Anna Conrad - The Paleo Comfort Foods Bible: More Than 100 Grain-Free, Dairy-Free Recipes for Your Favorite Foods

Special editions can also be created to specifications. For details, contact the Special Sales Department, Skyhorse Publishing, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018 or . Skyhorse and Skyhorse Publishing are registered trademarks of Skyhorse Publishing, Inc., a Delaware corporation. Visit our website at www.skyhorsepublishing.com. 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file. Print ISBN: 978-1-62873-620-5 Ebook ISBN: 978-1-62873-976-3 Printed in China Notice This book is intended as a reference volume only, not as a medical manual.

The information given here is designed to help you make informed decisions about your health. It is not intended as a substitute for any treatment that may have been prescribed by your doctor. If you suspect that you may have medical problems, we urge you to seek competent medical help. { Contents } { Welcome } W elcome to The Paleo Comfort Foods Bible . I wrote, tested, and edited the recipes in this book in my kitchen, located in Chattanooga, Tennessee. My mission with The Paleo Comfort Foods Bible is to create a comprehensive collection of favorite comfort food recipes and reformulate them to comply as closely as possible with the paleo diet.

I garnered feedback from family, friends, and customers to create the recipes in this book. In many, many instances the recipes are better when converted to paleo versions. I hope you enjoy the recipes, many of which you will recognize as all-time favorites. And hopefully you will consider the paleo versions to be even better than the old recipe you remember. { Preface } T he paleo diet does not lend itself to easily incorporating traditional comfort food recipes into the everyday menu. However, I believe youll find that The Paleo Comfort Foods Bible includes recipes that evoke warm feelings, full stomachs, and feelings of home without grains, dairy, and high glycemic index sugar products.

Pasta, breadcrumbs, cheese, cream, and sugar often find their way into comfort food recipes. Ive reformulated these recipes to incorporate breads made with nut flours and paleo-safe oils and sugars. Pasta is more of a challenge, and even the paleo pastas on the market didnt pass my criteria as a paleo-friendly food. For that reason, I dont include pasta in my recipes. If the recipe requires a pasta-like ingredient, I use spaghetti squash. You will not miss the pasta! When choosing ingredients for the recipes in this book, make sure you always use high-quality, organic, grassfed meat and poultry, wild-caught seafood and fish, uncured meats (unless you cure them via paleo-friendly methods), whole foods, and additive-free ingredients whenever possible.

For a complete list of foods allowed on the paleo diet, see my first cookbook, The Paleo Cookbook . { Stocking Your Pantry } T he following is a list of standard ingredients you will need to have in your pantry before making the recipes in this book, in addition to commonly used ingredients. Ive listed suppliers for almond flour because almond flour is the key ingredient in many of the recipes, and the suppliers I list here are the best brands to use, based on my experience. I did not list suppliers for other ingredients because I found that they are widely available from multiple suppliers without much variation in quality. ALMOND FLOUR AND ALMOND MEAL : Almond flour and almond meal are made by grinding sweet almonds. Almond flour is finely ground blanched almonds.

Blanching almonds removes the skin. Almond meal is made with or without the skin on the almonds, and it isnt as finely ground as almond flour. The consistency of almond meal is similar to that of corn meal. I used almond flour from three different suppliers and found them all to be acceptable in my recipes. The almond flour suppliers I used are JK Gourmet (www.jkgourmet.com), Benefit Your Life (www.benefityourlifestore.com), and Honeyville (www.honeyvillegrain.com). I grind my own almond meal from whole almonds since I use it smaller quantities.

COCONUT FLOUR : Coconut flour is the meat of a coconut ground finely and defatted. When purchasing, make sure the ingredients state pure coconut flour without any added ingredients such as rice flour, sugars, or preservatives. Choose coconut flours that are not pristine white in color because that may indicate unnecessary processing. The color should be similar to coconut flesh, a little off-white and cream-colored. COCONUT OIL: Coconut oil is extracted from the coconut flesh (meat). Coconut oil is used in many paleo recipes and is the primary fat used in this cookbook.

Choose virgin coconut oil (VCO) that is made from fresh coconut and mechanically pressed to extract the oil. Other forms of coconut oil may be extracted via chemical or high temperature methods, which can reduce the nutrient content and flavor properties of the oil. OLIVE OIL: Vegetable oils are typically off-limits for paleo dieters, and olive oil is vegetable oil. However, its considered paleo-friendly because it is comprised mostly of monounsaturated fat, a fat source that is safe and healthy for us to consume. It is not suitable for cooking with on the stovetop or for greasing pans for baking because it oxidizes at higher temperatures, breaking down into compounds that arent healthy for humans to consume. Use it in dressings or on top of your already cooked meals.

Fresh, cold-pressed, extra virgin olive oils in dark bottles that havent been on the shelf for a long time are the best. Store olive oil in a dark and cool place to increase its shelf life. You can store it in the refrigerator, but it will become cloudy and thick. Refrigerated olive oil will return to its normal appearance and consistency once it comes to room temperature. RENDERED ANIMAL FAT : They are the essence of the reason we eat paleo in the first place. Cavemen ate animalslots of themfor energy, and therefore they obtained a lot of fat from animal sources.

Most animal fats are highly saturated and are therefore stable enough to cook at high temperatures. Conversely, they are solid at room temperature and dont need to be refrigerated. Their reputation for being less healthy means that they are not very popular, and therefore very cheap to obtaineven the fats coming from well-treated animals. Just go to your butcher and ask for duck fat, pork lard, or beef tallow. Your butcher might not have those fats rendered and ready for you to cook, so youll have to work a bit to use them, but youll see that its not terribly difficult. You may also purchase leaf lard or suet (beef fat).

DRY METHOD OF RENDERING ANIMAL FAT Remove any vein, meat, or blood from the fat, and then chop it into very small chunks. Next put the fat chunks in either a crockpot or heavy-bottomed Dutch oven. Set the fat over very low heat. Once all the white fat chunks have become brown and dry, strain off the pure fat and let it cool. Be careful, as it will be very hot. Once cooled, the fat will be white and hard at room temperature.