Meal Planning 101 (Crystal)

If I was just making food for me and could prepare all my meals at home, I would probably end up at the grocery store every day. Since that isn't an option with a full time practice, a family of 5 and births happening all over the place- eating like this takes some careful, yet flexible, planning. I am lucky because my husband happens to be a very good (and creative) cook. So we decided to attempt 4 days of preparation.
Dinner Thursday: Turkey Burgers (these turned out fantastic so I will post the recipe below.)
Friday: Steak, Asparagus and roasted sweet potatoes
Saturday: Italian Chicken Sausage stew (another favorite- so I've also posted this one.)
Tomorrow will be tacos. (traditional for the kids and salad style with lots of veggies and no meat for me)
Breakfasts are usually eggs or smoothies (fruit for the kids, green for me) and snacks are usually nuts or miscellaneous veggies dipped in hummus.
And I have mastered the perfect pancake maker. Thanks to my Dad's late night infomercial buy, I can now make 8-12 gluten and sugar free pancakes (Bob's Red Mill- replace veg oil with coconut) They freeze well and make perfect snacks or desert with raw organic almond butter.






Turkey Burgers with Nitrate Free turkey bacon
(Recipe makes 5-6)

1 1/4 lb ground turkey
1 red pepper
1/2 sweet yellow onion
3 cloves garlic
1/4 cup braggs nutritional yeast
pinch of kosher salt

blend red pepper, garlic and onion in a food processor. Knead the mixture and the nutritional yeast in to the ground turkey In a medium bowl.
Make in to patties and grill or pan fry about 16-18 minutes, flipping several times to make sure they don't burn.
The picture shows the patty served over spinach with tomato and avocado and some nitrate free bacon. There aren't really commercial made hamburger buns that are ok on the candida cleanse so I just don't bother with a grain. it tastes good like this. You could also add onion, lettuce, mustard (made with apple cider vinegar- not regular mustard)



Italian Sausage Stew
(serves 4-6)

olive oil (organic cold pressed)
1 lb nitrate free organic turkey or chicken sausage links
4 cloves garlic (chopped)
1 yellow onion (chopped)
2 tomatoes
1 cup spinach
1 red bell pepper
2 cups organic vegetable broth
salt and pepper
1/4 cup nutritional yeast (optional)
chopped parsley
Organic brown rice pasta

Add 2 cups cold water to large frying pan. Add sausage links and cook, frequently turning about 20 minutes. remove from pan and set aside. rinse pan. Add olive oil (about 2 tbsp) then sauté garlic. Add chopped onion. In a chopper or food processor, finely chop tomato, spinach and red pepper them add to pan. Add vegetable broth, followed by salt, pepper and nutritional yeast. Slice sausage in to bite size pieces then add to mixture. Simmer another 25 minutes and cook pasta in the meantime according to package. Spoon over the drained pasta and add parsley to taste.

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