After a long (and hectic) winter break full of travel and far too much dark chocolate, I am ready to get back to my regularly scheduled life...

M and I made a pact to eat clean and healthy this year. A lot of people started out 2014 with a Whole30, and we are doing a variation on that--just not as strict, because we find that being Paleo-Zealots makes for a difficult life, and life is difficult enough without the added stress of trying to be perfect. We prefer a more balanced approach to life and to food. That being said, we will still be avoiding all the main "non-paleo" foods: grains, beans and sugar. M is following a stricter Paleo plan than I am--avoiding dairy pretty much completely, but eating fruit most days. He eats lunch and dinner and usually skips breakfast.


I am including grass fed and organic dairy products in my diet because I am doing a strict ketogenic diet and I find adding cream or butter or sour cream to my meals makes it much easier to keep my fat high enough. I am limiting my carbs to 20-30 per day, my protein to 70-100 grams per day, and aiming for 75-80% fat each day. Over the holiday I read The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Living,and The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Performance, two Keto cookbooks (Dana Carpender's Fat Fast Cookbook, and KetoDiet Book by Martina Šlajerová). I started off the New Year ready to go!

I think that this year I will be able to lose the weight I need to lose, and still be able to maintain the well balanced Paleo diet my husband loves. I have had a lot of fun looking up new recipes and coming up with ideas for lunches. M works in a very physical job, so he needs daily lunch sustenance. I have taken some paleo kids lunch ideas from around the web and converted them into adult-sized portions. I am trying to take pictures so that I have a record of what we are eating so that I can blog about it later. We also like to drink wine from time to time, but have stopped buying it and bringing it home--on our "date nights" however we have dry wine and eat out. We focus on eating steak and veggies or a green salad with chicken or shrimp. One of our favorite places to go is JJ Mahoneys in Redmond--they have a yummy steak on the menu that we get (without the Guinness gravy) and with extra veggies no potato or bread. A fair Paleo meal, and low carb enough for me, even with a glass or two of wine!

For my next blog post, I will share with you some of the meals I have been making for M. In the meantime, for those of you on Keto, I know how hard it can be when your friends, family, and workmates are not doing the same thing as you. Good luck. Keep Calm and Keto On! For those of you on Paleo, I will be posting some awesome new recipes soon, so stay tuned!