Rosie Contained

A hellacious windstorm blew through my town recently and a huge Douglas Fir tree toppled in its wake. It fell straight down my property line and took out 100 ft of my fence. The porch roof was damaged but I counted myself fortunate that it didn’t land on my house. The butt is six-foot in diameter, I stopped measuring it at 76 ft with a six-inch diameter. Big, big tree. Just so you know, according to the insurance company the property owner where a tree lands has the liability. So its up to me to get rid of this behemoth. And replace the fence. And repair the porch roof. With a cash influx from the insurance company minus my deductible. My neighbor helped me put up some temporary fencing on either side of the porch so the dogs wouldn’t be able to climb out over the tree. This didn’t work at all as both dogs jumped off the porch rail onto the lawn.

Much to my dismay Rosie discovered an escape route. On two separate occasions she took off when I was out in the yard. I called her name, she turned and looked at me, then took a flying leap over the tree and away she went. What a brat. For a week now she’s been chained when outside. The forlorn little thing has that chain stretched taut trying to make a break for another chance at freedom.

I have a dog containment system which I hadn’t installed as the entire property is fenced. Was fenced… I located all the components after much searching (I found my bicycle shoes, my baseball mitt, AND my missing childhood photo album!) except the plug that connects the controller to the wire circuit. I flashed back on disconnecting the system when I moved – the plug was wired through a wall - in a fit of impatience I just cut the mother. Yeah, rather a dumb move in hindsight. Particularly since it is quite small and easily lost… After a couple stops at the local hardware and automotive stores I did the smart thing and located a dealer some 50 miles distant. And scored the part for $10. I wired a temporary circuit blocking the downed tree and placed white flags (a visual reminder for the dogs) along its path. I got everything plugged in and tested the system with a dog collar. Beep, beep, beep. Success! I collared and leashed Rosie and walked her over to the flags. She did not want to get anywhere near them. It’s been two years since we moved and she clearly remembered! Her escape path is blocked. That escape path anyway.

She immediately went to the front of the house and CLIMBED up the porch rail (5 ft from ground level). When I caught her she was contemplating jumping over the hedges lining the porch to reach the tree. I planted more of those white flags along the porch – and that was the end of that. Hopefully she doesn’t test the system!

Shrimp Tacos

I'm now eating fish several times weekly. My experience cooking fish is minimal so I'm reading recipes and trying different ideas. I've been craving fish tacos - and they're easy to make. Primal Blueprint has an 80/20 rule. If you follow the guidelines 80% of the time you can have foods that are limited (like corn tortillas) 20% of the time. Rather sensible, don’t you think?

To accompany them I tried my hand at pickled carrots and jalapenos. Rigoberto’s in Redmond always has a vat of them – and I’m hooked. I used a cup of vinegar, four carrots peeled and sliced, and one jalapeno – then let it sit for a quick pickle for several hours. It wasn’t as hot and spicy as Rigoberto’s. Next time I will locate a recipe…

1 lb. shrimp
3 limes (I used lemons as a substitute)
½ cup mayonnaise
1 tsp chili powder
8 small corn tortillas
1 cup shredded cabbage
2 small carrots, peeled and shredded, optional
1 jalapeno thinly sliced, optional


1. For lime sauce, juice two of the limes into a bowl (cut remaining lime into wedges for serving). Stir mayonnaise and chili powder into juice.
2. Cook shrimp in large skillet with 2 tbl. oil. Turn when pink.

3. Wrap tortilla in paper towels, heat in microwave 30 seconds.
4. Top tortillas with shrimp, cabbage, carrots and jalapeno. Drizzle with Lime Sauce. Pass lime wedges. Makes 4 servings.

The Primal Blueprint works for me

I’ve been following the “Primal Blueprint” for seven weeks now, very simply stated: a lifestyle of eating organic meats, vegetables, and fats. As I had followed the Atkins diet since August 2010 I was used to eating very little of grains & rice, legumes, or processed foods. These foods are discouraged in Primal. Hmmm, taco chips are processed – and they were my last holdout junk food. And I do love black beans and rice… I eat meat. I eat dairy. I eat fruits and vegetables. I eat fat, my favorite food group.

I recommend reading the book for all sorts of informative and thought provoking information on nutrition and exercise. Primal’s dietary structure is in direct contradiction to the Food Pyramid, the dietary guidelines promoted by the USDA which touts eating a diet heavy in carbs and light in protein and fats. So read the book. I know for a fact that it works for me – see my last post about my improved lipid panel and weight loss.

I set up an account at Fitday.com and charted my daily food intake for several weeks to get a feel for this new way of eating. Now it’s become routine and I know what I can eat. There are cookbooks available for free download at marksdailyapple.com for menu ideas.

I do my grocery shopping in Eugene, an old hippy town with many organic markets and produce stands. Market of Choice has an excellent selection of organic meats and wild-caught fish.

The book has a formula to figure grams of protein, fat, and carbs to consume for weight loss. For me this translated into 92 grams of protein, 96 grams of fat, and 72 grams of carbohydrates daily which equals 1,666 total daily calories. (I’d give you my specifics but I’m too vain to put my weight out there in the wide world of the internet.)

Just follow the directions below to figure out yours:
Don’t be daunted by the math!

Step 1
Go to a BMR calculator internet site. Plug in your age and weight. The result will be the number of daily calories burned to support your basal metabolic function.
Write that number down. Example: 1,411

Step 2
Activity Factor (chart below for women)
Add in some additional caloric needs for your activity level.

Example Category: Extremely Active factor 1.725


Activity Factor Category Definition Chart
1.2 Sedentary Little or no exercise and desk job
1.375 Lightly Active Light exercise or sports 1-3 days a week
1.55 Moderately Active Moderate exercise or sports 3-5 days a week
1.725 Very Active Hard exercise or sports 6-7 days a week4
1.9 Extremely Active Hard daily exercise or sports and physical job

Your BMR x Activity Factor
1,411 x 1.725 = 2,433 Total Daily Calories

Step 3
Determine your body fat percentage – you’ll find a calculator online.

Your weight at your body fat percentage = pounds of lean body mass

148 weight x 27 % body fat = 102 pounds of lean body mass

Step 4

Factor for Protein Requirements in Grams per Pound of Body Weight per Day Chart
Sedentary Adult (RDA) 0.40
Adult Recreational Exerciser 0.75
Adult Competitive Athlete 0.90
Adult Building Muscle Mass 0.90
Dieting Athlete 1.00
Growing Teenage Athlete 1.00

Factor for protein intake per pound

Lean body mass in lbs x Factor for protein intake

102 lbs lean body mass x 1.0 (Dieting Athlete) = 102 grams of average daily protein intake.

Step 5
Determine your desired weight loss of per month:

Example: Goal of losing 7.66 lbs per month

7.66 lbs x 3500 calories required to burn 1 lb = 26,810 total calories / 30 days = 894 daily calorie deficit.

Step 6

Calculate your average caloric intake per day:

Example: 2,433 Total Daily Calories less 894 daily calorie deficit = 1,533 calories per day.

Now we’re almost to the finish line


You get 1,533 calories per day

You get 102 grams of protein per day (102 grams x 4 calories per gram of protein = 408 calories)

You get 75 grams of carbs per day (75 grams x 4 calories per gram of carb = 300 calories)

1,533 calories per day (less protein & carb calories = fat calories per day)
- 408 protein calories per day
- 300 carb calories per day

825 fat calories There are 9 calories per gram of fat. 825 / 9 = 91 grams of fat daily


To achieve the exampled weight loss goal of 7.66 lb per month, your daily goals are:

408 calories protein, (102 grams protein)
300 calories carbs, (75 grams carbs)
825 calories fat, (91 grams fat)

Whew. That’s done.

Cholestrol Screening Results

The results are in and they are positive overall. **Seven weeks ago I changed to the Primal Blueprint lifestyle and:

I've lost nine pounds to-date.
LDL levels improved 1.3%
Triglycerides improved 22.9%
Chol/HDL Ratio improved 17.0%
HDL improved 19.6%
Somehow Total Cholesterol spiked up 1 point, 0.4% in the wrong direction.

I am now at the "Desirable" level in three categories, one "Borderline High" and one "Very High", improvement in all but one category. And I've got a baseline for tracking.

I was going to insert a nice little chart with the relevant information from my 6/2010 screening compared to my 3/2011 screening, which number cruncher me created in a spreadsheet. But it won't translate easily here and I'm tired of fooling with it...

*I've been researching the whole Lipid Panel, a novel idea for me who prefers to think of my entire body as a solid, hard rubber ball through and through. Well, maybe one of those soggy gel balls at this stage of my life... I digress, I cannot locate the information on how rapidly cholesterol levels change except that screenings are typically done once yearly. Twice yearly for statin users - but that's to check liver function (statins can adversely affect the liver - yee gods.)

** Last August I switched over to the Atkins diet which probably impacted my recent screening.


Have your butter and eat it too. Here's to a fine Bearnaise sauce!

Chicken Florentine - Primal

Chicken Florentine
Serves 4 - 6

2 Tbl oil
8 cups baby spinach
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (about 1-1/2 pounds)
Salt & pepper
1 shallot minced
2 garlic cloves, minced
1-1/4 cups chicken broth
1-1/4 cups water
1 cup heavy cream (I used Half&Half)
6 TBL grated Parmesan cheese
1 tsp grated zest and 1 tsp. juice from one lemon (add such a nice flavor)

1. Cook spinach. Heat 1 TBL oil in large skillet over medium-high heat until shimmering. Add spinach and cook, stirring occasionally until wilted, 1 to 1 minutes. Transfer spinach to colander set over bowl and press with spoon to release excess liquid. Discard liquid (I fed mine to the dogs).

2. Brown Chicken. Pat chicken dry with paper towels and season with salt and pepper. Wipe out pan and heat remaining oil over medium-high heat until just smoking. Cook chicken until golden, 2 to 3 minutes per side. Add shallot and garlic to skillet and cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Stir in broth, water, and cream and bring to boil.

3. Make sauce. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer until chicken is cooked through, about 10 minutes; transfer chicken to plate and tent with foil. Continue to simmer sauce until reduced to 1 cup, about 10 minutes. Off heat, stir in 4 TBL parmesan, lemon zest, and lemon juice.

4. Broil. Cut chicken crosswise into 1/2 inch slices and arrange on broiler-safe platter. Scatter spinach over chicken. Pour sauce over spinach. Sprinkle with remaining parmesan and broil until golden brown, 3 to 5 minutes. Serve

Primal Crackers - Sesame/Sunflower

This delicious cracker recipe was submitted by Girl Gone Primal and included in "The Primal Blueprint Reader Created Cookbook.

Check out her blog at http://girlgoneprimal.blogspot.com/ - many great recipes and articulate health articles.

Amazingly easy crackers





Ingredients:

1 cup each sunflower seeds and sesame seeds
1/4 cup water












In a food processor (or by hand), create a sort of flour from the sunflower seeds. It takes about 2 for the seeds to break down and turn into a more flour-like consistency, although it will be thicker and heavier.



Add the sesame seeds and pulse a few times (or mix in by hand), then slowly add water, stirring or pulsing until a thick paste forms that can be rolled out.
Between two greased pieces of baking (parchment) paper, roll out the paste as thinly as you can while maintaining a uniform thickness. Remove the upper piece of parchment. Score the batter into squares with a sharp knife, and sprinkle with salt and pepper/herbs if you’d like.



Bake at 350°F until golden and crisp, about 20 minutes. The outer edges tend to bake faster - I remove them before becoming too browned, then pop the pan back in the oven for the rest of the batch. Allow to cool thoroughly before gently breaking into squares as scored.

Eggs florentine for breakfast

A nice thing about cooking only for myself is I eat whatever strikes my fancy. Wanting to finish up the sirloin steak from the recent birthday dinner, (a typical bread and meat sandwich not being a Primal option), I simply diced up the meat then tossed in some red onion and grape tomatoes. Added a dash of vinegrette - and chowed down - without taking a photo. Delicious.

Organic spinach is abundant at the market so I made the following breakfast.


Fry bacon - I use nitrate free bacon.





Toss a handful of spinach on top (I drained off the excess grease much to Moose's delight)


Briefly wilt spinach
Crack in a couple eggs

Cover pan and cook until whites are set - or however you prefer your eggs.

Plate up, a couple dashes of hot sauce. Yummy.

Bearnaise sauce ala Julia Child

Melissa visited for a couple days this week. I decided to prepare a special meal in honor of her birthday: I’d purchase a nice organic steak and planned to pair it with artichoke hearts, a béarnaise sauce to top both.

I consulted Julia Child “The Way to Cook” and immediately had to make substitutions as I had neither “good” wine vinegar nor any dry white vermouth. Dry white vermouth? Little chance of finding any at the Yoncalla grocery. The recipe calls for a ¼ cup of each to be cooked down to 2 Tablespoons. Balsamic vinegar was the obvious answer. We gathered a few scallions from the garden, can’t get any fresher than that!

I whisked three egg yolks until thick and pale yellow then added the vinegar and 2 Tbl. cold butter, set the pan on low heat as per directions. I cook on an inferior electric range, the burners slow, slow, slow. Melissa immediately wanted to crank up the temperature but I prevailed (in hindsight I could have turned up the heat a notch). Whisk, whisk, whisk. Eventually the butter melted and the egg yolk thickened enough to see the bottom of the pan between strokes.

So far so good. After removing the pan from the heat I added 2 Tbl. cold butter, whisking in one Tbl. at a time to stop the cooking. Melissa was whining all the while, a picture of impatience, so I set her to work with the whisk. We began adding melted butter in dribbles. Whisking emulsified the ingredients into a fine, smooth sauce. We tossed in the chopped scallions. Voila, it was done.

I’d planned to photograph the meal but my camera was acting up and I didn’t plan on letting dinner get cold while I figured it out. So we ate.

The meal was magnificent, the béarnaise sauce a perfect accompaniment to both steak and artichoke. Cries of “mmmm” and “oh, this is so good” kept my dogs close by in hopes of a dropped tidbit. Yeah, like that was gonna happen…

So the attached photo is from the next day. The sauce looks more like melted butter after reheating. However it tasted just as good!








Recipe:
3 egg yolks
2 Tbl. balsamic vinegar
4 Tbl. cold butter (half now, half later)
1 stick melted butter
1 Tbl. minced shallots
1/2 tsp. dried Tarragon
1/4 tsp. each salt and freshly ground pepper



Whisk eggs yolks as described above. Add vinegar and 2 Tbl. cold butter. Set pan on low burn and (pay attention Melissa) GENTLY whisk until yolks have thickened and you can see the bottom of the pan between strokes.

Remove pan from heat. Add 1 Tbl. cold butter and whisk until dissolved. Add one more Tbl. cold butter and whisk until dissolved.

Dribble warm butter, a Tbl. at a time, into mixture, whisking all the while. When fully emulsified add spices and serve.

Your tastebuds will thank you.