Day Twelve: Pinterest Enhances My Paleo Journey

Do you remember life before the internet revolution? Remember when you had to consult the Encyclopedia Brittanica instead of Google? Remember when you actually called or wrote to find out  what was going on in friends' lives instead of stalking them on Facebook? How about actually holding a physical book with pages instead of flipping thru the virtual pages of your Nook, Kindle, or other e-book type device? Oh, or back when people wrote in real, hard-bound journals rather than blogging?!
I know, it feels like that was f-o-r-e-v-e-r ago. I, honestly, think that I wouldn't notice much of a difference in my life if I couldn't access Facebook ever again. Yes, I'd miss "keeping up" with my friends, but I could revert back to letter writing and phone calls, if necessary. I would not be any less of a person if I never wrote another blog entry and the world would certainly not miss my half-hearted attempts at wit. I prefer to read REAL books over the computerized ones. Don't get me wrong, I read magazines and books on my iPad, but I prefer the feel of turning physical pages and the smell of ink on paper that one can only embrace when reading a book. Could I live without Google? Yes. Would life be more "difficult?" Possibly. Would more time be consumed? For sure. But, I have the skill of consulting a librarian, periodical indexes, and card catalogs, so I'm confident that I could do it. But, could I live without Pinterest? Let's not even think about that one, okay?

In the event that someone in the world has no idea what Pinterest is, it's essentially a virtual pin board or favorites list. If you find something in the vast expanse of the internet that you want to hold on to for later, for whatever reason (recipe you'd like to try, color scheme for painting your bathroom, ideas for your wedding in 26 years, etc.), you "pin" it and the site holds those "pins" in your account and makes them available for your friends to see, as well. It's a lot of sharing the same pins over and over, though. I seriously think I have seen the post for the Jolly Rancher lollipops 1,000 times. And if you want to know how to make your hair wavy only by using a flat iron, I'm confident that almost every girl ages 17-24 has posted this one to their account. Well, I jumped on the bandwagon for one of these "most popular" posts and found it to be completely worth all of the re-pins that show up on my home page. You might be familiar with the post, if you are on Pinterest. It boasts that it is "the best shrimp you'll ever taste!" The one that I pinned doesn't even go to a real blog or anything. It's simply a picture with the recipe in the caption of the pin. Four simple ingredients: butter, lemon, shrimp, and italian dressing dry mix. The instructions read, "Melt a stick of butter in the pan. Slice one lemon and layer it on top of the butter. Put down fresh shrimp, then sprinkle one pack of dried italian seasoning. Put in the oven and bake at 350 for 15 min."  Here is the picture from Pinterest:

Before I started on my Whole30, I made them just as the "recipe"/caption says. They actually were really great! I don't know that they are the "best shrimp" I've ever eaten, but they were good enough to make again. Only thing is, I'm doing the Whole30 now and butter is not allowed (unless it's clarified butter or ghee, neither of which I have time to mess with right now). So, I made them with coconut oil instead. AND I made my own no-sugar added Italian Dressing Mix using a recipe I found here (I simply omitted the sugar and significantly decreased the amount of salt). Know what?! I think I liked 'em even better with the coconut oil/homemade dressing mix. Oh, and by the way, I used peeled shrimp for this recipe. The ones in the picture clearly still have the shell intact.

I ate mine on top of bagged salad from the grocery store, but I served the hubby his on a bed of buttered egg noodles. Gosh! His looked sooooo tasty! I REALLY wanted those noodles. But, I was good! I stuck with my salad and enjoyed it.

If you eat seafood, specifically shrimp (I know, they're the cockroaches of the sea. But, we like them. And we don't eat them every day!), then I would recommend you try these with your fat of choice (butter, coconut oil, lard, etc.). And if you'd like to decrease the sodium and sugar in your dressing mix, try the homemade recipe and use 1 1/2 tablespoons of the dry mix to sprinkle over your shrimp before baking. They're too easy to pass up!

Breakfast



     Eggs with spinach

     Banana

     Roasted pumpkin seeds

Lunch

     I missed lunch. There was too much going on at that time. I need to get better at being more purposeful in eating at least 3 meals a day.

Dinner

     Shrimp

     Salad

     Steamed asparagus

Snack

     Gala apple with cashew butter

Day Five: A Bumble and Some Shrimp

Day Five was full of several abominable discoveries. (How am I learning so much and I'm only 1/6th of the way into this thing??) The word "abominable," though it sounds like it should be horrendous, kind of makes me smile. It reminds me of the Bumble from Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer. He was always my favorite character!

Sorry, rabbit trail. Back to the real (non-smile-worthy) abominations.



Abomination #1: I gave up refined sugars for Lent this past winter/spring. When I did that, I did NOT also give up high fructose corn syrup because it seemed nearly impossible to give up both sugar and corn syrup and still eat like a normal person. In all honesty, the average American eats way too much sugar anyway, so I don't know why I was striving to be "normal." But, with the Whole30, one is not allowed to have any added sugar (real or fake), so both sugar and corn syrup are out of the question. Essentially, the only sweet treat I can enjoy at this point in time is fruit. However, I think that I'm starting to dislike sweet foods altogether. I had an Apple Pie Larabar for a snack at work last night and thought that it was mighty sweet. When I had this flavor for the first time, on Day One (four days ago), I thought that the Apple Pie version was quite scrumptious. While it still tastes good, the sweetness was almost enough to make me sick tonight. Similarly, I have been eating grapes and pineapple the past few days, both of which I really enjoy, but I am beginning to think that they are just too darn sweet to indulge in more than one or two bites. What is happening to me?! Am I really turning into a cavewoman?!


Abomination #2: Speaking of cavewomen. I know they couldn't read and write and all they had were cave paintings, but I bet their cave paintings didn't come with lists of ingredients for their foods. I am becoming more and more irritated with labels on food. As you may recall, I had "dry roasted sunflower seeds" on Day Two as a snack. In my haste running out the door to go work last night, I decided to grab the bottle and take it with me when the ingredients list caught my peripheral vision. I noticed that it was quite extensive and immediately my curiosity was piqued. I mean, what can POSSIBLY be in a jar of sunflower seeds other than seeds and maybe some salt. I'd considered the possibility of oil, but they are dry roasted, after all. The list of ingredients seemed to go on for days! Who decided it was a good idea to poision unsuspecting sunflower seed lovers with monosodium glutamate?! Seriously?! MSG in my sunflower seeds?! Good grief! What is this world coming to? Not to mention the fact that they have cornstarch (a corn product, so not allowed), sugar and corn syrup solids (both added sweeteners, so no!), and hydrolized soy protein (soy product, so no, again!). Who knew something so simple as sunflower seeds could be so toxic? So, because I made the mistake of eating these on Day Two, I have decided that I will be extending my Whole30 to be a Whole32. UGH! I'm trying so hard, only to be tripped up by an innocent looking bottle of seeds. Lesson learned! READ ALL LABELS!

Abomination #3: I'm running out of vegetables! My husband and I are going to visit the Lynchburg Community Market today in hopes of scoring some delicious local produce to help remedy the lack of vegetables problem, but I'm running out of creative preparation ideas, too. Does anyone have a favorite vegetable (not corn, beans, or white potatoes) recipe that you'd like to share with me? I'd be grateful for any new ideas you could share with me. I found a recipe for "creamed" kale yesterday that I'm excited to try. I don't know if I like kale, though.


Abomination #4: I still didn't get enough calories yesterday, according to myfitnesspal. How in the world am I supposed to keep eating if I'm not hungry? Is that not counterproductive to what I am trying to accomplish? I used to overeat all of the time. All of the time! But, now I have gotten myself to eating mostly normal portion sizes, healthy food choices, and drinking only water and the darn fitnesspal thing says I need to eat more! I can't win!

Here's the break down of what I ate (I know I did not have enough vegetables, see Abomination #3):

Breakfast:
2 fried eggs
1 banana

Lunch:
Leftover Caribbean Lime Chicken breast
Classic Panera salad (no dressing)
1/2 C Pineapple

Dinner:
Roasted greenbeans, mushrooms, and shrimp
1/2 C Pineapple

Snacks:
Apple Pie Larabar
Scant handful of raw pecans

Here is the recipe for the greenbeans and shrimp. I found this recipe originally on Pinterest, so I am new to this lady's blog, but she seems to have a lot of good sounding recipes. Perhaps, if no one can share any good veggie recipes with me, I'll have to start trying some more out. I didn't have any coriander, so I just simply omitted it. I added 8 oz of button mushrooms, halved (and about 1/2 T of extra oil to compensate for the mushrooms soaking it up). And next time, I will add probably 1/2 t garlic powder.

Clean Eating Roasted Shrimp and Greenbeans

For the beans:

• 1 lb. green beans trimmed and cut into bite-sized pieces
• 1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 1/2 tsp ground coriander
• 1/2 tsp ground cumin
• 1/4 tsp kosher salt
• 1/2 tsp fresh ground black pepper
• 1/8 tsp Cayenne pepper

For the shrimp:

• 1 lb. medium-large raw shrimp (thawed if frozen), peeled
• 1 tbsp olive oil (plus a little extra to brush on roasting pan)
• zest from one lemon (save the lemon and cut into fourths)
• 1/4 tsp. kosher salt
• 1/2 tsp. fresh ground black pepper

Directions

Preheat oven to 425.
Once the shrimp has been peeled and cleaned, rinse it under cold water. Be sure to pat the shrimp really dry (if the shrimp is not dry it will steam rather than roast!).
Place the trimmed and cut beans in a bowl and toss with extra virgin olive oil, ground coriander, ground cumin, salt, freshly ground black pepper, and Cayenne pepper.
Place shrimp in another bowl with the extra virgin olive oil, lemon zest, salt, and fresh ground black pepper.
Brush roasting pan with olive oil or use a non-stick spray, then arrange beans on pan in a single layer (as much as possible). Roast beans 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, toss the beans and arrange shrimp on top and roast 8-10 minutes more or until shrimp are just done.
Squeeze the four lemon quarters over the shrimp and beans and serve immediately.
Makes 2-4 servings.