I am the type of person that follows a recipe the first time I make it. For most recipes, that even includes ingredients we don’t generally like. That is, until recently.

In the past it was just dill. I’d made some things that should have been delicious and I loved all the other ingredients but realized that the dill was ruining it for me. So for a long time, if a recipe had dill in it, I would not make it. Then I realized that I could make it and just skip the dill. For a long time, that is what I did. Then one day I got the recipe for something that I had tried before and enjoyed and found out it had dill!

Not long ago, we were invited to dinner at a couple’s home one Sunday after church. He made some herbed baked sweet potatoes. These too had dill and yet we liked them. So either our aversion to dill has dissipated or a little dill is okay now. I don’t know yet.

Cilantro has landed itself on our do not like list. However with that I will either use a tiny bit of dried cilantro or parsley. Then at one time cumin was on that list as well. I learned to substitute with either oregano or chili powder depending on the recipe. I found this by searching what I could substitute for cumin. So if there is something you don’t have or don’t want to use, do a search and use something you do have or like.

This all resurfaced again because last weekend I made an apple pie flavored breakfast dish that called for ground cloves, which happens to be a seasoning that is a bit strong for our liking. As a matter of fact, I don’t add it in my apple pie at all. Once we had a ham with cloves stuck all over it, which made for a pretty dish but the flavor was off. I even decreased the amount of ground cloves it called for by about half and still it was too strong for us but otherwise we liked the dish. I’m making a note on the recipe to omit it in the future.

Then it was another interesting turn of events when Michael became allergic to beef and pork. Wow, this really limited my options. I learned to substitute ground turkey for ground beef and thankfully it was less expensive too. But this experience has taught me that you can substitute meat in a dish as needed.

Recently I made a beef stroganoff from the Trim Healthy Mama Cookbook (page 44). It calls for beef or venison. I happened to have some boneless skinless chicken thighs in my freezer, so I opted to use that instead. I really enjoyed it. Now my son prefers ground meat in his stroganoff, so next time I will use ground turkey. As a matter of fact, we’re having it for dinner tonight; so the picture may appear a bit later than this post does.

Anyway, all that to say, don’t be afraid to substitute a meat you do have or one that is on sale for a meat in a recipe that you don’t have. Of course, you generally want to go with something similar in cut but even then, like in the case of the ground turkey instead of beef strips, it can be done with a little textural difference. So do be sure to consider that when you make your substitutions. For many recipes calling for some form of beef, I use chicken breast instead. Of course there are limitations to this when it is a very specific recipe like fish but I have even used chicken breast in a fish recipe.

I even cook Michael some chicken breast in the crockpot seasoned like pork roast for carnitas. Oh, I’ll have to try it with boneless skinless thighs next time; it’ll give him more fat content in his meat.

I hope this post gives you the confidence to make substitutions as needed.

Michele ºÜº

I’m writing this post, not as an authority in the Trim Healthy Mama (THM) community but more for those of my friends who are interested in beginning this eating lifestyle.

Here are my tips for beginning:

• I recommend you get the Trim Helthy Mama Plan book either from the library system, new or used online or in a bookstore. You can just get the Trim Healthy Table cookbook which came out recently and has a summary of the plan in the first 3 chapters but for a better understanding, I recommend the plan book. If you cannot get that, here is an online resource you can use.
• You want to eat your fats separate from your carbs. So although you can have brown rice or sweet potatoes you cannot have them with steak but you could have it with chicken breast. You want to have lean meats with your carbs. It is important to have all your meals anchored with protein; this doesn’t mean you need six ounces of protein but definitely some. Protein slows the rise of blood sugar from eating carbs.
• You want to have three hours between eating. Don’t eat sooner, even if hungry. If you are hungry prior to 3 hours, note what you ate last and increase amounts next time or drink a sipper, cup of tea, or water. It is actually good to be hungry because that means the body has run through the fuel you gave it and is now ready for more (and should get it from your fat stores). You can change your fuel source after three hours, so you can have a meal with nice healthy fats and three hours later a meal with yummy sweet potatoes.
• You will need lots of non-starchy vegetables. I suggest lettuce, onions, zucchini, cauliflower, broccoli, green beans, and frozen okra. These are our basics.
• Did I mention eggs? Yeah, we use lots of eggs. I really like eggs. I bake a lot with eggs.
• Find a sugar alternative that you like. If you want to only get yours from a local store, I’d look for Swerve or Pyure (be sure it is only erythritol and stevia, they have some with extra ingredients that are not on plan). I also like stevia glycerite. But if you can order online, I recommend getting Gentle Sweet and Pure Stevia Extract Powder from THM. Here is my post on sugar alternatives.
• You will also need a flour alternative, since on THM you do not use things made of regular flour. I highly recommend Baking Blend from THM.  I also like to have coconut flour, blanched almond flour, whey protein isolate powder, flax meal, and oat fiber on hand to make baked goods. I get coconut flour and blanched almond flour from my local Wal-mart. The flax meal from either Walmart or Sprouts. Whey protein isolate powder I get from Sprouts as well, from their bulk section. However the oat fiber must be ordered online. I prefer LifeSource 500 brand which I get from Netrition.com; I’d stocked up and have not yet tried the THM oat fiber. Nili’s Blend is a good alternative but you need collagen and I get my collagen from THM, so might as well buy the baking blend. However, having said that, I do keep this recipe on hand for if I run out THM Baking Blend.
• Some items we have decided we love using are THM collagen, nutritional yeast, and sunflower lecithin. We also get sprouted wheat flour and/or spelt flour for making homemade bread for use in a carb meal.

Well, I think that is enough for today. If you have questions, let me know and I’ll see if I can help.

Until next time, God bless,

Michele ºÜº

I have no idea how food bloggers blog several recipes a week. Do you realize that at just one a week that is 52 a year and over a hundred every two year? How in the world do they do that? Well, clearly I am a newb!

Do you have those days when you forgot to defrost the meat you were supposed to use for dinner? I sure do. Years ago I found a way around this dilemma, other than remembering to get the meat out ahead of time. I had purchased a Turbo Cooker on clearance at Walmart and read the directions. I found out that if you put frozen meat in the pan and the lid on the pan, it would cook the meat — all the way through. It was amazing! I loved it and it saved my behind many times.

Well, we had this pan for years and it finally was so scratched that I was very concerned about the negative side effects of the non-stick surface being scratched, as I had heard that it can be so bad the fumes could kill birds. So, I sadly got rid of the pan. I replaced it with a cast iron skillet. I really missed cooking meat from frozen, so one day I tried it. Do you know what? It worked!

So here’s what you do: Put your chicken breast, pork chop, or other similar piece of meat in a skillet that has a lid over medium to medium high heat. I like to spray my skillet with oil spray first. Place the lid on the skillet and cook for about 5 minutes, length of time depends on the thickness of the meat. When the meat is gray and some of the blood is on the top of the meat, flip it over; what was on the bottom should be nicely browned. At this point you can choose weather or not to put the lid back on because it is nearly done. As soon as this side is browned. If at any point it seems to be burning or smoking a lot, add a tablespoon of water or so to release the meat from the skillet. It will take a few minutes longer than if the meat was thawed first.

If you have a strong knife with a serrated edge or a sharp edge, you can cut slightly thawed meat by putting pressure on the knife and pushing it through the meat, if you need your meat cubed. It will cook faster in small pieces but it might take a while to cut it depending just how frozen it is.

My favorite is frozen ground meat because all you do is get it out of the package and put the frozen block of meat in the skillet with the lid on top. Every few minutes, rotate the meat and scrape off whatever part has browned and/or is soft, letting it cook on another side. Since the lid is on the skillet, meat on top of the frozen block will soften. It can be scraped off into the pan to brown. It is a great dinner saver!

Until  next time, God bless,

Michele ºÜº