Wow! I am super behind with this! Here I am finishing up week 3 and writing about week 1! Typical!

Usually, I would take the time to blog each recipe and make a recipe card for it, but there are just too many to do! So I’ve decided I will just give you some basic info, and links to recipes that I modified (and list what modifications I used.)

First, a refresher!

Whole 30 is a diet challenge. I’m not going to go into all the details, but you should know that it restricts dairy, grains, soy, legumes, any added sugar (artificial or not. 100% fruit juice being the only exception), vegetable oils, and specific additives: MSG, sulfites (except those naturally occurring), and carrageenan (found in almost all lunchmeat and some almond milk). Oh and alcohol. All kinds. Cooking, drinking, vanilla…ALL kinds! And any “sex with your pants on” foods. That’s what the program calls restricted foods made with compliant ingredients. Like ice cream made with bananas, cauliflower pizza crust, banana pancakes, etc. These foods are not allowed in any form!

Click here for a complete rundown of the rules if you are interested.

So why am I telling you this? So that you know every meal I post on this page DOES NOT contain these ingredients. They are 100% WHOLE FOOD. Clean eating. No (or very few) additives. All are gluten-free, diary-free, and most comply with the Paleo lifestyle. And best of all…they are all good! 🙂

As you will notice…this is not your typical diet food. I am just starting out with this clean eating concept, so the thought of baked fish and roasted veggies every night is extremely unappealing to me! So I am doing this challenge, but I am doing it in a way that I can stick to! Cooking the things I like and that are appealing to me! Eventually, I assume eating a plate full of vegetables will be appealing to me, but that day is not today! So here we go!

A few things you should know about my kitchen and how I cook:

1. I am horrible about planning meals and will usually decide mid-day what dinner that night will be. And it will be whatever I have in the house! I tend to just look at my available ingredients and put something together.
2. I buy my meat in bulk and freeze it, So I always have something I can pull out of the freezer. 
3. Butter is outlawed on the program but “clarified butter,” or ghee, is allowed. I always have some in the refrigerator, and when I list butter in these recipes, I mean clarified butter. (Here is how to clarify butter). Of all the other acceptable cooking fats (coconut oil, olive oil, lard, bacon grease) I only use olive oil or coconut oil. And I, of course, always have those in the house. 
4. I have a very healthy selection of herbs and spices so I rarely have to buy something new. And I salt and pepper everything! I may not say it in a recipe, but really…everything!
5. I try to make extra for dinner and eat it for lunch the following day. Some days I get 2 lunches out if it!
6. I rarely measure! My measurements are “some”, “a little”, or “enough.” I just cook by taste and sight. So add as much or as little of an item as you want according to your own tastes!
7. Because of this challenge, I will not purchase any brand that has added sugar. You’d be surprised what sugar is added to! So check your labels! There are very few compliant prepared meats. Most lunchmeat, sausage, and bacon have some form of sugar. My packaged fruits are all no sugar added. I make sure my tuna does not list soy, and all condiments and spices must not have sugar, honey, MSG, etcetera. 

D1 M1: Sweet potato hash (made by just combining onion, green bell pepper, and sweet potato–all diced–cooked low and slow in olive oil with a little butter), fried egg, black coffee. (Black coffee is every morning!)
D1 M2: Compliant turkey lunchmeat, bacon, tomato, and avocado rolled up in lettuce, strawberries, and cucumber.
D1 M3: My Unstuffed Chicken, minus the wine and cheese, and add mushrooms. Then olives, cucumber, and apple sauce.  

D2 M1: Leftover sweet potato hash with a scrambled egg, and a banana
D2 M2: Leftover unstuffed chicken with some grapes
Snack: (snacks are only if you really need them! My lunch was too small so I needed a snack.) Sunflower seeds and raisins.
D2 M3: Steak with sautéed mushrooms and a sweet potato. I sauté my mushrooms in a separate pan with a little oil, a little butter (for flavor and to brown) and some garlic powder. Taste as you go and add more garlic if need. Cook them until they shrink up. For the baked potato- wash and dry potato. Use a fork to poke holes in all the sides, slather it in oil (olive or coconut–your choice), wrap in tinfoil and bake on 375° for 30-40 minutes, depending on the size of your potato. It’s done when you can squeeze it and it’s no longer firm. (please put on an oven mitt before attempting to squeeze it!)

D3 M1: Spinach & mushroom frittata, and cantaloupe. A frittata is just and egg pie really. I wanted to make this one smaller since it was just me eating it, so I used 4 eggs and a bit of water. Whisk them up well. Oil or butter the dish you will be using. Cut up some onion, spinach, and mushroom and sauté in a pan with some butter or oil. You want them to be mostly cooked. Then place the veggies in the baking dish (if you have a pan that can go from stovetop to a 500° oven, then just use that for the whole recipe) and top with S&P and garlic salt. Then cover with the egg. Bake at 500° for 10-15 minutes. Just give the dish a shake and I know it’s done when it doesn’t jiggle. The egg will puff up and pull away from the dish, but will settle back into place when it cools. Cut and serve like pie.
D3 M2: Leftover steak on salad greens with tomato, cucumber, and roasted red pepper vinaigrette (Recipe).
D3 M3: Meatloaf, salad with red pepper dressing, and olives. For this meatloaf, I used my recipe with a lot of substitutions, For starters, I had to make my own seasoning salt blend (I used this recipe and divided all measurements by 6), make my own beefy onion soup mix (recipe here. I made a full batch and used it all.) Then in place of the Worcestershire sauce I used 1 tsp apple cider vinegar, 1/2 tsp coconut aminos (can be found by the soy sauce), and 1/4 tsp mustard powder, and riced cauliflower 1-for-1 in place of the bread crumbs. (put some cauliflower in a blender and pulse until it’s a fine mince.) Oh and leave out the parmesan. It had a bit of a green tint for some reason, but the flavor was amazing!

D5 M1: Leftover frittata and strawberries
D5 M2: leftover meatloaf and strawberries
Snack: Banana & coconut cream. I had a banana in the freezer so wanted to try something. (The best way to freeze bananas is peeled and sliced in a plastic freezer bag). So this is one whole frozen banana, a couple ot tablespoons of coconut cream, (canned coconut milk in the refrigerator will separate and the cream will rise to the top, so when you open it, there will be about a half cup of coconut cream above the milk.) and a splash of coconut milk in the blender. Blend until smooth and them place back in the freezer to solidify to your liking. Then line a baking sheet with parchment and sprinkle unsweetened shredded coconut on it. Place under a hot broiler to toast. Watch it carefully! It will go from toast to burnt in .0245357 seconds! Pull out your banana-coconut cream and top with toasted coconut.
D5 M3: Tuna patty, and sliced cucumbers with leftover guacamole. I didn’t really care for the tuna patty I made so will need to work on a new one before posting a recipe. To minimize browning of guacamole, store it in a zipper bag and try to get out as much air as possible before sealing it.

D6 M1: More leftover frittata! I was definitely done with eating frittata!
D6 M2: leftover tuna patty, cashews, and a fruit pouch. I love these fruit pouches! They are great to just take with me when running errands, so I have something in case I miss lunch!
D6 M3 Leftover meatloaf (so over this as well!) and grapes.

D7 M3: Fried egg over fresh baby spinach (not my favorite meal, but was ok.)
D7 M3: Avocado egg salad and strawberries. Substitue yellow mustard for dijon in the recipe, and use either no mayo, or compliant mayo. (I make my own mayo. I use this recipe but use apple cider vinegar in place of the lemon juice. And if you have an immersion blender, you can add all the ingredients in a mason jar and blend from the bottom-up. Takes about 30 seconds. If not, you must follow the instructions for blender mayo.)
D7 M3: Rotisserie chicken and cauliflower-potato mash. When you mix cauliflower with potatoes, it tastes like potatoes…mostly. I just steamed a bunch of cauliflower and boiled about 3 baby red potatoes. Then I combined them in the same pan, added a bit of chicken stock, some garlic, and parsley, and used the immersion blender to get them to a mashed consistency. Easy peasy! And delicious!

Well that is all for week 1! I learned that I do not like eating the same thing for 3 or 4 days in a row! I try not to waste food, so if I have mushrooms for one recipe, I will usually try to find another way to use them before they go bad. I hope you like some of these! Cooking this way is a learning curve, and it was my first week doing it. It only get’s better from here! 🙂 Thanks for following, and for the support!