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Healthy Treat for Today: Whole Wheat Donuts

March 18, 2008 by Laura 97 Comments

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My dad…whom my boys call, Papa, is famous around here for buying us donuts when he comes to town. It’s become a big deal…one that the boys won’t let Papa forget about. (“Hi Papa…did you bring us donuts?…oh, and we’re also glad you’re here…”)

One Saturday morning…I decided to make homemade (and healthier) donuts for the family. I got up early…ground wheat into flour…mixed up the dough, rolled them out, fried them up…and made a special hot fudge sauce to drizzle over them. I put them on a pretty platter…poured glasses of fresh milk…and called the boys down for breakfast.

I cheerfully and excitedly greeted them with flour on my face and my hair all frazzled from all the work of making these fresh off the stove donuts…

And my three year old lit up and said, “Oh!! Did Papa make us DONUTS?!”

Huh. I go to all this trouble…and Papa gets all the credit.

sigh :)

Well, they liked my donuts just as much Papa’s…and I loved that these were a pretty healthy treat!

(Papa really got a big kick out of that story, of course..)

I hope you’ll get a big kick out of this recipe!

Whole Wheat Cake Donuts (or should I call them, “Papa’s Special”?)!Yum

3 ¼ cup whole wheat flour
2 t. baking powder
½ t. cinnamon
¼ t. salt
¼ t. nutmeg
2/3 cup rapadura (dehydrated cane sugar juice) or sucanat
2 eggs
1 t. vanilla
2/3 cup milk
1/4 cup melted butter
Oil for frying (I use palm shortening or coconut oil)

Mix dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Stir in eggs, vanilla, milk and melted butter. Knead dough a few minutes to make sure all ingredients are mixed thoroughly.
On a floured surface, roll dough to ½ inch thickness. Cut with donut cutter, or biscuit cutter. Heat oil in skillet or electric skillet…enough to cover the bottom of the skillet about ¼ inch. Place donuts into the hot oil to fry for 2-3 minutes on each side. Remove from skillet and place on a paper towel lined plate. Sprinkle a mixture of rapadura and cinnamon, or sprinkle organic powdered sugar over the hot donuts.

Yum! Anytime I want a special breakfast treat for my family…these donuts work for me!

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Kids in the Kitchen, pt. 5: Monkey Bread and Monkey Business

March 14, 2008 by Laura 19 Comments

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Yesterday I mentioned making monkey bread with all four of my monkeys in the kitchen. While there were times of craziness when we were putting this together – really, really we did have fun! (All of us…even me.)

Monkey Bread Tutorial 2

Yum

I wanted to share this recipe with you, as it is a healthy (uses only whole wheat flour and unprocessed sugars), yummy treat that is fun to make with your kids. It does take a bit of time to make, but you do it in stages, and the time spent is worth it!

I simply used my Honey Whole Wheat Bread recipe, but instead of forming loaves as normal, we made it into this wonderful, sweet cinnamon pull apart bread for our breakfast.

How to Make Whole Wheat Monkey Bread

Kids in the Kitchen, pt. 5: Monkey Bread and Monkey Business

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Author: Laura

Ingredients

6 cups whole wheat flour, divided
1 ¾ cups warm water, divided
⅓ cup honey
1 package yeast (2¼ teaspoons)
1 teaspoon sea salt
3 T. melted butter

Instructions

Mix 3 cups of whole wheat flour with 1 ½ cups of warm water in a large glass bowl. Allow this to sit for about 30 minutes. This will break down the gluten and help the bread to rise better.
Meanwhile, in a small bowl mix together ¼ cup water, yeast and honey. Allow this to sit for about 10 minutes, or until the yeast is activated and mixture becomes bubbly.
Add salt, melted butter and yeast mixture to the flour and water mixture. Gradually add the remaining three cups of flour and stir well.
As the dough becomes harder to stir, pour it out onto a clean counter and begin to knead the dough. Add a little flour if needed to keep it from sticking. Knead the dough for 5-10 minutes.
Place the ball of dough back into the bowl and cover it with a cloth. Allow the dough to rise for one hour, or until it has doubled in size.
Using a floured hand, pull the dough out of the bowl onto the counter. Knead for just a minute or two until the air bubbles are gone.
Melt one stick of butter.
In a medium bowl, mix together 1 cup rapadura and 3 t. cinnamon.
Pull off small fits of dough and roll them around in your hands to form a ball.
Dip the ball of dough into the melted butter, then roll it around in the cinnamon/rapadura mixture.
Place the covered ball into a buttered bread pan or angel food cake pan.
Continue to dip bits of dough in butter and cinnamon/rapadura. Fill pan ½ full. You should be able to make two pans.
Allow the dough to rise for about 30 minutes.
Bake in a 350 degree oven for 45 minutes.

Here are a few picture highlights of our Monkey Business:

Once the dough had risen and needed to be punched down…EVERYONE wanted to be a part of that. I mean – it’s permission to punch something. What little boy doesn’t want THAT?!

Asa got to knead the dough, and I’m not sure what Justus and Malachi are licking off their fingers there…flour? Okay you two – wash your hands…again.

Not to be outdone by the biggest brother, Justus and Elias needed to knead too.
Asa got the butter melting on the stove.

Justus smeared butter all over the bread pans.

Malachi stirred up the rapadura and cinnamon mixture.

And then EVERYONE got to pull off balls of dough and do the fun rolling and dipping and making ooey-gooey bread part.

Ah, the beautiful loaves, rising and almost ready to go into the oven.

Monkey bread!! Can’t you just smell it?!

The next morning, I rewarmed it a little and we had it with milk for breakfast. When the boys woke up smelling it, they jumped out of bed and ran downstairs.

All the way down the stairs, I was hearing monkey noises, “Ooo Ooo…Aah…Aah..” in high pitched tones and looked over to see four monkeys making their way into the kitchen. And that is how my monkey bread morning began.

(At least they didn’t start picking bugs off of each other and eating them. My monkey’s are slightly tamer than that.)

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Healthy Treat For Today: Strawberry Jelly Roll

March 7, 2008 by Laura 4 Comments

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Today, I asked Elias what we should make for our healthy treat…

He said, “Something with strawberries!! Some kind of cake!!”

Since strawberries aren’t in season yet…and I couldn’t really come up with any good ideas for a cake using frozen strawberries…

We came up with the idea to make a Strawberry Jelly Roll.

I’ve actually never made a jelly roll before…

Um, because, they’ve intimidated me.

I admit it. I have Jellyrollaphobia.

I’m usually a mix-up-a-cake-and-throw-it -into-the-pan kind of a girl. The idea of whipping my egg whites and folding in my flour mixture…blah, blah, blah…

And then rolling the cake thingy and spreading the filling, and rolling it back up without the thing breaking apart all over the place really scared me…

Jellyrollaphobia.

But today, everyone…

Today, I have overcome my fear of the Jelly Roll.

I have learned that Jelly Rolls are nothing to be afraid of.

This was very easy to make…and not at all scary.

Strawberry Jelly RollYum

1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 t. baking powder
4 eggs yolks
1/2 t. vanilla
1/3 cup rapadura
4 egg whites
1/2 cup rapadura
Strawberry Jelly – the kind made with only fruit, of course

Stir together flour and baking powder. Set aside. In another bowl, beat egg yolks and vanilla and 1/3 cup rapadura. And in another bowl, beat egg whites until soft peaks form. Add 1/2 cup rapadura to the egg whites and beat some more until hard peaks form.

Then, fold the egg yolk/vanilla mixture into the egg whites. Next, fold the flour mixture into the egg whites.

Spread the batter onto a buttered piece of parchment paper lining a cookie sheet. Bake it for 12-15 minutes at 375 degrees. The cake should “spring back” if you gently touch it in the middle.

Immediately pull the cake off of the parchment paper and lay it onto a tea towel. Roll it up in the towel. Allow it to cool completely.

Unroll it, spread jelly all over it, and roll it back up.

Done.

Slice it, eat it, share it, exclaim over it, be amazed by it.

We all really liked this treat.

And I will definitely make it again sometime.

I’ll probably even play with it and make different fun variations to the Jelly Roll.

Pumpkin Roll, Chocolate Roll, Cream Cheese something or other Roll, Chocolate-Pumpkin-Cream Cheese-something or other Roll…

I am a Jellyrollaphobic no more.

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Healthy Treat for Today: Mudballs

March 6, 2008 by Laura 35 Comments

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Who wouldn’t want to eat a Mudball?! These treats give the idea of making mud pies a whole new meaning!

These are great fun to make…and great fun to eat!

Just ask my boys…who have gone through about 4 double batches of them since Jayme sent me the recipe!

As Jayme put it…

“Sometimes we eat them warm right out of the pan…sometimes we eat chill them and then eat them…but mostly…we just EAT them!”

Perfectly said!

You have to try these! They are a great snack to have on hand in the fridge. And they really do just take about five minutes to make.

MudballsYum

1/4 cup peanut butter
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup wheat germ
1/2 cup oats
1/4 cup chocolate chips
1/4 cup sesame seeds or flax seeds

Cook the peanut butter and honey over low heat until melted. Add remaining ingredients. When cool enough to handle roll into oohey gooey mud balls.

Have fun! Let me know if you don’t like the name of these treats just as much as my boys do!

UPDATE

Every time I make these, I have to do way too much mental math to figure out how to make a large batch. Finally I realized that I needed to update this post with an additional recipe card to help us all just make these without having to stretch our brains to figure out how many 1/4 cups are in 40 ounces. Oy.

You may wish I had some sort of happy medium recipe – somewhere between Tiny Recipe and Monster Recipe. I suggest that you might want to cut the Monster Recipe in half, or make the big recipe and then wrap/freeze some Mudballs for another time!

NOTE: If you do the math, you’ll notice that not all of the ingredient amounts listed above are multiplied the same. This is because I refuse to use that much honey, which then changes the liquid consistency of the big batch. What you see below is how I make these now as I use a 40-ounce jar of our favorite peanut butter from Sam’s. (40-ounces is 5-cups, by the way. You can see then, that I don’t want to use 5-cups of honey!?!?! These are perfectly sweet with way less honey!)

Monster-Sized Recipe for Mudballs

Healthy Treat for Today: Mudballs

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Author: Laura

Serves: 50-60

Ingredients

40 ounce jar natural peanut butter
1 cup honey
1 cup wheat germ
1 cup flax seeds (ground or regular)
1 cup unsweetened coconut flakes
1½ cups chocolate chips
4 cups oats

Instructions

Cook and stir the peanut butter and honey over low heat until melted together
Add remaining ingredients.
Use a medium-sized cookie scoop to form balls.
Store in an air tight container.

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Healthy Treat for Today: Applesauce Bread

March 5, 2008 by Laura 132 Comments

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Wanna know the biggest problem I had with my Applesauce Bread this morning?!

applesauce_bread

Yum

I only made one loaf! What was I thinking?!

We downed the whole loaf very quickly…

And then, “Mom, did you make anymore?” say all the boys as they peek around in hope at all the countertops and at the oven.

So, be warned, you might want to double this recipe if you’re going to wake your family up some morning to the delicious smell of this bread baking.

And, it is a great way to wake your family, I promise!

5.0 from 1 reviews

Healthy Treat for Today: Applesauce Bread

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Author: Laura

Serves: 1 loaf

Ingredients

1½ cups whole wheat flour
¾ cup sucanat or ½ cup honey
½ teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon nutmeg
¾ cup applesauce
2 eggs
¼ cup melted butter

Instructions

Mix dry ingredients.
Make a well in the center and add applesauce, eggs, and butter.
Stir well.
Pour batter into one buttered bread pan or stone.
Bake at 350° for 45-55 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle of the loaf comes out clean.

Check out these cutie boys eating their Aplesauce Bread this morning with butter melted on it, with a glass of milk…

See, Malachi has his green cell phone handy right there – ready to call someone to let them
know what a great breakfast he’s having. (I can’t believe my kids were actually this little once!)

This is one of our favorite fall recipes! Put some in the oven, and your whole house will smell like fall. Or Christmas. Or comfort. Or all of the above.

Hint: If you have some apples that are beginning to get mushy and no one wants to eat them – simply core them and put them into a food processor or blender. Puree them, then stir them into this recipe. Works like a charm!

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Healthy Treat for Today: Homemade Pizza Pockets

March 4, 2008 by Laura 113 Comments

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Lunch time around here can be a hectic time…

These Pizza Pockets are a perfect treat that you can make ahead put in the freezer…then throw in the oven at lunchtime.

Here’s how I made these:

I used my regular pizza recipe…

CrustYum

3 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
1 teasoon sea salt
1 cup melted butter
1 cup plain yogurt

Stir ingredients together until thoroughly mixed. You can make these pockets right away, or you can allow this dough to soak for 12-24 hours in order to break down the phytates and make the grain more easily digestible.

Pizza Sauce

1 1/2 cups tomato sauce
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1 1/2 teaspoon oregano
1 1/2 teaspoon basil

Stir together and simmer for a few minutes.

Pizza Pocket Fillings

Grated mozzarella or white cheddar cheese, cooked hamburger, pepperoni, olives, peppers, mushrooms

To form a Pizza Pocket

Roll a small ball of dough into a circle. Place one tablespoon of pizza sauce in the center. Put in a small amount of your choice of toppings. Fold the dough in half. Use a fork to pinch the edges together.

Lay Pizza Pockets on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Freeze for about one hour. Pop them off the cookie sheet and put them into a freezer bag…and back into the freezer.

Bake your Pizza Pockets

For frozen Pizza Pockets, bake in a 400 degree oven for 30 minutes. If the Pizza Pockets are thawed, bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes.

I love the convenience of this nutritious “fast food”! Serve them with fruit and veggies(God’s fast food!)…and you’ve got yourself a quick and easy lunchtime treat!!

You’ll find more healthy treat recipes here.

Grocery List

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Healthy Treat for Today: Chocolate Chip Brownies

March 3, 2008 by Laura 98 Comments

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Do you like rich chocolate like I do?

For me…the richer the better…

And this is one wealthy brownie. Loaded. Rollin’ in it. It’s got bank.

These babies require a glass of milk. A tall one.

After you have these, a brownie from a box just won’t do anymore. You won’t even be able to call those boxed things brownies anymore. They’ll just be a brown square of blah-ness. Nope, now these…these are real brownies.

And, guess what?! I experimented a little with the chocolate chips to see if I could make them with butter instead of coconut oil.

Oh yeah!! You SO can!

The chips are a little softer when made with butter, but they still worked just fine.

And they definitely taste good.

And make great Chocolate Chip Brownies!

Chocolate Chip BrowniesYum

1 stick butter, melted
1 cup sucanat
1/4 cup cocoa powder
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup homemade chocolate chips (chunks)

Stir together butter, sucanat and cocoa. Mix in egg and vanilla. Stir in flour and mix until combined. Fold in chocolate chips. Pour into a 8×8 baking stone or pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

I had to double this recipe today because I’m taking a few to some friends tonight, and because…YUM!

Get yourself a tall glass of milk and sit down and enjoy one of these rich treats!

And then, get up and jog a few laps, because even though these are on the healthier side of things…

They aren’t carrot sticks.

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Healthy Treat for Today: Banana Cake

February 28, 2008 by Laura 23 Comments

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So, I told you I’d give you some amazing and deep insights into why I want to be like a banana. And I know you can hardly wait to read this and gain from my incredible deep- thinking thought.

So here it is.

I was looking at my bananas a few days ago…and watching as they turned darker and blacker and squishier and saggier.

And then I began to think through the life of a banana.

It starts out green…and it’s not very tasty.

Then it turns a beautiful yellow and it tastes good…it’s in it’s prime of life.

And then, it begins to lose it’s beauty…and slowly becomes darker and blacker and squishier…and saggier…

And as that happens…the banana just gets softer and sweeter…

And even more useful.

Because before, it was just a banana to be eaten.

Now, it is a super sweet banana that can be made into ALL kinds of things…banana bread, banana pancakes, banana smoothies, banana muffins…

And that’s when I decided that I wanted to be like a banana.

As I get older…I’m going to get age spots and get saggier…and all those fun things.

But, I also want to get sweeter and sweeter and be more and more useful to people.

I want to appreciate the older “bananas” around me who are “oh so sweet” and have “oh so much wisdom and usefulness”.

And I want to teach my children to appreciate them too.

Now when I see those bananas on my counter, instead of seeing the black, squishy sagginess of them…

I see that they truly are beautiful.

And THAT, my friends is my incredibly deep insight into why I want to be like a banana.

Here’s a great recipe to use with those beautiful squishy bananas!

Banana Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

2 cups whole wheat flour
1 1/4 cup rapadura or 3/4 cup honey
1 1/2 t. baking powder
1 t. baking soda
1/2 t. salt
2 smashed over-ripe bananas
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk or buttermilk
1 stick butter, melted
1 t. vanilla

In a large bowl, stir together dry ingredients. Mash bananas in a separate bowl. Make a well in the center of dry ingredients. Pour in mashed bananas and all other ingredients. Stir well (or beat with hand mixer).

Pour into a greased 9×9 inch pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes. Allow to cool completely before frosting.

Cream Cheese FrostingYum

1/2 cup heavy whipping cream
3 ounces cream cheese
1 t. vanilla
4 T. honey

In a medium sized bowl, whip cream until soft peaks form. In a separate bowl, beat cream cheese, vanilla and honey until smooth. Fold cream cheese mixture into whipped cream. “Slather” it on your banana cake.

Enjoy.

I’m going to go have myself a piece of cake…

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Healthy Treat for Today: Coconut Macaroons

February 26, 2008 by Laura 16 Comments

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All these “natural sugar” treats are soooo working for me around here. They satisfy the sweet tooth…my kids love them…and I can feel good about us all eating them!

Here’s today’s recipe!

Coconut MacaroonsYum

4 egg whites
1/4 t. sea salt
1/2 t. vanilla
2 T. arrowroot powder
1/2 cup real maple syrup (grade B is best)
2 cups unsweetened, shredded coconut

Separate eggs…putting the whites in a mixing bowl and the yolks in the fridge for tomorrow’s breakfast!

Beat the whites and salt with a hand mixer until soft peaks form.

(I took this picture with my left hand while I beat my egg whites with my right hand. But, I’m not trying to brag or anything…)

Continue to beat and add vanilla, arrowroot powder and maple syrup, one at a time.

(I cannot brag about adding these ingredients and beating the egg whites and taking a picture all at the same time.)

(I mean, I could have… but I was too busy working on our taxes, practicing my latin skills and tayloring a new suit for my husband while I did this step. I simply cannot do everything at once.)

Fold in the coconut.

Drop by spoonfuls onto a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper.

Bake at 300 degrees for 30 minutes….then turn the oven to 200 degrees for one hour to let them crisp up.

These little treasures are so delicious!

The hard part about making them is smelling them bake for a whole hour and a half….and not being able to eat them!

Ah, but your patience will pay off!

Enjoy!

Tomorrow’s natural sugar recipe will have something to do with bananas…as I have several around here who have seen better days.

I’m thinking…hmm…banana cake?!

I also plan to share with you some deep insights into why I hope to be like a banana someday.

Deep. Very deep insights.

Be sure to take a look at all of the great natural sugar treat recipes…and to keep coming back for more each day!

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Healthy Treat For Today: Smoothies

February 26, 2008 by Laura 23 Comments

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There really is no limit when it comes to smoothies.

smoothies

Yum

Whip out your blender and you can make them with just about any combination of ingredients:

Yogurt or kefir, berries, peaches, apples, bananas, juice, cream, milk…

How about spinach smoothies?

Yes, and they’re good too. Really. I’m not kidding.

I made myself one yesterday. Ain’t it purty?

Heather mentioned some smoothie suggestions a few weeks ago at the beginning of the NO SUGAR Plunge. Here are her great ideas:

The Ultimate Smoothie:
half a Banana
four to six frozen strawberries
half cup plain yogurt
half to one cup orange juice
one Tbsp Flax seeds (ground in coffee grinder)

In a blender add the banana, strawberries, yogurt, and orange juice. Blend until smooth. Add the flax seeds and whey, blend until evenly distributed. Pour in two glasses and enjoy! Makes 2 smoothies or cut ingredients for a solo one!

Change the fruits to make a whole new kind of smoothie.
Tropical- Fresh banana, frozen mango, pineapple juice
Very Berry– Fresh blueberries, frozen raspberries, pomegranate juice
Peachy Dreams– Fresh strawberries, frozen peaches, orange juice

Thanks, Heather for sending us those!

I really like mixing my homemade yogurt or kefir (kefir is a lot like yogurt, just a little runnier) and a variety of frozen fruits, a tiny bit of vanilla and a few drops of stevia to sweeten. Blend it up and you’ve got breakfast or a snack or a side dish at lunch.

And I know you’re dying to find out how I made my spinach smoothie…’cause you really want to hop right up and make one yourself!

It was a banana, and apple, a big handful of spinach leaves, about a half cup of water and a few drops of stevia. Trust me, it mostly tastes like banana and apple. You can use any kinds of greens – I just happened to have spinach on hand.

What do you put in your smoothies?

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