I posted a coconut pancake recipe earlier that had been advertised as a crepe recipe... but it wasn't. At least it wasn't when I tried making it. So I've created my own crepe recipe and it's delicious!

For dinner tonight we're going to have salmon (with onions and a broth/butter sauce), apple slices with brie cheese, and parmesan spinach crepes. Here's the recipe for the crepes.

Ingredients
4 eggs
1 cup coconut milk
1 tablespoon honey
1/4 cup coconut flour
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) melted butter
dash of salt
dash of savory herbs (I used some lemon peel I didn't even know I had till I went rummaging through the herb/spice drawer.)
more butter to fry the crepes in

Directions
1. Melt the butter in the oven. Microwaving destroys nutrients. I know. I know. The micro is faster. But I'm trying to be a good girl and good girls melt their butter in the oven (or on the stove, or in the toaster oven, or somewhere that's not the micro).
2. Mix all of the ingredients together (except the butter that you're going to use to grease the fry pan). I don't care how you do it. It doesn't matter if you do dries and liquids separately then mix them together. That's just a bunch of bosch that cookbooks use to fill up their pages as far as I can tell. Throw everything into a bowl. Whip it up.
3. Melt some butter in a fry pan. Once it's hot, pour enough batter into the pan till it's about 3 or 4 inches across. When I did anything larger than that, it didn't flip so well. I found the crepes flipped better when the butter was starting to get used up, but they taste better when there's lots of butter. So I throw a lot in at first, then figure by the end I have pretty crepes even if in the beginning I had tasty crepes. It evens out.
4. Pile the crepes up on a plate as you work. You can then freeze them, fridge them, or use them immediately.

For the crepe filling I thawed some frozen spinach, threw in about 1/2 cup of parmesan cheese that I had grated a couple days ago but not used, and stuck the bowl in the oven (where the fish was cooking). The cheese melted a bit and when I pulled it out I just stirred it together and used it to fill the crepes. Because the crepes themselves were kind of small, I had to "pin" them together with toothpicks. 

Cooking from scratch can be a major time sink. But I've found a few recipes that are really easy and totally yummy. This is one of them.

My sister sent me a link for Chia Chocolate Mousse (dairy-free, vegan) (Her picture is prettier than mine.). The first time I made it, I was too lazy to grind up the chia seeds first. Otherwise I followed the recipe and the mousse was a hit with the kids. The second time I made it, I figured I really should follow the recipe the way it's written. I assumed that grinding the chia seeds up with enable the mousse to thicken without having chewy seeds bits to contend with. So I followed the directions and we all agreed, it just didn't taste as good. The chia seeds, when powdered, added a slightly bitter-ish taste that none of us liked. I tried following the recipe to the letter one more time with the same results. So I've gone back to not grinding the chia seeds.

With my Ninja food processor, making several grab-and-go servings of mousse is a breeze. I make vanilla first, then cocao.

Cocao on the left, vanilla on the right. This is before the ingredients are blended. 

Ingredients
1 can Natural Value Organic Coconut Milk (which doesn't contain guar gum, a GAPS no-no)
1/3 cup honey (I don't really measure, so this is approximate. When you measure honey, you lose some in the measuring cup. I'd rather put that honey in my mousse.) :-}
flavoring - either vanilla, almond extract, or cocoa. You want to add to taste so for vanilla I go with about a teaspoon, with the almond extract I use a wee bit less. With the cocoa you can add 1/3 cup if you want the mousse pretty dark chocolatey, or a little less (1/8th cup-ish) for a more milk chocolately flavor.
2 tablespoons chia seeds

Directions
1. This is where the Ninja comes in so handy. I suspect a Bullet or a mixing wand might work well. I use the personal sized cup on the Ninja and fill it with the can of coconut milk, the honey, and whatever flavoring I've chosen. (If you're making several batches, start with the lightest flavor first.)
2. Once you've dumped all but the chia seeds in, blend the ingredients till the honey is mixed in thoroughly.
3. Add the chia seeds. I use a knife to stir the seeds in because I've already got a butter knife out that I used to scrape out any coconut milk that wasn't willing to leave the can of its own accord.
4. This makes about 30 oz. of mousse. I use five 6 oz. canning jars with lids. That way I can pile these up in the fridge and toss them into school lunches if I want. Fill each container half way, then go back and finish filling them all the way up. That way, if your chia seeds all sank to the bottom, you won't end up with no chia seeds in the first few and tons in the final jars. I've only had that happen to me once, but I've learned to half fill first just to make sure I'm getting a better mix of chia seeds throughout.
5. Screw the lids on and throw these babies into the fridge. They should be ready to chow down on within an hour or so.
6. If you want to make another batch, I always rinse out the blender cup to get any chia seeds out. I don't do a thorough job because I don't care if the other ingredients get mixed into the new batch. I just don't want blenderized chia seeds. I don't bother washing off the blender blade since that didn't touch the chia seeds. Throw in another can of coconut milk, more honey, and add a new flavoring ingredient so you have a little variety to choose from when you want a snack.

I put the can in the picture so you could get a sense of the size of the jars. 

You can sorta see the darker chia seeds in these cans of vanilla mousse. 

The nature of recipes online --> Person A posts a recipe. Person B finds the recipe, makes it, and adjusts it a bit before posting her own version. Person C finds B's recipe, alters it a bit more, and posts that version on her own blog. I am person C.

I found this recipe that Barbara posted to her website paleo / vegeo - Amazingly Yummy Coconut Flour Paleo Pancakes (or Crepes). (Barbara is person B in this scenario.) The pancakes looked very crepe-ey and delicious and I looked forward to trying them. Barbara had originally gotten the recipe from Shannon - Fluffy Coconut Flour Pancakes. Both gals raved about the recipe, though Barbara mentioned that Shannon's recipe was on the runny side, so she tripled the amount of flour she used.

I should have known something was wrong when I looked at Shannon's photos and saw thick, fluffy pancakes and when I looked at Barbara's (with tripled flour) and saw crepes. I don't know where the oopsie was, but something was off.

So I started to make Barbara's version of the recipe, got a cup of coconut flour mixed in and felt like I was mixing grout rather than pancake batter. I could have rolled the batter into balls of dough like cookies. Needless to say, I didn't add in the last bit of flour that the recipe called for. Instead I ended up doubling everything else - essentially giving me something much closer to Shannon's recipe. And even that was thicker than I had hoped for. So the next time I make this, I'm going to use 3/4 to 1/2 as much flour as Shannon's recipe had called for. In the meantime, here's the recipe that I ended up using.

I thought the pancakes were on the bland side. They could have used a little cinnamon or almond extract or something. But the kids loved them and were asking for seconds.

Ingredients
4 eggs
1 cup coconut milk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 tablespoon honey
1/2 cup coconut flour (start with a small amount and add more as needed. the goal is batter, not bricks.)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
coconut oil for frying

Directions
1. Mix everything together.
2. Pour approximately 2-3 inch rounds into the coconut oil in the pan.
3. Flip once browned on one side. The batter will bubble a bit, but not as much as you might be used to with wheat batter.
4. Serve with honey and/or fruit. I used frozen blueberries and raspberries.

Here's yet one more coconut pancake recipe. This one calls for even less flour, and it adds applesauce in so the pancakes aren't too dry -- Ultimate Coconut Flour Pancakes.

We did a super speedy version of the GAPS intro diet in two weeks in October. Now we've been on the full GAPS diet for an additional month. I've had die-off symptoms pretty much this whole time -- mostly increased heart rate and a tickley sensation in my upper chest. But it seems like that's finally going away. I'm hoping that means that I've reached the end of getting rid of the bad guys and I'm moving into seeing some improvement with the help of the good guys. The girls, on the other hand, are convinced that the diet has led to increased acne. I'm hoping that's just a die-off symptom as well and that they'll soon have clearer skin. Here's to hopin' anyway. If their acne continues to worsen, I fear there'll be a mutiny and they'll go off the diet entirely. That wouldn't be the end of the world, but it's easier on me when we're all on the same diet page.

Although I miss bready stuff once in awhile, for the most part I think we've been appreciating all the healthy, fresh foods we've been getting. I've slowly been adding a few new dishes into our repertoire. As I refine them to a point where I like them, I try to post them here, though I notice I've mostly only been posting snacky/desserty things. Meals have mostly been the boring meat, veggie, veggie variety or something along those lines. I made BBQ ribs tonight for dinner. I found the recipe for the sauce on Journey to Food that Gives Life. We still miss having easy snacks on hand to eat. For the most part the quickie snacks are homemade yogurt (but Nathan is mostly staying off dairy, so that's out for him), panna cotta (no one likes the version without sour cream so again, this one's out for Nathan), fresh fruit, eggs, muffins (no one seems to like them after day one), and cookies (almond raisin or snickerdoodle so far). I miss the days of grabbing a box of cereal and milk and chowing down on an easy bowl of cereal or granola.

Since starting the GAPS diet I've watched a few videos from the GMO Summit and a few from the Gluten Summit. One of my struggles with the concept of a grain free diet is that people have been living on grains for thousands and thousands of years. Why is a no grain diet suddenly better for us? If Jesus ate bread, why shouldn't we? But according to some of the speakers I listened to, wheat today is very different than the wheat of 50 years ago. I'd like to hear more on how, exactly, it's different, and why we can't just go back to growing the old stuff again. If there's a version of wheat out there that didn't use to cause problems, then I would think there would be a market to start growing that grain again, even just as a niche sort of thing. According to one speaker, however, once your body has built up antibodies for any type of grain (most notably for the kind that's popularly grown today) there's no turning back. You can't even go back to the old kind of wheat. But then wouldn't we want to feed the old kind to our kids? And why, when people go to Europe, do they notice a difference when they eat the bread there? Doesn't that mean there's hope that we could eat wheat again? ... All of this to say that I'm left with more questions than answers. Suffice it to say that between GMOs screwing with things and altered genetics through nonGMO means have led to a poisoning of our food supply. And most people are shoving those poisons into their bodies at an alarming rate. That alone is enough to keep me on this diet (or something similar) for the foreseeable future.

The photos shown here are of various breakfasts over the last week or two. We always have one egg, plus something on the side, usually fruit (mostly because it's easy).

Top photo: fried egg, fresh banana and tangerine
Second photo: one egg omelette, half a kiwi fruit, and pumpkin pancakes with honey
Third photo: fried egg, fried bananas, homemade sour cream
Fourth photo: one egg omelette, cantaloupe and pomegranate seeds
Daily pills: Nathan has a few that he takes that the rest of us don't including zinc picolinate (but when I looked up the spelling just now I saw that it apparently is good for acne, so maybe I'll have the girls start taking it, too), L Theanine, and Lemon Balm. All of us take Bio-Kult probiotic, an Omega 3 pill with more EPA than DHA, fermented cod liver oil, and an additional probiotic called Optima by Nature's Way. 

I've tried several Paleo/GAPS muffin recipes with pretty so-so results. But I finally found a recipe that I like. In fact, I haven't tried making any modifications to this one yet. (Which is really saying something since I love tweaking things. I may change out a wee bit of the almond flour for coconut flour the next time I try to make them, just to see how it goes. But I really like these muffins just the way they are.) I've only used this recipe to make blueberry muffins so far, but you could add any kind of berries, or go a savory route and try adding a little cheese and mustard.

This recipe is from Camilla over at Power Hungry. She includes links to two muffin recipes that she modified this one from. I think I'll have to test both of those out as well just to see how they compare. I've taken out the non-GAPS ingredients from her recipe. But everything that's here is something she included as an option, so I haven't made any substitutions.

Ingredients
2-1/2 cups almond flour/meal
¾ tsp baking soda
½ tsp fine sea salt
3 large eggs
⅓ cup unsweetened pumpkin/squash puree (or apple sauced or mashed ripe banana)
2 tablespoons honey
2 tablespoons melted coconut oil
1 teaspoon vinegar (I used white wine. Camilla suggests white or apple.)

Optional Flavorings: 1 teaspoon extract (e.g., vanilla, almond), citrus zest, dried herbs (e.g., basil, dill), or spice (e.g., cinnamon, cumin)
Optional Stir-Ins: 1 cup fresh fruit (e.g., blueberries, diced apple) or ½ cup dried fruit/cacao nibs/chopped nuts/seeds

(I love all these optional suggestions. They're straight from Camilla. )

Instructions
Preheat oven to 350F. Line 10 cups (or more if you're adding a lot of fruit) in a standard 12-cup muffin tin with paper or foil liners. Mix all ingredients together. Fold in any optional stir-ins, if using. Spoon batter into muffin cups. Bake in preheated oven for 15 to 20 minutes until set at the centers and golden brown at the edges. (I've used frozen blueberries and because they're not thawed all the way when I add them, I have to cook these muffins for the full 20 minutes.) Move the tin to a cooling rack and let muffins cool. The cooler they are, the easier they'll be to remove from the tin. 

Being on the GAPS diet has opened our eyes to a bunch of creative recipes that are ridiculously simple and über healthy. Their only fault is that you have to make them a few hours in advance of when you want to eat them.

This banana ice cream recipe rocks. I got the recipe from the Use More Butter blog. In the morning, after the kids have toddled off to school, I grab several bananas that are starting to get past the point of ripeness that the kids will still eat them, I chop them into bite sizes pieces into a tupperware container, then I throw the container in the freezer. That's the sum total of the prep work. Like I said, it's a simple recipe. You just have to plan ahead.

When the kids come home from school, I ask them if they'd like banana ice cream. The first time we had it we went with plain just so we'd have a sense of what our base ice cream was like. It's pretty darn tasty all by itself. The second time we tried peanut butter and cocoa (as recommended in the blog). It was OK, but the kids didn't really like peanut butter ice cream. (I've got other ideas on peanut butter that I'll share later.) We've finally settled on plain and with cocoa. I know, kinda cliché.

Once I've got their flavor order, I pull out the frozen bananas, dump them into our food processor, and whirl away. You'll get grainy banana bits at first, but if you keep whirring it eventually becomes creamy and smooth. If you want to add flavorings, you can dump them in at the beginning or do it now that you've reached creamy consistency. That's it! You're done. Scoop it out and enjoy.

Toppings: I've experimented with making a "cookie dough" version. I like eating raw Artisana cashew butter right out of the jar. It's so creamy and yummy and it reminds me of eating cookie dough. So I plopped little spoonfuls onto a tray and froze them. I then mixed them into my plain banana ice cream. I liked having the cashew butter bits in there, but they didn't come out very cookie doughish. Oh well. My next experiment will be to do the same thing with peanut butter, then add them to cocoa flavored banana cream.

This is a GREAT way to use up overripe bananas. And if there are gooey blackish parts of the banana, no worries! No one will notice once it's ice-cream-a-fied.

The movie Genetic Roulette – The Gamble of Our Lives is available to stream for free for the next few days. The movie includes the results of several studies that have been done that show the harmful affects of GMOs in our food supply. They also explain how some of these affects lead to so many other problems that we're seeing a sharp rise in these days such as inflammation, leaky gut syndrome, IBS, autism, birth defects, reproductive disorders, cancer, etc.

Essentially, large corporations are changing our food supply to our detriment and without our consent. Not only are corn and soy almost entirely GMO crops, but the meat we eat that was fed these crops are also full of GMOs. The only way to not play this game of roulette, is to stop eating GMO foods.

Half way into the movie there's a description of a farm in Africa that was growing GM corn. The workers ate the GM corn at every meal and before long they were seeing several symptoms they didn't have before, including constantly runny noses (which is the problem we've been trying to get rid of in my son) and severe headaches (which my daughters keep getting). We went onto the GAPS diet to fight the runny nose, headaches, yeast infections, and acne. I wonder how many of these symptoms are caused by GMOs. We eat a lot of organic food, but are there treats or other foods that we've been eating that we didn't realize were full of GMOs? There's no way to know what contains a GM gene without some sort of labeling.

I strongly recommend this movie. Click here to stream the hour long video. (They'll ask for your name and email address.) I've told my husband and kids that this movie is a must watch for them this week. 

I decided to make a dessert to follow our Friday dinner. Because I had just been looking through Sarah Fragoso's Everyday Paleo book on Italian Cuisine, I decided to try out the Panna Cotta. I made a few modifications so I'm going to post my version here with Sarah's ingredients listed at the end in case you'd rather do it her way. I found that this recipe makes just barely enough for our family of five. Next time I make it, I think I'm going to try doubling it.

Meg's Version Ingredients

1/3 cup cold water

2 1/2 tablespoons of grass fed gelatin

2 cups (1 can) Natural Value Organic Coconut Milk (in a BPA-free can)

1/2 cup honey

1 teaspoon almond extract
1 cup homemade sour cream

1/2 bag frozen raspberries plus a bit more honey

Directions

In a small bowl, add the cold water, and sprinkle the gelatin over the top. Let is sit for 10 minutes. It'll become a thick gelatinous glop. I have no idea why this step is important. It seems to make it even harder to mix the gelatin in later. But Sarah says to do it, so I do it.

Meanwhile, in a saucepan, add the coconut milk (or you can use heavy cream), and cook over medium heat until hot but not yet boiling. Remove the coconut milk from the heat, and add the honey and pure vanilla extract (or almond extract if that's all you can find in the pantry. I don't know where all of our vanilla got to. But it's really good with just a wee bit of almond extract.) to the pan. Whisk well until the honey is dissolved.  Add the gelatin and gently whisk until the gelatin is completely dissolved. If you find that the gelatin refuses to dissolve entirely, add a little more heat from the stove until the gelatin is no longer lumpy. Once the gelatin is thoroughly mixed in, add 1 cup of homemade sour cream.

Side note: Homemade sour cream is ridiculously easy to make. Pour one pint of whipping cream into a yogurt maker (or into a container on top of your dehydrator. Or into a container that you set over your fridge where its warmest) and add one packet of yogurt starter (which you can find in the dairy section of the health food store).

Pour the liquid into custard cups and refrigerate for 3 hours or until the Panna Cotta is firm. I found that the small Ball wide mouthed canning jars (that are often used for jam) work really well. Divide the liquid into as many cups as you want to serve (about 4 or 5) and screw the lid on. Then you can stack the containers in your fridge without worrying about any liquid spilling out if someone accidentally bumps the cans before they're set.

For the sauce I dumped out a half bag of raspberries (because that's what I had in the freezer), added a little honey (maybe 1/4 cup), and warmed and mashed the raspberries up until I had a seedy sauce. I added about 2 or 3 tablespoons of sauce to the top of each of the 4 panna cottas I made, which was just about right. Although I think the panna cotta was so yummy it would have been fine without sauce.

This recipe is gluten-free, Paleo, GAPS friendly, and if you only use coconut milk and not cream or sour cream, it's also dairy free. (I've made the coconut-milk-only version and though it's not quite as yummy, it's still really, really good.)

Sarah's Version Ingredients

6 tablespoons cold water

2 packets unflavored gelatin 

2 cups heavy cream or canned, full-fat coconut milk

1/2 cup honey

1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract

optional: blueberries, blackberries, or raspberries

These are mushrooms that I saw on my walk this morning.

We are experiencing a serious lack of snacks. The kids are feeling it. I'm feeling it. I tried some mango gummies (see link in the Thursday list of food) and some peanut butter cups (which I wrote down the ingredients for, but I'm not satisfied with them yet. So I'll have to work on this and post a recipe later). The main snack of choice for me and Anna is yogurt. Naomi goes with bananas. Nathan wants something more but doesn't seem to want anything that we already have readily available. :-P

I'm tempted to shell out $40 to get this heap of cookbooks from the Village Green Network.

I think snacks are generally grains. Grains hold up better than meat and veggies when they're not refrigerated. Cookies, cakes, granola bars, chips, pretzels, etc. You name it. If it's in the snack aisle it's mostly likely full of grains and/or full of sugars. There aren't a lot of veggies or meats in that aisle. (And if there are some there, they're full of extra junk that you really don't want to eat.) I think I need to start drying fruits and veggies and getting used to them as snacks. And I need to find ways to make and store food that the kids are willing to eat, but that don't require me getting up and cooking something every time they get hungry.

Here's the mostly-not-snacks we've been eating late. Lots of the same old same old.

Tuesday (Day 18)
Breakfast: broken record = one egg omelette (this time with onions and tomatoes) and slices of avocado
Lunch: another broken record = Indian style meat stuff for the kids. leftover asparagus frittata for me.
Dinner: yay! something new! I made a GAPS-style version of Naomi's favorite Mediterranean chicken dish with cauliflower rice. It wasn't as good as our usual version, but it was still kinda comforting to eat something from the olden days.

Wednesday (Day 19)
Breakfast: blah, blah, blah plus pancakes with peanut butter instead of almond butter and sunday bacon.
Lunch: blah, blah, blah and I went out to Restaurant 415 with my mom and had a salad and carrot curry soup. The soup was better than the salad.
Dinner: Borscht. I'd made borscht before since we started this diet, but all of the liquid was chicken broth and it was way too chickeny. We're all used to the way I usually make it with veggie broth, so the flavor was way off. This time around I made it with only a few cups of chicken broth and the rest was water with a veggie bouillon cube thrown in. It tasted just right. Anna's comment was, "Finally! Food that's not from the diet!"

Thursday (Day 20)
Breakfast: blah, blah, blah plus fried apples (Slice apples, fry them up on medium heat in lots of ghee, add cinnamon)
Lunch: blah, blah, blah and Mango Gummies for the kids (which Nathan said were horrible. Oh well.) and leftovers for me and Anna (who stayed home with a sore throat)
Dinner: salmon, asparagas, and chard.
Halloween Treats: Squash fudge (which no one seems to like but me), and peanut butter cups (which I didn't like the chocolate part of but like the peanut butter part of and nathan liked the chocolate part of but didn't like the peanut butter part. I need to keep working on that recipe. I used lots and lots of coconut butter, so I'll have to buy more before I do any more experimenting.)

Friday (Day 21) - We've finished 3 weeks on the diet.
Breakfast: blah blah blah, blah diddy blah plus bacon (which the girls didn't eat) and leftover homemade applesauce (only enough for the girls)
Lunch: Indian style meat stuff for Nathan. Yogurt, store bought apple sauce, and turkey slices for the girls. Yogurt and leftover roasted veggies for me.
Dinner: I want pizza. I need to look up lentils and GAPS and see if I can swing lentil soup. If not, I think I'll branch out and try one of the new recipes I've found via the library. If it's any good, I'll post the recipe.

I'm considering not keeping up our food diary, since it's a lot of the same stuff. (When you're making breakfast and lunch for four within 30 minutes, I don't really have the brain-bandwidth to mix things up too much.) So from here on out I think I'll focus on posting new recipes or links to sites with helpful info. If I find one of us has a reaction to something, I'll just have to use my brain to remember what it was we ate. (At this stage in my life I feel like I forget more than I remember. *sigh*)