I’ve jumped on the bandwagon — I’m doing Whole30.
It’s actually not that big of a leap. I’ve been eating more or less paleo since March (OK… on and off… but mostly), so cutting out those last few things hasn’t been too tough.
That said, the first reaction I usually get is: “But you live in France! The bread! The cheese! The wine!”
Yes, yes, I know. But that’s not the worst of it.
I haven’t said too much about it yet, but my Little Sister is back in Paris, living with us while she goes to the Sorbonne to learn business French. And while I’ve been living in France for ten years now (as of Monday), I can go without cheese and bread and wine as easily as Americans can go without Oreos and KFC and pizza. (See, you know I’m foreign when I’m stereotyping American food. [I don’t really think Americans eat like that.])
But I digress. Since Little Sister and I are in this together, we’ve been cooking together. We’ve been making lots of yummy things in the evenings like roast pork and pumpkin soup and salmon with lemon and potatoes, but at lunch, we usually just throw together a huge salad. Here are some of the stars from the past two weeks, all seasoned simply with extra-virgin olive oil, unpasteurized cider vinegar, salt, and pepper.
Arugula, red cabbage, avocado, tuna, hard-boiled eggs.
Brussels sprouts, pomegranate seeds, shallots.
Kale, savoy cabbage, beets, green onion, (slightly undercooked) hard-boiled eggs, parsley, cilantro.
Mâche, arugula, parsley, cilantro, avocado, tomato, seared bavette, green apple.
Kale, red cabbage, supremed orange slices, lime juice, sesame paste, avocado, hard-boiled eggs. (No vinegar and oil in this one.)
Kale, cooked beets, raw shredded beets, apple, green onion, mushroom, mâche, arugula.
And finally, this super yummy recipe from Well-Fed Weeknights with steak, orange, cilantro, red onion, and a fig-pistachio dressing that was so good I licked the pot. Seriously.
While Little Sister has marked the day she can eat croissants and baguette on her calendar (and no, that ain’t hyperbole), I think I could get used to this.