Introducing... Chubby Checkers ~ in delightful Pumpkin Spice! flavor :)

Okay, I admit it. I've been holding out on you. All the way back in October, I began working on a recipe for a sweet treat that is completely safe for SIBO and absolutely delicious! But I wanted to get the recipe as close to perfect as I could before I shared it with you.

I believe that day has come.

Anyone on a SIBO-specific diet knows one thing: there aren't a lot of legal treats involved. Back in my raw food days, a few Medjool dates with almond butter, some soft Turkish figs and raw cashews, or a row of organic dark chocolate after dinner were daily practice. Those days are gone, but not the desire for something sweet to delight the taste buds or finish a meal.

I call these delightful little treats Chubby Checkers. I suspect that they may be (*blushing*) my single greatest gift to the SIBO community. But of course that is for you to decide. 

Chubby Checkers are the Sexy Sibo version of a "fat bomb," essentially a carb-free, sugar-free candy containing mostly fat. Mine also contain some low-FODMAP protein powder for flavor and texture.

When it comes to low-FODMAP protein powder, there are just two choices: whey protein isolate or beef protein. (I know, gross. Just accept and move on.) Unfortunately pea protein, hemp protein, rice protein and other vegan protein powders contain FODMAPs, so we can't use them. It has to be beef protein or whey protein isolate. (Note: it's very important to use only whey protein ISOLATE, not whey protein concentrate, because only the isolate is lactose-free, and lactose is a FODMAP.)

The fat I use to make Chubby Checkers is raw, organic cacao butter—the best!

For protein powder, I've been using Pure Paleo from Designs for Health. Pure Paleo is created from something called Hydro-Beef and comes in Chocolate or Vanilla flavor. I've also used Vanilla Whey Protein Isolate from Bluebonnet, which is super high quality: cold processed, grass fed, the works. If you can't find Bluebonnet, it's fine to substitute with another whey protein isolate but read the label and, if the product is sweetened, make sure the sweeteners are strictly one of the following: stevia, erythritol or monkfruit (aka lo huan guo). No other natural sweetener is SIBO-safe.

If your protein powder is not sweetened, you can use one of the above sweeteners, or Lakanto. Crystallized sweeteners need to be ground up before adding to batter.

To create the "checker" shape you'll need a silicone mini-muffin mold, which you can buy online or someplace like Bed, Bath and Beyond for under ten bucks. If you don't have a silicone mini-muffin mold, you can still make this recipe using a shallow dish lined with waxed paper or parchment paper. When the candy hardens, just peel off the paper and cut or break the candy into pieces. I recommend you invest in a silicone mold, though. It makes a nice presentation and it's fun to use, especially when it's time to pop out the checkers!

Pop!

So far, I've got THREE yummy flavors of Chubby Checkers ready to share with you. But I wouldn't want to overwhelm. So today, I shall present to you just the latest: Pumpkin Spice!

Next up will be two different chocolate versions. I'll post a link from here to that page when it's up. Stay tuned! And enjoy. xo

Chubby Checkers - Pumpkin Spice!

This recipe makes 12 checkers.

Ingredients
2 oz raw cacao butter
1/3 cup Vanilla Pure Paleo powder
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1/2 tsp powdered ginger
generous pinch of Himalayan pink salt (about one third of a quarter tsp measure)

Directions
Chop cacao butter into chunks if it isn't already broken up, and melt it in a Pyrex or ceramic dish, on VERY low heat, in your oven or toaster oven. My toaster oven has a low setting of 150 degrees F. At that setting, the cacao butter takes about 20 minutes to melt.

Combine dry ingredients in a separate dish. When cacao butter is melted, remove from oven and let it cool down a bit. Then, stir in the dry powdered ingredients using a whisk or fork. When batter is smooth and fully mixed, use a spoon to distribute it evenly between the 12 cups of a silicone mini-muffin mold. Transfer mold to fridge and allow candy to harden—this takes about an hour, tops.

Pop Chubby Checkers out of the mold (super fun part!) and store in a covered container in the refrigerator. Recommended serving size: 2 checkers.

Pumpkin Spice! Chubby Checkers

Breakfast Sandwich Hack

One of the easiest SIBO restaurant hacks is what I call a deconstructed sandwich. In other words, please hold the bread. 

Usually we think of sandwiches for lunch, but the breakfast sandwich is a great bargain and often comes with a nice mix of cheese and veggies, too. 

This one featured fried egg, mushrooms, cheddar and arugula. Yum!

Potatoes on the side are not for SIBO beginners. I've been at this a while and can now handle a spud here and there. If you're just starting out, pass on the home fries, pay an extra buck and ask for greens instead. 

I got this deconstructed breakfast sandwich at a sweet little cafe called Bread and Butter in North Amherst, Mass. It was pretty delicious!

Note: I asked for an extra egg because I was extra hungry. Pricewise, you pay more for two eggs but breakfast sandwiches always cost less than Benedicts, omelettes or scrambles, so it evens out. :)

Hot Toddy - a classic winter warmer

Drinking cold beverages when it's cold outside is counterintuitive at best. Enter the hot toddy. I learned how to make this delicious, warming drink last December and all I can say is: What took me so long?

A hot toddy is basically warm, sweet lemon water plus whiskey. Whiskey is one of the SIBO-safe alcoholic beverages, along with most plain spirits and dry wine. (We need to avoid the higher carb drinks like sweet rum, brandy and beer.)

I like Jamieson's whiskey in this drink; it's mild, smooth and flavorful without being overpowering. I use erythritol to sweeten (in place of the traditional honey or sugar) to guarantee 100% SIBO safety.

To make 1 Hot Toddy you need:

1/2 fresh lemon 

3 whole cloves

1 teaspoon erythritol sweetener (Zero)

1 jigger of whiskey (1.5 oz)

about 1 cup boiling water

Directions: Put water on to boil. Cut a nice, round slice of lemon off the end of the lemon half and stud it with three cloves. Juice remaining lemon into a teacup. Add the studded lemon slice, along with the teaspoon of erythritol. 

When water boils, pour half of it over lemon juice/clove blend until tea cup is about half full, and allow to steep for a minute or so. Add the whiskey, then top off with more hot boiled water to fill cup. Stir and sip!

For a nice variation, make your toddy with hot ginger tea instead of plain hot water. If you're in a fancy mood, a cinnamon stick makes a nice garnish (and stirrer) too. Very yummy all ways. 

Veggie Soup with Rice (& Shrimp)

Once you know how to make your own chicken stock and bone broth, you can start making your own super delicious, gut-healing soup-based meals. You can even start living on these soups, like I do. What's not to like about wholesome, easy and reliable fare?

Here's my modus operandi:

Step 1. Start with the broth you've stored in fridge or freezer. Add SIBO-safe veggies like peeled zucchini or summer squash, mushrooms, bell peppers, baby spinach or Swiss chard, and green herbs like parsley. Simmer for 15-20 minutes or until the veggies are soft,  remembering to add in tender leafy greens only in the last few minutes of cooking. Voila! Veggie soup!

Step 2. Season to taste with herbs of choice, sea salt and black pepper. Or stir in some Thai red curry paste to make it fancy.

You can eat this soup as is, or add more substance and nutrition if you like. Try Jasmine rice & shrimp, like I did here, or get creative with your bad self. Any combination of Option A and Option B below is sure to please.

Option A. Add STARCH as 1/4 cup uncooked Jasmine Rice per serving and simmer for 20 minutes until done. This will soak up a lot of broth and create more of a stew feeling, as pictured here. (Note: I always cook just enough rice for one meal because after rice has cooled, it develops resistant starch, a leading cause of fermentation and gas symptoms. Fresh is best. Same goes for other starches like potatoes.)

Option B. Add PROTEIN as your choice of peeled frozen shrimp, organic eggs, sliced chicken or other meat. Feel free to use up any leftovers here, or start with uncooked animal protein and just simmer until done.

Option C. Add Jasmine rice and protein AT THE SAME TIME!!! (omg)

Step 3. When your soup is done, pour it into your bowl and top with finely chopped fresh cilantro, scallions or other green leafy herb to make it look and taste fresh and pretty. A squeeze of lemon or lime is nice, too.

That's it! Bon appetit!

White Chocolate Coconut Cups (Fat Bombs)

A year ago I would NEVER have made this recipe! I was eating a low fat, vegan, whole foods plant based diet—about as far away from a ketogenic, Paleo-inspired diet as you can get. The idea of eating a “fat bomb” would have made me laugh out loud, if not gag.

Then came SIBO.

Technically, these cute little treats are called “fat bombs”, not a pretty name. I prefer White Chocolate Coconut Cups. Doesn’t that sound nicer?

Backstory. I discovered fat bombs when scouting around online for a sweet treat that wouldn’t feed my archaea and aggravate my SIBO. The treat I was searching for needed to be grain-free, sugar-free and low in fermentable carbs.

Most of the fat bomb recipes I've come across are made with a base of coconut oil, which is fine, but I prefer to use cacao butter, which is the pure fat of the cacao bean.

Cacao butter is rock solid at room temperature but melts instantly upon contact with the human body.

It also tastes lovely, providing the aromatic essence of chocolate without any fiber or caffeine. Cacao butter is the key ingredient in so-called "white chocolate", hence the name of these adorable coconut cups.

In case you're wondering where to find Raw Cacao Butter, try The Raw Food World online, a super sweet family-run business. That's where I get mine.

As you can see, I use a fancy high tech kitchen scale (pictured at left) to weigh it out. Then, I melt it in the toaster oven on the lowest possible bake setting: 150 degrees Farenheit. You can also use a double boiler to melt cacao butter but please, don’t use a microwave. Microwaves alter the molecules in your food in unnatural, cancer-causing ways. (If you don't believe me, read this.)

By the way, if you don't have a kitchen scale, just chop up the cacao butter and measure it instead. 3 ounces equals about a half a cup chopped -->

According to my research, the purest fat bombs are made only with 2 main ingredients:

1) a fat (usually coconut oil)

2) a sugar-free, zero-carbohydrate sweetener such as stevia, erythritol or monkfruit.

Some recipes call for Sucralose/Splenda but I wouldn't touch that scariness with a 10-foot pole, let alone my lips. Not to be overdramatic, but really. Just, no.

For the sweetener in this recipe I used Golden Lakanto, a combination of monkfruit and erythritol. Lakanto, available in white or golden, is currently sold online only, as far as I can tell. The golden tastes quite nice—brown sugarish with no nasty aftertaste. It is kind of hard to get, though. If you can't find Lakanto, try organic erythritol, a pure sweet tasting, non-fermenting polyol (sugar alcohol) that's sold at Whole Foods under the somewhat unfortunate brand name "Zero." Zero erythritol is what I put in my tea these days. It's a white crystalline sweetener offering plain, slightly cool sweetness and is 100% SIBO-safe, as well as non-poisonous (e.g. sucralose, aspartame) and a little less pricey than Golden Lakanto. But I digress...

Anyhoo, here's a secret: I’ve been experimenting with making fat bombs for a while—adding whey protein isolate to make them chewy, spicing them up with cinnamon, ginger, vanilla extract and essential oils like lemon, orange and tangerine. But I haven’t shared any of those recipes because, to be honest, so far they haven’t been THAT great.

But...I got a little crazy yesterday and decided to make some über-fancy fat bombs with shredded coconut, pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds added. BE ADVISED: nuts and seeds are not recommended when you are first starting out on a SIBO-safe diet.

I avoided all nuts and seeds like the plague over the entire summer, i.e. for two or three months while I was on my strict ketogenic healing program, and I’m NOT planning on eating them regularly now. But for a treat, IF you can limit yourself to one or two AND you’re out of the woods with the bloating (very important point), you might like to give these babies a try. They really are pretty darn good!

White Chocolate Coconut Cups (Fat Bombs)

3 ounces raw cacao butter (about ½ cup roughly chopped, 1/3 cup melted)

1 teaspoon coconut oil

3 teaspoons Lakanto or erythritol (Zero)

½ cup shredded coconut

¼ cup each raw pumpkin seeds & raw sunflower seeds

¼ teaspoon sea salt or Himalayan pink salt (my fave)

DIRECTIONS: Melt cacao butter in a low oven or double boiler. Stir in coconut oil and Lakanto. Add shredded coconut, pumpkin & sunflower seeds, and salt. Mix well. 

Divide mixture evenly into the 12 cups of a silicone mini muffin cup mold, or if you don’t have one of these (I just got mine at Bed Bath and Beyond—it’s awesome!), turn the mixture onto a sheet of wax paper, shape it into a log and roll it up. Refrigerate or freeze for 20 minutes to harden. If you did the log method, slice into 12 circles, or as desired. The mini muffin mold cups just pop right out!

Variation: Replace the coconut, pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds with about ½ cup of whey protein isolate or Pure Paleo protein powder, vanilla or chocolate flavor.  This is a good option for people on Phase 1 of SIBO-safe diet. Note: The exact amount you need to add will vary depending on the consistency of your powder. Just start stirring it in one tablespoon at a time until the mixture starts to thicken up enough to divide into the mini muffin cups or roll into a log. Then, chill as above and enjoy. :)

Sexy Sibo White Chocolate Coconut Cups (aka Fat Bombs!)

Breakfast of Champignons

What I really wanted this rainy Saturday morning was a muffin. A whole grainy Morning Glory muffin packed with raisins, walnuts and grated carrots and zucchini. The kind I used to love before I learned that grains were not my friend.

I knew where to get one, too. In fact, I was THIS close to getting in my car, 2nd Street Bakery bound, when...

I got saved. What saved me were two things. 1) The honest knowledge, based on experience, of how crappy I'd feel for the rest of the day (if not longer) if I introduced wheat into my body for breakfast. And 2) the knowledge that I could make myself a delicious, savory breakfast WAY more satisfying and digestible than some dumb old muffin with its sweet secret promises of pain and noisy farts to come. 

I had everything in the fridge for a veggie and cheese omelet. I made it, I ate it, I enjoyed it and my belly feels like a million bucks. Full, but functional. Going out for the whole day now and I won't be hungry till dinner. Feel like a champ. Mind over matter rocks. 

Mushrooms rock, too. Surprisingly nutritious and immune enhancing. Perfect for fall. Beats a flu shot any day.

What's in my bowl:

Portobello Mushroom & Cheddar Omelet

(made with 2 local pastured Eggs, Raw Goat Cheddar, Portobello Mushroom, Orange Bell Peppers, Roasted Garlic & Chard)

Organic Wild Mushroom Chicken Sausage

Avocado garnish. Yum. 

Romaine-inspired Tuna Boats

Often, the hardest thing to wrap your mind around when starting a SIBO-safe diet is the “no bread” conundrum. Gluten or not, bread shows up often (if not in every, single meal) for much of the population. What in the world could possibly take its place?

Enter Romaine, one of my top bread replacements. True, all large-leafed green leafy vegetables can be used to wrap, layer or stuff toppings into and on. Swiss chard and collard greens are two others that come to mind. But as far as I’m concerned, Romaine rules.

Romaine lettuce is crisp and juicy, with just the right hint of saltiness and a trace of sweet. It enhances the experience of any sandwich made with bread, and as a stand-alone, is a perfect foil for fillings of all ilk. Romaine is also incredibly easy to digest, especially when compared to leafy greens in the Brassica family such as kale (watch out!) or even collards.

Think Romaine in place of sushi wrapper, taco shell or tortilla and proceed as usual. Or, if you’re eating nut butters, try this: spread a tablespoon of almond butter, peanut butter or tahini down the soft centerline of a fresh romaine leaf. Drizzle with honey, fold the sides over to make a packet and then munch. You’re in for a sweet surprise!

The photos on this page showcase Romaine lettuce in action today, playing the role of Boat in a quintessential summer luncheon favorite: Tuna Boats. (The term “tuna” is used loosely here: these green boats are actually stuffed with salmon salad, made with natural mayonnaise, lemon juice, parsley, scallions and dill.) Just use your favorite tuna (or salmon) salad recipe and you’re in business.

Note: Even though it’s not bad enough for the Dirty Dozen, always buy organic Romaine. Lettuce is one of the most heavily sprayed vegetables in the supermarket. Bon appetit!

Tuna Boats with Timi Hendrix, world's sweetest lunch buddy.