Conquering Spring Break & Carby Cravings

We've been plugging along this last month with our weekly routine which includes two days of Mother's Day Out for Rylin, BSF on Tuesdays, and Mr. D's visits on Thursdays. Then last week, we hit spring break. I didn't think it would mean much to our young little family until I discovered no MDO, BSF, and then D's visit was cancelled. We gladly took the opportunity to head with some friends downtown for a mid-week distraction.

This little guy was excited to finally be riding the train!

Rylin with his buddies (all girls btw!)

First stop was the DMA

 making their own art

 story time at the museum

After leaving the museum we headed over to the new park above Woodall Rogers.  It was packed with other spring breakers, but the weather was amazing.

 Rylin & I waited in line for over an hour for some food truck goodness.  Luckily Mr. D was asleep in the stroller at this point.

This was devoured in about twenty minutes by a hungry pregnant lady and two starving toddlers!  Braised Beef quesadillas, and three sliders: Fried Chicken-Mashed Potatoes-Gravy, Brisket-Mac&Cheese-BBQ sauce, and Nutella-Peanut Butter-Bacon.  Not pictured were lime tator tots.  (got to live a little once in a while!)

We let the kids cool off at the splash park before heading back on the train for some late afternoon naps.

The yummy food on our day off has not been my only indulgence as of recently.  I have found myself with an intense dairy craving (among a few others) that has culminated into a once weekly trip to Sonic for cheese fries.  It's really gotten out of control, and though I don't cheat with my Paleo diet often, pregnancy has made it an easy excuse.  I should preface by saying that dairy is a debated subject in the Paleo world, but as for me, it has not been a problem of digestion so I have continued to eat it in moderation even before I was pregnant.  It's just that at some point I added the fried battered kind, which is a no-no for sure.  So yesterday I had had enough!  Surely there must be a good alternative to this carb laden fried cheese.  I scanned Pinterest with searches of "low carb cheese sticks", "paleo cheese sticks", and "healthy cheese stick alternatives".  I found some interesting recipes and taking what I liked best from a few, think I have discovered the perfect low carb fried cheese stick.  You might want to sit down for this one.

First I made a egg bath of one well mixed of the urban chicken variety and a separate bowl of powdered Parmesan cheese (because what kind of batter really could be better than more cheese!) and some left over ranch seasoning I had on hand.  I read that it is essential to use the powdered cheese (though not as preferable paleo-wise to the shredded) for sticking purposes.

Then I sliced my premade cheese sticks in half lengthwise and dredged them in the egg then parm mixture two times until they were well coated.

I heated up a tablespoon of refined coconut oil in a small saute pan and dropped them in.  Only a couple minutes on each side and these puppies were good to go.

My cheese sticks were pretty cold beforehand (suggested freezing) so they didn't ooze too much in cooking.  They had the texture of a battered and fried stick and were a lot tastier then with a bread coating.

Me and the kids consumed them in approximately 2 minutes and they were asking for more.  I'm sure this will be my new weekly snack and I feel a lot better about sending these down the hatch to the third hungry kiddo than some fast food guilt trip.