What to Cook? Easy Meal Ideas

I should have started this blog while we were in the Nutritional Response Testing program, but I didn't even think of it. Our priorities were to make it through the three months in one piece! What I'm sharing below aren't recipes as much as meal ideas. They are pretty simple, and since we were told to try to have vegetables with every meal, we try, even with breakfast! Even if it is an omelet with cheese cooked with a chopped onion, red pepper, spinach, kale, or tomatoes, we try to include vegetables. We also go through a lot of eggs!

I admit, when we started this "diet," I was kind of at a loss for what to cook! We had to re-think pretty much every meal. We weren't supposed to have processed or pre-packaged food, and no grains (no tortillas, bread, rice, quinoa, etc.). It was hard! We gradually started putting meals together, focusing on meat, produce, and dairy.

I went to the library and got some "low carb" cookbooks but most of them were really elaborate and complicated, and not quite what we were looking for. Dr. Mantz told us sweet potatoes were ok to have and butter was good, too. We started experimenting and one of the first dinners we cooked was shepherd's pie with mashed sweet potato instead of regular white potatoes. It was really good!

Shepherd's Pie...We make it with either ground beef or ground turkey. Brown the meat, add onions, seasonings, and I like to add a mix of frozen vegetables (carrots & peas, or broccoli, or whatever is in the fridge or freezer!). The meat & veggie layer goes on the bottom, then add your mashed sweet potato mixed with butter (I also like to switch the butter for coconut oil and add coconut milk, but you can add butter and regular milk too--my husband doesn't like coconut oil so I only use it if I'm just cooking for myself). We always add a layer of shredded cheese (any kind of cheese) and bake it until everything is hot and the cheese is starting to brown.

My sister made chicken kabobs when we visited her. I turned her recipe into a stir fry that worked really well. I think since it was for me, I used coconut oil, but butter or olive oil would work great too. Chop red bell peppers, yellow and orange bell peppers, pineapple, and cube some chicken breasts. Cook the chicken first, then put aside. Cook the bell peppers, and heat up the pineapple. Add the chicken back, and if you want, add a little soy sauce, liquid aminos, or coconut aminos (haven't tried the coconut ones yet, but it's supposed to be a little sweeter and less salty than soy sauce. Also, a lot of people avoid soy, so this is a good substitute).

A typical dinner. Baked chicken or salmon, 1/2 sweet potato with butter or coconut oil, and a vegetable (usually from a bag of frozen vegetables). We like pink Himalayan salt, pepper, or lemon pepper with everything. We also usually put butter or olive oil on the vegetables.

I'm the most proud of this one! One of my favorite places to go for breakfast or coffee in Carson City has a breakfast sandwich that has poached eggs, spinach, provolone cheese, and pesto on a croissant. I remade it at home with everything but the croissant for a good low-carb breakfast! I also love the chicken sausage links from Trader Joe's, so I get those and cook the whole package ahead of time for the coming week.

Taking Control: How We Got Started

Just over a year ago, my husband had to get a blood test and physical for his CDL. A few days later his doctor called him and asked him to come in because he didn't want to discuss the results over the phone. He went back in and got the results: high blood sugar (not quite pre-diabetic, but close enough), high liver enzymes, high cholesterol, high blood pressure (not from the blood test), and he needed to lose at least 30 pounds in the next couple months. His doctor didn't really tell him how to lose the weight and fix all those problems, just that he needed to. He also said eat less starchy food, like bread and potatoes, but that was about it. The doctor also wanted to give him more prescriptions to manage his blood pressure and cholesterol, but he declined, especially the drug that was for lowering his cholesterol. It turns out that was a good idea, and I'll share more on that later.

We had been pretty active people before we moved from Utah to Nevada, but with our jobs and having to travel a ways to be able to hike or really get out and do something, we became less and less active. I started to worry a lot more, and decided I needed to do something for myself too. I talked to a co-worker and he told me what his girlfriend (now fiancé) had done for her health. I looked it up, filed it away, and forgot about it. I had even asked her about it, and the answer was " he is a chiropractor who practices kinesiology." For whatever reason, I decided not to even look it up.

By November of 2015, I was wearing a size 10 in work pants (I had been a size 4) and was starting to feel hopeless. Neither of us had done anything to get started, except for a few hikes and a few sporadic workouts, along with a few "healthy" meals here and there. We were low on energy and couldn't really decide what we should do about it. I had also fought insomnia for about a year; I was getting frustrated and was tired of being tired at work!

During the first week of January, I had another talk with my co-worker, and he again recommended this chiropractor in Reno who also practiced kinesiology (muscle testing). He described the process based on what his fiancé had told him, but he had never gone through the process himself. I looked up the website (I just tried to look up the website and couldn't find it--I'll update when I find it again), called to make the appointment, and texted my husband (Dave) to tell him about it. I didn't give him a choice. I just said we are going to see Dr. Mantz and see what he has to say. We looked up his business--a chiropractor who also does nutritional response testing (aka muscle testing or kinesiology). He tests each of the organs in the body by placing stress on them. If that organ is stressed, the strength in your arm disappears and he is able to push it down without much effort. If that organ is not stressed, your arm stays strong.

That was kind of a bad explanation for something that is actually pretty interesting, and Dave's results almost perfectly matched his blood test. His pancreas, liver, heart, and brain were stressed and were all priorities. I almost forgot to mention that Dr. Mantz wanted to send Dave straight to the hospital because his blood pressure was way too high!

My results surprised me: my spleen, immune system, and brain were stressed! I didn't (and still don't) get colds or other viruses very often, but there is a variety of autoimmune diseases in my family (diabetes and rheumatoid arthritis for example). We decided then and there go through with the program and after a rough couple of weeks (months?), we started feeling a LOT better!

After a couple months, they called us "rock stars" because we followed the program as closely as we could (not perfect, but we tried) and saw results. We really wanted this to work so we stayed with it. I think if we hadn't seen results right away, we wouldn't have stuck with it...I'll post our results soon!

I'm hoping to share the process of going through this program, and more with this blog. I'll share recipes and meal ideas along with what we did and are still doing to take control of our health! I've also done a ton of reading and follow a lot of health blogs and Facebook pages, which I will share a little later. They all have great information and are interesting to read.