Completing four days of the 10-day Real Food Pledge feels like we’re really going to succeed! Breakfast was our usual oatmeal with apples or bananas and cinnamon. Lunch was left-overs (finally!)

Patrick's lunch: red beans over brown rice, carrots, corn

I’m so glad that Patrick enjoys vegetables:

Happy to have steamed carrots

I finished off the flounder over a green salad with a local, free-range egg:

Flounder, egg, and veggies

Patrick’s afternoon snack was drinkable GoGo squeeZ apple sauce on the way to the grocery store and a banana on the way home. I had coffee and homemade granola while he napped.

Dinner was a local chicken that was pasture-raised on Coon Rock Farm, a sustainable family farm on the Eno River. I covered the chicken in seasoning and roasted it upright in the oven. This chicken had great flavor and tougher meat than factory-farmed chicken. I assume this means it was a really happy, healthy chicken.

Local "happy" chicken

Next to the chicken, I roasted red potatoes with zesty orange-peel, sage, and garlic powder seasoning. This has been a favorite recipe of ours ever since my mom gave it to me years ago, and I will post it as soon as I learn the source to give credit.

Orange-peel garlic potatoes

Finally I steamed zucchini from the farmers market… with a little extra help before I turned on the stove:

Steamed zucchini

Patrick and I played outside for a bit while everything roasted in the oven. I started the zucchini when Jim got home. And in no time, dinner was ready:

Roasted chicken, potatoes, zucchini and oranges

To complete the meal, it always helps to add a half-pint of Jim’s delicious homebrewed Kölsch.

Dinner with Jim's homebrew