No-Bake Brownies and Healthy Mini-Cakes

I promised to begin posting some of our favorite healthy desserts, so today I have two for you. Both recipes fit the bill for when you need something sweet, but don't want to sabotage your healthy eating lifestyle.

 

The Brownies are of the gooey sort; if you like yours more like cake, this may not be the recipe for you. (You could always add 1/4 cup of almond flour to the recipe and see if that makes it more cake-like, but I haven't tried it so I don't know if it will.) 

 

One of my daughters is a true chocaholic and these brownies pass her taste test AND satisfy her chocolate cravings, yet they're free of refined sugar and white flour--I call that a winning recipe. :)

Raw (No-Bake) Brownies & Frosting

1 cup walnuts

1 cup dates, softened

1/4 cup cacao powder, preferably raw

1/4 tsp vanilla 

 

Place walnuts, dates, cacao and vanilla in a food processor and process until a ball of dough forms. (Process well--until smooth)

Place brownie batter into an 8 x 8 in. baking dish and press down to form a consistent thickness.

Frosting  

1/4 cup raw cacao powder

1/4 cup coconut oil, (liquid)

 

Mix cacao and coconut oil by hand or in blender until emulsified. Frost brownie. Freeze for 10 minutes and then cut into squares and enjoy! 

The following recipe would work as a donut if you have the pan for it. If not, just make muffins as we do.  The glaze topping is optional, but it adds a wonderful touch. You won't believe how sweet it tastes--with no sugar!

Paleo Mini-Cakes (Muffins)

1/4 cup almond flour

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp baking soda

3 eggs

2 Tablespoons honey

1/4 cup coconut oil

1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

 

Mix all together. Bake in muffin cups @ 350 F. for 10-15 minutes, or until brown. Add glaze topping. (optional)

 

Glaze Topping

1 banana

2 Tablespoons milk

 

Microwave 30 seconds and then mash up banana and milk. Add another dash of milk, if necessary, to bring to glaze consistency. Use a knife or pastry brush to glaze muffin tops. 

 

You could also sprinkle cinnamon or chopped nuts, (or even chocolate mini-chips) over the tops of muffins after glazing, if desired.  My favorite is finely chopped nuts.   

In a hurry? 

If you absolutely must have something sweet but don't have time to make something, my go-to solution is organic dark chocolate. Trader Joe's has some good selections. A small piece of chocolate, which I sometimes slather peanut-butter over, is a craving-quencher that is very low on sugar but high in antioxidants.  You may be surprised to find that one or two bitefuls is really enough to give you that feeling of having indulged in something decadent, but without the guilt. Try it!

Giveaway Still Going On

Don't forget that the giveaway of Inspiring Women of the Faith is still going on. Leave a comment to be entered. Each comment counts as one entry.

 

Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid!

One of the things I really enjoy about Nourishing Traditions is a feature in which they have a sidebar that says "Know Your Ingredients. Guess This Product." It goes on to list the ingredients of an everyday product on the shelves of the grocery store, probably an item many of us have purchased in the past.

It's sort of horrifying, first of all, to read the ingredients, but somehow fun to go to the appendix and find out what the mystery product is. Many times I've been able to guess, but there are actually products out there with so many fake "foods" and convoluted-sounding additives that the actual item is really camouflaged. To think, we're eating this stuff!

A better headline to the sidebar might be: Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid! 

Recently I was on the road for a few hours with some of my family and we stopped at a popular fried chicken eatery. I just plain won't eat a lot of fast food, but I was hungry, and it smelled good, and we were far from home....you get the idea. I don't eat biscuits, but might have been tempted if they'd had real butter--which, of course, was nowhere to be seen. Instead, there was a "buttery spread," full of hydrogenated oils and lots of other unhealthy things. What really got me, though, was the "honey" sauce. Check out the ingredients to what should be a fully natural and single ingredient item:

(Fried-Chicken Fast Food Place) Honey Sauce

High fructose corn syrup

Corn Syrup

Sugar

Honey (hooray! There's some in there)

Fructose

Caramel color

Molasses

Water

Citric Acid

Natural and Artificial Flavor

Malic Acid 

From what I've read, "natural and artificial flavor" could mean MSG--by another name, so even this ingredient is suspect.

Notice the first ingredient? I've been on a crusade of sorts to abolish high fructose corn syrup from my home since last year, and it's absolutely amazing how many items in the grocery store contain it. Once you start reading labels, you'll see what I mean. I have one daughter who loves soda, and, even though I've convinced her not to drink diet types, she still asks for the regular type, especially coke. I didn't realize until I started checking labels that not even soda is sweetened with real sugar, however. So, even if you avoid the artificial sweeteners, you can't avoid high fructose corn syrup if you buy most brands, even the big names.

I'm not saying that soda--or sugar--is good for you, mind you, but I'd get her soda with sugar on occasion (if it was readily available. Maybe it's good it isn't!) whereas I won't buy the diet or HFCS ones. Now and then I'd like a soda myself, and guess what--there's a solution! I drink ZEVIA--it's soda sweetened with all-natural, zero calorie stevia. SO glad they came out with this! But it's pricey, so having a can of soda only occasionally works out well. My daughter knows that if she wants a can of soda, she's got to earn it.

Before I go, here's an interesting article I read recently about this subject of what's in our foods. :
Do Healthy Processed Foods Exist?
(If you enjoy this article, click the link to high fructose corn syrup (above) and let Dr. Mercola explain how bad this stuff is.)


All of this reminds me why, when I go to a grocery store, my mantra could be: Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid! (Read labels!)
What about you? Have you taken any steps to put your family on a course towards better eating? I'm working on a free pdf called, "The Top Ten Easiest and Pain-Free Ways to Improve Your Family's Diet and Health."
Watch for it, coming soon. :)

And don't forget to enter this month's free giveaway by leaving a comment! 

How to do Paleo Eating

Paleo Style Dinner. Meat, vegetables, and fruit.

Lots of people ask me about the so-called "Paleo" Diet, which I've been following for about 18 months or so.  First off, I don't consider it a diet in the sense of Weight-Watchers or Weigh-Down, or any other diet you can think of. It's not about controlling portions or quantity of food. Instead, the focus is on choosing healthful foods over processed, meaning the closer to raw or lightly processed you can get, the better.

Why "Paleo"?
The moniker "Paleo" is because some proponents of this lifestyle like to say it is how our ancestors ate. Not your grandmother or great-grandmother, but ancestors like pre-historic, or paleolithic man. In my opinion, there is no such thing as truly "pre-historic" man since the Bible gives us a history of the very FIRST people on earth! However, there is no doubt that previous generations did not subsist on the packaged, factory-formulated boxed and canned stuff we call food. They also didn't suffer from many of our modern maladies, at least not in huge numbers. Diabetes used to be a rarity. Heart disease and cancer happened, but not like the epidemic we see nowadays.

(Now, even if you eat a completely organic and natural food diet, there are still modern sources of chemicals and pollutants that abound, but eating well is a way to eliminate much of the unnecessary exposure we subject ourselves to.)

So--call it what you will, Paleo, or Cave-Man or Cave-Girl Eating, or whatever. It's all about returning to eating food the way God made it. This is not to be confused with a completely raw diet, either, since Paleo is most definitely about eating cooked food as well. (Fire, after all, is as old as Adam, and after the Fall there was certainly the use of fire for cooking raw meat. It was God, after all, who instituted the first burnt offerings.)

Essentially, to follow this eating lifestyle, you need to be committed to cutting three things from your diet:

White Flour

Almost All Other Grains

(White) Sugar

Some people give up most dairy as well, but I am assuredly not among such as they.
In some respects, you might think this is simply a repackaged lo-carb diet, but it isn't, and here's why:
On a lo-carb diet you can't eat lots of great, nutritious vegetables and fruits because they have higher carbohydrate contents. Things like sweet potato, butternut squash, maybe even carrots; fruits like bananas,
mangos, some melons. They're off limits on those diets. But not so on the Paleo regimen. You can eat basically any plant food except for what modern agriculture has tinkered with, such as wheat and other grains. Paleo purports to follow the pre-agricultural eating style of mankind. But any fruit and any vegetable is okay.

A family favorite (before baking): Zucchini Chips

As I said at the start, it's not about controlling portions but if you want to stay lean, you'll have to use some common sense, which you should be doing anyway, no matter how you eat. Personally, I've found that weight has slipped off without any effort on my part other than cutting things out of my diet! I still eat as much as I want, and it's been a joy to eat the kinds of food that were previously thought to be real no-nos, such as nuts and seeds and coconut oil.

If anything, I may eat more than I used to, but I eat differently than I used to, and I'm now 27 pounds lighter than I was before I embraced this way of eating.

To get a real handle on the Paleo lifestyle, I recommend the following resources:
 

And my favorite website for great do-it-yourself recipes (not just for food but for lots of household products. I make my own toothpaste, for instance, from a recipe I got here.) is the Wellness Mama. The Wellness Mama also has links to articles that will tell you all you want to know about the Paleo lifestyle and tips on how to follow it.

Are you ready for a change? Ready for healthier eating? What's your biggest block to eating right? Share it with us, and if I get enough responses I'll do a post on this topic (Stumbling Blocks to Eating Well).
 I also still have a three-tin set of English Teas to give away, because I did not get 12 unique commenters on my last post. Leave a comment to be entered in the drawing!

Wholesome and Healthy Breakfast

Note: Blogger refuses to behave! My headings and type sizes are all mixed up no matter what I do in the "editing" mode. I'm switching to WordPress, but please bear with the zany look of this blog until I finish the transition. THANKS!

"I was talking to Carol, Steph and Rachael--a few ladies from my church--the other night and found real interest in my method of preparing oatmeal for my family. Steph was way ahead of me as far as eating organic locally grown food is concerned, and it was fun to compare notes and learn about new resources.   But I promised to share my oatmeal recipe. (I like to post about health, books, writing, and Christian living, so this fits nicely into the "Health" category.)  

 Wholesome (Fermented) Oatmeal

Why Fermented?  Grains have anti-nutrients and phytic acid in them, which means they aggravate the digestive tract. Fermentation removes the phytates, making it much more friendly to your system, and healthier overall.

According to the dictionary, a phy·tate is a salt or ester of phytic acid, occurring in plants, especially cereal grains, capable of forming insoluble complexes with calcium, zinc, iron, and other nutrients and interfering with their absorption by the body.

Quick Background Note: Two years ago, I was prescribed a medication I had to take nightly, due to increasingly irritating heartburn. Well, I don't like taking medications. At all.

I'd ignored the problem until that prescription. After filling it I started researching what had gone wrong, and why.

Long story short, I changed my diet—cut out most grains, and stopped using that medication so long ago I don’t even remember what it was.   And I no longer suffer from heartburn! (Not to mention, I'm more than 27 pounds lighter!)

Perhaps having heartburn wouldn't be enough of a motivating factor for you to change your diet. If not, there are lots of other really valid reasons for eating the way I do, which is with an emphasis on fresh, real food and AWAY from processed, chemical –laden food. But, in a nutshell:

 It's Not Rocket Science

You don't have to understand the science behind it, to get that eating fresh food is better for you, or that grains have inherent properties (anti-nutrients) that fermentation can remove.

And because there are some awesome blogs out there which do explain the science, I'm not going to re-invent the wheel here. ***

Check out the blogs I list at the end to learn more, but for now I'll just share this wonderful recipe that has transformed breakfast in my home. (Which I owe to my awesome sister, Christine. She stayed with us in January and taught me how to ferment oatmeal. We love you forever, Chris!) 

I make this all the time, now-- Every two days, to be exact. (I'll share more on that in a moment.)  Simply switching your add-ins can change the flavor and texture so much that it's never boring.

 Wholesome (Fermented) Oatmeal

The formula is quite simple: 1 cup warm water and 2 Tablespoons yogurt to each cup of rolled oats.

Here's the way I do it:

2 cups regular rolled oats (not instant)

Organic, whole-milk, cultured yogurt (4 tablespoons)

2 cups warm water

Take a mixing bowl and put in the warm water. Add the yogurt and stir. (I don't even use a real Tablespoon measure. It doesn't have to be exact. Just don't skimp.)

Now add the oats and stir until blended.

Cover loosely with a dish towel or other cloth and set somewhere quiet to ferment over night. I put my bowl on top of my refrigerator. 

This is what it looks like while it's fermenting: 

  In the morning, the oatmeal is ready to be cooked and eaten. It only takes five minutes! 

  Put one cup of water for each cup of oatmeal you prepared, in a stovetop pot.

  Since I made two cups for our recipe, put two cups water in the pot.

 Add salt to taste, stir in the fermented oat mixture and bring to a boil, stirring often, if not constantly.

AS SOON as it boils, turn the heat to low, and cook, stirring for another minute or two. That's it!

It should already be nice and thick, and will thicken even more as it sits. 

  I leave the prepared oatmeal on a "warming" spot on my oven, and the kids helps themselves as they're ready to eat.

Note: Always use butter or some other fat source when you eat this. It makes all the good nutrients in oatmeal bioavailable.  

Toppings: (In addition to butter)

Any fresh fruit

Raisins, or dried cranberries

Cinnamon

Stevia and cinnamon

Low-sugar jam

Apple butter

Maple syrup (just go lightly with this) 

Sometimes I pop the fruit in right after the oatmeal is ready but still on the stove.  

I happen to love this stuff with just salt and butter, but the kids like it a bit sweeter.

Now, here's the best thing about this recipe:

Any leftover oatmeal can be used the next day to make oatmeal pancakes. This is why I only make it every other day—I reuse what's left for the second day's breakfast. 

I've made up to four cups of it at a time just to have more leftover for the following day.

After everyone's eaten all they want of the oatmeal, and it's cooled down, cover the pot and stick it just as it in the fridge.

The next morning it will be pretty solid, but don’t let that put you off. Take a few eggs and break them directly into the pot.

Depending on how much oatmeal you have left, you'll use anywhere from two to five eggs.

Here's what one batch of my oatmeal looked like on the 2nd day after I added eggs and strawberries.

  Once you add the eggs, use the end of a whisk to break up the lumps and blend the mixture. You will NOT get out all the lumps and that is fine.

Now, take a frying pan, add a little coconut oil or butter and use the batter for pancakes. 

  Strawberry-Oatmeal Pancakes.

They break up easily so you have to be careful when flipping them over, and when removing them from the frying pan. I "slide" them out onto a plate I keep on the "warming" spot of the stove.

Even my husband, who doesn't like the oatmeal, loves the pancakes. By using different fruit and varying thetoppings and even how many eggs I add to the batter, the pancakes are just different enough each time we eat them to never be boring!  

           Pancakes with less fruit, more egg.

Gone are the days of buying over-sweetened, GMO cereals!

Happy Breakfast!

 ***For a quick primer in Paleo eating, see the Wellness Mama. This is a Christian lady who supplies lots of great recipes and ideas for going natural in life. She even has a wonderful post about how bread can be bad for you, even though Jesus described Himself as the bread of life.

Another useful blog is Mark's Daily Apple. He's woeful when it comes to accepting the myth of macro-evolution, but he nevertheless has great recipes and useful information regarding the pitfalls of the common American diet.

  Do you have a favorite healthy breakfast? Share it with us! 

  Warmest Blessings,

 Linore

More About Paleo and the Science Behind It
(And Why the Evolutionary Argument Doesn't Work)

From Paleo Spirit comes this excellent article giving more information on why the so-called "caveman" diet is really not what it sounds like. It's not evolutionary logic which supplies the scientific mechanism for why this style of eating is so healthy and beneficial.

I'll cut and paste the blog post from Paleo Spirit below, or, if you like, you can click through to the source itself and get on that mailing list for yourself.

Here's the article: (A bit long but well worth the read)

Does the Paleo Diet Make Sense Only in Light of Evolution?
Posted on December 16, 2011 by Lea

The Paleo diet (or Primal if you prefer) is based on the premise that we humans are genetically adapted to the diet of our ancestors. There is a heavy reliance on the explanation that Darwinian Evolution is at the root of this – that we have EVOLVED to eat this way. Now I consider myself an intelligent person. For what it’s worth, while far from being the universal designation of intelligence, I do have a couple of degrees from great universities. I like to examine facts and evidence and use logic in making decisions. But guess what? While I acknowledge adaptations and the like, I am not a believer in Darwinian Evolution and I am not alone. There are many other people like me. The point of this post is NOT to debate evolution or change anyone’s mind (please, let’s not go there). But I would like to explore why it is that I am a devotee of a diet and lifestyle that appears so rooted in something I do not embrace.

Instead of relying so heavily upon human evolutionary theory, the Paleo diet makes sense for other reasons. I believe the argument “cavemen did this so you should too” is illogical. Sure, I like the fun, iconic caveman as much as the next person. There’s no reason we can’t have fun with this, right? But I believe as Matt LaLonde, a biochemist with a Ph.D from Harvard and a strong interest in Paleo nutrition, stated in episode #68 of Robb Wolf‘s podcast, that looking at what our ancestors ate is instructional at best. It can point us in the right direction but does not rise to the level of a convincing argument.

In fact, LaLonde said,

“It really drives me nuts when people justify what I’ll [call] the Paleo lifestyle or way of eating, by stating that ‘cavemen and modern hunter-gatherers ate meat, vegetables, fruits, nuts and seeds and they did not suffer from the diseases of modern civilization, so you must eat this way too if you want to avoid this disease.’ That is indeed a logical fallacy…It can be used to generate hypothesis that should then be tested. But it does not establish cause and effect.”

This “testing” might take the form of formal scientific studies with well-developed protocols, examinations of biochemical processes, or anthropological studies that focus on the health of our ancestors or modern hunter-gatherer populations. It might simply be what is known as an N=1 experient we conduct on ourselves. (I recommend a Whole30 elimination diet for that, btw.)

Matt LaLonde went on to say,

“One argument actually that gets me even more worked up than the previous one is ‘our Paleolithic ancestors evolved over millions of years while not consuming grains, legumes or dairy so we should not consume these foods because we are not adapted to them.’ This is an assumption, and it is completely incorrect. The assumption that [a] species is not adapted to a food because it never consumed that food is completely false. There are plenty of examples throughout evolution where a species finds a new source of food and thrives on it.”

Clearly Dr. LaLonde is a believer in the theory of evolution. So the point is not that you have to be an evolution skeptic to find holes in this whole argument. He and others have pointed out there are many and varied reasons for eating a Paleo diet OTHER than because cavemen ate this way or because we evolved to eat this way.

One of the reasons the Paleo diet movement (or whatever we call it) is attractive to me is the intellectual curiosity of many of those at the forefront (Robb Wolf, Matt LaLonde, Mark Sisson and many, many others). There’s a willingness to challenge the status quo and question conventional wisdom handed to us by government and others with self-serving agendas. There’s an independent spirit that I admire. And as an official “nutrition nerd” I love the modern nutrition science studies and discussions on the biochemical processes in our bodies. I also like the simplicity of it all – the getting back to basics. It just makes sense to me. And most importantly, I like how much my health has improved as a result of eating this way.

It has always struck me as unfortunate that the Paleo movement focuses so much on the evolutionary component because it can be a real stumbling block for some people. There are many like me who do not believe in evolutionary theory as fact. There’s an impression out there among some Christians, and other believers in a Divine Creator or Intelligent Designer, that adopting this diet and lifestyle somehow puts a stamp of approval on something rooted in what might be perceived as an atheistic world view. Now, please, I am NOT saying that everyone who believes in evolution is an atheist or if you are an atheist that you militate against those of us who do believe in God. Not at all. I am simply pointing out there are many people who might otherwise benefit from this way of eating if they could get past the emphasis on evolution. And sad to say, I have also witnessed some hostility out there to believers in God. It’s as though some folks adopt the Paleo lifestyle as a way of justifying their existing atheism. I have heard people say that because the Paleo diet works so well that it PROVES we MUST have evolved. I could easily argue we were CREATED to eat this way and that is why it works.

For me, the word “PALEO” means something ancient – something simple, a getting “back to the basics”, a harkening back to a time before mankind started adding lots of “stuff” to our lives and to our food. I embrace that word. The name of this site is Paleo Spirit after all! I think there is common ground in this idea. It is possible to come together whether you believe we EVOLVED to eat this way or whether you believe God CREATED our bodies to function best eating this way.

What do you think? Do you know anyone who has stayed away from the Paleo/Primal diet and lifestyle because they were turned off by the emphasis on evolution?

If you liked this post why not subscribe to Paleo Spirit?

[end of article]
http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
I find that I always need to qualify my involvement with Paleo by explaining away the unfounded evolutionary associations, so I enjoyed this article very much. Thank you, Paleo Spirit!
Warmest blessings,

Linore
PS: LAST TWO DAYS for my publisher's promo on my book, The House in Grosvenor Square,for only $2.51 on Kindle! If you have an e-reader, don't delay! Promo ends tomorrow! (1/3/12) The print book is greatly reduced from retail, too, by the way. : )
http://www.amazon.com/Grosvenor-Regency-Inspirational-Romance-ebook/dp/B003V4B4HU/ref=pd_sim_kinc_4?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2

Author Gone Paleo!



Todays' post is about food, which may surprise you. But what we put into our bodies is really a part of living and should be one of the ways we seek to please God. So, "Author Gone Paleo" is about some beneficial changes I've made recently in my eating habits that I wanted to share with you.

What is Paleo? It's an eating style--more, a lifestyle--which tries to universally reject modern food tinkering such as GMO's (genetically modified food), over-processing, pesticides, growth hormone-injected meat, etc. It's nothing new in essence, but there are new scientific findings that support this type of eating with one major new factor. Unlike the organic-food eaters of the past, the Paleo diet does away with modern grains. Yes, that means no whole-grain flours, organic wheat flour, etc. But make no mistake: this is NOT your typical low-carb regiment. With newer research showing that coconut flour (and oil) are actually good for you, that eating nuts and seeds are powerhouse nutrient sources and that these, too, are GOOD for you, the Paleo diet becomes rich in its own goodies. Almond flour is now a staple in my pantry. Squashes of all types, sweet potatoes, and fruit are important elements of eating this way, too.

For an in-depth look at what it's all about, visit The Wellness Mama . This Christian lady not only gives the first excellent argument I've ever read explaining why grains are bad for our health, reconciling it wholly with Jesus's calling himself "the bread of life," she also gives scrumptious recipes, tips and ideas that are really helpful. (Read her blog post called, "How Grains are Slowly Killing You." This one post did more to transform my thinking and get me eating better than anything else I've ever read.)

I explained my eating transformation to my friends like this: It's like when Neo (in the Matrix movies) suddenly sees the bad guys as nothing more than CODE--he realizes that they're not real beings, they're computerized code that he is seeing as real. AT that point, he becomes invincible and easily does away with the baddies. Well, reading that article on how grains are slowly killing us made that leap for me: instead of seeing a yummy bagel or doughnut, I suddenly saw POISON.Let me tell you, I love good good food and I come from a family where food is the center of our celebrations, but it was absolutely no stretch, no effort, for me to start eating differently after digesting these food-facts.

Does it work? Well, I lost twelve pounds in the first two months without even trying. I was eating a great deal of fruit and nuts. If you TRY to lose weight on this eating style, you can easily do so by eliminating most fruit, and by eating less nuts and seeds. I wasn't trying, so I ate what I wanted--and lost weight, anyway.

I'm not trying to explain the whole lifestyle here, but I did want to share my Paleo "Cereal" that I ate this morning. It's filling, and chock full of
protein, antioxidants, fiber, micronutrients, and healthy fats. (Not to mention, yummy!)

Linore's Paleo "Cereal"

In a nutshell (pun intended), this is basically a kind of trail mix that I added coconut milk to, and ate as a cereal. The best trail mixes are homemade as you can customize them to what you like best, but this is my current version. Feel free to customize your own as you like. Dried fruits like pineapple or apricots (use moderately), other seeds, nuts, and even spices like turmeric or cinnamon can be added.

Get a one or two quart container with an air-tight lid to store this in. Refrigeration is not necessary. (Ironically, I'm using a cleaned-out container that once held chocolate chip cookie dough--poison, lol!)

Three cups walnuts, chopped or not
Three cups pecans, chopped if preferred, but not fine.
One cup dried cranberries
Two cups pistachio nutmeats
One-two cups sliced almonds
Half cup pine nuts
One cup sunflower KERNELS
1/2 to one cup DARK or bittersweet chocolate chips (optional)
coconut flakes (optional)

I put in the chocolate only because it's Christmas week. But it's perfectly fine to eat a small amount of DARK chocolate every day.

IMPORTANT:
Don't eat scads of this stuff on a daily basis. It's nutrient-dense, so a little goes a long way.
I take a 4-6 ounce mug, fill it about 1/2 to 2/3 full of mix, and then add coconut milk. I wouldn't have this every day for breakfast, but it's a great energy-boosting filler and good for you, to boot.

NOTE: You must understand that if you're going to keep eating all the unhealthy white bread and grains in your diet, then adding paleo foods like trail-mix won't do you many favors.
In fact, you'll gain weight.

The key to using these foods to benefit your body is to remove the grains from your
diet, first. Don't try to do it all at once, but keep removing sugar or white flour
(or any flour) on a weekly basis.

Better health=better productivity in all areas of your life! This past Thanksgiving I made a totally Paleo feast (including grain-free stuffing), and two days later when I weighed myself, I had actually lost two pounds since the previous week. LOST weight, after THANKSGIVING! And I ate until I was more than full.

Resources: Wellness Mama 101--The Basics
Everyday Paleo by Sarah Fragoso and Robb Wolf

Paleo Spirit

Mark's Daily Apple: Primal Living in the Modern World(Ignore the evolution idiocy--for a guy who researches everything about the food he eats, why doesn't he do the same for so-called "facts" of evolution, carbon dating, the fossil record, etc? Even scientists who aren't ready to call themselves Christians conclude that evolution is a religion, a chosen belief-system, based on interpretation of facts that skew the evidence (which overwhelmingly supports a higher-intelligence Creator). After all, evolution is a THEORY. Funny how everyone leaves that word out when referring to this widespread heart-held belief system. Since even museums uphold this theory with religious fervor, people think it must be true.)

Resources:
Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed (DVD)

Answers In Genesis/Creation Scientists

The Riddle of Origins Series


Warmest blessings,

Linore
Linore Rose Burkard.com
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For Your Health

Since I'm posting scriptures of healing and well-being, I thought I should also share a link for a free pdf concerning how to buy foods that are not genetically modified. GMO products have been proven to be highly dangerous (see Mercola.com for the article) but how do we avoid them?

See if this guide can help.

God bless your day,

Linore