How Blue Apron and Plated have saved my [foodie] life

I don't sing praises of things too horribly often. And when I do, it's like the first week after I've bought it and nothing's gone wrong yet. I'm the reason why you can't trust Amazon reviews. *sigh*.

However, 7 weeks after being a Blue Apron subscriber, I can whole-heartedly say that, as a foodie that lives in the middle-of-nowheresville, having fresh produce, varied menus, and awesome quality ingredients delivered to the door is second to none.

For those who don't know about Blue Apron, it's a meal delivery service that provides all the ingredients, in the correct quantities, for 3 meals a week. I have mine set to deliver my 3 meals (with 2 portions each) on Wednesdays, which is just perfect. It ends up being $9.99 a portion, which for 6 portions evens out to $59.94 a week. For the quality of food, I normally would be willing to pay about $15/18 per entree if we were to eat out, which is a $50-ish savings, not including the wine or the tip or the tax associated with going out. Not to mention, there's no "going out" where I live. So there's that, too.

Anyways, this week was:

• Center-Cut Pork Chops with Beet, Heirloom Carrot & Hazelnut Salad
• Crispy Chicken Thighs with Kumquat Relish & Freekeh Salad
• Pan-Roasted Salmon with Spicy Miso Broth & Wakame

I made the salmon the first night (AMAZING broth. But I hate salmon. So the boyfriend got two meals.), and the pork chops last night. Those were to die for. And I wouldn't hesitate to make them again. I've linked to the recipes above (another perk of Blue Apron - the recipes are free!) and they're totally worth a shot. For those of you on Paleo, the pork chops are a must. I used traditional butter and not ghee or anything but if you did that, you could make it Whole30 compliant. 

This week, I was feeling especially lazy, however, and decided to try Plated as well, since I got a deal on it and the menu looked super delicious. Here's what I'm having delivered today:

• Seared Pollock with Blood Orange, Olives, and Grapefruit Salad
• Thai Peanut Chicken Curry with Sticky Rice
• Vietnamese Caramel Fish with Vermicelli and Bok Choy

Again, some of these aren't paleo, but you can always substitute vermicelli with some zoodles and you're good to go. Don't really know how to sub a peanut curry, but sometimes a cheat here and there isn't a terrible thing for food. Tonight's adventure will start with the Pollock, if the boyfriend can manage to wrangle up a pan and actually, you know, help.

Typically you can find great deals on these (i.e. Plated will give you 4 plates free with the purchase of your first 2 plates), and Blue Apron if you know someone who can send you a subscription (wink, wink), can be free for a whole week. If you don't, they'll do the same deal I think as plated and send you 2 meals free with the purchase of 1 for your first time.

Happy Cooking!
CJ

Recipe: The Breakfast Bomb Burger

Again, because I've actually committed to a budget, it means I have to get extra creative with my pantry. This may also be partly due to my insane laziness when I get home from work, which I pass off as dog-mom-guilt and not wanting to bail on the pup for any more time during the day than I must. Excuses. I know.

But happily for me, I remembered to thaw a random pound of grass-fed beef from my freezer yesterday and so I got home from work and realized that hurray! I have dinner. Burgers. Who doesn't love a good burger?

Now, the rest of the meal may end up paltry (I'm making this up as I go and am more in the "planning dinner" stage than making it as I sit here a type. This should make 2 servings, I hope. 

Ingredients

• Bacon (4 slices)
• 1/2 lb Grass-Fed Ground Beef, divided
• Brie 
• 1/2 onion sliced thinly 
• Olive Oil
• Salt & Pepper
• Frank's Red Hot
• Toppings as you'd like: Fried Egg and Arugula for me. 

Instructions

1. Cook bacon on the stovetop til crisp. Pull off the burner, place bacon onto a paper-towel lined pan and reserve the bacon fat in a small jar or container. Immediately place the bacon fat in the fridge. Crumble up the bacon into a bowl once it's dry into smaller (but not tiny) bits.
2. While the bacon is cooking, remove the beef from the fridge and put into a bowl. Season with salt and pepper and a dash of Frank's, mix with your hands, and then separate this into 4 thinner patties. Don't squish them too much or they'll be too tight when they cook.
3. Again, while bacon cooks, heat up a tablespoon or so of olive oil in a pan and sauté the onions until they're well-sauteed. Once they're done sautéing, take them off the heat, and put them in the bowl with the bacon crumbles. 
4. Near the end of the onions cooking, cut a few small slices of brie (remove the rind), put the slices in the middle of two of the patties. Top this with the onion/bacon mixture, and use the remaining 2 patties as covers. Crimp down the edges with a fork, and then reform to seal fully.
5. Top each patty with a dollop of what should be the cooled bacon fat, and cook (bacon fat side up first) on medium-high on a grill as you normally would, searing for 4 minutes or so on each side (and flipping only once). 
6. While the burgers are cooking, plate the rest of your dinner if you so choose (I am topping mine with an egg, so I'm using this time to fry it up), and when the burgers are done, get ready to feast! 

Happy Cooking!

CJ

Recipe: Coconut Shrimp and Pineapple Fried Rice

Okay, so it's not 100% paleo. But on the positive side, it used everything I had in the house, so I didn't have to go to the store. So…I consider that a win, for a dreary, rainy, cold day like today. 

I always have frozen shrimp on-call in the freezer. They're easy to thaw, ridiculously quick to cook, and are perfect for adding to starches or salads. You'll notice I have basically zero idea of the proportions I used in any of this. Sorry about that. I was pretty much winging it and it came out perfectly. Keep in mind, this makes shrimp for 2 and rice for probably 2 and leftovers.

Photo courtesy of CL Tampa Bay
(since mine was eaten too quickly to photograph)

Ingredients

Shrimp

• Fresh or Frozen shrimp (obviously); peeled and de-veined
• Coconut Flour
• Panko
• Shredded Coconut (unsweetened)
• 1 egg
• Cayenne Pepper

Pineapple Fried Rice

• 1 1/2 cups of rice (dry); cooked
• 1 can of pineapple chunks/tidbits, etc. (preferably just in juice. Avoid anything with syrup)
• miscellaneous refrigerator veggies (I used 3 carrots and about 1/2 cup of red cabbage, but the frozen vegetable medleys of corn/peas/carrots would work here too)
• 2 Tbsp Soy Sauce (give or take)
• Powdered Ginger
• Onion (3/4 to 1 whole white or red onion); diced small
• 2 garlic cloves (minced finely or pressed)
• White Pepper

Instructions

1. Begin with your rice (which is helpful to have pre-cooked, but I didn't. No big deal.); cook it if it isn't cooked according to the directions. As it's finishing, in a large pot, heat up a tablespoon or two of oil (coconut is preferable) on medium. Toss in your onions and garlic first for a few minutes, followed by your veggies until they're just starting to soften for a few minutes. 
2. While you're stirring the veggies around, take the time to pull out a cookie tray and start setting up your "shrimp stations". You'll want to break an egg (1 egg was good for ~12 shrimp for me) and whisk it in a small bowl, have a second small bowl with some coconut flour in it (remember, you can always put more in, but since it's raw shrimp you can't do anything with the excess but toss it), and a third bowl with a ratio of 2:1 or 3:1 (that was more like mine) of shredded coconut to panko and toss in a small pinch of cayenne. If you're strict on paleo, just leave out the panko. It'll be OK. As the veggies are going, take each shrimp, coat it in coconut flour, then dip it in the egg (the flour helps the egg stick), then coat it thoroughly in the shredded coconut/panko mixture. Set it on the cookie tray and repeat. By the time this is done, you'll probably have your veggies finished. Pop the shrimp tray in the fridge just so everything sticks a bit better.  
3. Put a skillet on the stove (preferably cast iron) and melt coconut oil in it on medium-high heat. This is what you're going to fry your shrimp in, so make sure that it has that deep popping sound to it when you flick some water in to test the temperature. While it's heating up, dump your rice and your pineapple into the already cooking veggie mixture. It'll probably need to be in there, if it's fresh rice, for 9-10 minutes or so until it starts to dry out a little bit and brown. 
4. Pull the shrimp out of the fridge when the coconut oil is up to temp. Work in batches of probably 5-6 depending on how big your pan is. I did about 2 minutes per side, and then since my shrimp were deveined, I put them on their backs for another 30 seconds just to get everything fried up nicely. As the shrimp are done, pull them out and put them on a plate lined with paper towels so they don't get soggy. 
5. Finish up your rice with the soy sauce and a sprinkle of ginger and white pepper for another 2 minutes. Everything should be ending just at about the same time, so you should be able to just plate it all and go!

I garnished mine with some leftover pineapple chunks and drizzled my shrimp with a coconut balsamic vinegar (one of the best slightly-intoxicated purchases I've made in the last year, courtesy of Epicurience VA last summer…). 

Enjoy, and Happy Cooking!

CJ