One of the most common excuses I hear for not eating Primal is “I don’t have time”.
Well I have news for you – That’s just an excuse! There are loads of Primal meals that can easily be prepared in 10 minutes or less. Grass Fed beef steak with spinach leaves and olives? If you like your steak blue like me, that can be done in 1 minute – Talk about fast food!
That said, there are plenty of tasty meals that do take a little longer to prepare. How can you enjoy these foods, but without spending all your time slaving in the kitchen?
The trick is, to create your own little Primal Food Factory, spend a couple of hours per month, and you can prepare enough meals to last you one month!
Not only is this method more time efficient, its more energy efficient too. Double win.
Here’s an example of one of my Primal Food Factory Days where I prepared over 30 meals and some tasty Primal snacks in just a few hours:
Ok, this is a bit of a cheat, as I salted these squares of pig skin the night before in preparation of making some home-made pork scratchings. It only took 5 mins just before going to bed though and it was more than worth it, as I love pork scratchings, but hate all the additives you normally get in there!
The following morning, I stumble downstairs bleary eyed, and put the oven on full to preheat.
Meanwhile, I take my salted pig skin out of the fridge, pat it dry with kitchen towel (the salt is to draw out the moisture to ensure they are crispy), and arrange it on a baking tray.
I then get out two more roasting dishes, onto one I place a joint of
free range pork belly that has been scored with a sharp knife and had salt rubbed into the skin (what can I say, I am a fan of crackling!), on the other I arrange some grass-fed brisket on the bone, which I drizzle with marmite.
Turn the oven down to 220 degrees, stick all the above in the oven, and set the timer for 20 mins.
Once all this is in the oven, you can start chopping some vegetables.
Put two large pans/woks on the hob and turn on the heat. Add some oil, personally I prefer to use coconut oil.
Keep the heat at a medium temperature – Food is always better cooked slower and longer
where possible.
Hopefully you remembered to set the alarm on the cooker, when it goes off reduce the temperature of the oven to 175 degrees. You’ll also need to take out the pork scratchings and drain the rendered fat into a jar. Keep this, as you can use it to make rillettes or any other number of tasty piggy treats! We waste nothing at Primal! You’ll need to keep repeating this draining process every 20 mins or so until the pork scratchings are done (around 80-90 mins). If you’re just roasting the pork and beef in the oven you can simply forget about them for a couple of hours.
Back to the pans – Every good Primal Pantry should have a good selection of herbs and spices.
Add a generous amount of various herbs to each pan (different ones in each). I.e. Basil, Oregano, Paprika and Thyme to one, Chilli, Lemon-grass, Marjoram, Coriander and Ginger to the other.
Add some meat. In this case I’m using beef heart – Cubed in the wok, minced in the pan.
Keep stirring both pans to ensure the meat is browned all over.
Once the meat in the wok is browned, transfer the contents of the wok to a slow cooker, along with a load of diced vegetables.
Put the slow cooker on medium, lightly brown some ox kidneys in the now empty wok, and then add these as well. Leave to stew for around 8+ hours (This is great if you’re doing all this in the morning before a late shift, as it’ll be ready just when you get home!). Stick some tins of tomatoes, frozen spinach and mushrooms and a tin of coconut milk in the big pan, and simmer for 45 mins.
Remember to keep draining your pork scratchings!
You can chill out for a bit while everything is cooking. Read a book, do your emails, put some washing on…
About 1 hour before the meat is due to be ready, chop some more veg. Here I’ve used onion and sweet potato, but one of my favs is carrot and parsnip.
45 mins before its due to finish, take out the pork belly, lift it out of the tray and toss the vegetables in the rendered fat before seasoning them generously. Place the pork belly back on top and stick it back in the oven.
45 mins later you can get it all out the oven and be proud of all your hard work!
2-3 hours later and low and behold, 30 meals worth of food (plus some tasty pork scratchings, and some rendered beef and pork fat).
Awesome work Si! I happened to cook a lamb’s heart kind of broth mix a few weeks back and loved it. Minimum amount of work with satisfying results! Big fan of the slow cooker but I’ve never pan fried. Just wondering is this just to brown? I know they often suggest it. I must try the pork belly soon! 🙂
Yes Sassie, the pan frying is just to brown the meat, and I find it infuses a bit of flavour if you add the spices then too.
Pork belly rules!
Losing weight reuriqes balancing a diet. What will help most is eating small meals and consuming more dark greens and a mixture of veggies. Then fruits. Then meat. Then whole grains, though non-gluten grains such as tasty and versatile buckwheat are more helpful. Then starches such as potato, plantain, cassava. An example:1 cup of raw or quickly steamed veggies (firm and color will be bright when cooked properly)4oz of meat, rare to medium rare for best benefit1 whole fruit between meals (less fruit than veggies but more fruit than meat)1/4 1/2 cup whole grains or starch between meals cereal, toast/bagel/crumpet/plain bread with honey, real butter or peanutbutterDo NOT use lean meat! The fat that comes with meat contains digestive enzymes. What can interfere with losing weight is consuming meats treated with hormones.Read labels to avoid hormones, trans fats and refined sugars (usually end with ose’ like fructose and high fructose)Walking 20 minutes several times a day bring you closer to your goal much faster. If you can’t walk, build a light stretch and exercise routine into each day.Be sure to take a good multi-vitamin.Drink half your weight in ounces of water each day. If you weigh 100lbs, drink 50 ounces which is easy to do by exchanging other fluids for water.Digestive enzymes, like Now Foods Super Enzymes, will help digest food.Probiotics such as cultured kefir will condition the digestive tract with good bacteria required for proper nutrient assimilation.
Hi Mariko,
Thanks for your comment.
While I totally agree with you on the eating plenty of veggies, and avoiding meat treated with hormones, transfats and excess sugards, many of your recommendations are not supported by science.
For example, on what evidence do you place wholegrains as superior to tubers/root veg such as potatoes etc?
On what evidence do you base your recommendations with regards to avoiding lean meats?
On what evidence do you recommend taking a multi-vitamin?
And when I say evidence, I mean high quality, peer-reviewed scientific studies, not a blog post by a self-proclaimed health guru.