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Read MoreFive Paleo Dinners To Cook Next Week #34
Today, Dave and I are celebrating our ninth wedding anniversary (although we’ve been a couple since 1992). This is our favorite photo from the big day—it seems fitting that it was taken in the kitchen just after our vows. Seven-seven-seven really was my lucky day.
This is the part of the post where I usually tell you some kind of story. But I really just want to go spend time with my favorite person in the world. So I’m outta here.
Happy cooking to you!
Dinner Ideas (Whole30 compliant)
Çevapçiçi, aka, cute Balkan sausages
Cookup Tips: The meat “dough” can be made 1 day in advance then cooked—or you can cook the çevapçiçi during your Cookup and re-heat just before eating. They’ll stay fresh and tasty for 5-6 days after cooking. They also freeze like champs! The original recipe calls for grilling, but you can also make these little guys in the oven: 425F for 20 minutes or so.
Recommended Sides: These taste great on a pile of Oven-Roasted Cauliflower Rice and do not skip the Ajvar. (Make it during your Cookup and enjoy all week!) On our travels, we also ate these with shopska salat: a chopped salad of cucumber, tomato, onion, and bell pepper dressed with lemon juice and extra-virgin olive oil. It’s very similar to my Turkish Chopped Salad.
Egg Foo Yong
Cookup Tips: This recipe is pretty much made from leftovers, so if you cook chicken, beef, pork, or shrimp during your Cookup, you can toss it into an Egg Foo Yong patty with whatever leftover veggies you have on hand.
Recommended Sides: You can stick with the Asian theme and cook up a batch of Cauliflower Rice, or do a diner-style mash-up and make some Home Fries or Sweet Potato Fries instead. You can do prep on all the veggies for sides during a Cookup, then finish them at dinner time.
Pesto Chicken Meatballs
Cookup Tips: This also tastes even better after some time in the fridge, so you can make the whole shebang during a Cookup and eat it later in the week. It’s also great for freezing!
Recommended Sides: You can serve these on top of Zucchini Noodles—prep the zucchini in advance: julienne it, sweat it, rinse it, pat it dry, and place in fridge until you’re ready to eat— or Spaghetti Squash roasted during your Cookup.
Vietnamese Chicken Salad
Cookup Tips: You can prep all of the components in advance: poach the chicken, make the mayo, chop the veggies, mix the dressing. Then when it’s time to eat, toss it all together and enjoy!
Recommended Sides: It doesn’t need a thing… YAY!
Oven-Fried Salmon Cakes
Cookup Tips: These hold up great in the fridge and reheat (and freeze) beautifully, so they’re perfect for Cookup action. Serve them with the leftover mayo from the Vietnamese Chicken Salad, or with the Spicy Coconut Mayo below.
Recommended Sides: Veggies that can be made in the oven are nice because you’ve already got the oven going, so how about Oven-Roasted Cauliflower Rice, Sweet Potato Fries, or Mustard-Garlic Brussels Sprouts?
Condiment (Whole30 compliant)
Spicy Coconut Mayo
Cookup Tips: This is delicious on a green salad, or dabbed on top of the Salmon Cakes or Egg Foo Yong. It’s good until the expiration date on the egg you use to make your mayo.
Treat (not Whole30 compliant)
Grain-Free Green-ola
Cookup Tips: This is easy to throw together and halfway ignore while you’re going about your business with the rest of your Cookup.
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Aw! Happy anniversary!
What a lovely tribute to your enduring relationship! I wish you both many, many more years of bliss (and kisses in the kitchen) . . . Enjoy your special day!
Happy Anniversary! Enjoy your together time!
A most happy anniversary
I just really love you. And your recipes, but also you and the things you say and the way you say them. The more I read, the better it gets. Congratulations and thank you for all the great recipes and content.
You are so nice to say so… thank you very much! And thanks for reading.
I love that you specifically chose 07-07-07! I remember thinking on that day it would be an awesome day to get married (but I was only 19). Happy happy anniversary! I hope someone else is cooking for you two today. 🙂
We originally wanted to get married in Las Vegas on 7-7-7, then realized that we were not the only people in the world to have that idea 😉
Very sweet! Many congrats and happy anniversary!
Thank you so much!
Yay! Awesome plan and sounds like a splendid event. You better start planning 7.7.77! It’s only 61 years away; we’ll all still be around then, right?
That will be a kickass party in ’77!
Hi,
Firstly, congratulations on your anniversary☺I live in the UK and wondered whether you are intending to write a book for the UK market? If not, could you point us to alternative ingredients to use e.g. what to subtitue for jicama? I really don’t like coconut in any form and havd started to clarify my own butter. Is there a substitute for cocunut? Many thanks and best wishes…
You can substitute potatoes for the jicama in my recipes.
For coconut aminos, you can use this homemade substitute: http://meljoulwan.com/2014/03/01/substitute-soy-sauce-coconut-aminos/
For coconut oil, use extra-virgin olive oil, ghee, or another fat your prefer.
For coconut flakes, just omit them.