Keto Garlic Bread Knots with Pepperoni

I’ve become a lil obsessed this week with Holcomb Valley. Maybe it’s the lack ‘O carbs coursing through my hiker’s body! My lack of carbohydrates might be going to my brain. (Although doctors do say that carbs are the reason for brain fog) Here I am on day three of my let’s try this again keto-kraze and I am doing fantastic! Snacking on smoked chorizo and aged cheddar trailside at seven a.m. between my sunrise guided hike with tourists and my me time off-road adventures and mountain bike shenanigans with the puppy. Shoving hard-boiled duck eggs at my face at eight a.m. is not my favorite form of breakfast if I am being completely honest but hell is it hard not to be a fat ass at forty-two years old. So keto it is. Sunrise six-mile hike, let’s do it! Mountain bike ten miles with the puppy, bring it on! And then let’s go home, chug a bullet coffee chock full of coconut oil and no carbs and work in the yard for two hours, digging in the dirt to plant organic fairytale pumpkins, peppery Cherry Belle radishes and so many bunches of golden beets.

I am going to be enjoying so many Dark Chocolate Beet Cupcakes this late summer when we come back from our east coast road trip! This may be just one more reason why I absolutely need to concentrate on keto and this low-carb lifestyle right now. Now pass me that grass-fed butter snack!

Here in our ski town of Big Bear Lake California, it’s now dawning on June and we survived the crazy winter. This was the most intense winter Big Bear Lake has seen since 1978. Our family was prepared. I come from a hardy line of mountain folk (Besides my brother who is an artist) My people know how to stock up for a snowstorm. Believe me, no one wants to run out of Costco bacon especially if you live in a keto-friendly household. When I’m not fantasizing about baked goods that may just be chock full of carbs, these days I’m out on the trails of Big Bear Lake hiking or mountain biking.

I am having a love affair with Holcomb Valley. It may be the scenic sluice ponds. It may be my puppy’s unbridled joy at romping through the sluice ponds and Elmer’s Lake. It may be that this area is a hidden Big Bear secret and no one is here in this ten thousand acreage but me and my English Foxhound puppy on a mountain biking spring morning weekday. Maybe it’s the early season monsoon moisture bringing these gorgeous cumulonimbus clouds to our mountain communities but man, on days like this, I love me the Big Bear Lake lifestyle. I mean, I might love it a lil more if I wasn’t on day three of zero carbs but I also don’t love my Butter Chicken Butt.

Did you know Butter Chicken is keto BTW? Just saying, Fry those onions, add those spices and create that masala, because you can enjoy all the Butter Chicken you can shove at your face!

How does she do it?

Mountain biking all morning, followed by taking tourists hiking all over the Big Bear Valley can be a lot physically and mentally. The answer is coffee with butter in it! Thirty days of keto. Is it really possible? Will I get tired of having hardboiled duck eggs for breakfast? Will I be super cracked out on bullet coffee? Once upon a time, I thought I was going to cut back on my caffeine consumption. Ha.

One thing I miss on keto is bread. I could kill for a multigrain toasted bagel right about now. Thank God for these keto-friendly bread knots. I can pretend I’m shoving carbs at my face! Go ahead, use all the garlic. No one wants to kiss you with keto breath anyways!

Keto Garlic Bread Knots with Pepperoni

1 cup almond meal

1/2 cup cheap mozzarella cheese (The cheap mozzarella has less water in it)

1 teaspoon garlic salt

4 teaspoons cream cheese

1 egg

1 small package of sliced pepperoni

For the garlic oil and herbs

6 cloves garlic, chopped fine

1/4 cup fresh parsley, chopped

1/4 cup fresh basil, chopped

1/4 cup fresh oregano, chopped

1/2 cup olive oil

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese

Combine all the herbs, oil, salt and garlic powder to create the garlic oil. I like to make the oil at least an hour in advance so the garlic can really permanent the oil.

Preheat the oven to 350. To make the dough melt the shredded mozzarella cheese for forty-five seconds in the microwave. Mix in the cream cheese. Stir in the egg, then the garlic powder and the almond meal.

Cut your dough into ten pieces. Roll each piece out into a log, wrap a piece of pepperoni around it and tie it into a knot. Bake for 10 minutes, then flip and bake for fifteen more. After the bread knots are baked slather them with the garlic sauce and a sprinkling of grated parmesan cheese.