fbpx

Lemon Coconut Cheesecake Bars Sugar Free, Grain Free

Lemon Coconut Cheesecake

Lemon Coconut Cheesecake Bars

No Bake, Sugar Free, Grain Free, Gluten Free

 

We love cheesecake at the Parker house. My favorite place to celebrate is The Cheesecake Factory. Since going, grain free, sugar free, and lower carb… that is a dangerous place to go with all the sugar filled temptations.

This no bake cheesecake recipe filled a need for my love of cheesecake while staying in my diet and keeping me healthy.

Plus, it is easy to make too! 

I’m a mom of two little girls. I want to cook healthy and more importantly EAT healthy… So I love no fuss, easy to throw together recipes that I can feel good about feeding my family. read more

Low Carb Cheese Stuffed Muffins

Low Carb Cheese stuffed muffins

Low Carb Cheese Stuffed “Cornbread” Muffins

 

When I’m eating soup, I want some sort of bread to go along with it. I love a piece of grain free cornbread to sop up all the flavors. This is a really fun Grain free and low carb muffin because it is stuffed with cheese.

This low carb cheese stuffed muffin goes really well with Tomato soup. When I think of tomato soup, I immediately think of a grilled cheese sandwich. This is an easy grain free substitution to go along with your soup.

My daughter loves cheese sticks. She thought it was such a fun baking trick to cut the mozzarella into one inch pieces and stick them in the muffin batter. read more

Gluten Free Cake Round Up

Gluten Free Cake Round Up

This past year, my husband and I discovered that we both were reacting to gluten in our food. Not so much of an allergy, but definitely an intolerance. Did you know that up to 6-10% estimated people are celiacs or have a gluten allergy? Wheat products are not easy for human to digest even for the person without celiacs disease.

Phytates in the grains bind to other minerals like magnesium and are hard to digest. These phytates can make your digestive system inflamed overtime. They can also cause deficiencies, a leaky gut or just impair your immune system.  Because of these factors, it is becoming more and more common for people to go Grain Free (Read our story here and here) read more

Peanut Butter Crunch Chocolate Mug Cake

 

gluten free, grain free, one serving chocolate cake, healthy snacks, healthy chocolate cake, sugar free snack cake

Peanut Butter Crunch Chocolate Mug Cake

What could be better than peanut butter and chocolate in a single serving cake?

I love this peanut butter crunch chocolate mug cake for a dessert recipe because it is sugar free, grain free, and gluten free. 

I’m loving single serving cakes because you can enjoy them fresh out of the oven or microwave – which is always when they taste the best. I also love topping this with Peanut flavored Greek yogurt. Greek yogurt is so versatile. I love how it can be a sub for sour cream or be sweetened to act like an icing.  read more

Iced One Serving Chocolate Chip Cookie

minute cookie, one serving cookie, microwave cookie

Iced Chocolate Chip Cookie in 2 Minutes

Grain free – Sugar Free – Gluten Free

Iced One Serving Chocolate Chip Cookie {In 2 Minutes}… Miracles do happen.

I’m so glad I discovered this recipe. I really am in love with coconut flour. It is the perfect flour for making a grain free cookie. I also just started using cocoa nibs in baking. They are a wonderful substitute for filling my desire for chocolate chips. If you like dark chocolate, I think you will love these.

Who doesn’t love chocolate chip cookies? I think everyone gets that craving at night… but you don’t want to make a whole batch of cookies (and be tempted to eat them all – because none of us have ever done that *cough*). read more

Why Grain Free? Part 2

Adapted from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/frederikvanroest/3842334310/

Adapted from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/frederikvanroest/3842334310/

Why Grain Free? Part 2: Harmful Effect of Grains

Earlier I shared why we went grain free for a while. You can read that post here

It took a lot of research for me to even consider this… I loved my carbs and bread and pasta… 

So what kind of research did I find?

First, I learned about phytates that are part of the grain. This is mother natures way of “protecting” the grain so it would pass through the stool and then germinate once “deposited.” These phytates bind to other nutrients (like magnesium) in your foods and aren’t digested or absorbed. It is like starving yourself from the inside – but the calories are getting absorbed. You get fatter, just without the nutrients. read more

Trim and Healthy Biscuits and Sausage Gravy

 

 

Biscuits and Sausage Gravy are one mine and my husband’s favorite weekend treat.

 

These are not traditionally a healthy meal. Traditional biscuits are full of processed carbs and hydrogenated fats. These processed carbs are likely to send your blood sugar soaring. Sausage gravy is usually thickened with processed flour, mixing carbs and fats.

 

We learned in Trim Healthy Mama  that when you mix carbs and fats together, you are going to store excess carbs and fats in your cells as more fat.  read more

Pregnancy and Gestational Diabetes

pregnancy, gestational diabetes, low carb

Pregnancy is wonderful… Gestational Diabetes is not.

I’m 29 weeks pregnant now. Usually around this time, it is typical to test how your body is responding to glucose. In your pregnancy, there are certain hormones that can interfere with your body’s ability to bring glucose into the cells leaving a higher blood glucose. If you think about it, it makes sense because you want some glucose to go to the baby. However, if too much glucose goes to the baby, you could end up with an unhealthy, “fat” baby with sugar issues at birth.

Last pregnancy, I did the typical one hour 50 grams of glucose test. I think my result was 140 (which is the upper limits of normal). From that point on, I was put on a very restrictive, low carb diet. This was before I had ever heard of being grain free or paleo. It was a major shock for me when I had no recipes that I liked that were basically no carbs (no sweet potatoes : ( , brown rice, beans).

parker2_edited-1

Gestational diabetes is somewhat controversial in some groups as in “does it really exsist” or is it a normal thing in pregnancy to have higher blood glucose to give energy to the baby. Most studies show that there is no better outcome from being diagnosed with gestational diabetes – if anything there are few positive outcomes when doctors insist on inducing early or just scheduling c-sections due to risk of larger babies.

One article I read, said that possibly babies that are going to be larger and need more energy release a signal to the placenta to secrete more hormones that block glucose absorption into the mom’s cells leaving more for the growing baby. I’m not sure, but it makes sense given my 9 pound baby – is now a toddler who is over the 95th percentile for weight and height. I don’t think there was anything I could have done differently to have “grown” a smaller baby given her personal genetics.

Luckily, going through that process last time has helped me so much this pregnancy. I decided to decline the one hour glucose tolerance test, and just test at home one hour after meals to see what foods caused any spikes. I wouldn’t say that I have gestational diabetes, but I do tend to have glucose intolerance – which would be the precursor. I have very few high numbers 2 hours after meals (over 120)

November 14 2007 day 34 - Meters

The past week I have been testing and showing that I do great for my typical breakfast and lunch. I start my day with eggs and yogurt and usually have a huge salad for lunch. Dinner is usually when I vary my meals. I’ve learned that I can have some carbs this pregnancy (I don’t think I could handle any carbs at first last pregnancy).

I cooked homemade chicken alfredo with tons of vegetables and tossed with pasta – it was SOOOOOO good!! and it didn’t spike my blood sugar! But If I eat over 50 grams of carbs (or so) even with lots of protein, I will see a rise in my blood sugar. Last night we had CORN (clean our refrigerator night) and I had taco meat and black beans, with roasted sweet potatoes, carrot souffle (recipe here) and green beans. At one hour, my glucose level was 106 – which is great!

Again, the change isn’t as bad as last pregnancy when I was eating a lot more carbs (whole grain what-nots). When I don’t eat any carbs (fruit, starchy vegetables, etc) I don’t feel like I have any energy – like can’t get out of the chair. So I am very thankful I can tolerate some healthy forms of carbs for energy.

Exercise wise: I am either doing about 35 minutes on my elliptical machine (last week I got in 55 minutes one day!) or going on about a 50 minute walk in my hilly neighborhood daily. I would exercise normally, so that isn’t a change at all.

I just have to be a little more proactive in what I’m going to cook or eat – and no cheats – which I would have had a treat at small group that I will have to pass on now : ( Only 10 weeks or so left! Of course I want to do anything to have a healthy pregnancy and baby, this will be worth it in the end.

I’m taking the Perfect Prenatal whole food vitamins throughout my pregnancy. They were recommended to me when I was pregnant with Aidalyn and I loved them so much I’m taking them again. You can buy some through HerbsPro (affiliate) with this discount code:

We are getting so excited about welcoming Annaleigh into our family!

Read my Tips for Controlling Gestational Diabetes Naturally! 

How to Control Gestational Diabetes Naturally

Read Annaleigh’s Birth Story Here 

img_0981_edited-1 (1)1

// <![CDATA[
(function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){i['GoogleAnalyticsObject']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){ (i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o), m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m) })(window,document,'script','//www.google-analytics.com/analytics.js','ga'); ga('create', 'UA-46219330-1', 'grassfedmama.com'); ga('send', 'pageview');
// ]]>

Baking With Coconut flour

low carb, low sugar, stevia

Baking with Coconut Flour 

Baking with coconut flour can be a great way to eat low carb, grain free and keep all your favorite breads and cakes in your diet. 

We’ve already talked about how great coconut oil is:

increasing metabolism, supporting immune system, promoting the absorption of vitamins, detoxing the body, promoting healthy cholesterol and heart health. Now we are going to talk about all those great benefits in a flour: Coconut flour.

 

Our bodies don’t tolerate grains very well (wheat, barley, oats…). They are filled with phytates that bind to minerals in our bodies like magnesium. This overtime can leave us deficient in vitamins and minerals. You can soak your grains to help reduce the phytates, but it may be easier to incorporate more grain free foods into your diet.

 Does that mean you can never eat a piece of bread again? What about cake?

There are two main flours that people who are eating grain free are using: almond flour and coconut flour. Those certainly aren’t the only ones, but they are definitely the popular ones.

You can read here about some benefits of coconut flour to other flours. I haven’t bought Dr. Mercola‘s coconut flour – we just bought Bob’s Red Mill brand on Amazon.com.

There are a ton of recipes using coconut flour that you can make and not even realize you are missing the wheat. I found several grain free recipes by searching on Pinterest.

 

Check out my King Cake in a Mug that Uses Coconut flour

coconut flour, louisiana, cake in a mug, minute cake

 

This is just one I found recently: original post here

Gluten Free Carrot-Poppy Seed Loaf

3 eggs
1/4  cup applesauce (add more if you need more wet ingredients after you have mixed dry and wet together)
3 Tbsp honey or one teaspoon of liquid stevia extract 
3 Tbsp melted coconut oil or butter
1 cup grated carrot
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup sifted coconut flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup walnuts, chopped (optional)                                                                                              1.5 tablespoons of poppy seeds  read more

Why Grain Free? Part 1

Adapted from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/frederikvanroest/3842334310/

Adapted from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/frederikvanroest/3842334310/

Why You Should Go Grain Free

Grain Free? Wait – haven’t you looked at the food pyramid??? Aren’t we supposed to get 9-11 servings of breads, cereals, grains each day? No bread, no pasta? Are you crazy?!?

This was my exact internal conversation when I started reading about giving up grains.

I am by no means an expert on this – I do have personal experience and I think that matters. I know most of what I know about grains and what they do to us from reading Mark’s blog at Mark’s Daily Apple and Kate at Modern Alternative Mama.

I read the Maker’s Diet by Jordan Rubin 7 years ago or so that drastically changed my eating habits. It is a 40 day challenge to basically purge your body from all the junk you have been eating your whole life on the Standard American Diet and jump start it with whole foods.

Before the diet, I was eating the standard “healthy” diet – low fat, low meat. The Maker’s diet recommends a diet full of nutrient rich foods: vegetables, fruit, protein, healthy fats, soaked grains. It confronts nutrition (and the national health crisis) from a biblical standpoint. For about a year, we did very very well on this diet. Adam and I both felt great, we were both working out, able to wake up in the morning easily… it was a success. But I didn’t understand at the time why I wasn’t eating grains – or why I was supposed to be soaking them, and it just didn’t stick.

Then life happened. We got lazy – I wanted pasta, bread, cereal… the cravings came back. We still ate whole foods, we just continued to substitute more carbs in place of vegetables and fruit – we always grabbed the whole wheat bread (Nature’s Own), the whole wheat pasta, the stone ground whole wheat flour… We thought we were eating healthy.

Our diet consisted of whole grain carbs, fruit, vegetables, and just a little protein and fat. But we weren’t healthy any more. We had sugar cravings, we were tired, I was having blood sugar problems – getting shaking between meals, getting light-headed… It was my “normal.”

Then I got pregnant. Pregnancy did my diet in… It was not sustainable. I was miserable with morning sickness, weakness, dizziness, passing out at time. This diet was not nourishing for me or my growing baby. Thankfully, I was getting care from a midwife at the time who does a more “whole body” approach. She asked me to send her a 3 day food diary.

I just knew that I had the perfect diet, why should I be worried? Then she knocked me across the face, “your baby needs protein and fat” – and very little empty carbs. Of course, this was going to have to change every single meal I was eating at the time. I was more miserable for the next 2 weeks when trying to change my diet then I was before – was this even worth it? I would sit at the dinner table and cry because I didn’t know what to eat and I had so many food aversions from pregnancy… I just felt so limited! 

I was eating more protein and fat with my meals then I had ever eaten before – I’m going to be huge! But I wasn’t getting bigger (other than my growing belly) and after I got down the “acceptable” meals down – I was feeling great.

So, fast forward a few weeks to December 2, 2010. I had an amazingly easy homebirth of a 9 pound healthy baby girl. I thought “I can eat whatever I want now!” Bring on the carbs! And my diet went right back to what I was eating before I was pregnant – whole foods, but a whole lot of carbs. In one week I had dropped all the baby weight, I was in my prepregnancy clothes again – I felt amazing!

But that feeling didn’t last… I was breastfeeding, so I was hungry – but I grabbed carbs – crackers and cheese, breads… I even started gaining weight around 5-6 months post partum… This wasn’t supposed to happen. I was breastfeeding and working out!

I got to thinking, if I was able to eat all the fat and protein while I was pregnant and my body functioned like it needed to – giving it to the baby and not my thighs, maybe there was something there. So, I started doing some research… and research…

It took months before I convinced myself that I needed to go grain-free. Aidalyn was probably around 10 months, when I just started reducing grains. Then Adam and I committed for the whole month of January we would be 100% grain-free, after that we would be 80-20. I did a lot of “pinning” on Pintrest to get ready. We started using more coconut and almond flour for baking and cooking.

***Update: Trim Healthy Mama does a great job of balancing the carbs, fats, and protein in their book. You can soak oatmeal to reduce any phytates, if you want to eat that for an energizing breakfast. Grain free breads are perfect for satisfying meals and snacks. 

Check out Part 2 of Why Grain-Free here

Grain free Biscuits and Sausage Gravy 

grain free coconut almond flour

 

What are your thoughts on going grain free? Have your tried adding more grain free flours into your diet?  read more