Steak and Asparagus with Blue Cheese Sauce

We travelled to England this weekend and stayed with friends, where we needed more than just strawberry salad to feed our hosts (Tristan likes to force everyone to eat what he eats).  With only five ingredients, turns out this meal is equally perfect to cook for friends when you're at someone else's place.

Ingredients:

90 g ribeye steak (cooked)

130 g asparagus (raw)

5 g butter

Blue cheese sauce:

40 g double cream

20 g blue cheese

20 g butter

Pan fry ribeye steak in butter over medium high heat for 3 minutes on each side for medium-doneness.  Ribeye was chosen for having a high fat content.  It is also readily available and cheap!  Make sure to weigh the portion after it is cooked.

Sauté asparagus in pan with butter over medium high heat until tender and lightly browned.

For sauce, combine double cream, blue cheese, and butter in a sauce pan and cook over medium low heat allowing the sauce to come to a simmer to thicken.

Pour blue cheese sauce over steak and asparagus and enjoy!

fat:  67.3 g, protein:  29.5 g, carb:  3 g

ratio:  2.1:1

Note: values will vary somewhat depending on the particular blue cheese used.  Make sure your blue cheese is .1 g carb or less per 100 g.

Strawberry and Goat's Cheese Spinach Salad

This salad is our go-to meal for eating out at a friend's house.  When someone invites us over to dinner, we offer to make them something at their place.  This salad works as a starter or main (after all, when we have it, it's our whole dinner!) and with a few tweaks, it is quite palatable to non-keto people as well.  'The acceptable face of keto' we call it.  Also, it is easy to put together in an unfamiliar kitchen with ingredients that are pretty easy to find.

Ingredients:

40 g baby spinach

25 g avocado

30 g strawberries

100 g Eroski goat's cheese

28 g olive oil

7 g red wine vinegar

2 drops stevia

Note on goat's cheese:  Make sure your goat's cheese is <0.1g per 100.  Besides Eroski's home brand, Capricorn goat's cheese (UK) is good (although you can't find the values on the outside of the package, trust me), and Trader Joe's (US) also carried some.

Cut the avocado, strawberries, and goat's cheese into thin slices and toss over your bed of baby spinach.

For the dressing, combine the olive oil, vinegar, and stevia and pour over your salad.  Adjust the olive oil as needed if you use a cheese with different values.

fat:  63.1 g, protein:  22.7 g, carb:  3 g

ratio:  2.5:1

Variations:

Toasted pecans are another lovely addition to this salad, and allow you to cut out a bit more olive oil or cheese.  Make sure you adjust down your carbs elsewhere, such as by going down to 35 g of spinach.

Blue cheese also works well on this salad if you can't find an appropriate goat's cheese (like in south Texas).  It's too strong for my tastes, but Tristan likes it even better!  Alternatively, we've even used brie on this salad in a pinch, which is much milder.

Bacon!  I tried it on a strawberry salad in Austin and became a believer, so if you need a bit more protein in your diet, sprinkle some on.  Like the pecans, most bacon has carbs, so adjust your spinach (or other carb) down a bit to compensate.

Texas Style Pimento Cheese

Apparently pimento cheese is a southern food, but to me, growing up in Texas, it was just food.  The family recipe, passed down from my Great Aunt Erma Lee, includes pickled jalapeños, which gives it a bit of a twist and tiny kick.  In this keto-version, I've left out the pimentos from which the name comes, and left in the pickled jalapeños which are quite low-carb. Tristan tells me that the Spanish word for pepper is 'pimiento' so I'd say it's still pimento cheese, even without the specific pimento/pimiento pepper from the name.

Pimento cheese is typically eaten with crackers or in a sandwich, so crackers, or rather 'flackers', are what I paired it with here.  The avocado just adds another yummy layer.

Ingredients:

25 g savory flackers

30 g avocado

Pimento Cheese:

56 g Boar's Head Canadian Cheddar

30 g Philadelphia cream cheese

30 g Hellman's mayo

7 g pickled jalapeño

3 g green onion

0.3 g garlic powder

Nothing too complicated here, just shred your cheese, chop up your green onion, and combine all your pimento cheese ingredients together in a bowl.

Divide the pimento cheese between your crackers and top with sliced pieces of avocado.  Enjoy!

fat:  66.1 g, protein:  22 g, carb:  3 g

ratio:  2.6:1

Variations:  

I realize that store-bought flackers are probably not available to everyone.  Tristan and I found these Dr. In the Kitchen brand 'flackers' at Wheatsville Co-op in Austin, Texas and decided to give them a try.  If you can get them, I would recommend them.  They score major points for convenience, and they are also quite tasty.  They use whole flaxseeds and are raw, and hopefully I will get a chance to try to recreate them myself.  If you can't get flackers, you can make your own flax crackers as well.  

This recipe for pimento cheese can also use different cheeses.  If you choose a different cheddar, make sure it is 0 carb, and aim for as much fat as possible.  It is also really delicious with smoked gouda.  I will try to post a smoked gouda + homemade crackers variation sometime soonish.

Keto Snack Pack

This is another non-recipe.  When you're on the road, the simpler the better.  We do a lot of hiking, so this is the lunch we pack for a day on the trails, but it works just as well for a day walking around a new city.

Ingredients:

70 g dubliner irish cheddar and/or dutch gouda

32 g macadamia nuts

32 g brazil nuts

This particular snack pack combination is especially good for a day of hiking because it's an even higher ratio than usual.  That extra fat comes in handy when you're exerting yourself!  You can also find even fattier cheese brands than what I've put in here at some grocery stores to really knock it out of the park. (Tristan especially likes Trader Joe's Double Cream Gouda.)

fat:  68.4 g, protein:  23.9 g, carb:  3 g

Ratio:  2.5:1

Variations:  We have also used green olives, pecans, and pork rinds in various snack packs, so try any combination you like.

Speaking of travel, don't forget to check out our keto travel network suggestion!

Broccoli Cheese Soup

Tristan and I are currently on the road (Kansas!), and I knew I needed to prepare food-wise for our 9 state road trip.  One of my ideas was pre-made soup which would be easy to reheat in motel room microwaves or over a campfire.  If you're traveling by car, freeze it solid, keep it on ice, and you're good to go!

In the early days of the diet, Tristan insisted that soup on its own could never be filling enough, but soup is the perfect keto meal, so he never stood a chance resisting.  He's definitely changed his mind about soup now!

Ingredients:

35 g chicken (thigh)

30 g broccoli (raw)

10 g green onion

30 g european butter

50 g cream (40%)

50 g cheddar

Start out by boiling skin-on, bone-in chicken thighs in a large stock pot until fully cooked.  The leftover water will be used in the soup.

In an adequately sized soup pot, add the broccoli, green onion, butter, cream, and enough of the chicken stock you created to steam the broccoli.  With the lid on, bring the liquid to a simmer and cook until the broccoli is tender.

While the broccoli cooks, remove the chicken meat from the bone to get 35 g.  It should fall easily off the bone.

Once the broccoli has cooked, add the chicken.  Using a blender, submersible or otherwise, blend everything until smooth.  

Add grated cheddar last, melting into the soup.  Note that I used dubliner irish cheddar which has 0 carbs.

Salt to taste.

Serving size will vary based on the amount of liquid you choose to add to thin out your soup.  The chicken stock will also vary based on the ratio of chicken meat to water you use, but it will contain a small amount of protein and fat which is consequently impossible to factor into the nutritional values.

fat:  65.4 g, protein:  24.2 g, carbs:  3 g

ratio: 2.4:1

This soup is really delicious freshly made.  The texture isn't quite as smooth after being frozen, but still tastes just as good.  After canning, well that's a whole new post ...