Working Late, Again...

So I work at a groccery store and though it gives me great inspiration for baking is not always the most fun when it comes to hours.  I tend to work nights, and this has begun to interfere with my dinners.  Today I decided to make dinner early and to make my favorite quick meal.

Ingredients

2 cups Quinoa

4 cups water

1 zucchini

1 summer squash

4 mushrooms

1 tomato

salt/oil/vinegar

lemon juice

I sauteed the zucchini, squash and mushrooms with some coconut oil for about five minutes while the Quinoa was cooking.

Usually I will add some feta cheese which adds a nice bite to the flavor, however, we were out, so instead I added lemon juice and oil and vinegar to taste.

Just add to a bowl and enjoy!

What to make??

I am faced with a dilemma... Tomorrow I am having some friends over for swimming and a Cook Out, which will be fun, but knowing me I will need to bake something delicious to satisfy our sweet tooth's (teeth?) anyway.... does anyone have any ideas for something easy and perfect to make for the summer???

Thanks for the Sun

For those who set out to make the greatest recipe and get their ingredients ready the night before, just remember to always take out your butter. Today I was all excited to make my newest discovered recipe; Raspberry Lemonade Bars, however, despite all my excitement my butter remained in the freezer, until I realized that I needed it to be room temperature about five minutes before I needed it. Oops... Thank God for sunny days in the middle of a heat wave because I had to go old school to warm my butter.  All I can say is thanks for the sun!

my Butter warming technique

After my butter was softened enough I made the crust which was easy, just butter, sugar, flour and salt.  The crust needed to bake for 20-25 minutes and while that was cooking we began the filling.

The filling was a smooth pink, and had bits of lemon zest mixed in.

The batter took about 35 minutes to bake and then I allowed it to cool for the rest of the day, about 6 hours and then I cut them into 16 squares.

These are a gift for my moms office tomorrow, so I made sure the plating was perfect with some powdered sugar and garnish with some mint leaves.

The Finished Product!

Lets hope they get positive reviews!!!


Here is the recipe - I got it from another blog, so please don't give me the credit!

Crust
9 tablespoons unsalted butter (1 stick, plus one tablespoon)
1/4 cup (50g) superfine sugar (or regular granulated)
1 cup (100g) of unbleached all-purpose flour
pinch salt
- cream butter and sugar together with salt
-mix in the flour until incorporated
-flour your hands, and then line the bottom of the pan so the crust is about a half an inch thick
-if you want you can use parchment paper to line the pan but you can also just bake as is.


Filling
1 1/2 cups (287g) superfine sugar (or regular granulated)
3 egg whites
1 egg
2/3 cup (150mL) freshly squeezed lemon juice (from 3 lemons)
2 tablespoons lemon zest (from 2 lemons)
2/3 cup (65g) unbleached, all-purpose flour
pinch of salt
1-2 cups (150-275g) of frozen raspberries, defrosted
**1 tablespoon confectioner’s sugar (to top)
-whisk together all the ingredients except for the raspberries
-with a sieve press out the juices from the raspberries and then add to the mixture.
-mix together and pour over the crust
-bake for 30-35 minutes
-once cooled you can cut and dust with the confectioners sugar.

Aren't you glad I didn't say Banana (muffins)

Okay so the title of this post lies because there are actually three banana's in this recipe but I finally made Banana Bread Muffins!!! Thank you thank you!!!

The Recipe (thanks to the internet and google muffin searches) and the best thing about it is that each muffin is only about 80 calories, so you can feel guilt free while eating them!!!!

3/4 cup all purpose flour 

1/4 cup whole wheat flour 

1 Tbs baking powder 

1/2 tsp baking soda 

1/8 tsp salt 

1 cup mashed bananas 

1/4 cup sugar 

1/4 cup applesauce 

1 egg 

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

preheat the oven to 350 and bake for about 15 - 20 minutes.  

As you may have noticed I added a little chocolate to the recipe just for good measure.

The adorable cupcake wrappers are from my adventure to Ikea!! greatest place if you are looking for inexpensive baking materials!

Lunch Anyone?

My "food rut" has extended to everything I eat, and it is starting to get annoying.  Yogurt with fruit and granola for breakfast, egg white omelet for lunch and something yummy that mama T makes for dinner (can't really complain there).  Yesterday, I decided that it was time I venture back into the world of sandwiches.  I blame the internet because while I was searching away I found a recipe for grilled cheese, which by itself is eh, but when you add turkey and tomato it becomes the greatest sandwich I have ever eaten.

The Recipe

2 slices of Sesame Ezekiel Bread

2 slices of American Cheese

2 slices of Turkey

one slice of Tomato

(*cook like a regular Grilled Cheese)

I bit into this sandwich expecting it to taste like any other, however, this was a BLT in disguise.  It was probably the best thing I have ever made!!

Today I decided to continue exploring new things to eat and for breakfast had a bowl of Multigrain Cheerios with blueberries, strawberries and walnuts, topped with some almond milk.

After the gym I decided that a recovery shake was what would be lunch for the day so I ordered a Mango Tango Smoothie.  If you want to make a version of this at home take orange juice, frozen mango, frozen strawberries and ice and blend.  It is quite good!!!

Now as I write this, and wait for my Banana muffins to cool I am considering all the possibilities of what I can make for dinner??? hmm decisions, decisions.

Do you have any go-to favorites or quick dinners that are your favorite???

How to get out of a Rut..?

Today I realized that I have fallen into a baking rut.  I realize that I have been making the same recipes whenever I have the urge to bake. I will be at work thinking about new and creative things I can bake like white chocolate brownies or banana bread cupcakes and instead I will come home and make chocolate chip cookies.  While I do love cookies, I find myself wanting more out of my baking.

Tonight while surfing the internet for new ideas I found my new favorite recipe.  Raspberry lemonade Bars.

As soon and I can gather all the ingredients I will post about these bars and how wonderful I know they will be.

Have you been stuck in a rut lately?
What do you do to keep your baking interesting?

Whole Wheat Review

So after a day or two of tasting the healthier version of my Chocolate Chip cookies I have to say that they have become my new favorite thing!

At first the taste took some getting used to, but now that I look back the cookies are less sweet and help curb a sweet tooth without taking in to much sugar.

Just a quick post, however, if anyone knows a healthy alternative to butter for a cookie recipe???


Night everyone!

Whole Wheat, its a Treat

So my first attempt at substituting whole wheat flour for regular flour began this evening when I got home from work.  I had my plan in mind to alter my favorite cookie recipe.

Substitutions
White Unbleached Flour - Whole Wheat Flour

White Sugar - Splenda Sugar Blend
(it cuts your sugar in half)

Regular Chocolate Chips - Chocolate Chunks
(this was just because I wanted to use chunks instead of chips)

When the batter was mixing I noticed that the butter didn't absorb as well as it usually does with the sugar, but that was because there was less sugar in the batter.  When all the ingredients were added I could see that it made the batter a bit darker and there was a different texture to it.

The cookies took the same amount of time to bake and once finished and cooled they looked like regular Chocolate Chips (perhaps the color was a little different), however the taste was not that different.  You can definitely tell that the batter is made using Whole Wheat, but its not a bad change.

I think that this is a good alternative for people who are trying to watch what they are eating because there is about half the calories when compared to regular cookies, however, for those who like to indulge every now and then I would stick to the regular recipe, lets be honest, there is nothing as good as a freshly baked cookie.

The Experiment

So I have been baking quite a bit this summer and I realize that all my recipes satisfy the sweet tooth but when it comes the aspect of health well they fail the test.  Yes, they may be delicious but it is bathing-suit season so I want to pose a challenge to myself and any reader who would like to take that challenge.  I am going to take my recipes and  "health-a-fy" them.  I did this for the first time with my Bahama Mama cookies by switching out white flour for whole wheat four, but I want to see if it works for any recipe.  Who knows, if it works I might just make the switch permanent.

Tonight I am going to do my first test with my favorite recipe, "Mama T's Chocolate Chip Cookies", this is without a doubt the best cookie recipe as is but I want to see what I can do to make them truly "guilt free"


If this works out it will completely change my baking habits from now on.  Have you changes any recipes to make them healthier?
I love comments so let me know!!!!1

Its been a while...

Hello Everybody,

I can't believe that I haven't posted anything in about 2 weeks, and I must apologize.  Honestly I haven't felt that any of my recipes lately were good enough to post about but I have made a few new things so I figured why not share them with you.

There was my Double Chocolate Chip Mint cookies.  I just took a double chocolate chip cookie recipe and added mint chips as well as white chocolate chips which were pretty good, coming from a girl who doesn't like mint and chocolate together (i know its like food treason, but hey...).

There there were the Chocolate Biscotti. Which were the greatest invention ever, and I would give you the recipe but the biscotti recipe is TOP SECRET!

 



There was also the super healthy Whole Wheat Blueberry Muffins which were delicious considering that they were extremely healthy.

 Instead of using whole eggs I used egg whites and yogurt.  We used whole wheat flour and splenda instead of sugar and white flour.  They had a little bit of a different taste but the taste was good, for a healthy muffin.

That is it for my baking for the past few weeks, I promise to try to be more diligent with my writing but maybe after this quick break I will have more ideas to work with.... anyway Happy Eating!!