Keto Challenge Week 2 - Monday to Wednesday

The keto challenge continues this week with lots of delicious recipes!

Before diving into this week's menu, I want to remind you of a few important points to succeed in your challenge. When you eat keto, that means you have to:

• consume between 70 to 75% fat, 20 to 25% protein and 5% carbohydrates at each meal;

• remember that sauces sold on the market are very often very high in carbohydrates, but hot sauces are generally great for this diet;

• know that when the body falls into ketosis, it will need more water and sodium (between 3000 to 5000 mg/day) and that there is then no stress to have regarding the addition of cold cuts and delicious spices in meals ☺️;

• walk 30 minutes (2 x 15 or 3 x 10 minutes) per day, i.e. take about 10,000 steps (this is very important!).

Also, I would like to take this opportunity to inform you that in my menu, the quantities are always for one person (or four, when it is a recipe to share).

Monday

Morning : like last week, we fast or help ourselves to something to drink and/or eat.

For the beverage, opt for a glass of warm/hot water mixed with ½ squeezed lemon, then a "fat" tea or coffee. If you don't consume caffeine, you can simply have nothing. You can also consume the ultimate alternative, which is beef bone broth to which you add salt or California spices and Explorer (both from BBQ Québec).

As for the meal, we go with 2- 3 eggs sprinkled with Texas BBQ Quebec spices plus a meat (which does not have to be bacon; 50 g of semi-lean ground beef is perfect) sprinkled with L'aube BBQ Québec X La ferme Monette spices and a whole avocado. In this meal, the eggs and avocado alone account for the 70-75% fat, 20-25% protein, and 5% carbs we're looking for, but you can add hot sauce to your meal for an additional 1g or less carbs. 😋 Note: These are the lunch options I'll be offering throughout the week.

Noon : we eat the leftover spaghetti from the day before.

Evening : we prepare a good beef and pancetta tartare!

Ingredients :

• 1 beef flank steak or Boston steak.

• 50g sliced ​​pancetta or bacon (this will become the “croutons” of the dish)

• 5 green olives

• 1 egg

• ½ avocado

• 3 to 4 tbsp grated cheese (Parmesan is great, as is sharp cheddar or any other funky, firm cheese)

• 1 to 2 tbsp mayonnaise (ideally made with MCT or avocado oil)

• 1 tbsp olive oil

• 1 tbsp sun-dried tomatoes

• 1 tsp balsamic vinegar

• 1 tbsp capers, chopped

• 1 tsp California BBQ Quebec spices

Preparation :

1. We start by grilling the piece of beef directly in the fire for about 1 minute 30 seconds on both sides.

2. Then remove it from the heat and let it cool... a few minutes on the BBQ shelf in winter or in the freezer in summer should be enough. :)

3. Then cut the piece of meat into small pieces and place them in a bowl.

4. Next, we cook the pancetta pieces in a small basket to give a certain "crispness" (I made that word up) to the tartare. (Remember, we need 70-75% fat, 20-25% protein and 5% carbohydrates in our meal, so we use the pancetta to increase the amount of fat in the dish.) If you don't have a grilling basket or prefer not to use one, that's okay; you'll have a recipe more like "stuffed buns".

5. Once it's cooked (or not), add the pancetta to the bowl containing the pieces of beef.

Add all the other ingredients to the bowl, mix everything together and… voilà, it’s ready!

For dessert, we treat ourselves with my “fat bomb” recipe, not for the faint-hearted!

Ingredients :

• 10 Brazil nuts, unsalted

• 10 raw pecans, halved

• 60 g cocoa butter

• 2 tbsp (15 ml) organic coconut TMC oil

• 35g grass-fed butter or ghee, melted

• 2 tsp Lakanto Golden Sweetener with Monk Fruit

• 70 g of 100% cocoa dark chocolate

• 1 tbsp Swerve Brown Sugar Sweetener

• 1 tsp Himalayan or Hawaiian salt

• 1 tsp (or more or less; to taste) vanilla extract

Preparation :

1. In a bowl, mix a little grass-fed butter with the vanilla.

2. The pecans are lightly soaked in the mixture and once they are soaked in the mixture, they are sprinkled with Himalayan salt and a small amount of sweetener (with monk fruit and brown sugar).

3. Place them in a grill basket with the Brazil nuts and grill for 2 to 3 minutes, making sure to shake the basket every 30 seconds so the nuts don't stick together.

4. After the nuts have cooled, chop them with a knife until you get the texture you like.

5. In a separate bowl, melt the chocolate with the cocoa butter, TMC oil and the remaining grass-fed butter and sweeteners.

6. Mix everything together and when the texture is homogeneous, add the chopped nuts.

7. Mix one last time, then pour the dough into small muffin molds (you can put as many as you want).

8. Finally, place the molds in the freezer and let the muffins cool for at least 1 hour before tasting them (you can still taste a muffin after 15 minutes without any problem, I won't tell ;)).

Bon appetit, friends!

Tuesday

Morning : we fast or we repeat the recipe for lunch from the day before.

Lunch : enjoy a stuffed “meatloaf” made with cooked tartare. It’s not complicated to make (you can even make it ahead of time and prepare it on Monday at the same time as the meal): take the tartare from the day before, add lots of cheese and put it on the BBQ. You can eat it as is, wrap the mixture in a romaine lettuce leaf or place it on Konjac rice (a 100% natural “rice” with no carbohydrates… it smells a little weird when you open the bag, but it’s good).

Evening (enough meal for 2 adults and 2 children and/or 1 lunch): For dinner, we prepare a good chicken Caesar salad!

This video is from 2013, but I was already a pioneer! At the end of the video, I invent the famous "lettuce wrap" from A&W, hahaha! Joking aside, the video shows the basics to know for this recipe. The differences are that this time, we replace the croutons with pancetta or bacon slices (in the case of the first option, we cook the pancetta on the BBQ at 300 °F for 6 to 7 minutes, then in the second case, we cook the bacon in indirect cooking so that it is perfectly crispy) and that we substitute the sunflower seeds with hemp seeds or thinly sliced ​​almonds.

To cook this recipe, you need:

• 2 or 3 chicken breasts

• 1 iceberg lettuce

• 6 to 8 thick slices of bacon

• 1 block of halloumi

• 1 avocado

• ½ or 1 tomato, sliced

• Hemp seeds, to taste

• Avocado oil

• BBQ Explorer Quebec spices, to taste

• California BBQ Quebec spices , to taste

• Montreal BBQ Quebec spices , to taste

Preparation :

1. We start by digging a hole in the salad to transform it into a “bowl”.

2. Then, season the bacon with Montreal spices and the chicken with Explorer and Montreal or California spices (depending on the flavor profile you prefer) and place the meats on the BBQ.

3. While the meats are cooking, also grill the whole avocado (with its peel) for 2 to 3 minutes on each side.

4. When cooked, let the bacon, chicken and avocado cool a little, then slice them into pieces.

5. On another work surface, drizzle the halloumi with avocado oil and season with California spices.

6. Make sure the BBQ is on medium-high heat, then grill the halloumi for 1 to 2 minutes on each side.

7. Once the cheese is ready, we cut it into slices.

8. Then garnish the salad with pieces of chicken, bacon, halloumi, avocado, tomatoes and hemp seeds and put it on the BBQ as in the video .

9. Once its leaves are well grilled, we take it out of the BBQ, cut it and serve it with vinaigrette.

For the dressing: mix 2 tbsp mayonnaise with 2 tsp olive oil and spices of your choice (I use Explorer and Tex-Max spices), then… BANG! You have a great dressing!

Wednesday

Wednesday is a special day this week because I am lucky enough to welcome Pénélope Villeneuve, a naturopath specializing in ketogenic diets, to my evening Facebook live .

Morning : we fast or we redo the recipe for Monday's lunch.

Lunch : we make a cheese wrap with "Caesar chicken". You can guess from its name; we take the leftovers from Tuesday night, we wrap them with slices of mozzarella cheese (to create the wrap), we add a little spicy mayo (mayonnaise mixed with Tex-Max spices for example ;)) and there we go!

Evening : we cook a “BBQ bowl”.

Ingredients :

• 200 g ground beef

• 100 g button mushrooms (or to taste)

• ¼ tomato, diced

• 1 avocado

• Lime juice, to taste

• Coriander, chopped, to taste

• Ghost Sauce DAMN!, to taste

• 1 to 2 cups broccoli (or to taste), in florets

• 1 to 2 stalks celery, sliced

• 60 g grated Tex-Mex or cheddar cheese

• 2 to 3 tbsp butter, ghee, beef fat or duck fat

• Quebec BBQ Explorer Spices, to taste

• California BBQ Quebec spices, to taste

• Tex-Max BBQ Quebec spices , to taste

• Butter, to taste

Before I tell you the steps, I have to admit that to take the pictures, I made this recipe not on the BBQ, but directly in my new Camp Chef cast iron skillet ! It was IN-CREDIBLE! I I didn't think I was "betraying" my BBQ, but to try it properly, I had to dedicate my attention to it and not be distracted by what was around me... So now that I've confessed, I tell you the steps to take!

The recipe is very simple.

1. Start by sprinkling the ground beef with Tex-Max spices, then form 20 to 30 gram balls each (the salt in the spices makes the meat "stick" more easily to itself when handled and the balls hold together well). Set them aside and get the pan.

2. Put butter in the pan, add the celery pieces and sauté for 1 minute.

3. Once that's done, add the mushrooms to the pan, sprinkle the vegetables with Explorer spices and mix everything together.

4. When the mushrooms are golden brown, add the broccoli to the pan and stir the vegetables for 1 to 2 minutes so that the broccoli becomes hot and crispy.

5. Remove the vegetables from the pan and keep them warm, ideally.

6. Add more butter to the pan and this time reduce the heat to medium-low (you should know that the cast iron pan retains heat and we will need less later) and cook the meatballs for 1 to 3 minutes on each side.

7. Once the meatballs are cooked evenly, add the vegetables back into the pan and cook for 5 minutes, making sure to stir the mixture every minute so that the flavors meld well. Oh! Add butter on top of that too. :)

To accompany the dish, we make homemade guacamole.

1. Take the avocado, cut it in half, spread the butter on it, then pour the lime juice and Ghost sauce on it.

2. Place the avocado halves, skin side down, on the BBQ and grill for 3 to 5 minutes at a temperature between 300 and 400°F.

3. We peel them and put their flesh in a bowl.

4. Add the tomatoes and coriander to the bowl, then pound and mix until you get a smooth texture.

5. We serve the guacamole with the meatballs and enjoy it all!