Back in the saddle

So yesterday, i.e. the day AFTER the Carbageddon, I made a delibrate effort to go low on carbs. One of the favourite dinners in my house is turkey tacos. The SO has taco shells, I use leaves of romaine. The recipe is super simple: I finely dice about 100 grams of onion, saute them until nice and soft and golden in coconut oil. I throw in around 400 grams of ground turkey, sprinkle with salt free chili powder, ground pasilla chili, and cumin. Toppings on the side are chopped tomatoes, mashed up avocado, sliced romaine, and Newmans Own salsa (we are both obsessed with this stuff-SO GOOD).

Great nutrition, good fat from the coconut oil and avocado, plenty of flavour from all the seasonings and the onion. Caramelized onions are, after all, one of the oldest chef tricks in the book, and while a lot of cookbooks advise adding a little sugar to assist the caramelization, it's not necessary, particularly when you use sweet onions. I honestly don't miss taco shells at all-like croutons and many hard cereals, they scraped the roof of my mouth, and I avoided them because of the discomfort.

Besides, without the taco shells taking up room in your belly, you can fill that space with the really yummy stuff. I remember when, in my freshman year history class in high school, my teacher explained that the reason we eat pasta or bread or rice is as a way making sure humans got adequate calories and of stretching the good stuff--the meat and veggies. It made sense to me then because I would always eat the sauce of my pasta before the pasta, or lick cream cheese off my bagel.

Now, given the abundance and access we have to meat and veggies, as well as the knowledge we have about the nutritional as well as the gustatory superiority of these foods over grains, why settle for the filler?