Heavenly Homemakers

Encouraging women in homemaking, healthy eating and parenting

Easy Homemade Granola

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I didn’t really plan it this way, but what better way to follow up a post about not soaking grains than by giving you a recipe which includes unsoaked grains. Do with this what you wish. :)

This recipe works great as a snack or for a quick breakfast, especially if you’ve made it ahead of time. We like to put it in a bowl and add dried fruit and milk or cream. A friend of mine even adds applesauce to this granola for a sort of “apple crisp” taste. Her kids love it that way!

Easy Homemade GranolaYum

4 cups rolled oats
1 cup shredded, unsweetened coconut
1 cup slivered almonds
1 cup sunflower nuts
1/2 cup sesame seeds
3/4 cup honey
1 cup coconut oil

In a small sauce pan, melt together coconut oil and honey. Stir all remaining ingredients together in a large bowl. Drizzle on the honey/coconut oil mixture and stir well. Pour mixture onto a large, parchment paper lined baking sheet. Bake at 300° for 35 minutes, stirring after the first 20 minutes. Store granola in an air tight container.

granola_2

Are you granola eaters at your house?

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Homemade Sausage Gravy

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Biscuits and Gravy

Have I ever told you about the time I made a cream gravy for a special boyfriend many years ago? We had reached our six month dating anniversary, and so, to celebrate, I was making him a dinner of hamburger steak, mashed potatoes, gravy, and I can’t remember what else.

Everything was coming along pretty well. I called my mom five or twenty times while I was preparing the food, mostly so that she could walk me through the gravy making process. I thought I had it all figured out and soon, it was time for us to enjoy our meal together.

But the gravy. Somehow between hanging up the phone with mom, calling my boyfriend in for the meal, and serving the food – the gravy (if, in fact, we can call it gravy) had turned into a thick, heavy paste like substance. How could this have happened?

Never fear. My boyfriend was very kind. He simply got a butter knife and spread chunks of gravy onto his meat and potatoes. Then he proceeded to eat heartily, and even complimented me on the great flavor of the food.

Yeah, he was a nice one all right. I shouldn’t have let that one get away. Oh wait. I didn’t. A few months after I made him choke on gravy, that nice boy asked me to marry him. I guess he figured that if he could survive my gravy, we could get through anything – thick and thin. (Ha, get it? Thick and thin? The gravy was thick. Get it? Okay, it wasn’t that funny.)

I have since then perfected my gravy making skills, much to the delight of my boyfriend husband, and all of our darling offspring. Here is my sausage gravy recipe and a picture tutorial that will hopefully spare you all from making the same pasty mess that was once my “gravy”.

Homemade Sausage GravyYum

1 pound turkey sausage (I like using this homemade recipe.)
1 Tablespoon plus 3 Tablespoons butter
3 Tablespoons flour (I use freshly ground white whole wheat)
2 1/2 cups milk
Sea salt and pepper to taste

Begin by browning the sausage with one tablespoon of butter in a large skillet until it is cooked thoroughly.

Add the remaining 3 tablespoons of butter, stirring it around until is has melted.

Sprinkle in the flour. Stir it around with the meat and butter until it is absorbed.

You should now have kind of a thick, meat mixture in your skillet. Turn the heat on your burner up to “high”.

Pour in the milk, and stir constantly. I find that I must leave the burner turned to “high” in order for the gravy to thicken.

Continue to stir over high heat until gravy becomes thick and bubbly. Remove the gravy from the heat, add salt and pepper to taste, and serve.

Trouble shooting your gravy:  If your gravy turns out too thick, simply add more milk, small amounts at a time, continuing to stir, until gravy is the desired consistency.

If your gravy fails to thicken, mix a “paste” of 2 Tablespoons flour with 3 Tablespoons of water. Stir the mixture into your gravy, little bits at a time until the gravy thickens to desired consistency. Do NOT sprinkle flour directly into the gravy. That’s how lumpy gravy is made. :)

We love this gravy served over these Whole Wheat Biscuits.

Have any fun stories about boyfriends or gravy you’d like to share? :)

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Sweet Pepper Fritata

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I can’t decide which I like best about this dish:  looking at it…or eating it. I love that the red and green peppers make this fritata look festive for Christmas. This is very easy to make and can be put together ahead of time and baked just before serving. If you want to add a little extra protein, throw in some leftover cooked chicken or sausage.

Sweet Pepper FritataYum

1 small onion, chopped
3/4 cup chopped green pepper
3/4 cup chopped red pepper
2 Tablespoons butter
5 eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 cup chopped sun dried tomatoes
1 1/2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Saute onion and peppers in the butter for 5-7 minutes or until veggies are tender and your family comes running into the kitchen to see what smells so good. Meanwhile, combine remaining ingredients in a bowl. Stir sauteed vegetables into egg mixture. Pour into an ungreased pie dish. Bake in a 350° oven for 25-30 minutes or until a knife inserted in the middle of the fritata comes out clean. Serves 6-8.

Sweet Pepper Fritata

Which would you rather do – look at this, or eat it? Or maybe you could just really enjoy looking at it while you eat it. ;)

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Multi-Grain Pumpkin Waffles and Pancakes (wheat free)

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I am such a whole wheat girl. I love my freshly ground hard white wheat. I order 500 pounds of wheat at a time for goodness sake. But, in an effort to add variety to our diets, I’ve been on a mission to try different grains.

As you know, I’ve done a fair amount of experimenting lately with Coconut Flour (which isn’t a grain, but it does add variety to our healthy baked goods). Recently, my dear friend Angie sent me this Pumpkin Waffle recipe, and then another dear friend Jenny (who is Angie’s sister) affirmed how good these are – so I went for it. This recipe calls for several different grains and none of them are wheat. Look at me, growing in my grain varieties! Hey, it’s not difficult when you have good recipes like this one. In fact, my kids loved them and my pickiest eater even said, “Wow, these taste like your homemade donuts!” I think we have a winner.

Multi-Grain Pumpkin Waffles and PancakesYum

1 cup sorghum or barley flour
1 cup buckwheat flour
1/3 cup millet flour
1/3 cup brown rice flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ginger
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
3/4 cup pumpkin puree
4 tablespoons melted coconut oil
4 tablespoons maple syrup or sucanat
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 eggs
2 cups milk (or coconut milk if you’re going for dairy free also)

Whisk together dry ingredients. Beat the wet into the dry ingredients to combine. Cook the batter in a waffle iron – greasing well between each batch. Or, add a few extra tablespoons of milk and cook the batter into pancakes.

pumpkin_waffles
I can attest to the fact that it’s best to keep your waffle iron greased well to keep these from sticking. Otherwise, these were easy to make and incredibly delicious. And we just added some multi-grain variety to our diets. It wasn’t even painful. ;)  Remember, my nine year old thinks these taste like donuts. That’s a multi-grain transition anyone can make!

What grains do you eat at your house? Have you ventured beyond whole wheat yet?

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My Favorite, Versatile Whole Wheat Dough

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You’ve been seeing this same dough recipe pop up over and over as I post new recipes. It has definitely become my go-to dough recipe for quick, kid-friendly meals that are also healthy. I decided today to highlight and feature my friend, The Versatile Dough. He (she?) is a winner in my book and can multitask in my kitchen to create all kinds of wonderful food.

I guess that must mean that this dough is definitely a “she”. He’s can’t multitask as well as she’s can. This is not an insult to the he’s – no not at all. I’m thankful that God made males able to focus on one thing well. We females can multitask so well, it’s sometimes hard for us to focus on just one thing. Trust me, I’m a she. I know these things. (See, like right now I’m typing this, thinking about the meat thawing in my kitchen for lunch tomorrow, making a plan for what to do with the apples on my porch and creating a chore list for my kids – all at the same time. It’s amazing that my post makes any sense at all. Case in point. So far, this post hasn’t made a whole lot of sense. After all, I’ve just assigned a gender to my whole wheat dough.)

So back to my point, because surprisingly, I really do have one. I love this Whole Wheat Dough. I use it a lot. I think you will love it too.

Versatile Whole Wheat DoughYum

3 to 3 1/2 cups whole wheat flour (I use freshly ground hard white wheat flour)
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 cup butter, melted and cooled
1 cup plain yogurt

Mix all ingredients and knead together until a nice dough has formed. (If you’re using store-bought flour, you will probably not need all 3 1/2 cups of flour.)  You can roll out and use this dough right away, or you can allow it to sit on the counter-top overnight (covered) in order to break down the phytates in the wheat and make it more digestible.

If you do allow the dough to sit overnight, it is best to knead this dough for several minutes before you try to roll it out. :)

What to Make With This Versatile Whole Wheat Dough

(Click on the links above the pictures to find the specific recipes.)

Pizza Crust

pizzasm.JPG

Poptarts

Pigs in a Blanket

Mini Apple Pies and Pockets

miniapplepies9sm

Pizza Pockets

pizzapockets2sm.JPG

I bet if I think real hard, I can come up with several more ways to use this dough. Have you tried making this dough before or any of the above recipe ideas? You MUST try it – it’s buttery, flaky, healthy, tasty and EASY!

And if you think I’m weird calling my dough a “she” you should hear me talking to my frozen/thawing chickens as I prepare them for soup. Wouldn’t you just like to be a fly on the wall in my kitchen sometime? Oh the things you would learn about me then. ;)

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Homemade Peach Syrup (made with unprocessed sugar)

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We usually top our pancakes with real maple syrup or homemade applesauce. Sometimes peanut butter and jelly. Or peanut butter with maple syrup. Or honey. Or if we sprinkle a few mini chocolate chips into the pancakes, we don’t really need syrup at all. But last week when we had some fresh, local peaches in our kitchen, I made a quick and healthy homemade peach syrup that is oh-my-goodness good.

You need exactly two ingredients to make this: peaches and sucanat. The two together cook to form a syrup. No water necessary. Can you believe how easy this is?

Homemade Peach SyrupYum

Homemade Peach Syrup (made with unprocessed sugar)
 
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Ingredients
  • 3 fresh peaches (or 2 cups frozen)
  • 2 Tablespoons sucanat or brown sugar
Instructions
  1. Slice peaches into a saucepan.
  2. Stir in sucanat and cook on medium heat, stirring occasionally until the peaches are tender and the ingredients have formed a syrup.

You can add a few shakes of cinnamon if you like. Of course I love doing that in the fall when everything seems to need to smell and taste like cinnamon.

I love how the fruit and sugar cooked together form a syrup naturally. This works with both fresh or frozen fruit. No need to thaw the frozen fruit before cooking!

Homemade Peach Syrup

 

Another variation of this Peach Syrup recipe is…

Easy Raspberry Pancake and Waffle Syrup

Easy Raspberry Pancake and Waffle Syrup - Only Two Ingredients!

It’s the same idea – just sub out peaches for raspberries. Or use blueberries instead. Or strawberries. Or any combination of peaches or berries to make a multi-fruit syrup. See how easy this is?

In case you need them (and of course you do want them), here are our family’s favorite pancake and waffle recipes:

What’s your favorite way to top pancakes and waffles?

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Whole Wheat Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins

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Whole Wheat Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins anyone? Grab a cup of coffee or hot chocolate! What a delicious combination, and perfect for fall!

Yum

As several of you requested, I’m sharing my healthy variations to Crystal’s Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins. These were a big hit yesterday morning when I served them in our marriage class.

If you’d like to read more about how I adapt a recipe to make it healthier, check out this post. You’ll find a free, downloadable recipe conversion sheet which you can tack onto your refrigerator to reference when you need to convert a recipe.

Whole Wheat Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins

(adapted from MoneySavingMom)

5.0 from 1 reviews
Whole Wheat Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins
 
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Author:
Serves: =24
Ingredients
  • 3 cups whole wheat flour (I used freshly ground hard white wheat)
  • ½ cup sucanat
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon sea salt
  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon
  • 4 eggs
  • 2 cups pureed pumpkin (or one 16 ounce can)
  • 1 cup melted coconut oil (or butter)
  • 1 cup chocolate chips
Instructions
  1. In a large mixing bowl, stir together all dry ingredients.
  2. Add eggs, pumpkin and oil.
  3. Mix well.
  4. Fold in chocolate chips.
  5. Spoon batter into 24 paper lined muffin cups.
  6. Bake in a 400° oven for 16-22 minutes or until the muffins are golden brown.

 

(I prefer either homemade chocolate chips or soy free chocolate chips)

 


These are easy to put together and make your house smell just like the fall season is supposed to smell. Pumpkin and cinnamon smell awesome. Plus, adding chocolate to a muffin never, ever hurts my feelings. :)

Want more pumpkin recipes?

  1. Overnight Pumpkin Spice French Toast Casserole (Such a wonderful recipe to put together at night, then bake and serve to guests in the morning!)
  2. Super Moist Sour Cream Pumpkin Bread
  3. Pumpkin Spice Roll-Out Cookies (Simple and sweet, one of my favorites!)
  4. Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bread
  5. Pumpkin Donuts (I make these all year round as an excuse to feed my kids a vegetable for breakfast.)
  6. Warm Pumpkin Custard (Oh yes, you should drink your pumpkin.)
  7. Simple Pumpkin Pancakes
  8. Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cake
  9. Pumpkin Pecan Pie Squares (Such a fun combination of two holiday favorites.)
  10. Pumpkin Pie
  11. Pumpkin Breakfast Cake
  12. Pumpkin Cheesecake (Making life better, one delicious bite at a time.)
  13. Pumpkin Pie Bars (These are a Thanksgiving tradition at our house.)
  14. Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins
  15. Easy Pumpkin Cheesecake Muffins (With chocolate chips on top. Amen.)
  16. Flourless Pumpkin Muffins (Flourless and fabulous!)
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Coconut Flour Cheddar Drop Biscuits

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coconut_flour_cheddar_biscuits_2

At a recent youth event, my friend Lisa mentioned something about her Coconut Flour Cheese Biscuits. I immediately dropped my plate and fork, leaped over the couch to the other side of the room and tackled her onto the floor, begging her to please share her recipe.

Of course you know I’m kidding.

Her name is really Louanne.

Okay no, I’m kidding again.

Her name really is Lisa and when she mentioned her Coconut Flour Cheese Biscuits I didn’t actually drop anything or leap over anything or tackle her. I’m not that crazy.

Yes, kidding again. You all know I’m crazy.

But still, she was nice enough to give me her recipe without all the drama. The drama is what I felt inside when I heard that she had a new great coconut flour recipe to offer.

So here, without any shoulder shaking, leg grabbing or tearful pleading is my friend Lisa’s awesome recipe:

Coconut Flour Cheddar Drop BiscuitsYum

¼ cup coconut oil or butter, melted
1/3 cup sifted coconut flour
4 eggs
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon onion powder
¼ teaspoon baking powder
½ cup sharp cheddar cheese, shredded

Blend together eggs, coconut oil or butter, salt, and onion powder. Combine coconut flour with baking powder and whisk into batter until there are no lumps. Fold in cheese. Drop batter by the spoonful onto a greased cookie sheet. Bake at 400 degrees for 15 minutes. For a cheesier biscuit increase cheese to ¾ cup.

This recipe makes about 10 biscuits.

coconut_flour_cheddar_biscuits_1

If you’re curious, here’s a post I wrote explaining more about why I love coconut flour. And also, one of my readers just let me know that this great deal for coconut flour is back up and running. How very thoughtful of them to re-stock five minutes before I posted this recipe. :)

Disclaimer:  No friends were harmed during the acquiring of this recipe.

Have you tried coconut flour yet? Do you love it?

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Whole Wheat Blueberry Streusel Muffins (plus a little project announcement)

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blueberry_streusel_muffin

A few months ago when I went to my friend Tracy’s Shelf Reliance party, I ordered a big can of freeze dried blueberries for an excellent price. I love having those blueberries on hand – and they work perfectly in these Blueberry Streusel Muffins.

Blueberry Streusel MuffinsYum

1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour (I use freshly ground hard or soft white wheat)
1/3 cup sucanat  (you can use brown sugar or honey if you prefer)
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1 egg
1/4 cup melted butter or coconut oil
3/4 cup milk
3/4 cup blueberries, fresh, frozen or freeze dried

Mix dry ingredients together well. Add egg, butter and milk, stirring until all ingredients are mixed. Gently stir in blueberries. Scoop batter into 12 paper lined muffin tins. Sprinkle with Streusel Topping and bake in a 400° for 20 minutes.

Streusel Topping:

3 T. sucanat or brown sugar
1 T. butter, softened
2 T. chopped nuts (optional)

This is one of those easy recipes that your kids can help you make. I feel like it is super important for you to get your kids into the kitchen with you so that they can learn the basics of cooking.

In fact, you wanna know a little secret? I’m frantically working on a (big) new ebook/curriculum that guides you in depth through teaching your kids to cook. I hope to have this project finished in the next few weeks (months?) so that you can have it when the new school year begins – hopefully?! (UPDATE:  Here it is!)

Anyway – now you know. I’m not sure why I didn’t tell you earlier – it’s too much fun to keep a secret! I’m super excited about this and hope to create a resource that will be helpful to all. I’ve even “borrowed” some little girls to help make the book a little more well rounded. :)

This may be one of the most fun projects I’ve ever worked on – combining two of my favorite things in the world:  kids and cooking. Stay tuned for more information about this book as I get closer to finishing it. And if you hear me squealing at any time during the next few weeks, it’s because I really am having that much fun with this project.

Yeah, that little darling in the above picture is cute enough to make all of us squeal. ;)

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Coconut Flour Banana Muffins

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I’ve been having so much fun playing with this Gluten Free/Dairy Free Muffin recipe! We’re on the home stretch of the Gluten Free Experiment we’ve been conducting at our house (more on that soon), but I guarantee you we’ll continue to make these muffins and all the fun variations I’m coming up with whether we’re gluten free or not. What a healthy little muffin (that just so happens to taste like cake).

Coconut flour is high in fiber, high in protein, making it a wonderful addition to your diet. I find coconut flour at Tropical Traditions or Amazon. I’m so in love with this stuff that I might just write a post all about it someday soon.

I don’t recommend substituting whole wheat flour in this recipe. Coconut flour and wheat flour are not created equal. If you want a Whole Wheat Banana Muffin recipe, check out this one! We love it!

Coconut Flour Banana MuffinsYum

1/2 cup Coconut Flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
6 eggs
4 Tablespoons Coconut Oil, melted
1/4 cup honey
2-3 ripe, mashed bananas
1/2 cup nuts (optional)

Mix all ingredients together, then pour batter into a well greased (or paper lined) muffin pan. Bake at 350 for 15-25 minutes. Makes 12 muffins.

coconut_flour_banana_muffins[1]

I never put nuts in muffins because 5 out of 6 of us don’t care for them in our baked goods. How ’bout you? Are you a nutty kind of person? (I really mean to ask if you like nuts in your muffins…not if you consider yourself to be nuts, but feel free to answer according to how you’re feeling today.)

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