Shrimp Scampi: Whole 30 & Paleo Friendly

Who needs pasta, butter and cheese when you have an even yummier, butterier, yet healthy substitute? Yes, I'm being completely serious - this tasted better than the real thing in my opinion. I made this shrimp scampi a couple nights ago and couldn't believe how good it turned out. It's Whole 30 approved and paleo friendly, although please note that I did add some parmesan cheese which you can see in the photos. You can easily substitute nutritional yeast for that though if you're trying to go dairy free.

I've always cooked spaghetti squash whole, but decided to roast it in halves this time around. Let me tell you... that baby was freaking IMPOSSIBLE to cut in half. I had my sharpest knife out and was somewhat afraid that the scene was going to end bloody. Luckily, with a little patience, I was able to get it in half. I'm not sure it tasted any better or was any easier though to cook this way. The only benefit was the cook time, which was cut in half. I'll let you guys choose how you want to cook it! The other option would be do do zucchini noodles. They'd be delicious in this recipe.

Ingredients:

• 1 whole spaghetti squash
• A bag (about 2 dozen) shrimp
• Half of red onion
• 1 tbsp+ of ghee (to taste)
• 4-6 garlic cloves
• EVOO
• Parmesan cheese (Optional - exclude or sub nutritional yeast for Whole 30 or paleo option)
• Himalayan salt & pepper

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. Cut the spaghetti squash in half, remove the seeds, and rub olive oil all over the inside and outside of the squash. Place on baking sheet and bake for about 40 minutes or until tender.
3. While the spaghetti squash is cooking, chop up the onion and mince the garlic so that it's super fine. 
4. Heat olive oil in pan and add onion and garlic and sautee until translucent (a couple minutes). Add about a tablespoon of ghee and cook a little longer. Then add all the shrimp and cook for a few minutes.
5. Once the spaghetti squash is done, scoop it out of its shell, and add the squash to the pan with the shrimp - one note here is that I only used about 1/2 to 3/4 of the squash because my pan wasn't big enough to hold it all.
6. Mix well in the pan and cook on low until the "noodles" are tender (a couple minutes so that the noodles can soak up the ghee and garlic taste).
7. Serve and enjoy the best scampi EVER! This recipe makes about 4 servings - I had lots of leftovers. 

Pumpkin Risotto with Pancetta and Sage

Gotta love a yummy comfort food, especially a "healthified" option! This isn't in the post holiday detox plan really (it's a little too carb heavy, plus there is some dairy), but it's a good recipe to save for those nights where you're just craving something warm and comforting... Or if you aren't detoxing post holidays, then whip this up right this instant! Honestly, all the ingredients in this are pretty darn good for you. I didn't use any cream, milk or butter for the risotto, and it still came out delicious and creamy. 

As usual, this dish is gluten free and could be dairy free if you want to omit that too. I usually don't see anything wrong with adding a little high quality/organic cheese to a dish every so often. Just don't make it a daily occurrence! Recipe below. Let me know how you like it!

Ingredients:

• 2 cups rice (I use Trader Joes organic wild, sprouted rice)
• 3/4 cup canned pumpkin
• Chopped pancetta (however much you want really)
• 1 red onion
• 4 cloves garlic
• Large bunch of fresh sage
• Organic chicken or bone broth
• 1/2 cup grated or shaved parmesan cheese
• Ghee
• Extra virgin olive oil
• Salt & pepper (Himalayan) 

Directions:

1. Heat olive oil & ghee in a large pan and add the onion. Cook until translucent. Add garlic cloves (minced or chopped very fine). Season with salt and pepper to taste. Add the rice and sauté for a couple more minutes so rice is slightly toasted. 
2. Pour the chicken broth into the pan and cook per instructions for rice (for the rice I used, I believe it was 2 cups of broth for 1.25 cups of rice). Stir occasionally until all liquid has been absorbed (about 25 minutes).
3. While the rice is cooking, in a separate pan, fry the pancetta until crispy. Remove from the pan, but don't remove the leftover fat. Use that to cook the sage and make it super crispy!
4. Once the sage is done cooking, I threw the pine nuts into the pan and cooked them just a bit so they were crunchier.
5. Once the rice is almost done cooking, add the canned pumpkin to the mixture and cook for a few more minutes until everything is heated and mixed well. Season with more salt and pepper if needed.
6. Once everything is ready, add the rice mixture to a bowl. Top with parmesan, pancetta, sage, and pine nuts, and enjoy!

Butternut Squash Soup with Apple & Parmesan

It was one of those Sundays where I hadn't gone grocery shopping for the upcoming week, I didn't feel like doing so really, and yet I also didn't want to order out. I had a butternut squash sitting on my counter for over a week, so I decided I was going to do something with that for dinner. I did a little digging around my fridge to see what else I could scrape up... an onion, some garlic, apples, carrots... sounded like soup would be the answer! I looked at a couple recipes online, but in the end decided to go with my own.

This turned out even better than I could have expected. It's rich in flavor, filling, and quite healthy. The recipe below is the best estimate of all the measurements I used, since I just kind of threw things in a pot. Luckily, you don't need to have exact measurements for soup, as you would if you were baking something. Feel free to use what I used, or sub in your own ingredients - anything goes!

Some of the ingredients below are entirely optional... I like to add collagen to everything possible to give my recipes a little health boost. If you haven't read my post about collagen, check it out here.

Ingredients:

• 1 large butternut squash
• 1 green apple
• 1 small red onion
• 6-8 garlic cloves
• 1 large carrot
• 3-4 cups chicken broth (or vegetable)
• 1 tbsp ghee 
• 2 tsp truffle oil
• 2 tsp cinnamon
• Olive oil
• Parmesan cheese
• Salt & pepper to taste
• 2 scoops of collagen peptides powder (optional)

Directions: 

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.
2. Peel the butternut squash and cut into small chunks. Throw on a baking tray with 6-8 whole cloves of garlic mixed in and bake for about 20 minutes or until soft.
3. While the squash is cooking, chop up the onion, apple, and carrot.
4. Heat the olive oil and ghee in a large pot over medium heat. Add the chopped onion, carrot, and apple and cook for about 10 minutes until onions are translucent. Add the bone broth and cook on low for another few minutes until the butternut squash is done roasting.
5. Add the butternut squash and garlic to the pot and cook for another 5-10 minutes on low heat. Add the cinnamon (and whatever other spices you want), truffle oil, salt & pepper, and collagen, and stir.
6. Pour the mixture into a blender and blend thoroughly until liquified.
7. Top with parmesan cheese (unless you want to keep this vegan), and serve!