Ant & Anise

Simple, elegant, healthy food and a fondness for gluten- and grain-free recipes

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The Paleo Diet Challenge: Day 23

guacamole and baked yam chips

Hmmm, on the Paleo Diet Challenge Day 23, how timely: I run across an entertaining article on Scientific American’s website about why the Paleo diet doesn’t make much sense. Now you tell me.

Most of the article is about explaining how the human “gut” works and about the evolution of our digestive tract, which has evolved to eat grains, along with vegetables, fruits, nuts, and meat, and pretty much anything else we toss into it. Judging from the comments so far, he’s touched a nerve from Paleo defenders. Hmmm, I guess I can’t be sure until the challenge is over, but I think I know which camp I’ll end up in, eventually. Hint: it’s not the die-hard Paleo one.

One of the things that I am missing, more than I thought I would, is tortilla chips. Plain, salted, corn tortilla chips, preferably the blue, organic ones from Que Pasa. (Not sure why I like the blue ones so much, but they’re my favorite. Maybe because of the novelty? It’s not like there’s a lot of naturally blue foods out there.)

But since corn tortilla chips are off the menu for the next 8 days, I thought I’d try my hand at oven baked yam chips for a pre-dinner snack. Now, Paleo-friendly nuts are great, and I love them, but they’re not something I’d would want to be dipping in my guacamole.

I’ve done thicker yam fries in the oven before, and they are very, very difficult to get crispy. Almost impossible, really. I blame the high sugar content. But armed with my mandoline to make paper-thin slices, I was confident I’d end up with a crispier result.

Well? They looked very bright and pretty, and tasted great, but even though they were as thin as the mandoline could make, they weren’t nearly as crispy as I had hoped. The burnt ones were the best for crispiness, and got eaten first.

I think I’m officially starting my countdown until the end of the challenge. Crispy tortilla chips are in sight.

More on the Paleo diet challenge:
Why I’m doing it in the first place
My plan for the 30 days

The Paleo Diet Challenge: Day 17

paleo diet challenge day 17 eggplant flatbread

Exciting news! I’ve found a Paleo bread that is quite acceptable.

It is a flatbread, though. I have yet to crack the code on Paleo sandwich bread (or a baguette of sorts), except maybe in my dreams. (Sigh.)

So far, I’ve experimented with a couple recipes to work some bread-like food into the challenge, but success has eluded me. The muffins and banana bread both passed through my taste and texture hoops, but the plainer bread I tried, in the hopes of making some toast for breakfast some day, didn’t come close to making it through any kind of hoop at all. Not even off the ground.

I’m starting to think that, perhaps, the key to enjoying any kind of Paleo bread is expectation management. Yep. Like several things in life, lower those expectations a notch or two and you might be pleasantly surprised by how you feel.

That’s exactly what happened with the eggplant-based flatbread I made. Eggplant as a bread, really? Dead simple to make and, even better, I wasn’t even expecting to like it but I did. Much better than I thought I would. It definitely has an eggplant-y flavor, but the texture is chewy and has a graininess that reminds me of a hearty multigrain bread, albeit on the very, very thin side.

No, it’s not what I would pair with peanut butter for breakfast, but it did toast up relatively well to have with a nibble of cheese. It also made a softer, more substantial base for a  smoked salmon and cream cheese appetizer that I usually make with puff pastry.

paleo diet challenge day 17 eggplant flatbread

 

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Eggplant Flatbread

Adapted from Make It Paleo by Bill Staley and Haley Mason, where they use it as a base for pizza.

Ingredients

  • 1 medium eggplant
  • 1/2 cup + 2 tablespoons (10 tablespoons) grain-free 'flour' substitute (flax seed meal, almond meal, coconut flour) - use all of one type or mix it up to equal 10 tablespoons
  • 1 egg
  • salt and pepper to taste

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 350F. Cut 2 sheets of parchment paper to fit your pan.
  2. Peel the eggplant and grate. (I used my food processor with the shredding blade.) Transfer the eggplant to a fine mesh strainer and, over the sink, squeeze the eggplant into a ball to drain the liquid out. Transfer the eggplant to a medium sized bowl.
  3. Add the grain-free 'flour' to the bowl and mix to combine. Add the egg and mix thoroughly. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
  4. Transfer the batter to the baking sheet lined with 1 sheet of the parchment, and flatten out with a spatula or your hands until it’s about 1/8” thick.
  5. Bake for 30-35 minutes. Remove from the oven.
  6. Here's where it gets a little tricky: Brush some olive oil on the flatbread, and then place the second piece of parchment over it. Nest a baking sheet (bottom side down) right on top of the parchment, then carefully flip the whole thing over. Slide the flatbread back onto the original baking sheet. Slowly peel back the parchment paper on the top of the eggplant (what used to be the bottom), and brush the top lightly with a little more olive oil.
  7. Bake for another 15 minutes or until slightly brown around the edges. Remove from oven, cool and slice.

 

More on the Paleo diet challenge:
Why I’m doing it in the first place
My plan for the 30 days