Paleo Thanksgiving Stuffing

Since I started doing the Advocare 24 day challenge, we have started to eat sort of a Paleo based diet.  I'm really, really loving it.  The boys are starting to make better food choices on their own, Chris is on board enough to appease me, and I'm totally loving how it makes me feel and how it's changing the way my body looks.  To date, I've lost 28 pounds.  Which is exactly what Katie weighed when we brought her home.  I've lost the equivalent of a Russian four year old former orphan. . . . That's a little bit crazy.  

I've started to think about what I'll make for Thanksgiving.  I certainly want to make our traditional foods, but will make some changes to the ingredients.  Chris' favorite part of Thanksgiving is the stuffing.  I make a stuffing with cornbread and biscuits. . . not exactly Paleo.  Or healthy.  I've got a pan of it in the freezer, so I certainly will pop that into the oven on Thanksgiving for Chris and the other people who don't want to eat a grain free stuffing.  I have searched the internet and found lots of Paleo Thanksgiving options.  I tried the stuffing from PaleOMG.com today.  Her website is ridiculous and is one of my new favorites.  And one of my favorite readers, Katie, thinks I should share more recipes.  

So, back to the stuffing...

Ingredients:

• 1 lb of ground pork sausage
• 5 slices of bacon, diced
• 5 stalks of celery, diced
• 1 sweet potato (next time I'll use 2)
• 1 yellow onion, diced
• 1 container of mushrooms, diced
• 2 apples, diced (I used three, and I'm so glad I did)
• 2 tablespoons white wine vinegar
• 1 cup dried cranberries
• 1 cup pecans, chopped
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 1/3 cup chicken broth

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Cover a baking sheet with foil and put the diced sweet potatoes on.  Drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper.

2.  While the potatoes are cooking, get a big skillet and heat it over medium-high heat.  Toss in your diced bacon and let that start cooking down.  

3.  Once the fat starts to seep out of the bacon, add the diced celery, diced onion, and chopped apples.  

4.  Once the onions start to turn translucent, add the sausage and mushrooms.  Cook that down until the sausage is no longer pink.

5.  When the meat is no longer pink, transfer the entire contents of the pan into a large bowl and let it cool a bit. Beat the eggs and add to cooled mixture.  Add the chicken stock, sweet potatoes, chopped pecans, and cranberries and mix well.

6.  Transfer mixture to the foil lined pan.  You could also use a 9x13 pan, but I'm not in the business of making more dishes than I need to.  Bake for 15-20 minutes, or until it starts to get brown and crispy around the edges.

Turn around and see that your kitchen looks like this.  Or not - I hope that doesn't happen to you.

The smell?  Seriously amazing.  

I didn't trick myself into believing that I was eating traditional Thanksgiving stuffing, 

The next recipe I'm going to try from this website is the chicken tortilla soup.  But it doesn't have any tortilla.  I can't wait - literally looking at the pictures makes my mouth water!