Paleo Almond Flour Pancake/Waffle Recipe

My five year old loves waffles for breakfast, and I have been using this easy almond flour recipe for the past year or so.  It only yields about three medium sized waffles, or four small pancakes, so adjust the recipe to fit your needs.  Please note:  this recipe calls for blanched almond flour.  Almond meal or ground almonds will not yield the same desirable results).

Ingredients:

*1 cup blanched almond flour (I use Honeyville brand)
*2 eggs (preferably organic and pastured)
*2 tbsp flax meal
*2 tbsp coconut oil
*1/2 to 3/4 cup water
*pinch sea salt

Directions:

1.  Mix all ingredients together in one bowl.  I mix it all together at once to avoid hassle in the morning.  No need to separate wet from dry first, etc.

2.  Spoon about 1/4 cup mixture onto greased (preferably with coconut oil) waffle iron or griddle.  Remove when done as you would with a standard waffle/pancake mix.

3.  Top with ingredients of your choice.  My son, of course, loves maple syrup on his.  I usually just eat them plain or top them with mashed fruit or nut butter.  My toddler loves these plain as well!  He doesn't yet know about the sweet stuff yet and happily chows down on these plain :)

Easy Chili Recipe

This chili recipe is so easy, even a caveman could do it! Ha!

But seriously, I make this chili once a week and the whole family digs it.  Even my husband, when asked what he wanted for his 40th birthday dinner, requested this bad boy.  You can find all the ingredients at your local Trader Joe's.  Plus you will have tons of leftovers so you won't even have to think about lunch.  You could even add some eggs any style to it and have it for breakfast!  Whoo hoo!

Ingredients:

-2 lbs. grass-fed ground beef or ground turkey

-2 tbsp. coconut oil (or butter or other oil of your choice to brown meat in)

-1 bag frozen bell peppers n onions (TJ's makes a fire roasted variety; not organic, but easy peasy)

-Two 15 oz. cans organic tomato sauce (yes I know cans aren't that great for ya, but we are using canned in the interest of saving time and hassle!)

-Two cans water (use cans from tomato sauce)

-One 12 oz. can organic tomato paste

-2 tbsp. chili powder

-diced avocado to taste

Directions:

1.  Add coconut oil to skillet and melt over medium heat.

2.  Brown ground meat in coconut oil.

3.  Poor off drippings (or not)

4.  Add all ingredients sans avocado to a large pot.  Add browned meat and stir all together.  Cook over medium high until boiling, then set to low and simmer for about 15 minutes.  Alternatively, you could place all ingredients in a crockpot on low for a few hours to let the flavors really meld and have dinner warm and ready when you come home!

5.  Add diced avocado on top or if you go the dairy route, add sour cream and/or cheese)

6.  Enjoy!

Paleo Pumpkin Pancakes

Is it really already November?  Fall is in the air and so is the smell of pumpkin goodness in our house!

A few weeks ago my five year old and I made a paleo pumpkin pie from scratch.  I was a little intimidated by the pie pumpkin that sat on my counter for about a week, but making the insides resemble the stuff we buy in a can was easier than expected!  I would post the paleo pie recipe, but I basically butchered a standard pie recipe to make it paleo and can't remember what modifications I made.  But I can tell you that it was damn good!

Anywho, I had some leftover pumpkin puree from the pie pumpkin we steamed and decided to research a paleo pumpkin pancake recipe.  I doubled this one and thought I'd share it with you here because it was deelish!

Ingredients:
* pinch of baking soda
* pinch of salt
* 1/2 tbsp pumpkin pie spice
* 1/2 cup almond flour

* 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
* 1/4 cup pureed pumpkin
* 1 tbsp honey ( I skipped the honey and added a little bit of Stevita )
* 2 eggs

Combine the dry ingredients together in one bowl, then in another bowl combine the wet ingredients. Then toss the wet ingredients into the dry and mix thoroughly. Let mixture sit for 2 or 3 minutes.

Cook in a pan on medium-high like a normal pancake.

Makes 6 medium sized pancakes. The pancakes will look a lot darker (and orange-er) than normal, but are still delicious!!