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As anyone who has been following my Facebook page or this blog has probably noticed, but what started out as a chemical-free, green living blog has become very interested in real food. Learning about real food has not been easy, and I am gobbling up all the resources I can find. I bought multiple cookbooks over the summer, although I am struggling to find cookbooks with enough nightshade- and bean-free recipes. Currently there is a stack of 7 library books sitting next to my chair on clean eating, healing with food, and the science behind paleo. I have requested 3 other books, and have 2 pre-ordered.

Yeah, I’m into resources right now. Since I have not thoroughly read most of them yet, you will have to wait for recommendations.

I have, however, come across a few really helpful resources that are not in book form. These are nice because they are much quicker to go through and easier to put into practice. One has many videos associated with it, so it can teach me things that no book can (like how to chop stuff).

One resource that I find incredibly helpful is meal plans. Meal plans can be found from a variety of resources, and I really enjoy them. 2 months of figuring things out on my own for my elimination diet was a bit too much for me. Now, I am so happy to have found so many meal plans to choose from, adapt, and play with. With these plans, I feel good about the food I am eating. I don’t have to worry about whether I am getting a good balance as much.

While there are some meal plans I am looking forward to that have no been published yet, I have 3 resources for you that I hope you enjoy.

My personal meal plans: These are the meal plans I created for my elimination diet. They are available for free, but you get what you pay for. If you wish to do a similar elimination diet, please take a look. But note that while there are links to online recipes, many of the meals listed come from cookbooks that I link to. These were also my first try at making meal plans, so I make no promises regarding quality. I enjoyed them, though!

Paleo Book Meal Plans: Many paleo books have meal plans, complete with recipes for all dishes. So that is definitely a step up from what I have to offer. Many of these plans take real life into consideration. They plan for leftovers, freezing, and batch cooking. Many of them even include shopping lists.

The meal plan that I have thoroughly read (but not tried) is the meal plan from the Paleo Autoimmune Cookbook. This is a very strict diet for those with autoimmune disease, and it is meant to act as the first stage of an elimination diet. Mickey walks you through the diet and provides shopping lists for each week on the meal plan. Her goal is to make this protocol as easy as possible. If that sounds like something you need, I highly recommend it.

Purchased Meal Plans: There are meal plan services that will send you unique meal plans each month, so you don’t need to adapt them if you don’t want. This can be very helpful for busy families that don’t have time to plan out their meals for the week. An example of these meal plans is the ones from Holistic Squid. These are real food meal plans that are great for people who just need ideas and recipes to get started. The meal plans include 5 dinners with recipes large enough to provide plenty of leftovers. She also includes additional recipes to supplement the dinners. Within the meal plans she also plans out the steps and time spent in the kitchen to help you schedule as well as gives a detailed shopping list. Very useful!

Visit her sales page to get a free sample. She offers both real food (with gluten-free options) and paleo (with primal option) meal plan subscriptions for the time period that suits you.

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