Cranberry Orange (no bake) Coconut Bars and Sneak Peek of Real Life Paleo

So, I’ve got all kinds of news on our upcoming print book Real Life Paleo!

I know you’re really here for the SNEAK PEEK which features our fantastically amazing Cranberry Orange no bake Coconut Bars, but try to read (or at least skim) the post before jumping to the end for the recipe – there’s a really important piece of information I need you to know:

1. This book is HUGE.

When we originally pitched this book idea to our publisher we intended to write 125 recipes and 50 pages of “front matter”, resulting in our estimation of a book (including indexes, table of contents, etc.) of 368 pages. But shortly thereafter we launched what became our incredibly popular first eBook, 3 Phase Paleo; and after our audience and publisher asked us to add the same approach to Real Life Paleo and it became much more than we anticipated. Now with 175 recipes and over 100 pages of “front matter” which details our recommended approach to Swap, Remove, Heal your way to health, Real Life Paleo is now 432 pages, the most that can possibly be bound by our publisher.

2. Real Life Paleo includes SO MANY recipes perfect for everybody!

Yes, you read that right. 175 recipes. ONE. HUNDRED. AND. SEVENTY. FIVE. That’s a LOT of food. And thanks to Aimee Buxton, it’s mouth wateringly gorgeous food. More than that, these are the kind of recipes we actually eat. In our real, day-to-day life. And lest you be afraid of all those recipes, we provide several indexes (including the extensive visual Table of Contents) to help you keep track. They also tell you which recipes are:

36 are Phase 1 – highly palatable and fun transition foods*
83 are Phase 2 – standard paleo foods
54 are Phase 3 – nutrient dense healing Paleo superfoods

note: we purposefully created an 80/20 ratio of “treat” type recipes in the book to the healthier dishes, to make Real Life Paleo sustainable for a lifetime of health

 

115 are Egg-Free
109 are Nut-Free
143 are Nightshade-Free

note: we purposefully created recipes for people with food intolerances beyond just standard paleo, these recipes total more than what most other paleo cookbooks offer entirely – let alone allergen-friendly

 

80 are Under 30 Minutes
70 are 5 Ingredients or Less
82 are One Pot
27 are Holiday
45 are On-the-Go

note: we purposefully created recipes that would be quick and easy for the everyday person trying to live a busy life, while also ensuring plenty of “special” recipes for the occasions you’d like a treat

3. We don’t just give you recipes, Real Life Paleo teaches you how to put Paleo meals on your table.

Because one of the most common questions we get from people just starting out is “I have all these recipes, but how do I feed my family with them?”, we’ve finally been able to give a fantastic answer. Instead of trying to explain or give a list (although we do provide full weekly meal plans for each phase), we not only photographed all the recipes in Real Life Paleo, but created Meal Ideas for Setting Your Paleo Table.

An easy souffle and cereal for breakfast? You won’t even miss the gluten, refined sugar, and processed foods eliminated in Phase 1!

Yes, you no longer need to pine for our Peruvian chicken meals – we have replicated a paleo version for Real Life Paleo!

As Autumn approaches, I cannot wait for healing braised dishes to once again arrive on our table multiple times a week!

As you can see, these meal ideas show you not only how to prepare a complete meal, but also give you the recipes included, an explanation of why we recommended it, a little bit of information on macro/micro-nutrients, and tips on making ahead, what to do with leftovers, and ideas for the chefs. These Meal Ideas happen to be my favorite part of the entire book, and were not easy to organize or photograph among the 175 recipes we were coordinating on our weekly photoshoots with Aimee – we hope you love them too! We’ve provided 21 Meal Ideas so that you can see what a breakfast, lunch, and dinner of each 3 phases looks like!

 4. There are so many guides, tools and sections to set you up for long-term success!

Building upon the popular guides and tools we provided in 3 Phase Paleo, we’ve gone above and beyond in creating even more in beautiful easy-to-read formatting for Real Life Paleo. The “front matter” includes:

Phase 1: Swap

• Grocery List Guide*
• Food Swaps*
• Going Out Guide*

Phase 2: Remove

• Simple Safe Foods*
• Paleo Staples*
• Family Fun Guide*

Phase 3: Heal

• The True Superfoods*
• Making Healthy Lifestyle Choices*

*provided also as tear-out guides

How To:

• Create Spice Blends and Flavor Combos for each Meats
• Make Paleo Mashes and Rices
• Build Your Own Salad
• Make Drinking Water More Interesting
• Replace Common Allergens
• Replace American Standards
• Make Cooking Quick and Easy
• Keep Paleo Eating Affordable
• Cook for Special Occasions

Setting Your Paleo Table:

• Meal Ideas for Phase 1, 2, and 3
• Phase 1, 2, and 3 Meal Plans

Recipes – a lot of them – look at ’em all!

 

 

See, we’re not kidding… HUGE!

The Punchline: What You Need to Know

So, what I’m trying to say here is, we put a lot into this book. We’ve put everything we know, all of our fan favorite recipes, and even more brand new recipes you’re going to LOVE. But… there’s an unfortunate catch.

The cover price of the book is changing from $34.95 to $39.95. We worked with our publisher to do everything we could to get the price of Real Life Paleo to not change, but the only alternative was to cut sections or recipes from the book – which we didn’t want to do.

We want this book to be THE book you can give your friend who says, “I REALLY wanna go Paleo, but I just keep backsliding.”

We want this book to be THE book you can give to the family member who refuse to try going Paleo because of those one or two things they’re not willing to give up.

We want this book to be THE book you can give to anyone and say “This is HOW to do it, it has EVERYTHING.”

We want this book to be THE book you use in your own life to make Paleo easy, sustainable and healing – no matter where you are in your journey.

 

Which is why we decided to keep all 432 pages and increase the price of the book by $5. What does that mean? Well, we’re not sure. As soon as the book sellers (Amazon, B&N, etc.) are notified they will have a choice to make on their own. Will they honor all the pre-order pricing (for example, Amazon was at one point selling pre-orders at $22 on what is now a $39.95 book) or will they cancel the pre-orders and listings entirely and then relist Real Life Paleo all over again? I sure hope not! But it is unfortunately not up to me.

So, I need your help. You can still place your pre-orders, in the event book sellers do honor pre-orders. And, in the event it they cancel pre-orders we will need your help mobilizing and spreading the word to encourage all the people we’ve been trying to reach for months to “buy” the book all over again. Sigh.

After all that, how about you go make yourself these Cranberry Orange No Bake Coconut Bars? Because, winter is coming. OK, maybe not. But Autumn air is here in Northern Virginia and fresh cranberries will soon be in stores – so, enjoy!

♥♥♥

I love these Cranberry Orange (no bake) Coconut Bars. They were one of the first recipes we made for Real Life Paleo and if you follow me on Instagram you probably already saw the teaser I put up there almost a year ago when we first made them.

At that time we didn’t even have a name for the book, we just knew we were going to make our first general cookbook. Now you can search the #reallifepaleo on IG for a glimpse at all the photoshoots and foods made. But at the time all we knew was that this was the third in what we planned to be a trifecta of paleo books. And this recipe was inspired by YOU all! It was the holiday season and we wanted to use fresh cranberries in a unique way without the cliche of all the other seasonal cranberry dishes we were seeing online. Then we got one of the many comments and e-mails we frequently get on our Creamy Coconut Macaroon recipes that told us the dough was so good the cookies barely made it into the oven. And an idea struck! That super popular, super simple, super amazingly delicious dough was then sandwiched into layer bars with a crust of fresh dates & nuts (because, yum) and topped with a jelly made of fresh cranberries and orange zest.

Still in the early phase of photo shoots with Aimee, it took a few set-ups with lighting and props before we were happy with the style (the lifecycle of a food photograph is fascinating, right?!). But, I happen to think that the final photo represents the beauty and taste of this shockingly easy no-bake bar that is lusciously creamy against a nutty crusty and tart, bright topping. If you like our Creamy Coconut Macaroons, it’s high time you try our Cranberry Orange (no bake) Coconut Bars! Of course, frozen cranberries would work well here too – in case they’re not yet available fresh where you live.

p.s. this is the actual layout of Real Life Paleo –
very similar to the clean, popular aesthetics of Beyond Bacon with some simple additions:
notice the allergen and on-the-go icon at the top next to the phase number? Smart, right?

Maybe you wanna pre-order, then? ♥