Let's talk about eggs!

Lets talk about eggs or What are you going to do with all those eggs?

My family eats a lot of eggs. We could easily go through 1 ½ or 2 dozen a day. We have eggs in some form for breakfast almost every morning. And eggs make a great take along snack when they are hard boiled.

It's not unusual for me to go to Braum's on my shopping day and get a case of eggs or more.

I love the reactions I get when I walk in and get that many eggs at once. The question I get the most is “What are you going to do with all those eggs?” DUH!!!! We're going to eat them. But sometimes I feel almost onery enough to say “We're having an egging spree tonight. We need a few new targets, can I have your address?” I haven't done it yet, but it's more tempting each time! :)

I also get the response in the statement that “Eggs are so expensive”. I had one lady tell me that, just as she was paying over $5.00 for one ice cream sundae with all the trimmings.

For that same $5.00 I got my family 4 dozen eggs. For the same price that she purchased a small boat of fat and sugar, I was able to get protein for the next 2-3 days for my family.

It's all a matter of perspective, and all a matter of priorities.

Eggs are cheap protein. When you compare 1 egg to the price of 1 oz of cheaper ground beef, the cost is usually the same or less. Then you have to take into consideration, that when you cook the ground beef, you loose some of the volume as the fat is cooked and drained off. 1 full oz of raw meat is not going to remain 1 full oz cooked. You're going to need to eat a little molre 1 oz of cooked ground beef to get the same protein as in one cooked egg.

Eggs are nutrient dense, and considered a high quality complete protein. They contain all the essential amino acids required for the human body. They are calorically low, and one egg can have as few as 3% of the daily calories needed by a adult man. Eggs contain most of the vitamins and many minerals the human body needs. They are high in the B vitamins, especially B12.

And yes they contain fat. But fat has gotten a really bad rap. Fat is essential for the cells to properly develop, and the brain required a fair amount of fat to function to it's full potential. The right kinds of fat taken in moderation are not as harmful as most of the nutritional communitiy would like you to think.

I could go on, about the nutritional contributions that eggs make to the human diet. But there are already countless websites and journal writings that say way more that I could. Just do a google search on eggs and nutrition.

So here's just a few ways we make our eggs, and eat them too!

Perfect breakfast:

2 egg as an omalette or scrambled with ¼ cup whole milk with small dash sea salt

2 cups raw spinach leaves tossed in just before eggs are completely cooked

4 Tablespoons fresh salsa

Snack

1 hardboiled egg, 3-6 almonds/cashews, 1 medium apple or orange.

You can take the hb egg and make a single deviled egg by splitting it in half, mushing the yolk, with a tiny bit of mayo and mustard. If you do this, don't eat as many almonds if you're worried about zone blocks.

Dinner:

Eggs Florentine

½ stick of butter or coconut oil

¼ cup flour – more if needed

2 cups whole milk

Nutmeg to taste

8-12 eggs

Variety of fresh veggies; such as red peppers, tomatoes, spinach, mushrooms, onion, green onion, broccoli, asparagus, peas, corn, ect, chopped/diced/sliced.

½ lb grated cheese

Start by making the white sauce. Melt butter or coconut oil in skillet or saucepan. Add flour and blend well. Add milk a little at a time to avoid lumping of the flour. Heat until sauce starts to thicken and bubble. Add Nutmeg and remove. Stir more to help it thicken evenly.

Whisk eggs till well beaten. Add white sauce to the eggs. Whisk well to mix.

Prepare veggies and place in bottom of a square or rectangular baking dish. Pour sauce/egg mixture on top. Bake at 350F for 45-50 minutes. About 40 minutes start doing the toothpic test. Stick a toothpick in the center of the dish and pull out. When it comes out clean and dry, the dish is done. Remove from oven and top with cheese. Place back in oven for about 5 minutes to let the cheese melt a bit.

Let cool 15 minutes before cutting into. Serve along side a big salad of romaine and red leaf lettuce.

OHS Practice

Yesterday I worked on perfecting my squat form, and practised OHS with PVC filled with sand.

Warmup

5 Rounds
10 OHS with PVC

5 rounds
10 Front Squats with Kettle bell

Rest 1 minutes between each round.

Suprisingly my legs don't feel like jelly after this one.

However I am still having trouble with pain in my foot. It appears to be scarring from an old injury to my soft tissue in my foot that is causing the problem. So my husband/therapist is giving me tough love and subjecting me to the wonderful therapy of A-stem at home. You know, the therapy that's famous for making patients scream on the therapy table? That's it. I'm going to experience quite a few evenings on my bed with my face in a pillow while he works on/digs into my foot.

But it shouln't interfere with me getting back into my workout routine. Hopefully.

1 Cor 9:27 But I discipline my body and bring it into subjection, lest, when I have preached to others, I myself should become disqualified.

What I eat. What I do. How I roll.

Yesterday I got an email from a friend asking me what I eat, what I'm avoiding, and what I do for exercise (like when, where, etc). I haven't had much time to blog lately, and thought it would be the perfect time to update my blog since I'd be writing the same stuff in an email anyway.

In our daily diet, we follow what is termed the Paleo-Zone diet the best we can. CrossFit Journal 21 recommends "eat meat and vegetable, nuts and seeds, some fruit, and no sugar." This is essentially the Paleo philosophy. The Zone aspect comes into play by making sure every meal and snack you eat is a balance of protein, carbs, and fat.

While our diet is not close to being clean enough, we have come a long way from where we were last year.

Yes I will tell on myself and say I brought home cookies from a girls night out party and ate 6 of them yesterday before I threw the rest of the box away.

We have cut out most grains and starches. I no longer buy bread or make bread (ok, so sometimes I do bake bread). I avoid cooking with pasta, potatoes, ramen (I'm not even sure that's a real food), and rice. We have also cut way back on the amount of milk we drink as a family. We do not keep soda in the house, and very rarely do we have fruit juice on hand.

However, our fridge is consistently well stocked with fruit such as oranges, apples, pears, grapes, etc. I like to keep strawberries and blueberries in the freezer. Our girls go through fruit quickly, it's their preferred snack. If there is candy in the house they'll eat it, but if it's not here they don't ask for it but just reach in the fridge for some fruit. We probably eat more fruit than recommended, but it's better than candy or potato chips.

Meat/ Animal protein is essential for growing kids and for helping one's body recover/rebuild after a hard workout. We eat a lot of chicken, turkey, fish, cheese, and eggs. Beef occasionally depending on the cut and how good of a sale it is. Very rarely we eat deer when we're blessed with some from a friend.

I like to grill, bake, broil, or steam. I avoid breaded chicken or frying my meats when I can.

Yes you can get some protein from beans and soy. But beans are more carbs than protein, and beans give us horrible gas so it's not worth it for me. From the reading and research I've done, the human body assimilates animal protein better than plant protein, and a plant's amino acids are not the best for rebuilding muscle.

Eggs are cheap protein, and easy to fix for a quick meal or snack. You can poach them or fry them in small amounts of canola oil for breakfast, or lunch sandwich on some tortillas. Or you can hard boil them for a take along snack.

I do not eat pork. I avoid it if at all possible. It's just a personal preference of mine, and Jerimiah will eat it any day of the week. To me, there's a reason swine were forbidden to be eaten under the Old Testament Law. Swine are natural garbage disposals, and will eat anything including manure or other dead animals. They are great for rooting around, and turning the soil if they are temporarily penned in an area you plan to make a garden, but I don't consider them good for food. Plus the way most of the pork on today's market is raised/produced is not healthy for the animal or for me.

I also avoid Catfish for the same reason.

Cows thrive when fed fresh green grass. Poultry thrive when given free range to eat bugs, worms, and vegetation. (Have you ever had a garden and let chickens free range through it? In my childhood experience, they like tender peas and beans. We had ducks a few years back and they constantly ate my tomatoes!)

Vegetables, I buy as fresh as I can get them. Kale, spinach, Romaine, tomatoes, cauliflower, etc. Veggies I usually buy frozen are peas, mixed veggies, corn, etc. I love farmers markets and farm stands. There is a "You Pick" farm down the road that I'm going to try for next year for most of my veggies. I tried several years to have a garden of my own, but we have numerous stray cats in the neighborhood and I got sick of cleaning cat mess out of my soil. If you can grow your own, do it! If not buy it as fresh as you can get.

We eat a lot of oatmeal for breakfast, and I'll occasionally make pancakes with cornmeal and whole wheat or rye flour.

I don't like to cook with pasta. But spaghetti squash is a great substitute for spaghetti nights.

What about no sugar or sweeteners? I have cut out almost every sweetener from my personal diet. I do use raw, local honey in my coffee and on the kids oatmeal. But no processed sugar, no sucanat, no turbinado sugar, no molasses, no stevia, no splenda, no aspertame, etc. Splenda and Stevia may say on the box the have no sugar or no carbs. But research has shown that just tasting something sweet causes your body to respond by increasing insulin in your bloodstream. Frequent insulin spikes wreck havoc, and the crashes cause cravings for more, resulting in a really bad roller coaster ride mentally and physiologically.

We eat fats such as olive oil, canola oil, almonds, cashews, and avocados. If I can I like to avoid fast foods, fried foods, lard, shortening, and most oils.

Well, kiddoes, I'm out of time. My youngest is stirring in her bed so I need to grab a quick shower. I hope to answer the rest of this question tomorrow!

Be Blessed

Eating This - Crock Pot Chicken

1 5-6 lb roasting chicken
6 cloves garlic, unpeeled and whole
1 1/2 teaspoon coarse sea salt
1 1/2 teaspoon lemon pepper
3/4 teaspoon thyme
1 teaspoon rosemary
1/2 pound large mushrooms, cleaned and sliced
1/2 medium onion, sliced into 1/4 wedges
1/2 - 1 pound carrots, washed, peeled, and cut into long slices

Wash chicken, rinse inside of cavity thoroughly and discard gizzards and neck. Remove skin of whole chicken if desired. Tuck wings under the back to secure, and place in a crock pot. Put whole garlic cloves in cavity of chicken. Sprinkle salt, lemon pepper, thyme, and rosemary evenly over chicken breast. Arrange mushroom slices on top of chicken. Arrange onion wedges and carrots around chicken.
Cover and cook on low all day long, or on hight 4 hours or until chicken temps at 160F.
Serve with steamed brocolli and a large mixed salad.

10/14/2009

Warm Up

400 M run
10 Each:
Trunk Rotation
Leg Swings Front and Back each Leg
Side Leg Swings each leg
Inch Worms
Arm circles
Arm criss-cross
Heel to toes

WOD
2 Rounds
21 Situps
21 Kettlebell Swings - 25 lb KB
42 Step Lunges (21 each leg)
21 Back Extentions

Cool Down
Upward Dog
Lunge Stretch
Contrast Shower

I still had some heel pain, so I broke up my run with walking, but I was able to make almost all of the distance at a jog.

Eating This - Spinach Mushroom Scramble

Spinach Mushroom Scramble

1 Tablespoon canola or olive oil
1/4 onion diced
8 eggs
1/4 cup milk
4-6 Medium/Large mushrooms, washed and sliced
2-3 cups baby spinach leaves
1 small to medium avocado

Warm oil in large pan over med low - med heat. Add diced onion, and saute a bit.
in a bowl whisk eggs and milk together. Pour into pan with onions. Immediately top with sliced mushrooms and spinach. Stir frequently, to turn mixture, till egg is cooked completely. Portion evenly onto 4 medium plates.

Skin and quarter advocado. Slice quarters and arrange on plates beside eggs. Serve with a 1/2 cup bowl of cinnamon oatmeal sweetened with a touch of honey or stevia.

This does have a bit more fat because of the added avocados. But its a fat that is good for you and your brain. I give it to my kids often because they are growing and need it. But you can omit it if you choose to.