Originally posted in March 2016.

 

The good news about my diet is that I can eat meat and protein.  The bad news is that red meat has started bothering my belly.  So my meat/protein mostly consists of chicken, fish, and tofu.

I’ve tried a million recipes to make those food more interesting.  Chicken is fine, but it gets boring after a while.  Salmon is great, but how much can you eat it before you want a different flavor profile?

Here is my good, bad, and ugly list for dinners that are Whole 30 compliant.  If I have the recipe, I will link it.

The Ugly –

Zuchhini and Tomato Lasgna – Vegan – Well, I wanted this to be good, but it wasn’t.  I can’t even come up with a reason why. It just didn’t work.

Spinach Cilantro Meatballs – This is probably my fault.  I used bison. But that should have worked.  It didn’t. And since I had 40 meatballs, I had leftovers for weeks.

The Bad – 

Not really.  The Ugly was the Bad.  It just sounded good. This category is going to be my mediocre category.

The Meh – 

Lettuce cups – I have these all the time. They’re pretty easy, you can vary the vegetables, or the meat, and they’re quick.  But they are meh.  Not great, not bad, just food.

Cajun Cod – this recipe is from The Gut Balance Revolution book. You might be able to find it in Amazon if you do an Inside This Book search.   I like cod.  I like asparagus, celery, and red peppers.  I just don’t think it goes together or works. Again, all of the ingredients taste fine. It’s just rather boring.

Shiritaki noodles – These almost made my Good list.  The thing is…when you can’t eat noodles at all and you love noodles, you dream about noodles, you want to swim in noodles (I love noodles), a noodle substitute is pretty darn good. But really, it isn’t.  It’s just better than no noodles at all.  If you don’t know what shiritaki noodles are, they are made out of tofu and come in a brine.  You need to put them in a colander and rinse the heck out of them or they will smell something awful.  Then you can add pasta sauce or tomatoes and “pretend” that you are ingesting the Italian food that you dream about.

The Good – 

Rainbow Pad Thai – So I mostly follow this recipe.  But I don’t like my vegetables raw, so I warm them up in a pan. And I add marinated tofu.  This meal is delicious and beautiful.  I eat it at least once every other week.

Zoodles – I am a huge fan of zoodles…you know…zucchini noodles??  If you don’t, you definitely need to.  Here is a link to 28 zoodle recipes. Some are better than others, but zoodles hit that spot for me.  I like them with basil pesto, with tomato sauce, and with bacon.  Get a good spiralizer and a good cutting glove. Spiralizers are sharp and I try to get every last inch out of my zucchini. So I have cut myself a time or two (until I bought these.)

Green Curry Salmon – I used red curry paste because that is the color I prefer. This was a delicious meal. Not hot enough.  But I couldn’t add sriracha since it has sugar.  Next time I will add more chiles or chili powder.

My absolute favorite – Thai Chicken – isn’t loading on Pinterest. That would scare me, but I have the recipe printed and in a folder so I am not afraid. However, you should be. This is probably the thing that I have liked the most. It isn’t the prettiest, but it is definitely the most flavorful.  Put this is a lettuce wrap or get crazy and make coconut flour taco shells.  Boom!

And the best thing about finding good dinner recipes….the leftovers are tomorrow’s lunch.  Happy eating!