Breakfast Bowls!

I hope everyone had a lovely Mother's Day. It's a tough holiday for me since losing my amazing mom, Jeanine McKenzie Allen. This was our third one without her.

There's the sweet Angel, just the way I remember her. Since it's a bit of a melancholy day now, we keep it kind of low-key. I cut my own bouquet:

Then I announced I was skipping short-order cooking for the day. We ordered Thai food for lunch and Mexican for dinner -- they were both excellent meals and for me, dairy- and gluten-free. For breakfast, I did cook, just for myself -- the bowl! Here's the cooking shot:

Two eggs in coconut oil, a tomato, some leftover sauteed mushrooms and spinach. Onto the top of the cooked bowlful I piled chunks of half an avocado. This was so nutritious, filling and energizing. It makes sense for me to make breakfast a priority. A lot of work goes into being me. There are my injections and supplements,

some of which are tough to keep down if my stomach isn't otherwise occupied. The process cannot be rushed effectively, in other words I can't just wolf it all down without feeling sick, so some days I work breakfast and supplements into and around laundry and dishes and by the time I'm done it is about 11:30. So the big bowls really serve as brunch. If I want more food around lunchtime a small salad or fresh green juice will suffice. The bowl above was so delicious -- the eggs came out perfectly, only softly set in the center. I toasted a piece of gluten-free bread at the end to sop up every remaining drop.

Here's another morning's bounty:

I love how the coconut oil makes the edges of the eggs so golden-brown and crispy! As you might imagine, a brunch bowl is an excellent vehicle for leftovers. I didn't warm the steak from the night before. I prefer it on the rare side and warming it would have likely spoiled it for me. I really enjoyed the warm and the cold together, and now that I know it is good for nervous system regeneration, I enjoyed the fatty gristle on the meat too. Give a bowl a try!

Restaurant Meals

Of course eating at home and knowing the source of your organic food is the best option for those of us being very careful about our diets, but sometimes a girl wants to  go out. I do it quite a bit, actually, since that is the chapter in which I find myself with friends and family, including a husband, teenage daughter and a son in college, none of whom have much interest in eating the kind of food I'm choosing. I do have one wonderful friend who is walking a similar dietary path to mine. Liat is vegan and gluten free, but she has previously tried a paleo diet and has always been conscious of maintaining health through natural means.

It was Liat who brought me to The Loving Hut last week. I didn't even know we had one in the Atlanta area! Though I have added meats to my vegan diet and have subtracted gluten, I found plenty of fabulous, delicious food there. Liat and I split a Basil Spring Roll appetizer with peanut sauce -- so delicious and fresh! We were starving, so I forgot to take a photo before wolfing down my portion. Next, at Liat's suggestion, I had this eggplant dish, gluten-free. It was so rich and fabulous, and I loved the fresh cucumber and tomato with the tamari-based sauce. I needed a doggy bag for most of the rice here. Liat chose a ginger baby bok choy saute. We each shared a little of our entree. I loved her food too, for totally different reasons. The ginger was strong -- just the way I like it. I can never have too much of that pungent root. Thanks, Liat!

Forgive the awful photo on this one. I'm not so great with my phone-as-camera after dark. In my defense, it is one of the older phones, though it did take the lunchtime Loving Hut photo above, so it's most likely user error here. I'm old fashioned. I'd rather use a camera as a camera, and a phone as a phone. But I digresse . . . My husband and I love a little restaurant in Roswell called Bistro VG. On my other blog, A Midlife Vegan+, I have blogged about many fabulous meals I've eaten there over the years. With my new diet I had to pull out my reading glasses once again to select the most appropriate food. I started with my all-time favorite salad -- Simple Arugula -- without cheese, and then dove into this yummy pile: broiled wild salmon (rare) atop an amazing quinoa and veggie concoction. I cannot say enough good things about this plateful. It was strange yet familiar. It tasted like health and decadence all rolled into one. It was sublime. They are putting my food on menus now! :)

Finally, I want to share some pretty darn good drive-thru my husband picked up for me. This is from Panera: The Chicken Cobb Salad With Avocado. I asked for it with NO CHEESE, and with the dressing on the side. The chicken is hormone-free, tender and flavorful and the rest of the ingredients, egg, bacon, tomato, romaine and avocado, hardly needed a dressing at all. I only put a little on the tines of my fork. Next time, I think I will opt for lemon and olive oil instead. Though the ingredients in the dressing had none of the "forbidden items" there were a couple of chemicals I didn't recognize. Why not choose cleaner next time? This salad was amazing. I really like that you can get menu, nutrition and ingredient details on Panera's website while your husband is sitting in line at the drive-thru. Another great option for the health-based diner!