Hope your first week is going well! Mine is well.. going. I miss coffee and while I thought I had mastered the art of not being hungry on an Elimination Diet, the extra calories I'm loosing through breastfeeding have been a little harder to pick up, making me realize I was topping up with some empty calories. Time to pick up the smoothies I guess! On the plus side my skin is feeling great!
Here are the links and/or recipes for this weeks dinners! Enjoy!
Roast Salmon
Again, this week starts out with a roast dinner from Jamie Oliver. I love doing this because it's simple, it looks nice on the table, and you get great leftovers for meals later in the week. This week's roast is for a Roast Side of Salmon. The recipe has some veggies along side it but feel free to use your own family favourites.
Veggie Korma with Mock Cauliflower Pilau
I'm so excited about this curry because it's such a hit at my house. It's something I pull out when I feel like my daughter hasn't been eating enough vegetables because, since it's all vegetables, she's bound to get some in. I usually cook it out of "Save with Jamie" but I found this really cool PDF that even has pictures!
I wanted to let you know that I usually change a couple of things. First, if you are on the elimination diet you do want to leave out the optional feta cheese (and the yoghurt). Second, I don't like to use the liquid from canned beans (or the cooking liquid from beans) because it reduces the gas-causing carbohydrate raffinose in the final dish. Lastly - and this one is 100% optional - but my family is not 100% on board that cauliflower is a replacement for rice. In order to convince them (that sounds better than trick them right?!?!) I make "fancy rice". This means melting some oil / butter / ghee in a large pan, adding some flavours (such as lemon zest and juice, ginger root and turmeric) and then stirring the cooked rice through the yummy flavours.
Chicken Curry
This is another one of my fav's from Donna Hay's cookbook The New Easy. As much as I like cooking it's nice to have a curry recipe you throw in the oven and forget about! This is that one.
Lamb Tagine
This is another recipe from Gwyneth Paltrow's "It's All Good." Lamb is an allowed red meat on the Elimination Diet as it is generally still raised grazing on pasture and is therefore less inflammatory a red meat choice. While some individuals do well on no red meat, many people require meat in their diet (and occasional red meat) to feel their best. I'm one of those people so there's a bit of lamb in my menu plan. This recipe has some preserved lemon on top; I generally don't have preserved lemon on had so I just leave them out (it's still good).
Fish Burgers
I love these salmon burgers. The pickled ginger and cilantro go so well with salmon! They do have a bit of a challenge with them which is that they fall apart if you ignore the part where they are supposed to rest in the fridge. Now - normally something like that is enough for me to ignore a recipe forever but these are really yummy and on an elimination diet - I need healthy food that is really yummy. So it's best to suck it up and prep these the day before, then when you get home from work its really easy to just cook up the burgers and steam or sauté the vegetables. Make sure to make enough for lunch the next day - you are going to want to eat them again.
Chinese Chicken Salad
I hate to say this, but if you hate salads you are probably making them wrong. This one is a prime example of how to do one well - so you'll actually want to eat it. It has a soft and a crunchy lettuce, extra veggies for sweetness and texture, lots of herbs, a seed, some protein and a killer homemade dressing you'll want to use over and over again. This version has poached chicken breast - just for the salad, but it also works well with leftover roast chicken (or one of those grocery store rotisserie chickens. Shhh.)
Chicken Burgers
Making your own burgers is a sure fire way to avoid additives like gluten and soy as well as preservatives. It's also a great way to add in fun flavours and make the burgers you want to eat. I really love these chicken burgers. Keep them elimination diet friendly by pairing them with steamed our sautéed bok choy and some brown rice. Finished your elimination diet? Try them at your next BBQ on a bun with mayo.