to the drippings in a proportion of about 2/3 dripping to 1/3 sauce. You could also make your own low-sugar sauce.

As the sauce was reducing on low, I fired up the grill on high and did each side about three minutes or so. Plater it and dump the sauce on, or serve the sauce on the side. This came out fall apart tender.

Stuffed, Grilled, Sauced Pork Loin

Here's one thing I cooked this weekend. Lets begin with the grilling (you can click on the images for the full versions).

That's a pork loin on the barbie. The foil is for capturing the juices (i.e., fat) as well as for indirect heating. What you don't see, as it's obscured by meat and onion, is the four slots in each loin, wherein I have stuffed garlic cloves and fresh rosemary.

In the meantime, let's prep the sauce. In goes two (there's only one showing, but it was two eventually) cubes of my bone stock, a T each of duck fat, leaf lard, and butter.

Can you take a wild guess at what I thickened it with? Of course, the fat juices from the cooked loin went in as well.

How about paprika (about 2T) and a dash of cayenne?

So, here's the final result, sliced up, plattered, and sauced. You can see the garlic and rosemary if you look close.

For me, is was one of the more satisfying dishes I've made recently. This, salad, and some watermelon was enough. Well, not entirely. My friend's wife was away, along with mine, for the weekend and we finished off all but about four pieces of this. I believe I finished off those last four around midnight.

Simple Salmon

A commenter asked on another post about ideas for salmon. I pointed him to this past preparation of mine, but then got hungry for salmon, so here was dinner last night coming off a 1-day fast.

I just salted & peppered the fish, put it on a rack under the high broiler for about 2 minutes on one side and 3 or so on the other, until golden. In the meantime I wok fried asparagus in coconut oil and in a saucepan, melted a couple tbsps of ghee, to which I added just a tiny bit of minced garlic, making sure not to toast it to much. Then I added in the juice from half a lemon (for two servings) and let the juice boil off.

This ghee, garlic & lemon oil went over the salmon and mixed very well with the coconut oil fried asparagus. Very satisfying.