Category: Glimpses of Life

This Butternut Squash Soup is a Martha Stewart recipe that is absolutely wonderful. The soup is creamy and quite filling so make sure you don’t have it with anything heavy. I served it with a Pear and Walnut Salad.

Since we had leftovers of this soup, I froze it and it tasted just as good the second time around as the first time.

Here are some of the ingredients you’ll need. The original recipe calls for 4 cups of water but I was afraid it would taste too watery so I used a 1/2 a quart of vegetable broth and 1/2 a quart of water. I also used cinnamon and pumpkin spice because I like the taste of those spices.

The recipe also calls for 2 inches of fresh ginger but, for my taste, that was a little bit too much ginger and next time I’ll reduce it to 1 inch fresh chopped ginger.

Have you ever seen the inside of these beautiful butternut squash before?

After peeling the squash and cutting off the ends, you can scoop the seeds out with a large spoon or a small knife which worked better for me.

Next you’ll be slicing the squash and cutting it into bite size pieces (1 inch or so).

After preparing the rest of the ingredients, you’ll be putting the squash in a large skillet and allowing the squash to soften.

So far so good? The hardest part of this recipe is peeling and cutting the squash. Ready for the recipe?

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons of butter
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 1 piece (1 inch) fresh ginger, peeled and chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped
• 2 3/4 pounds small butternut squash, peeled and cut into 1-inch cubes
• 1/2 cup fresh orange juice
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon pumpkin spice
• Coarse salt and ground pepper (to your taste)
• 1/2 quart Vegetable Stock
• 1/2 quart water

Directions

1. Melt the butter in a large skillet over medium heat.
2. Cook the onion until clear, about 2-3 minutes.
3. Add the ginger, garlic, and squash stirring occasionally for a few minutes.
4. Stir in the water and vegetable broth.
5. Bring to a boil then reduce the heat and simmer until the squash is tender which is anywhere from 20 to 30 minutes.
6. When the squash is soft (you can poke it with a fork to check it) then turn the stove top heat off.
7. Pour 1/4 of the squash mixture into a blender and puree it.
8. Remove the pureed soup from the blender and set it aside then pour another 1/4 squash mixture into the blender and puree. Continue doing this until all of your squash mixture is pureed.
9. Make sure not to burn yourself while pureeing this hot soup — remove the blender cap (not the cover) and put a towel over the top of the blender. Hold the towel down as you’re pureeing.
10. Pour all the soup into a pot and stir the orange juice into it until it’s all incorporated.
11. Add salt and pepper to your taste.

Whala! You are finished and ready to eat.

This soup is creamy and rich. It has the texture of cream of wheat which I love but, unfortunately, my husband does not.

Enjoy! This is truly a hearty and healthy soup.

The crock pot — used more often when the weather gets chillier. So I scrounged around looking for a recipe that uses chicken thighs and found a Paleo Savory Cinnamon Slow Cooker recipe – although the original recipe uses chicken breasts. I also altered the ingredients a little bit — but not much.

This recipe can be made ahead of time, frozen and then defrosted in the refrigerator the night before to use the following day.

I did not freeze the recipe but instead marinated everything in the refrigerator for a couple of hours in the morning then tossed it in the crock pot for a few hours.

Ingredients

• 2 lbs boneless skinless chicken thighs
• 2 Bell Peppers, sliced
• 1 Onion, diced
• 2 teaspoons Paprika
• 4 Cloves of Garlic, minced
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 1 cup of Chicken broth
• 1/8 teaspoon Nutmeg

Directions

1. Combine all the ingredients in a Ziplock freezer bag, remove all the air and seal it.
2. Marinade for at least a couple hours or alternatively, freeze overnight and defrost before it’s time to put it in the crock pot.
3. Pour contents of the bag into the crock pot and cook on low for 6 hours or on high for 4.

And that, my dear friends, is all it takes. It tastes absolutely delicious.

Enjoy!

Ahhh … the overweight butternut squash. What to do with this heavy vegetable?

Fortunately, I found a recipe for Roasted Butternut Squash which is paleo and quite easy to make (although I did tweak the recipe a little). The squash is cumbersome to work with — uncomfortable for small hands when peeling it. But — what an awesome burst of flavor the squash gives you in every bite! I quite enjoy eating this vegetable.

Ingredients

• 2-3 tablespoons Coconut Oil (or olive oil)
• 1 Butternut Squash
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• Salt
• Pepper

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 400°F.
2. Peel, seed, and chop the squash into 1 inch pieces and add them to a bowl.
3. Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil.
4. Melt 2 tablespoons of oil then add the oil to the squash and toss together.
5. Add cinnamon, salt and pepper to the squash and toss together.
6. Roast the squash for approximately 35-40 minutes tossing every 15 minutes.
7. The squash is ready when soft — check by poking a fork through the squash to check for doneness.

Pretty simple, no? I served the roasted butternut squash with a salad and drumstick chicken.

I made this paleo Tuna Salad because I wanted to try some new ingredients for my husband’s lunch — namely, artichokes.  Blech!  Or … so I thought. The original recipe has you putting the tuna salad in tomatoes but that wouldn’t work very well for a lunch so I changed it up a bit.

The recipe calls for 3 cans of tuna in oil — I reduced the amount to 2 since my husband usually takes other things for lunch in addition to a salad and I didn’t want this salad to go dry sitting in the refrigerator.

Here are the main ingredients … ooohh, the capers are almost off the photo.

And … here’s the recipe for you with a few changes.

Ingredients

• 2 cans tuna in olive oil, drained
• 1/2 cup artichokes, drained and chopped
• 1/4 cup black olives, chopped
• 1/2 small red onion, finely chopped
• 2 tablespoons capers
• 2 tablespoons flat leaf parsley, chopped
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice (I used half a fresh lemon for this)
• 1 to 2 tablespoons olive oil

Directions (pretty simple)

1. Mix all the ingredients in a bowl then season with salt and pepper.

And that — is pretty much it.

I am not a fan of artichokes but it tasted fine to me. My husband, whose the artichoke lover, told me that he couldn’t tasted the artichoke at all.  Maybe that’s why it tasted fine to me.  (laughing)  I’m guessing that since the artichoke is chopped up, you don’t get the full flavor of the larger pieces.

Enjoy!

So … Meghan, at Paleo Effect, has outdone herself again. I recently tried a paleo bread recipe of hers and now she came up with a white fluffy gluten free paleo bread. Go Meghan!  I like trying her recipes because, so far, they have all been tried and true.

This recipe was really easy to make and it definitely will take the place of “real” bread. So, for those of you who are gluten free but long for bread, this recipe is for you.

Since we don’t normally have bread on a daily basis, I sliced my loaf and put 2 slices in plastic sealable bags so that I could grab them in the morning and toast them. Yum!

Here are the ingredients you’ll need to get started.

You’ll be combining all the ingredients together …

To get a beautiful white loaf …

Ooh la la!  You absolutely must try it!

Ingredients

• 1 ½ heaping cups Arrowroot Powder
• 1 heaping cup Almond Flour
• 4 Eggs, at room temperature
• 4 Egg Whites, at room temperature
• 4 Tablespoons Walnut Oil
• ½ Tablespoon Kosher Salt
• 1 ½ Tablespoons Baking Powder
• 2 teaspoons Coconut Vinegar
• Olive Oil Spray for your loaf pan (the original recipe used Coconut Spray)

Directions (the easy part)

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Combine the dry ingredients together in a bowl.
3. Combine the wet ingredients together in a bowl.
4. Combine the wet and dry ingredients together in a large bowl.
5. Spray your loaf pan with the Olive Oil Spray.
6. Pour the mixture into the loaf pan and bake for approximately 40 minutes. (The original recipe says 30-35 but mine took longer. A toothpick inserted in the middle should come out clean.)

And that is pretty much it!  The coconut vinegar is a tad expensive, however, since you don’t use a lot of it and you’ll be making this bread a lot, it’s well worth the money.

Hope you enjoy it! And check out Paleo Effect‘s website — I haven’t been disappointed yet.

This Apple, Pecan, Blue Cheese with Dried Cherries Salad is taken from a well known blogger, The Pioneer Woman. And, I simply love the combination of the ingredients.

So — let’s take a look at what we’ll need.

You’ll be making a dressing for the salad.

After prepping your ingredients, it’s just a matter of mixing everything together — pretty easy, eh?  So … here’s the recipe.

Ingredient

• 12 ounces Salad Greens
• 2 whole Apples, Cored And Sliced Thin
• 1/2 cup Pecan Halves
• 1/4 cup Dried Cherries
• 6 ounces of Blue Cheese Cut Into Small Chunks
• 1 Tablespoon Dijon Mustard or as much/little as your taste buds can handle
• 1 Tablespoon Maple Syrup
• 1 teaspoon Apple Cider Vinegar
• 1/4 cup Olive Oil
• Salt And Pepper, to taste

Directions

1. Combine the salad greens, apple slices, pecan halves, dried cherries, and blue cheese in a large bowl.
2.  In a small bowl, combine the Dijon mustard, maple syrup, vinegar, olive oil, and the salt and pepper and mix it together.
3.  Serve the salad dressing on the side so everyone can add as much or as little as they like.

That’s it! Hope you enjoy it.  I served my salad with baked salmon and asparagus.  Yum!