Race Week and Biscuits & Gravy

It’s officially race week for the Sprouts-PHX Mesa Half Marathon and I am excited to race my third half marathon this weekend. It has been a crazy last few weeks with a household of sick kiddos and husband. I think we finally are on the mend and I am praying I do NOT get it! So I have increased my bone broth and L-glutamine intake.

Speaking of bone broth…Do you incorporate it to your everyday life? Bone broth is rich in minerals and aids in boosting the immune system and supports digestion. It is great during this time of year when sickness tends to go around. Bone broth also supports joints and for this athletic momma and it is exactly what I need. You can read more about the benefits of bone broth on Chris Kresser Benefits of Bone Broth here.

One of Rob’s favorite meals is biscuits & gravy, and lately it has been sounding good. Back in the day we would pick up those no good for you country gravy packets. Well not anymore! A mixture of coconut milk and bone broth makes a creamy gravy that is simply delicious! I hope you enjoy and comment below if you make it.

BISCUITS & GRAVY

Ingredients 

• 1.5lbs of ground turkey (I get the organic ground turkey from Costco)
• 1 can of full fat coconut milk (shake before using)
• 8oz bone broth
• 3tbsp of tapioca starch or arrowroot starch
• 1tsp Ground fennel seed
• 1tsp Ground sage
• 1/4 tsp Cayenne pepper
• Cracked Pepper to taste
• Salt to taste
• Olive Oil
• Immersion Blender

1. Season your Ground Turkey with fennel, sage, salt, and pepper. Cook until turkey is done. Strain and set aside.
2. With leftover grease add a little more olive oil to pan until have about 1tbsp of oil. Add 3Tbsp of tapioca starch to pan and whisk. Should make dry and some gel like substance. Add a little bone broth and continue whisking until gel forms.
3. Slowly add in coconut milk about 1/4 cup at a time. Continue to whisk and mix until all the coconut milk is added. Then slowly add in the remainder of the bone broth while whisking. The gravy should now be a little thick. You may have some gel clumps still and that is ok. Add in few dashes sage and fennel. Add in the cayenne pepper and salt/pepper to taste.
4. Pour gravy into a bowl and use an immersion blender to blend. This will take care of any gel like clumps you may left and leave you with a creamy smooth gravy!
5. Add cooked Turkey to gravy mixture and mix until combined.
6. Serve warm over biscuits (I like making Namaste Foods Drop Biscuits)

If you want to try making your own bone broth I recommend using Against All Grain Bone Broth Recipe. We use her recipe often to make bone broth, but when I run out I sometimes pick up Pacific Foods Organic Bone Broth.

Chicken Salad

It is Super Bowl weekend and I am looking forward to cheering on the Atlantic Falcons! I will also be spending my Sunday morning up at the mountains for a trail run. It will then be time to prep for our Super Bowl party. We will be watching the game, playing cards, and enjoying this beautiful Arizona weather.

We have a lot on our super bowl menu this year. I will be sharing some of my recipes with you all over the next few days. I am starting us out with making chicken salad to snack on. It is great with celery, on lettuce leaves, or even with some rice crackers. I made a big batch because one I already have a big family and two we are have guest coming!!

Trail Mamma’s Chicken Salad

• 2lbs of boneless skinless chicken breast (organic if can)
• Minced Onion
• 1 1/4 cup chopped Celery
• 1 cup of quartered Grapes
• Walnuts – couple handfuls to your liking  *Optional
• 10 TBSP Mayonnaise or more if needed
• Oregano
• Thyme
• Garlic
• Salt/Pepper

1. Cook chicken with minced onion, garlic, salt and pepper. When chicken is cooked through set aside to cool. I even make my chicken the night before. Then shred the chicken.

2. Cut up the celery and grapes and set aside with the walnuts

3. In a big bowl mix the chicken and mayonnaise untiled combined. Add in a himalayan salt, ground pepper, ground oregano, thyme, and garlic powder until your liking. For me it is usually a few shakes of each. Add in the celery and mix. Fold in the walnut pieces if you  are adding. I only use a couple handfuls of walnuts and break up the pieces with my hands. Finally add in the grapes and give one last stir.

I hope you all enjoy this as much as we do. Makes for great snacks and quick lunches throughout the week too!

Week 8 – School Lunches and Girlfriends Podcast!

Hello November!  The month in which I can finally start to open the windows around here for a little while and get some fresh air. So lately my favorite thing to do while cleaning these days is to listen to the Girlfriends podcast by Danielle Bean.  What a great podcast. If you haven’t listen to it before I suggest you go check it our right now!  You can find it on iTunes here.  Talk about empowering women!  Women need to really empower each other and not compete with one another. Danielle interviews someone new each week on her podcast and she covers everything from health and fitness, parenting, work, motherhood, time management, spirituality, etc.  I have shed tears and heart felt laughs listening to her podcast.   I really can’t say enough good things about this podcast. I can truly relate to what she talks about, and I love the weekly challenges. So what are you waiting for, go take a listen for yourself!

Now on to this weeks lunches in our Yumbox!

Monday: Strawberries and Blueberries. Carrots. Stonyfield organic vanilla yogurt. Lettuce leaves. Grilled chicken. 

Tuesday: Cheesestick. Oranges. Broccoli Slaw. Ham, guac, and cheese rolls. Plantain chips.

Wednesday: Strawberries. Mozzarella Cheese. Broccoli Slaw. Lettuce Leaves. Wallace Farms Nick-Sticks ( you can buy them here).

Thursday: Mac’s Original Chicharrones (fried pork fat with attached skin and salt). Chicharrones are delicious! Strawberries. Broccoli Slaw. The Paleo Mom-plantain pancakes. You can find her recipe here. I served these with sunbutter and honey.

Friday: Pickles. Dried Apricots. Carrots. Gluten-Free pizza casserole ( you can find my recipe here). Plantain Chips.

An that is a wrap of this weeks healthy school lunches! Enjoy.

Week 6 – School Lunches

Happy Saturday as we approach the end of October! That means Halloween weekend is coming up! When we moved to Arizona over a year ago now it was weird to finally trick-or-treat actually on Halloween. It is great here to see all the homes decorated and people outside. With the usually nice weather, people are sitting out front to great the trick-or-treaters. In Iowa we had a designated beggers night and time in which the kiddos would go trick-or-treating. I like the change and really look forward to going all out once we buy our own home here! For now I will enjoy decorated the inside of the home and putting up a few lights outside. My oldest boy really wants one of those big blow up halloween creatures out in the front yard. I tell him that will be the first thing he can go and purchase with dad when we find our new home!

I hope you are enjoying my weekly school lunch post. I enjoy sharing what we have for lunches and how easy it is to pack a lunch! It is also great if your kiddos are old enough to help and pack them the night before or that morning. So here you go another week of healthy and delicious lunches in our Yumbox.

Monday: Cheesestick, celery, and cherries. Grilled hamburger. Lettuce leaves. Dark Chocolate Honey Mint that I get from Trader Joe’s. Those mints are so so so good! Even better in melted in your hot chocolate. Will be sharing my recipe for that soon, so stay tune!

Tuesday: Turkey Taco Salad with Goat Gouda cheese. Plantain chips. Mango Salsa ( you can find my recipe here).

Wednesday: Sunbutter and Honey wraps using Rudis wrap. Blueberries and Strawberries. Celery. Mix Kale salad ( I get from Costco, but I do not use the salad dressing in it.) Pepitas and Cranberries. Nick-Sticks ( you can buy them here). I love Wallace Farms Nick-Sticks they are a great protein made from grass-fed cows. I love to add them to lunches. They also make a good snack, keep in my purse on the go, or even after a workout!

Thursday: Bulgarian Yogurt with Raw Honey and Enjoy Life Foods mini chocolate chips. Blueberries and Strawberries. Uncured all beef hotdogs. Plantain chips. Carrots.

Friday: Lettuce Leaves and grilled chicken. Blueberries and cheesestick.

Another week in the books. Some days I struggle and don’t feel like making lunches, but then I remind myself how much my kiddos look forward to their lunch I pack them. Also I then know they are getting the fuel they need throughout the day to keep them going. I can say it was amazing not having to wash lunch boxes during fall break!!

Enjoy!

School Lunches – Week 5

How did this weekend already pass me by?!? Kiddos are finishing up on fall break and keeping me busy that is for sure. Enjoying our evenings as a family at the pool winding down the day. Crazy to think of it being Fall, and the weather is still well into the 90s around here.

Since the kiddos are on break I am sharing my lunches I made for them the first week of school. They got to enjoy dinner leftovers of course and a special treat that week! Here is another week of healthy school lunches in our yumbox.

Monday: Scrambled Egg and Shredded Pork in Rudis wrap. Strawberries and Blueberries. Carrots. Lettuce leaves. Special dessert: Goat Cheese Cheesecake. YUM! Seriously taste just like cheesecake!  You can find the recipe here.

Tuesday: Tuna cakes (find my recipe here) Dates. Plantain chips from Trader Joe’s. Broccoli slaw and lettuce leaves. My kiddos are not dressing fans and eat their salads plain.

Wednesday: Chobani yogurt tube, Dried Apricots, Carrots, Veggie fried rice, and shredded pork. Seriously my kiddos are pork fanatics, and I have to cut them off!

Thursday: Cheesestick. Mango Salsa ( you can find my recipe here) Broccoli Slaw that I by from Trader Joe’s. Gluten-Free pancake with sunbutter and honey that was leftover from that mornings breakfast. Uncured all beef hotdogs.

Friday: Blueberries. Celery. Lettuce leaves and grilled chicken. Ginger-Lime Cauliflower Rice ( you can find my recipe here) I love me some cauliflower rice! I buy the organic frozen bags from Trader Joe’s and it makes it for a quick throw together veggie!

So there you have it! Another full week of healthy and nutritious meals for the kiddos. Fuel the body with wholesome food 🙂

School Lunches – Week 4

Another week in the books for school lunches. For me, school lunches are a great way to finish up leftovers. Makes menu planning and prepping a breeze. It is also a way to have your kiddos help out if they are old enough. I keep my weekly menu board up in the pantry. Olivia, my daughter, loves helping out in the kitchen. When she is done getting ready for school she will step in and see what needs to be done for school snacks and lunches while I am making breakfast. She can look at the board and start going to town putting everything together. It helps me out, and gets them excited to help pack lunches and snack bags.

Week 4 meals were kind of a mixture of odds and ends left in the fridge. I have emergency protein on hand if we go through more of dinner than what I had planned. One of my favorite things to have on hand is Wallace Farms Nick Sticks. They make great snacks, after workout protein, and easy to cut up and throw into lunches! Here is a break down of what my kiddos enjoyed eating this week!

Monday: Hard Boiled Egg, buffalo chicken, lettuce wedges, mango, and cheese stick.

Tuesday: Hard Boiled Egg, Jello, Pickles, mango, and Lettuce Wrap Ham Rolls. Ham roll: guac, goad gouda cheese, carrot slices, and uncured ham slices.

Wednesday: Pulled Pork with Frank’s Red Hot, Lettuce wedges, Celery and Sunbutter, White Mountain Bulgarian Yogurt with Raw Honey and Strawberries, and Green Beans.

Thursday: Plantain Chips, Uncured Hotdogs, White Mountain Bulgarian Yogurt with Raw Honey, Grapes, Carrots, and Pickle.

Friday: Wallace Farm Nick Sticks, Carrots, Plantain Chips, Apple Slices, and Cheese Stick.

Another great week of healthy, wholesome school lunches. Providing nutritious food for growing bodies. Living life one day at a time!

 

Enjoy 🙂

School Lunches – Week 3

Week 3 into my weekly school lunch theme.  I hope you all are finding these useful. At least for me, it gives me a place to come back to when I am in a pinch for ideas. You know when you meal plan and trying to decide what to have. A lot of times I look through pictures I have taken or old blog photos for meals to revisit.  Take a look at Week 3 school lunches in our YumBox lunch boxes.

Week 3- Healthy School Lunches:

Monday: Tuna cake, kale salad with raisins and grilled chicken, pickles, blueberries and strawberries, and sunbutter ball.

Tuesday: Carrots, kale salad with cranberries and pepitas, pickle, ham and cheese wrap, and blueberries.

Wednesday: Carrots, kale salad, hardboiled egg, steak, cherries, and mini banana muffin.

Thursday: Pickles, ham/carrot/cheese wrap, jello, celery with sunbutter, and strawberries.

Friday: Carrots, grilled chicken, green beans, pickle, chocolate avocado pudding, pineapple and blueberries, and sunbutter ball.

Another week has gone by with another week of freshly made school lunches. Keeping my kiddos fueled with healthy and nutritious lunches! Living with purpose on this journey called LIFE.  Enjoy!

School Lunches – Week 2

Happy Saturday and it is time for another week of school lunches in our YumBox lunch boxes.  This week I made some of Against All Grains Jello using Trader Joe’s Cherry Cider.  Let me tell you, it was delicious. I love cherry and so do my kiddos. Typically I do unfitted apple juice or Newmans Grape juice, but I was in the mood for some cherry. As I was pouring the warm jello into the glass container, it totally reminded me of when my mom would make me warm jello when I was sick. Oh the memories… Now lets get to what we had this week for school lunches!

Week 2- School Lunches

Monday: Carrots and green beans, grilled chicken, Stoneyfield yogurt, kind bar, and orange.

Tuesday: Stoneyfield yogurt, G-F pancakes with sunbutter and raw honey, Nick-Sticks, Jello, Carrots, and half banana.

Wednesday: Carrots, jello, uncured hotdogs, cheesestick, and apple slices.

Thursday: Pickles, romain lettuce with grilled hamburger, strawberries, cheesestick, and jello.

Friday: Carrots, strawberries, jello, cheesestick, and beef roast.

So there you have it, another week of healthy prepared school lunches. Simple, filling, and nutritious. Have a great weekend y’all!

Gluten-Free Mac N Cheese

I decided to throw in a pasta meal this past weekend as my husband was running an international triathlon, and I wanted to add in some extra carbs. I typically get organic brown rice pasta from Trader Joe’s from time to time. This visit to the store I came across this new pasta they have. It is organic brown rice and quinoa pasta. Let me tell you, it was delicious. Such a hit that even all my kiddos ate it up. Which is huge as my youngest two are typically not pasta fans since they were not introduced to it until they were well past 3 years old. We are just starting to add in some different foods to our daily diets and see how we do with them; Gluten-Free pasta is one of them.

I made a really easy Mac and cheese, that I am sharing with you all today. We served it along with buffalo chicken. You can certainly make it into a cheesy tuna casserole too, or whatever else you come up with! 

Ingredients:

1. Package of Organic Brown Rice and Quinoa Pasta
2. 1/4 cup of coconut milk (or any other non-dairy milk or whole milk)
3. 1/2 cup of Bulgarian Yogurt ( I used White Mountain)
4. Approx. 2 cups of Raw Milk Cheese (or goat gouda)

Directions

1. Boil pasta according to package instructions. I used himalayan salt in my water while it boiled. Added the pasta and stir continuously until was done. I cooked it for 7 minutes and drained.
2. In same pan over med-med low heat add in 1/4 cup coconut milk and 1/2 cup of Bulgarian Yogurt and stir until combined. Slowly add a little bit of shredded cheese at at time until melted and combined. Continue until all the cheese is combined.
   

   

   3. Remove from heat and add pasta back in to pan and stir to combine with sauce. Season with salt, pepper, and garlic.

4. Dish up and Enjoy!

 

Weekly School Lunch- 1

So I decided to change things up with my school lunch post. I will be posting my weekly lunches on Saturdays. That way I can compile my weeks worth of lunches all in one spot. This will provide a better snap shot of how I do our lunches during the week, and how you can really utilize dinner leftovers throughout the week!  Oh and I am really liking our YumBox lunch boxes this year.

Week 1 School Lunches:

Monday: Carrots, romain lettuce with raisins, grilled chicken, pineapple, cheesestick, and organic ketchup.

Tuesday: Carrots, romain lettuce with pickle, hardboiled egg, oranges, ham and cheese wrap.

Wednesday: Celery with sunbutter, romain lettuce leaves, grilled chicken, cheesesticks, oranges and raisins.

 

Thursday: Carrots, romain lettuce leaves, grilled chicken with organic ketchup, Siggi’s yogurt tube, and strawberries.

 

Friday: pickle and carrots, Stonyfield  yogurt with raw honey and Enjoy Life mini chocolate chips, romain lettuce, uncured beef hotdog, and strawberries.

So there you have it, my kiddos weekly meals. Some days my kiddos get through all their lunch and some days not. They never waste food at school and I always pack their lunch in a lunch bag with freezer packs. So if they don’t get through their lunch they finish it either on the way home or as soon as they get home with their after school snack. Keep lunches simple and I never worry about repeating protein or veggies as you can see 🙂

Making healthy lunches to fuel their bodies one day at a time!  Happy packing.