A Healthy Breakfast: Banana Bread

What kid doesn’t love banana bread?!?!?!?

I know mine sure do and with this amazing recipe I found, (on Pinterest of coarse, thanks to 8wks to a Better You Recipe,) it is healthy, delicious, and filling! I just made it the day before so not only did it make a great breakfast the kids had it as a snack too. It would also be very easy to make this on the weekend, with the kids, and freeze until you are ready to use, just take it out the night before and leave to thaw on the counter. Also if you are anything like me you always have plenty of bananas lying around! What really drew me to this specific recipe though is it is made with whole wheat flour, which we have been trying to switch over to, and instead of sugar and oil it uses honey and unsweetened applesauce. Now it was a little blander than most banana bread recipes but not tasteless bland, it was still very delicious!

So here is what you will need:

• 2 cups whole wheat flour (I substituted 1/2 cup of flour for a 1/2 cup of ground flax seed)
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup sugar free applesauce
• 3/4 cup honey
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 3 mashed overripe bananas

1.Preheat oven to 350* and grease a bread pan.

2.In a bowl combine flour, (flax seed, if you are using it), baking soda, and salt.

3.In another bowl combine applesauce and honey, stir in eggs and mashed bananas, mix well.

4.Then mix your dry ingredients and wet ingredients until moist, don’t over mix.

5.Pour batter into prepared bread pan.

6.Bake for 60-65 minutes until toothpick inserted into center comes out clean.

7.Cool in pan for 10 minutes, take out and place on wire cooling rack to cool completely.

I hope you and your children enjoy this as much as we did!

~Bonnie

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Other great recipes by Bonnie

Banana Bread Muffins

Crockpot Strawberry Applesauce

White Chicken Chili

Cheese Stuffed Manicotti

Banana Bread Muffins

I have a yummy recipe to share with you today! I have been making a batch of these a week for that last couple weeks, my family is loving them. I tried to alter a few things here and there in the recipe to make them a little healthier too. I think that making things homemade is a great way to be healthier to begin with, you know what is in them, no preservatives or unknown ingredients. I just add a few little extras, I will let you know what they are so you can make them the way you chose.

Here is your ingredient list:

1/2 cup butter

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup sugar ( I used an organic pure cane sugar)

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 cup bananas, mashed

1/2 cup plain yogurt

1 1/2 cups flour (I used 1 cup whole wheat flour & 1/2 cup ground flax seed)

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt (I use real salt)

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1 box vanilla instant pudding

1/2 cup mini chocolate chips

1) In a mixing bowl or Kitchen Aid, cream butter and sugars until fluffy. Add the eggs, vanilla, banana, and yogurt, mix well.

2) Sift together the dry ingredients and slowly add to the butter mixture just until mixed. Stir in the choco chips.

3) Put batter in muffins cups and bake at 350* for 20-25 minutes. If using mini muffin tins bake for 10-12 minutes. Cool slightly before eating.

Yield 20 muffins or 48 mini muffins

Here is my little helper!

Yummy muffins!

Enjoy!

I would love to hear from you! Comment below and visit me on Facebook!

~Bonnie

Check out these other great posts!

Laundry Room Remodel

Spring Clean your Diet

Meet Bonnie

Crockpot Loaded Baked Potato Soup

Crockpot Pizza

Wash Fruits & Veggies Naturally

Christmas Cookies

 

If you are anything like me as Christmas is drawing near I am on the hunt for some new Christmas cookie recipes. I have my family favorites that have been made since I as little but this year I was in search of something new and something fairly easy since I am pretty busy. Do you have a go to person in your family if you need cooking advise or a new recipe? Well I do! That go to person for me is my dear older sister. She always knows how to cook anything and everything and always has great recipes. So she was the first person I called when I wanted a few new recipes for a cookie exchange I had signed up for. So both of the recipes I am going to share with you I had never made before, but let me tell you they are both incredible and fairly easy!

Cake Batter Cookies

2 Tablespoons milk

3/4 cup butter

3/4 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup sugar

1 (3.4oz) box vanilla instant pudding

3/4 cup yellow cake mix

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 teaspoon baking soda

2 1/2 cups flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

colored sprinkles

I used red and green for Christmas.

You don’t want to use sugar crystals, use either the little beads/balls or even the jimmies I think they are called.

I made two batches and used both kinds and they worked equally well.

Preheat oven to 350*

Mix: flour, salt, and baking soda.

Cream: butter and sugars.

Add: pudding and cake mix.

Add: eggs and vanilla.

Add: flour mixture and sprinkles.

Roll into 1” balls and place on a greased cookie sheet and bake for 10-12 minutes.

I used my Pampered Chef cookie dough baller to make nice even cookies.

 

Also I always bake things in my oven for several minutes less than a recipe calls for, it may be my oven but I think I only cooked them for 8 minutes.

We also prefer our cookies soft, not crispy.

 

 

These were my favorite of the two, they taste just like brownies!

Chocolate Crinkles

1/2 cup vegetable oil

4oz unsweetened baking chocolate, melted and cooled (melting in the microwave works best)

2 cups sugar

2 teaspoons vanilla

4 eggs

2 cups flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup powdered sugar, for rolling the balls in. I used quite a bit more than a 1/2 cup though.

Mix: oil, chocolate, sugar, and vanilla.

Stir in eggs one at a time.

Chill dough for a couple hours or even over night. You want the dough to be think and able to roll into balls.

After chilled, roll into balls and and drop into powdered sugar until covered.

Place on a greased cookie sheet and bake 10-12 minutes in a 350* oven.

I wanted then soft and chewy so I think I only baked them for 10 minutes and they came out perfect.

Take off cookie sheet immediately and place on a cooling rack.

I sure hope you enjoy these two recipes, I would love to hear what you think of them.

Head over to my Facebook page and introduce yourself and let me know what you think!

Have a wonderful time preparing for this most beautiful holiday season!

Bonnie

Day 19: Banana Muffins

With all the information out there on healthy living I feel it is harder and harder to feed your family right. In some ways there is too much information out there so it all gets so confusing. One of the things you hear so much of is to stay away from white foods, pasta, breads, sugar, flour………By no means have I excluded these things from my diet but I did come across a really great recipe the other day for Banana Muffins and they do not have flour in them. Instead it is oatmeal! One of my favorites, but it doesn’t happen to be a favorite one for my family, not sure what's wrong with them! Anyway to hide the fact that there was oatmeal in them I took my baby bullet and ground the oatmeal so it was almost like a flour. So they never even knew it was in them! We have to find ways to be sneaky sometimes as mothers!

Here is your ingredient list:

2 1/2 cups old fashioned oats (ground if desired)

1 cup of plain low fat Greek yogurt

2 eggs

3/4 cup sugar (or sweetener of choice)

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

2 ripe bananas

For the fun of it I also added some chocolate chips to the batter! The choice is yours!

Preheat oven to 400* and line muffin tins with paper baking cups or spray with cooking spray.

Mix all ingredients in blender until smooth.

Scoop into muffin tins and bakes for 20-25 minutes.

And enjoy!!

I even made some fun mini muffins!

Share with me your thoughts on this recipe, I love to hear your feedback!

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