An easy way to start eating primal/paleo
Do you ever wonder how easy or difficult it is to make the switch and start eating healthier? Does eating paleo or primal entail buying a whole set of new cookbooks or recipes to download? Not at all. Of course, there are many paleo/primal websites now that can help you discover the advantages of ancestral eating, such as Mark’s Daily Apple. But know that you can also simply start by picking your favorite recipes and change a few things only to make these recipes paleo/primal-friendly. The recipe below is an Italian meatball recipe that I have been making for more than two decades. And as I am now eating primal/paleo, I keep making it by just tweaking a few things.
How to change an old family recipe into a paleo-friendly goodness
So my original meatball recipe calls for:
- 3 lb ground round
- 1 lb bulk sausage
- 1 handful of parsley
- ¼-½ lb parmesan cheese
- 1 big chopped onion
- ½ cup bread crumbs
- 2 eggs
- I tablespoon of salt
- Pepper
Now to make this recipe primal/paleo-friendly, first I want to make sure that the meat is well-sourced (How to Source Beef has different links to websites you can purchase your meat from). The parsley has to be organic. The cheese becomes optional, but if you still want to add some cheese, it has to be well-sourced too, from a local farm or sites like US Wellness Meats. The onion can be organic or not, it doesn’t matter as much for onions, as mentioned in What to Buy Organic. Instead of using bread crumbs, I add ½ cup of a paleo nut flour blend that works just as well. The eggs have to be well-sourced (no eggs from CAFO chickens). Celtic or Himalayan salts work best, along with freshly ground organic pepper. So now we have:
- 3 lb well-sourced ground round
- 1 lb well-sourced bulk sausage
- 1 handful of organic parsley
- ¼-½ lb well-sourced cheese
- 1 big chopped onion (organic or not)
- ½ cup paleo nut flour blend
- 2 well-sourced eggs
- 1 tablespoon Celtic or Himalayan salt
- Freshly ground organic pepper
Mix all the ingredients together and shape meatballs out of the mixture. Next, you add the meatballs to your favorite organic paleo-friendly tomato sauce and let simmer 3 to 4 hours. The tomato sauce can be made from scratch of course, or if you are in a rush, there are different paleo-friendly options too at Thrive Market, for instance.
In summary
Remember that taking it one step at a time is probably the best approach for most to make any change long-lasting, as mentioned in a previous post: What foods to Get Rid of First. With that in mind, picking an old favorite recipe and changing just a few things to make it a healthy ancestral option is an awesome incentive. It is a small step that can make you feel good about how effortlessly you can eat better in no time!
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