Recipe: breakfast “cookies”

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I came across this recipe (most likely on Pinterest), and I decided to give it some tweaks…it has quickly become one of my favorite things.

The original recipe has no sugar, as it uses mashed bananas. I eat bananas, but I don’t really enjoy banana bread, so I decided to replace them. As such, I did add a bit of sugar. I’m sure you could use your sweetener of choice (or none, if you prefer).

1 1/2 cups regular rolled oats
1/3 cup brown sugar (I like dark brown)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon cinnamon
a healthy amount of ginger, cloves, and nutmeg (to taste)
1/4 cup of ground flaxseed
1/2 cup mixed nuts, finely chopped (I used sunflower seeds and pecans)
1 cup dried fruit (I used 1/2 chopped apple bits, and 1/2 craisins)

*the original recipe called for a cup of coconut flakes. I don’t care for coconut, so I just left it out and tossed in a little extra of each ingredient. I also added a few scoops of protein powder.

2 eggs
2/3 cup canned pumpkin
around 6 tablespoons nut butter (I used natural almond and peanut. also, this measurement is not very precise.)
1/4 cup coconut oil (original recipe uses canola. there are lots of possibilities here)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Heat oven to 350. Mix dry ingredients together. Combine wet ingredients in a separate bowl. Pour over dry ingredients and mix until well combined.

To bake these, I lined a regular-size muffin tin with cupcake liners and scooped in the batter evenly. Since these are thicker than the “cookies” in the original recipe, I bake for about 25 minutes. Of course, that may vary depending on your oven.

I used this chart to determine what to replace the bananas with. (I put the eggs in since I am not a vegan, and I have trouble getting enough protein.)

Currently my favorite (food) thing

Pumpkin, cranberry, & apple baked oatmeal

I made a couple of small tweaks to the recipe: I substituted ground flaxseed for wheat germ, added a teaspoon of cinnamon, plus a bunch of other spices (ginger, cloves, nutmeg). I also used vanilla soymilk instead of regular milk.

I made it once over the weekend, and substituted almonds for pecans (because I didn’t have any pecans). I made it again today to eat for breakfast for the rest of the week, using pecans this time. (The almonds were good, though…you could probably use any nut you like)

I am loving this blog, and there are all sorts of recipes I want to try! I’ll be sure to update you when I do…

(emily bites, the blog linked above, is one I found through Pinterest. Come, follow me! Or ask for an invite if you need one…)

Gale Gand’s Brunch! recipe review

brunch cookbook

My friend Stephanie offered me the opportunity to receive a copy of this cookbook in return for trying a recipe and posting a review. I agreed. I mean, who doesn’t love brunch?

When I flipped through the book, there were plenty of recipes that sounded interesting to me. Since I’m not a big fan of eggs, they were mostly of the sweet variety. Ultimately, though, my love of ginger won out and I decided to try the Ginger Scones with Peaches and Cream.

I had never made scones before, so I figured it would be an adventure!

mixer!

As always, I was very happy to have this at my disposal. Oh Kitchenaid mixer, what did I ever do before you?

The recipe was simple enough and easy to follow. When the time came for me to “use a biscuit or cookie cutter” to cut out the scones, I had to improvise. Luckily, I had a small round Rubbermaid container that was perfect!

scones going in the oven

The recipe said to bake for 15-20 minutes. I set the timer for 15, checked them, and left them in a little while longer. I’d say they were in for about 18 minutes.

scones fresh out of the oven

Mmmm…I found the scones themselves *very* tasty. The bits of crystallized ginger are perfect…and although the recipe didn’t call for it, I added a bit of ground ginger as well. Like I said, I love ginger.

I made the whipped cream as instructed in the recipe. It has sour cream in it, which was interesting. I found it to be somewhat like clotted cream. I had to use canned peaches rather than fresh, because fresh peaches are a little hard to come by this time of year.

ginger scones with peaches and cream

The flavors were interesting together, but as I said, these scones are very good by themselves as well!

Rand agreed. He said I could go into business selling scones. 😉

I would make these again, and look forward to trying some of the other recipes.