Meat Month: Days 5-7

Welcome back to Erica's House of Meats and Carb-Withdrawl-Depression. I continue to be on a diet overhauling my lifestyle. It is now Day 8. The (as far as I know completely mythical) thing where my body shifts to burning fat for energy has apparently not kicked in yet and I am having...brain...slowness. And body...encased-in-molasses-ness. Actually, I feel pretty terrible in general. But look at the timeline! I'm supposed to feel better really soon and/or right now! It's kind of weird how long the murdery phase is lasting!

Anyway, when I really get down (55 minutes out of every hour), I remind myself of what was happening exactly a year ago and how, strangely, this is somewhat easier and also more optional. Seriously, do you remember the Turkey Burritos of Sadness? I'll take a meat muffin (IT'S NOT DIRTY IT'S A THING) any day. Also, I've gotten a couple of comments about willpower and I just want to go on the record with this correction: stubbornness. I will resist every brie cracker shoved in my face out of stubbornness.

A bright spot in this bleak, bleak time of cravings and meat-sweats: the food really is pretty good. I whipped up some Egg Foo Yong the other day, which I sold to Anna as an "egg and chicken and cabbage pancake" with some success. I also made two sauces from the cookbook: Spicy Secret Sauce (good) and The Best Stir-Fry Sauce Ever (not really for me, since all I ever taste in Chinese Five Spice powder is anise, and yuck). Anyway, look at the beautiful little circles of savory griddle-y goodness!

BEHIND THE SCENES: this was mostly an aesthetic disaster and took foreeeeeever. Next time I won't try to replicate the awesome cookbook picture and will just make a giant yummy omelet.

It's heartbreaking when eggs betray me this way. See also: crepes.

And then I made A MEATZA. A meatza! MEAT-PIZZA, Y'ALL. And here you thought I was waiting to do the crazy vintage recipes.

Pizza sauce and olives go a pretty long way for me, but without mozzarella this really only provides wistful echoes of pizzas past. Confession: I rather liked it. But it was also the first time since meat muffins that I seriously wondered to myself, What on earth am I doing?

And I say that as someone who put chia seeds in her limeade because a magazine told her to.

I was pretty excited to realize that a recipe I already use and like very much was Whole 30 compliant as long as I used all mayonnaise instead of yogurt which is the reverse of normal and not something I ever could have envisioned. Anyway, tuna-cabbage salad is crispy and fine, especially if you really drown it in black pepper like I did (and do everything).

If you had told 31-year-old Erica about this mayo/yogurt reversal, she would have laaaaaaaaaaughed and laughed.

Finally, last night we had a nice bowl of Coconut Curry with chicken, cauliflower, and squash. I love curry and this was a gently spicy one. This is a meal that I would actually keep in my normal, pre-lifestyle-overhaul rotation.

Also a warm, comforting way to remind the weather who's boss around here.

Anna had a bit of a deer in the headlights thing happening with her First Day of School pictures.

FIRST DAY OF WHAT, NOW?

But then I realized she just had some very specific ideas about props and staging.

There's that cool confidence. Girl just needed her wheels.

Remembering to check her blind spot. All growed up!

Ivy is eagerly lapping up all the wisdom en-schooled big sister has to offer.

Anna has no idea how to use this DS, but she's excellent at propping it up in various places.

Meat Month commences

Hello from Day Five of what I am told is a Whole entire 30! I can barely even recall sugar and alcohol's sweet, sweet embrace! According to the literature, I should not feel particularly good yet, so everything is right on track!

First, I want to point out that I have so far been relying heavily (and happily) on Melissa Joulwan's excellent cookbook Well Fed. I highly recommend it to anyone who is not meat-avoidant. That said, I decided to kick things off with the two least appealing (to me) recipes for some reason. Probably because I'm worried that this little venture is not going to be enough of a challenge and I wanted to test myself right off the bat.

So...mayonnaise! My favorite!

Okay, this was because it seemed like a necessary component of ranch dressing.

Aaaaaand Meat and Spinach Muffins! Yep. Meat. And spinach. Muffins.

Honestly, this was probably just to be perverse.

I know, you're desperately trying to figure out where to sign up for this adventure with me right now. Don't worry, things quickly took a dramatic turn for the less frightening.

Lunch on Day One was sort of a scramble, as I had not yet generated any Whole 30 compliant leftovers, so I took some shredded chicken and put in in a bowl with mayonnaise and every vegetable I could track down.

I call it Chicken and Unpreparedness Salad.

But then I started consulting the professionals. I realized I was in good hands when this Chocolate Chili recipe gave me a chance to bust out my new Dutch oven and prove to the disbelieving sun that it is fall now. Who would cook chili in her new Dutch oven all afternoon if it were still summertime? That would be madness!

TAKE THAT, SUN.

Also, it was delicious over a sweet potato and some steamed broccoli. Really delicious. This picture does not do it justice, but it was a fine, fine meal indeed.

What's that? My effusiveness is due to the fact that my brain is eating itself for want of carbohydrates? Fair enough.

And then I made some "Pad Thai." Look, sunflower seed butter, which exists, is not peanut butter. Only peanut butter is peanut butter. My tastebuds were not fooled. But spaghetti squash is apparently close enough to real noodles for my discerning palate, because my general reaction to this dish was "WHOA DOES EVERYONE KNOW ABOUT SPAGHETTI SQUASH?"

I know. Brain-self-eating.

Next up: Czech meatballs over mustardy cabbage. It was good. I was actually more into the cabbage than the meatballs. I...might be getting tired of meat already.

Uh oh.

And finally, a simple, no-recipe grill-em-up. Did use some of that mayo I made to create a mustard-dill sauce.

Way to step up, mayo.

Obviously it's pretty early in the game to draw any conclusions about this experiment yet. I will say that I feel like I'm eating a lot of meat and certainly like I'm BUYING a lot of meat and I just don't know if it's sustainable for me personally. But the food has been really good and it's been fun to spend the time planning and cooking.

Also, based on the recommendations to clear all non-approved food out of the house and get eight hours of sleep every night and take naps (!), I do wonder how many people doing this have small children. I've worked in offices and I realize they come with their own socializing and break room temptations, but I kind of doubt your co-worker has ever 1) made you watch Ratatouille repeatedly or 2) literally put a brie-smeared cracker in your hand and said "Mama, I need you to eat this one." Feel free to correct me in the comments!

Ivy is oblivious to the entire undertaking, as she's been pretty into her cars lately.

Typical 10-month gearhead stage.

I kind of dress like a caveman anyway

Hey, look at the calendar! Look look! It's the last day of August! I know today's high is 102, but tomorrow it will be September and the leaves will turn colors and the air will be crisp and we'll all pull out our jackets and cute hats and new school supplies and football schedules and spiced apple cider recipes and everything will be okay again. Whew!

Okay, I know. But please just let me have this dream, y'all. I have had a bad August even for August, which is like saying "That expression was skeptical even for Anna." A variety of factors (weather, travel stress, dead cat) contributed, but if I had to guess, I'd say the primary reason that August was a bust was: lack of food project.

Sooooo here's what we're going to do. We're going to make some Blue Cheese Mousse. No! Wait. I'm saving that bad boy for October. We're going to do a Whole 30! Yay! Because it's what the internet is doing and I am in and of the internet and must do it as well. Seriously, look, all the cool kids are Whole 30-ing. Or rather, just finished, as I am consistently slightly behind everything popular. Or way behind. (I've been on Instagram for well over a month now! Pretty cutting edge, you've probably never heard of it.) I think I'm all set, I read the book and have the other book and I'm trying to stay as open-minded as possible, although I feel like my temperament is less "eat meat and lift heavy things" and more "be a vegetarian and do yoga," so we'll see. Anyway, the takeaway is: no booze, no dairy, no grain, no BEANS. No beans. I feel like it's going to be easier than Bon Appetit though, because on page 261 the Hartwigs say "We will not decree that you must eat shrimp." SOLD!

But first, we eat beans.

Look, all I have to do here is replace the beans and cheese with hunks of meat. Paleo-fied!

Let's eat some other stuff too, just to get it out of our systems.

Again, we just swap out the brie and crackers for meat and meats. This is going to be totally easy.

Fried pickles, fried macaroni and cheese, and ranch dressing becomes meat, meat, kale. Seriously, I can do this in my sleep.

Cheesecake = meatandveggiecake.

You know what, probably easiest just to give up cupcakes.

We did take a bakery tour this week, giving me a chance to make out with a loaf of sourdough bid adieu to bread for a bit. It also gave Anna a chance to be mesmerized by the bread-creation process.

I'm guessing she's not joining me for Meat and Veg Month.

Meanwhile, Ivy has been gently hinting that we may want to re-babyproof the house.

They probably eat shrimp in Stockholm

Wow, can you believe it's been almost a month since I was gloriously freed from my self-imposed Bon Appetit shackles? It's been so great basking in the glow of a world full of recipe variety! I mean, do you even realize how many recipes exist? Bookmarked or pinned on my computer alone? Not to mention the dozens of cookbooks lining my shelves OKAY FINE YOU GUYS IT WAS TOO MUCH FOR ME AND I WENT BACK TO THE LOVING ARMS OF MY CAPTOR. It turns out the real world is overwhelming and I do not like to make decisions.

So I roasted up some chicken.

And I, uh. I made some shrimp.

I mean who didn't see this coming, really?

Anyway, I think I've figured out a way to basically not eat anything interesting in September, so stay tuned because I imagine that will be pretty fun to read about.

So we had back-to-back birthday parties this weekend, as you can probably tell:

Oh, what's that? This was before the first party even started? Excellent.

First up was cousin Levi's party at the Pioneer Town arcade. You know Anna hit the ground running!

It's fine, it's fine. She found a friend to sit with.

Meanwhile, Ivy demonstrated some pretty mean air hockey skills.

Come on, Ivy. Just let your cousin win on his birthday.

Let's just check back in with Anna...yep, all good.

Okay, birthday two, let's do this! Well, pretty disappointing food and decoration from Regan, unfortunately.

Shoddy.

Anna seemed a little unsettled by the swirl of fun surrounding her at the Children's Museum.

Steady...steady...

But she soon realized that there was serious work to be done.

Though she may have been disgruntled that no one else was pitching in.

These cloth vegetables aren't going to pretend to water themselves.

Happy birthdays, Levi and Truman! Ivy can't believe she made it through all that and still no cake.

She's actually just practicing her "incredulous" face in a bid for more screen time here. Rewarded!

Haven't put a lot of effort into anything so far this week, not going to start now

Not a lot to report in the food department this week, although you can read Monday's Food Lush post for a California restaurant review. There's some food in that one. I'm sort of recovering from vacation and possibly gearing up for another project, so I've been doing this thing where I just go to the grocery store and buy some food that looks good then season it and heat it up. Did you know you could do that? Spend ten or fifteen minutes a day on dinner and that's it? Ugh. It's tragic how some people live.

Anyway, we're all taking it easy around here this week. Doing a little light reading:

Also some heavier reading.

Applying Vitamin E face masks.

Wouldn't have pegged her for a spa type, but there you go.

Dressing ourselves.

I feel like she's attempting to summon a thumbs up here. So upbeat lately!

And, uh...finger painting.

BOOM, drops mike, walks away.