Yeast Free Living

Archive for the ‘Entrees’ Category

I realize many people may skip right by this post but I felt that I had an obligation to post it.  I absolutely love liver but I do acknowledge that there are many people out there that hardly feel the same way.  My household is pretty much split down the middle on the liver issue.  I do not buy liver much but occasionally I will notice it in the supermarket and feel compelled to buy some and cook it.  By the way liver is candida diet approved. 

My mom used to make really good liver and onions but she fried it in Crisco and would always serve her liver with white rice of course.  I wanted to see if I could create a yeast free version of my mom’s liver.  My candida diet substitutions  included serving the liver with brown rice instead of white and using gluten free flour to coat the liver and to make the gravy.  Additionally, I used olive oil instead of Crisco.  In the end I realized that I did not have to do much to make this a candida diet friendly meal.  It was pretty tasty and very easy to prepare.  The anti-liver folks in the house still did not eat it but the pro-liver folks really enjoyed it.  While this is not a meal likely to make it to our weekly candida diet menu mostly because I hate preparing more than one dinner, I am glad to have a recipe for a candida diet version of a meal that I adore. 

Yeast Free Baked Liver and Onions Ingredients
1 1/2 pounds beef liver, sliced
1/2 cup olive oil
1 large onion, sliced
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon paprika
2/3 cups brown rice flour (can use any gluten free flour or gluten free flour mix)

Yeast Free Baked Liver and Onions Directions
Mix brown rice flour and spices in a bowl
Coat beef liver in flour mixture by dipping a few pieces at a time
Put aside coated beef liver when all pieces are coated  
In large baking dish put olive oil
Next place coated beef liver pieces
Add sliced onion
Cook at 375F for approximately 30 – 40 minutes or until beef liver is cooked all the way through but not burnt
To make gravy
Add 1 1/2 cup water to cooked beef liver
Slowly add 1 1/2 Tablespoons of brown rice flour to while mixing

My kids love salmon.  It is actually a favorite at our house and it is so unbelievably easy to cook.  I keep my salmon rather plain always baking it with a little olive oil and seasoning it with sea salt and ground black pepper.  I wanted to see if I could create a more flavorful salmon dish that was still of course candida diet friendly.  Fish is a great choice for the candida diet as it has zero carbohydrates and is packed with protein.  There is also numerous research documenting the health benefits of that one can derive from the consumption of fish.  I have to admit that I do worry about consuming excessive amounts of fish due to all the talk about high mercury levels.  I think that certain types of fish are worse than others but I try not to eat fish more than 2 – 3 times a week. 

Is it just me or does it seem like everything is bad for you in one way or another?   It makes it extremely difficult to purchase food and create meals that you feel confident are healthy for your family.  This also proves to be a complete pain when trying to follow the candida diet, as there are already so many foods and ingredients that you must eliminate from your diet and now you have to worry about not eating fish too many times a week.  Since fish is allowed on the candida diet it would be great if we could eat it liberally without any worries but that is just not our reality.  So I guess I will just enjoy it in moderation.  I have heard that choosing the wild caught salmon over the farm raised is better for you but it is a lot more expensive.  I do usually spring for the wild caught. 

Well, I did find a Baked Salmon Recipe on All Recipes and it definitely helped me to jazz up our salmon a bit.  This recipe uses a nice blend of seasoning and spices and is great served over brown rice and with any vegetable.   

Yeast Free Baked Salmon Ingredients
3 cloves garlic minced
1/4 cup olive oil
1 tablespoon fresh basil
1 tablespoon fresh parsley
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
4 – 4 ounce individually wrapped salmon fillets or 1 pound salmon fillet 

Yeast Free Baked Salmon Directions
In a medium glass baking dish combine garlic, olive oil, basil, sea salt, ground black pepper, lemon juice and parsley
Mix ingredients together thoroughly
Add salmon to the seasoning mixture and spread seasoning mixture over the salmon
Cover baking dish and place in the refrigerator to marinate for about 30 minutes
Preheat oven to 375 degrees fahrenheit
Remove dish from refrigerator and remove cover 
Cover the dish with aluminum foil and place in the oven
Cook until easily flaked with fork.  Salmon cooks quickly so be sure not to overcook

Recipe adapted from Baked Salmon II Recipe on All Recipes.

 
Wendy’s Chili is something that I have relied on heavily when a quick and/or cheap lunch is needed.  It tastes really good and the small size used to be only $1.  I would always get the chili with a plain baked potato and this was very filling and convenient.  I never really bothered to find out what was in the chili and if was it okay for the candida diet.  To be honest I just didn’t want to know and was just hoping that it was somewhat candida diet friendly.  Wendy’s always boast about being the healthiest fast food out there so it has to be okay, I thought to myself.  Last week I finally decided to take a look at the ingredients in the chili on the Wendy’s Website.  Well I have been thrust out of my denial that Wendy’s Chili is somewhat candida diet friendly.  There are a few problems with this chili for candida diet sufferers.  Some of the ingredients that may pose problems are citric acid, sugar, salt, dextrose and corn syrup. 

Well now that I finally confirmed that Wendy’s Chili is off limits I of course need to replace it with a homemade version.  Chili seems like a great thing to freeze and reheat so this will definitely help me when I am starved for time.  I Googled Wendy’s Chili Recipes and found one on Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur.  The recipe is very simple to throw together and can be done on the stovetop or in the crock pot.  This recipe also yields 12 servings so there is plenty of leftovers to freeze.  I made this chili with ground turkey meat instead of beef because of a food allergy in my house so it did taste a bit different than Wendy’s ground beef version but it was still really good.       

Wendy’s Chili – Candida Diet Recipe Ingredients
2 pounds ground beef (I used ground turkey due to a beef allergy)
one 29-ounce can tomato sauce (I used Pomi Strained Tomatoes which contains no citric acid)
one 29-ounce can kidney beans (with liquid)
one 29-ounce can pinto beans (with liquid)
1 cup diced onion (1 medium onion)
1/2 cup diced green chili (2 chilies)
1/4 cup diced celery (1 stalk)
3 medium tomatoes, chopped
2 teaspoons cumin powder
3 tablespoons chili powder
1 1/2 teaspoons black pepper
2 teaspoons sea salt
2 cups water

Wendy’s Chili – Candida Diet Recipe Ingredients
Brown the ground beef (or other ground meat) in a skillet over medium heat
Drain off grease
In a large pot combine all ingredients
Stir ingredients together so they are well mixed
Bring to a simmer over low heat
Cook for 2 – 3 hours stirring once every 15 minutes
In crock pot combine all ingredients and set as follows- Low Cook Time 5 – 7 hours; High Cook Time 3 – 5 hours

Wendy’s Chili Recipe from Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur

Homemade beef stew can be such a healthy comfort food.  Provided that all the potatoes and carrots don’t end up in your bowl at one sitting it can also be a great candida diet .  There are as many beef stew recipes as there are people who cook it so creating a yeast free version of beef stew becomes  more a matter of taste than anything else.  I adapted the following recipe from my Salad Master Cookbook.  This is actually the first beef stew recipe that I ever tried and it has been quite a success in my house.  It is more of a tomato based version of beef stew so if this is not the taste you are going for you may not want to use this recipe.   If you do try this yeast free beef stew it will be sure to satisfy your hunger.  This recipe yields 10 servings so freeze leftovers in small portions and reheat later for convenient yeast free meals. 

Yeast Free Beef Stew Ingredients
1 tablespoon olive oil
6 medium potatoes peeled and sliced
3 medium carrots sliced
2 pound ground beef cubed
8 cups water
2 cups tomato sauce (I use Pomi Strained Tomatoes which do not contain citric acid)
3 ribs celery sliced
1 large onion Chopped
2/3 cups tomato paste
6 cloves garlic minced
1 1/2 teaspoons fresh basil chopped
1 1/2  teaspoons fresh oregano chopped
1 1/2 teaspoons fresh thyme

Yeast Free Beef Stew Directions
Heat olive oil in large pot
Add beef and brown on all sides
Stir in medium onion
Cook while continuously stirring about 3 minutes
Add water, scraping browned meat particles from the pan
Stir in tomato sauce
Cover and cook over low heat for 1 hour
Stir in celery, onion, potatoes, carrots, tomato paste, garlic, basil, oregano and thyme
Cover and keep on low heat for about 1 hour or until vegetables are tender

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I remember the first time that I made this dish a few months back.  I was extremely proud of myself for trying something that seem so new and adventures.  The ingredient that made the recipe seem so exoctic was snow peas.  I couldn’t remember ever preparing snow peas before and  I actually had to find a picture of them just to make sure I could identify them in the supermarket.   To my pleasant suprise the meal was very easy to prepare and oh so tasty!  

While preparing this again recently I thought to myself that  posting this recipe with some information about snow peas may be helpful to some.   Being unfamilar with an ingredient in a recipe may give the recipe the appearance of being too complicted but I assure you that this meal was a piece of cake to prepare.  I found a good post on Kathy Maister’s startcooking.com about snow peas and how to prepare them.   This is truly a great recipe, actually one of my favorite in the Candida Contol Cookbook  by Gail Burton.  I hope that you enjoy it as much as I do. 

 Shrimp and Brown Rice Ingredients – 4 Servings
1 cup brown rice (128 grams carbs)
2 1/4 cups water (0 grams carbohydrates)
17 1/2 ounces unsweetened chicken broth (4.5 grams carbohydrates)
2 tablespoons olive oil (0 grams carbohydrates)
1/2 pound fresh snow peas (22 grams carbohydrates)
1 mediume red bell pepper, thinly sliced (5 grams carbohydrates)  
1 tablespoon fresh basil (4 grams carbohydrates)
1 tablespoon fresh oregano (4 grams carbohydrates)
1 teaspoon garlic powder (2 grams carbohydrates)
3/4 pound cooked bay shrimp rinsed (0 grams carbohydrates)    
Total Carbohydrates 169.5 grams (42.4 per serving) 

Shrimp and Brown Rice Directions
Combine chicken, broth, water and rice in large pan. 
Simmer rice for about 1 hour until rice is tender and all liquid is absorbed. 
In seperate pan heat oil, add vegetables, herbs and seasonings. Saute until tender. 
Add shrimp, stir for a few minutes.  Combine shrimp and vegetables with rice in a casserole dish. 

Recipe from the Candida Contol Cookbook by Gail Burton

 I started making stir fry several years ago and it is one of the few meals that I did not need to give up when embarking on the candida diet .  Stir fry is a meal that I never really minded cooking even when I was deep in my processed food rut.  Stir fry is quick and easy to cook and it requires very little effort and cooking skill to make a good stir fry.  It is also a very good choice for the candida diet because it is a medley of meat and vegetables which are the best choices for a yeast free lifestyle.  

This is a very basic stir fry recipe.  I like the taste and flavor that garlic so I use a lot of it but you may want to use less according to your taste.  Coincidentally garlic is also really good for the candida diet because it is a natural anti-fungal which helps to kill yeast.  To make preparing this meal even easier I use a frozen bell pepper and onion mix.  These mixes are usually easily found in the frozen food section of the supermarket.  You can of course use fresh bell peppers and onions instead but most of the time I rather not chop if I do not absolutely have to.   This dish goes great with plain brown rice but other side dishes to think about are baked or mashed potatoes.  I have also enjoyed this stir fry without any starch and have just steamed some broccoli as a side dish which is a great choice for candida dieters as we must watch are carbohydrate intake.  I hope that you enjoy my very simple yeast free beef stir fry recipe. 

Yeast Free Beef Stir Fry Ingredients
3/4 lb of beef strips for stir frying
1 tablespoon olive oil  
1 bag (16 ounces) frozen bell peppers and onion mix
5 cloves garlic chopped
1 cup water
1 tablespoon lemon juice
Sea salt and ground black pepper to taste

Yeast Free Beef Stir Fry Directions
In large skillet heat oil and add beef
Saute beef until meat is completely browned
Add garlic and frozen peppers and onion mix
Cook for about 2 – 3 minutes stirring frequently
Add water, sea salt and pepper and stir
Set at medium heat and cover 
Cook until vegetables are tender