Day 12 {Whole30}

When Olivia (our first kiddo) was born, we lived in a condo that gave us free cable. It was awesome. So me and newborn Olivia would watch hours and hours of Food Network shows back in the day when people still, you know, cooked on the channel. I picked up a few tricks then that I’m still using today. They have made my life in the kitchen infinitely easier. Especially with all the food prep you have to do during a Whole30, I’m glad these tricks make it fast. Here are the top 3:

1. Slicing an apple: I actually picked this up from Rachael Ray even though I couldn’t find her video. There are millions of ways to cut an apple but this is by far the fastest and it gives you uniform slices, perfect for dipping:

2. Dicing an onion: This technique I learned from Alton Brown, but again I couldn’t find his video of it. First cutting the onion radially and then dicing is so much easier for me than the parallel cut.:

3. Washing lettuce/greens/herbs: On the Whole30 we eat so much salad. I would hate washing lettuce if I didn’t know this trick that makes it so speedy. Again, credit for this method goes to Rachael Ray but I couldn’t find a video of it so I’ll have to describe it to you.

Fill up a clean sink with cold water (not warm or it will wilt the lettuce). Tear apart your lettuce so that the leaves are loose and not held together at the base. Dunk the leaves in the water and swish around to loosen the dirt from the leaves. Then leave them in the water and don’t touch them for about a minute. This will allow the dirt to settle to the bottom. Then carefully scoop the lettuce out of the water, trying not to disturb the dirt that has settled. Dry the lettuce on kitchen towels or in a salad spinner.

This is what our water looked like after washing some kale today.

 

 

Breakfast:

• Two Fried Eggs
• Spinach
• Trader Joe’s Garlic Herb Chicken Sausage
• Handful of Blueberries

Lunch:

• Ginger-Sesame Chicken Salad
• 1/2 an Apple (Kraft cut up the apple which is why it’s not sliced like the above video teaches 😉 )

Snack: I couldn’t help myself today so I had a Cashew Cookie Larabar (so good, my fav so far) and a handful of Trader Joe’s Roasted Plantain Chips.

Dinner:

• Slow Cooker Turkey Legs
• Kale

This is one of the easiest recipes I make. I got it out of a cookbook from the library ages ago. I don’t even know the name of it. You put two bunches of washed kale (stems removed), in the bottom of the crockpot with 1 cup of chicken stock. I can fit 6 turkey drumsticks on top of the kale in my crockpot. You must remove the skin from the drumsticks (Shout out to Rachel for learning the trick to getting the skin off easily is to use a paper towel. Gives you a better hold.). Then rub the drumsticks with olive oil and sprinkle salt, pepper, dried parsley, and paprika. Close lid securely. I cook mine on high for 6 hours.

Prep:

• Roasted 2 sweet potatoes
• Roasted 2 acorn squash

How We Felt:

Kraft is feeling hungry for each meal which is a total revelation. Ever since I’ve know him (which is about 12 years now 😮) He has never been able to tell when his body is hungry. He would just be fine and then totally hangry before hangry was even a thing. It was like a Snickers commercial. I would tell him he needed to eat something and after he ate, he’d be like, yeah, I guess I was hungry. He just could never read what his body was feeling. But now he can. He’s getting better at being able to tell when he is full and when mealtime comes around, he knows that he is hungry. It sounds insignificant now that I’ve typed it, but it is kinda a big deal.

This might be weird, but I think I’m sweating more when I workout. Ew. I know. You click on here to see what’s going on and you don’t want to hear about me sweating. But it’s what you get today. There are a few reasons why I think it is happening. Maybe my body is better at doing what it is supposed to be doing. Or maybe I’m exercising harder. My body is performing better so I’m working out more intensely and my body has to cool off more. Just a guess but I thought it was notable 🙂

Ok, no more talk about sweat. Pinky promise.