Cuisine de Judice sur la Route
By Robin
Ross and I both adopted Time Restricted Eating about two years ago. This means we generally only eat two meals a day, breakfast around 10AM after we exercise and dinner between 3-4:30PM. We pretty much eat all the food we want during that 6-7 hours. No hard and fast dietary restrictions. although we tend to low sugar, healthy fats, higher in vegetables, whole fiber foods and whole fruits.
We’ve both found we have really good blood sugar control and weight management with this style of eating. My weight is now completely stable (after fluctuating wildly up to 10 pounds for 40 years), my sleep is better, my mood is better, and my energy is good. We are flexible with the TRE when visiting family and friends. If we weren’t we’d have no social lives! But we always go back to the TRE as soon as we can. It’s been very easy to adapt to as a way of life.
Our day starts at 6AM (T’Chat Tummy O’Clock). I brew the coffee. We’ve enjoyed trying all the local roasts as we travel, but I swear that my brother-in-law, Remi, roasts the best coffee in the country. When we can score a few of his Sweet Maria beans, I am in absolute heaven. We drink our first coffees black (that was a hard switch for me, but if I have really good, smooth coffee, I now enjoy it).
For breakfast we’re now trying out alternating one day of having a green blender drink and the next morning a cooked meal. The blended smoothie has about 2 cups of greens, whey protein powder, potato starch or matcha (prebiotic fibers), plain yogurt or kefir (probiotics), psyllium husk fiber, flax seed, frozen blueberries or mixed berries, beet juice, half an avocado and liquid fish oil. Ross usually also eats an avocado topped with fish roe or anchovies. (NOT ME. YUCK!) Our cooked breakfasts might be fried eggs on Ezekiel bread, with avocado and tomato, a huge batch of sautéed greens and fresh fruit. I think we both were getting tired of having ONLY smoothies for breakfast. It’s nice to have a warm, whole food meal for breakfast, but still eat fairly healthy.
We keep 4 - 5 boxes of nuts in our pantry for snacking (almonds, walnuts, pecans, cashews, macadamias). This is what we typically snack on between meals. Or hummus and chopped veggies.
The other treat we go for in the middle of the day is a Fancy Coffee. We’ll search out a good local coffee shop (Starbucks in a pinch), and I’ll order a latté or brevé and Ross will get a cappuccino.
For our Main Meal, as we call it, we may go on stretches of eating out (especially if we hear about good local restaurants as we travel) but lately we’ve been making some really tasty home-cooked meals. When we cook, we try to make enough to have leftovers for the next day’s dinner.
Recent meals we’ve enjoyed at the trailer:
Scallops with sautéed southern greens.
Black-eyed peas with tomatoes, mushroom and Indian spices.
Cheesy southwestern lentils and rice with tamales we’d saved from New Mexico.
Shrimp with Creamed Corn and Feta and lots of sautéed greens.
Curried Lentils and Sweet Potatoes (we doubled the amount of Swiss chard in this one)
Crab cakes from Apalachicola with sautéed veggies
If I haven’t managed to score a really good cookie or a piece of pie from a local bakery, our dessert indulgence is an apple and peanut butter, with milk for dessert. Ross is better about eating less sugar. I can’t bear to give up everything I love, but I’m learning to adopt his apple/PB as an alternative to the hard-core sugar smackdowns.
We’ve got our cooking system down! I usually stay inside the trailer and do all the prep work (rinsing, chopping, gathering ingredients and utensils). Ross sets up the cooking area (his Cajun Flying Saucer Wok Thingy) outside and I hand ingredients and utensils out the door. It saves us tromping in and out over and over…and reduces chances of the Caged Tiger 🐯 sneaking out. Ross usually does the actual cooking of the meal. We join each other to eat outside if the weather’s nice. Then I step back in for Ross to hand me all the dishes to wash and stow.
I so appreciate Ross’ willingness to be the chef…and I don’t mind prepping and cleanup. Our family motto has always been divide and conquer, and this works well for us.
Camp breakfast, which included the black-eyed pea dish.
Sautéed scallops and greens. Note the sous chef in the background.
Morning coffee with kitty. Thank you Ann and Dad for the beautiful mug! Thank you Remi for the wonderful coffee beans!
A salad with ALL The Things.