Meal Prep 3/6/17: Histamine Reintroductions

Well, as much as I loved those veggie based "pumpkin pie" breakfast shakes from last week, something about them didn't sit well with me. With all the spices I included, they were definitely higher in histamine, and I felt it with a runny nose, watery eyes, and congestion. Even so, I'm glad that I tried it out, because I'm still feeling out the boundaries of this LH diet to see what I can and cannot do! The good news is, I do seem to be tolerating deli turkey just fine, along with small amounts of mayo, which is a huge help when it comes to simple meal prep. 

This week only includes 4 days of prep because on Thursday evening I'm headed to Anaheim for Expo West! Will you be there? If so, let me know, because I'd love to meet you!!

Breakfast: Protein Shake // 1 scoop Vanilla Build protein by PureWOD mixed with homemade cashew milk (this is the EASIEST thing ever, just 1 cup of soaked cashews and 4 cups of water, blended until smooth, and no nut-milk bag needed!), 1 tsp Bulletproof Brain Octane or 1 scoop MCT Powder by Perfect Keto, and frozen veggies. This week I'm trying out carrots + zucchini + ginger for a "carrot cake" flavor profile. I plan on trying out just the cinnamon without the cloves and nutmeg to see how I do with that. 

Lunch: Smoky Chicken Meatballs with Kale and Sweet Potato // The meatballs are made with 1# of ground chicken and follow my Basic Meatballs recipe. I kept these simple with some chopped green onion, salt, and 1/2 tsp liquid smoke. The sweet potato is roasted with ghee, and the kale is sautéed (also in ghee) on the stovetop until tender. Each portion of kale is about 1/2 of a bunch...it shrinks down so much!!

Dinner: Green Flatbread with Fresh Veggies, Liverwurst, and Mayo // This no-cook combo has been a lifesaver during these past few busy weeks! Instead of the turkey, I'm trying out some liverwurst from US Wellness Meats that I had in my freezer. Organ meats are definitely higher in histamine, but I love the nutrient density (and the flavor) so we'll see how it goes. I thawed it just enough to slice, then immediately re-froze in individual portions. It's not a perfect system, but it's the best I can do. I've been keeping some Primal Kitchen Foods Mayo at work to drizzle over my veggies or have with my protein. My green flatbread (again, modified from my original recipe to decrease the histamine content) this week includes parsley, cilantro, basil, chard, pumpkin seeds, Guiltless 7 Seed Flour, and salt). Last but not least, fresh cucumbers and radishes in my new Stasher bags (I'm hooked!), which I've been LOVING with the "Everything But The Bagel" spice blend from Trader Joes! 

Snacks: Fresh Apples + Artisana Coconut Butter // The essentials, you know. 

This batch cook session was also super quick. Meatballs cook up in a flash (12 minutes at 425), and the sweet potatoes didn't take more than half an hour. I steamed my breakfast veggies and cooked the kale on the stove at the same time, and the flatbread dehydrated overnight. 

Have a great week!

Meal Prep: 2/27/17

If you've followed me for any length of time, you're probably familiar with the fact that I originally started meal prep sessions because I work four 10-hour days, ending between 7 and 8:30pm. As such, I eat both lunch and dinner at work. Well, after 15 months of that schedule, my schedule is changing to a more normal 5/8 structure, meaning that I might actually get to enjoy some dinners at home again! Things are still in transition, so for this week, I stuck to what I know and prepped like usual, just with one extra day of food. Moving forward, we'll see what comes of my weekly batch cook! I know for certain that I'll still meal plan, but especially when considering the low histamine diet, being able to cook more food fresh would be ideal!

Breakfast: Protein Shake // 1 scoop Vanilla Build protein by PureWOD mixed with Pop and Bottle Classic almond milk, 1 tsp Bulletproof Brain Octane, and frozen sweet potato, cauliflower, and zucchini.

Lunch: Meatballs with Roasted Carrots, Yellow Squash, and Shredded Radish // An oldie but a goodie! All of the veggies are roasted with coconut oil and salt at 400 until starting to brown. The meatballs are made with 1# of ground beef from US Wellness Meats and follow my Basic Meatballs recipe. I used thyme, oregano, garlic, sage, and rosemary in this batch. 

Dinner: Green Flatbread with Fresh Veggies, Turkey, Mayo // This meal was so delicious last week that I'm having it again! Deli turkey (which didn't seem to be a problem from a histamine standpoint) with some Primal Kitchen Foods Mayo, green flatbread (again, modified from my original recipe to decrease the histamine content; includes parsley, basil, chard, pumpkin seeds, Guiltless 7 Seed Flour, and salt), and fresh cucumbers and radishes in my new Stasher bags (hooray!).

Snacks: Fresh Apples + Artisana Coconut Butter // I'm still on this apple kick. After two years without, I'm making up for lost time!

This batch cook session was pretty quick! I steamed all the veggies for my smoothies, roasted all the veggies for my lunches at the same time, and dehydrated the flatbread overnight. Tons of veggies and real food to keep me satisfied all day long!

Have a great week!

Meal Prep: 2/20/17

It's taken three weeks, but I'm finally free of the lingering post-flu symptoms that were hanging on. About time!! Now I feel like I can more accurately assess the impact of my low histamine diet on my overall symptoms. I'm still keeping things LH overall, but I am trying out deli turkey this week. (More on that below!) As well, I did pretty well with my higher FODMAP foods last week (cauliflower, apple), so I'll continue to cautiously include those for variety!

In other news, Grocery Outlet has been killing it lately with their selection of top quality name brands, including Artisana Organics Coconut butter, Purely Elizabeth granola, Pop and Bottle and The New Barn almond milk, Straus Organic yogurt (for my husband), and more! They also regularly have Love Beets, Acai Roots frozen puree, Chosen Foods Avocado Oil, NadaMoo Ice Cream (for a treat!) and plenty of organic produce. I love shopping there, because not only is it super affordable, it's also a little like a treasure hunt, because their selection is different every time! This isn't a sponsored ad or anything, I just love any opportunity to snag a deal!

Now, on to this week's meal plan: 

Breakfast: Protein Shake // 1 scoop Vanilla Build protein by PureWOD mixed with Pop and Bottle Classic almond milk, 1 tsp Bulletproof Brain Octane, and 1 cup frozen blueberries, cherries, or peaches. 

Lunch: Macadamia and Coconut Crusted Chicken with Zucchini Fritters and Roasted Sweet Potatoes // This meal doesn't look very pretty (more monochromatic than my usual spread), but gosh is it delicious! For the chicken, I started by blending about 1.5 cups of shredded coconut and 1.5 cups of macadamia nuts with some salt and garlic powder until they were about the texture of bread crumbs. Then I took chicken breasts that I had cut up into 1-2" pieces, dipped them in beaten eggs, then coated them with the nut/coconut mixture. I baked them in a parchment lined dish at 375 for about 20 minutes or so. For the fritters, I shredded about 1.5# of zucchini in my food processor, then salted and let it sweat for about 20 minutes. After squeezing out as much water as I could, I mixed in two eggs, some salt, and about 1/2 cup of Guiltless Superfoods Organic 7 Seed Flour. Then I pan-cooked them using Primal Kitchen Foods Avocado Oil until crispy! They are DELICIOUS. 

Dinner: Green Flatbread with Fresh Veggies, Turkey, Mayo // I'm trying a potentially higher histamine option this week: deli turkey. Turkey is low in histamine, but because it is in deli meat form, I'm not sure how that ranks, and due to the limited resources on the LH diet, haven't really found a straightforward answer. I decided to go ahead and give it a try, since the most important part of any therapeutic diet is how YOU tolerate it as an individual. I'll be having that with some Primal Kitchen Foods Mayo (my favorite mayo out there, though I do miss avocado!). For the flatbread, I modified my original recipe to decrease the histamine content. This batch has parsley, basil, chard, pumpkin seeds, Guiltless 7 Seed Flour, and salt! 

Snacks: Fresh Apples // Three cheers for an improvement in FODMAP tolerance! I've been LOVING my daily Pink Lady apple!

Are you following a low histamine diet? I'd love to hear some of your favorite recipes in the comments below!

Have a great week!

Meal Prep 2/13/17

Hello, and happy Monday! I'm FINALLY starting to feel back to normal after that no-joke bout of the flu. My appetite has been really off since I got sick two weeks ago. I had absolutely no appetite for a few days there, and then even when my appetite did come back, it was difficult to find foods that actually sounded good. I threw caution to the winds and ate broth cooked rice as one of my first foods after I got back on my feet, and fortunately, it didn't seem to affect me negatively. I'm still evaluating the big picture of histamine though, because even though I've been following a LH diet for 3-4 weeks now, I've been sick for half of it! One of the only other things that has sounded good to me is almond butter and apples, so I've been eating plenty of both. Sometimes you just have to make it work! Speaking of apples, they used to be totally off limits due to their high FODMAP content. (Bloat city!) I'm thrilled that I've been tolerating them better, and have added some other higher FODMAP foods into my meals this week too! Fingers crossed that I do as well with them. I've had issues with FODMAPs for over two years now, so any progress is hugely encouraging.

Breakfast: Protein Shake // 1 scoop Vanilla Build protein by PureWOD mixed with homemade almond milk frozen into ice cubes, 1 tsp Bulletproof Brain Octane, and 1 cup frozen blueberries, cherries, or peaches. 

Lunch: Ginger Cilantro Chicken Meatballs with Roasted Sweet Potato and Shredded Radish // These meatballs are pretty similar to what I made last week. 1# chicken, about 2 cups of chopped green onions, 2 cups minced cilantro, 1/2 cup minced ginger, and 1 tsp salt. I mixed everything together, scooped them out using a 1 oz scoop onto a parchment lined baking sheet, and baked at 425 for 12 minutes. I source my meat from two places: US Wellness Meats or Da-Le Ranch at my local farmer's market. At the same time, I roasted two large sweet potatoes cut into cubes and some shredded radish. (I love shredded radish!! My favorite is with ghee, cinnamon, and salt, but this time I used garlic to keep it LH.) 

Dinner: Smoky Chicken Meatballs with Toasted Collards and Creamy Cauli Rice // All the meatballs this week, apparently! When I was doing my meat shopping last week all that sounded good was chicken, so that's what was in my freezer. I mixed 1# of meat with 1 tsp salt, a couple cups of chopped green onions, and about 1/4 tsp liquid smoke. Most smoked foods are off limits with LH (I miss bacon!), and truthfully I have no idea where liquid smoke would fall on the scale, but it's just water and smoke flavor, so I decided to give it a try. I also toasted up some collards using my recipe for Perfect Kale Chips and sautéed a bag of Trader Joe's riced cauliflower on the stovetop with some ghee and salt. I stirred in some creamed coconut at the end to make it extra delicious! 

Snacks: Artisana Coconut Butter // I'll also keep a Primal Kitchen Collagen Bar on hand just in case. These bars are overall pretty low in histamine, but I'll only be using them as a backup this week as I continue to test the absence of collagen/gelatin. 

Have a great week!

Meal Prep 1/30/17

This past week of my low-histamine trial was not quite as successful as the first week. I had a few more symptoms (the return of some faint abdominal pain and some sinus congestion), and I suspect that it might have been the carob, which I found conflicting opinions on. As such, this week I'm taking it back to the basics! 

Breakfast: Protein Shake // 1 scoop Vanilla Build protein by PureWOD mixed with Native Forest Simple Coconut Milk, Bulletproof Brain Octane, and 1 cup frozen blueberries, cherries, or peaches. This is a slight change from last week, because I'm leaving out my favorite collagen peptides to see if they also might have been a factor. Gelatin is generally regarded as safe on a low-histamine diet, but some people do react to it. Since I use it almost daily, I decided I should try leaving it out and see if it makes a difference.

Lunch: Ginger Scallion Chicken Meatballs with Bok Choy, Zucchini, and Roasted Roots // Meatballs are so convenient because they cook up in a flash! To make these, I started with 1# of ground chicken from US Wellness Meats, added in about a cup of chopped green onions, 1 tsp salt, and 1/4 cup of chopped fresh ginger. I used my 1 ounce cookie scoop to make meatballs and baked on parchment paper at 425 for 12 minutes. At the same time, I sautéed about 1# of bok choy on the stovetop with more scallions and ginger, and also roasted about 1.5# of zucchini (in ghee) alongside the meatballs. When all of that was done, I portioned it out into single serving containers and immediately chilled before transferring to the freezer. Next up: the roots! I sliced about 2# each of carrots and parsnips into coins, tossed with a generous amount of ghee and salt, and roasted until golden at 400, then added them to my pyrex containers and froze. (I like these containers the most because they work perfectly with my Hot Logic Mini!)

Dinner: Sweet Potato Soup with Pumpkin Seeds // I basically made up this soup recipe on the fly. I started with about 2 cups each of carrot, celery, and onion, and sautéed those until soft in some ghee. At the same time, I peeled and chopped up two large sweet potatoes into 1/2 inch cubes and roasted them at 425 until tender and golden. (I roasted them for the depth of flavor, but you could also just throw them into the pot with everything else.) I added about 1# of chopped organic yellow squash and a can of full fat additive free coconut milk, then let everything simmer until soft before blending until smooth! Normally I would add two scoops of Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides as the protein, but since I'm testing a week without it, I'm using pumpkin seeds. It's a lower protein meal than I'm used to, but the fat should keep me satiated!

Snacks: Artisana Coconut Butter // I'll also keep a Primal Kitchen Macadamia Nut Sea Salt bar (definitely my favorite of the four flavors!!) on hand just in case. These bars are overall pretty low in histamine, but I'll only be using them as a backup this week as I test the absence of collagen/gelatin. 

Here's to another week of learning which foods work for me. This process takes planning and patience, but it's so worth it!!