Paleo Eats: 9/3/12

My extended vacation’s ending on Wednesday night, so I need to get back into the swing of everything – including photographing and documenting what I’ve been cooking and eating.

I knew I was in for a long chipper at CrossFit Palo Alto’s 9 a.m. women’s class. Now that I’m attending regularly (rather than dropping in sporadically), I make a point to pester my husband after his 5 a.m. class ‘til he divulges the day’s workout out of exasperation. The kids are now programmed to harass him, too: “Daddy! What’s the WOD today? Tell mommy so she’ll make us some breakfast! We’re staaaaarving!”

Sometimes you just have to play dirty.

Before I left the house, I ate a couple of fried eggs and leftover oven roasted tomatoes.

My vegetable CSA box has been overflowing with tomatoes lately, and the best way to keep up with the onslaught is to roast a big tray of juicy tomatoes whenever we’re just hanging out at home. These beauties can be thrown into just about any dish to level up the umami.

My post-workout meal consisted of a few bites of leftover steak and a few roasted beets. Then, as a special Labor Day treat, I grabbed my dogeared copy of Eat Like A Dinosaur and proceeded to bake a batch of Paleo Parents’ Anytime Cookies for the family. (For their recipe, you’ll have to get Matt and Stacy’s book!)

I love that these cookies are sweetened with just puréed apples and bananas.

Combined with a few other ingredients like almond butter…

…vanilla extract…

…and almond flour, a dough was ready in no time.

I tossed in some dried Bing cherries ’cause almonds and cherries go together like Al and Peg Bundy.

The smell of cookies baking in the oven isn’t something we experience often at our house. The Double-Os were eager for a taste, and had their noses pressed up against the oven window the whole time.

Let’s just say we ate way too many of these cookies.

At lunchtime, I seasoned a pound of ground beef with Penzeys Greek Seasoning…

…and fried up some burgers in my cast iron skillet.

While the burgers cooked, I made a pot of pressure cooker kale and carrots, and sliced up some cherry tomatoes.

Lunch was ready in just 15 minutes.

Before heading out for the afternoon, I decided to get more mileage out of my food processor before putting it away. I roasted a tray of yams and puréed them in my Cuisinart.

Crazy eyes scare the food processor into working that much faster.

It’s good to have a container of roasted yam purée in the fridge; that way, we always have some quick and tasty glycogen-replenishing starch on hand when we stagger home from the gym.

Plus, you never know when you might want to bake a tray of sweet potato bars from Sweet Potato Power. My kids love those bars, and I’ve been thinking of making some as an after-school treat.

At dinnertime, I seasoned and seared a small brisket in my pressure cooker…

…and added onions, tomato paste…

…bone broth and tomatoes.

I nestled the beef in the liquid and cooked it on high pressure for 45 minutes.

With the brisket on the stove, I roasted a tray of broccoli in the oven.

When the brisket was finished, I quickly released the pressure by running the lid under cold water…

…and tossed in collards and carrots.

After an additional five minutes of cooking under high pressure, the brisket and veggies were tender, and the broccoli was ready for a splash of aged balsamic vinegar.