Banana Oat Cookiies

As usual, my agenda began with an ingredient that required attention: 3 small overripe bananas. So I mashed them in a bowl, added oats and off I went. These are cheating a little on my usual strategy by using some dark brown sugar, but only 2 tablespoons. We ate these for breakfast, but my husband said, "Call them cookies, they'd be good anytime!" So I did.

Banana Oat Cookies

Mix together and let sit 

3 small overripe bananas mashed, or 2 large ones

1.5-2 cups whole oats 

1/2-2/3 cup almond milk (unsweetened plain) enough to make a mush, not liquidy

1 heaping tsp chia seeds

In a larger bowl mix:

1/2 c chick pea flour

2/3 c brown rice flour

1/4 c millet flour

1Tblspn tapioca starch

1 heaping tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1-2 tsp cinnamon (as you like it)

2 Tblspn dark brown sugar

2 Tblspn nutritional yeast

Combine moist ingredients into dry stirring til consistent, and toss in your favorite dry fruits/nuts. I used what I had on hand which ended up being about 1/2 c mixed raisins and cranberries plus 1/2 c walnuts.

Set oven at 375F and spoon out heaping tablespoon sized blobs onto a silicone baking sheet at least an inch space between them.

Bake 25 minutes (check 'em at 20 minutes). The house will smell great when they're done!

July 4th Blueberry Breakfast Bakes

We have a small bunch of blueberry bushes on our North facing slope, encased in a small pavilion of netting. Birds and chipmunks, even rabbits find their way in anyway, but usually by the first week of July we also get a few ripe berries. They can be tart, no doubt, but they are a thrill to pick a half pint to a pint on a daily basis. Towards the end of July, we can't keep up, and I throw them right into the freezer to pull out the taste of summer in the middle of winter. July 4th is usually a celebration that the berries are starting to come and in days before vegan, no oil eating, I used to make amazing blueberry muffins. So I don't want to give up that celebratory feeling when the berries start to ripen! It is hard to bake a muffin texture without wheat gluten or eggs, so I decided to try NEW INGREDIENTS: Xanthan gum and Potato Starch, both of which are available through Bob's Red Mill in some fairly "normal" grocery stores.
These came out nicely in scone-like shapes on a silicone baking sheet. If I had only had a few strawberries, I would have sliced them on top for a red-white-n-blue feeling.  I cannot say that these are truly gluten free -- using oats and Emmer wheat (also known as farro in its grain format), but there are those with some gluten sensitivities who do not react to farro, by any name. I haven't tried this combination with rice flour, but you could... and let me know how it goes if you do!

Fourth of July Blueberry Breakfast Bakes

1/3 cup oats
2 Tblsp flax seeds
2 Tblsp potato starch
1/4 tsp xanthan gum
2/3 c Emmer Wheat Flour
2 tsp almond meal
1 Tblsp nutritional yeast
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 cup walnuts

Blueberries - 10 smashed and nearly 1 cup more
1/8 cup or 2 Tbsp maple syrup
1/2 cup unsweetened soy milk

MIX the first 10 dry ingredients together in a medium large bowl.
COMBINE the moist ingredients with the berries (you can use a 2 cup measuring cup for this).

ADD the wet to the dry, mixing gently until it forms one gooey batter.

Add caption

PLOP in scone size splats on a silicone baking sheet and bake at 350F for about 25 minutes. Cool a couple minutes so that you don't scald yourself on molten blueberries in that first bite and ruin a yummy breakfast!

Blueberry Walnut July Muffins Nutrition Facts Serving Size: 1 Serving (80g) Amount Per Serving % Daily Value* Calories 182 9% Total Fat 5g 8% Saturated Fat 1g 3% Trans Fat Cholesterol 0% Sodium 127mg 5% Total Carbohydrate 28g 9% Dietary Fiber 4g 15% Sugars 5g 0% Protein 7g 13% Vitamin A 1% • Vitamin C 3% Calcium 11% • Iron 7% * Percent Daily Values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet. Your daily values may be higher or lower depending on your calories needs. courtesy of cronometer.com using my data.

Breakfast/Snack Crunch Cookie

Fresh cherries inspired this crunchy, nearly energy-bar cookie-like breakfast treat. It has puffed kamut in it, but you could use puffed rice. The oats, amaranth and pecans all give textural and flavorful variety in each bite. I can't say enough about the silicone baking surface!

BREAKFAST/SNACK CRUNCH COOKIE

2/3 cup oats
1/2 cup pecan pieces
2/3 cup kamut puffs
1/4 cup buckwheat flour
1 cup brown rice flour
2 tsp baking powder
2 TBLSP amaranth
1 tsp cinnamon
dash salt
1 TBLSP maple syrup
1/4 cup almond milk
1 banana
2/3 cup fresh cherries,  pitted & halved

1. Mix together all the dry ingredients in larger bowl of 2 bowls. Mash the banana with maple syrup and almond milk in the other bowl. COMBINE WET INTO DRY, then add cherries and gently mix.
2. Place on silicone baking sheet on top of a cookie sheet in large blobs 2-3" across, flattened slightly.
3. Bake longer than you think -- about 35-40 minutes -- at 350-375F. Crisp on the top! Crunchy! Good later too...

(I'm going to try these with Ranier Cherries too!)

Baked Breakfast Crunch Cookies makes 8 Nutrition Facts Serving Size: 1 Serving (80g) Amount Per Serving % Daily Value* Calories 215 11% Total Fat 6g 10% Saturated Fat 1g 3% Trans Fat Cholesterol 0% Sodium 43mg 2% Total Carbohydrate 37g 12% Dietary Fiber 4g 17% Sugars 6g 0% Protein 5g 11% Vitamin A 0% • Vitamin C 4% Calcium 3% • Iron 9% * Percent Daily Values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet. Your daily values may be higher or lower depending on your calories needs. courtesy of cronometer.com, using my data.

Strawberry Amaranth Corn Cake

 We ran into a special on strawberries, two quarts for $5, and with this began my thinking about how to bake something that wouldn't turn the berries inside into squish yet had that strawberry flavor. I'd been wanting something that might double as a breakfast food and a possible dessert, and then I saw the jar of amaranth on my kitchen shelf. The innovation in this came from pureeing a banana and some of the strawberries and adding this to the soy milk and maple syrup. It was like making a little cake with a fruit smoothie! It had to have enough nutrition to make a good breakfast, and enough sweetness and texture to make a nice dessert, perhaps under some coconut yogurt.

Strawberry Amaranth Corn Cake (6 servings)

1/2 cup corn meal
1/2 cup brown rice flour
1/3 cup oats
2 Tblsp amaranth
1 Tblsp flax seed

1 cup soy milk (unsweetened)
2 Tblsp maple syrup
1 medium banana
8 strawberries
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cardamom
1/2 tsp cinnamon

1. Mix all the dry ingredients.
2. Mix the soy milk and syrup, cut the banana and two or three strawberries into small bits and puree them with the soy milk.
3. Mix the wet into the dry, spread on a silicone baking sheet in about a 9" circle an inch thick.
4. Slice the remaining strawberries and cover the surface.
5. Bake for 30-40 minutes at 375F. Cool just a little before slicing.

Amaranth adds a little crunch to the moist texture. Excellent with a dollop of any kind of yogurt as a dessert. Terrific with a dab of honey for breakfast. Nice as a mid-afternoon snack with a cup of tea too.

Strawberry Amaranth Corn Cake Nutrition Facts Serving Size: 1 sixth slice (127g) Amount Per Serving % Daily Value* Calories 231 12% Total Fat 6g 9% Saturated Fat 1g 3% Trans Fat Cholesterol 0% Sodium 216mg 9% Total Carbohydrate 41g 14% Dietary Fiber 5g 19% Sugars 9g 0% Protein 7g 13% Vitamin A 2% • Vitamin C 17% Calcium 9% • Iron 12% * Percent Daily Values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet. Your daily values may be higher or lower depending on your calories needs.courtesy of cronometer.com using my data.

Pear Walnut Kamut Need-A-Sweet-Balls

So hard to go without that sweet treat. Subtracting brown sugar, butter, oils, wheat flours, even molasses, I have been hard pressed to do a dessert without resorting to soy yogurt and fruit. But what if you really want something that is not a muffin, not a yogurt, has a chew to it and that cookie-on-the-side feeling?  There was a nearly-too-ripe-to-eat Bosc pear clamoring for my attention, and this is what happened to it! It is heading down the road towards a granola bar, but if I had not used the silicone muffin cups, and had put small spoonfuls on parchment paper (bake 15 minutes), these would really be bite-sized treats. You can use apple, or probably dried apricots or any other fruit/nut combination and if you are going gluten free, you can either use gluten-free oats, or substitute a bit more almond meal and rice puffs. I cannot claim this is the be-all and end-all of Need-A-Sweet-Balls, so experiment and share your discoveries and success!

Pear Walnut Kamut Puff Need-A-Sweet-Balls (makes 6 silicone muffin cups/half full)

1/2  ripe Bosc pear, peeled and chopped
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1/4 cup whole rolled oats
1/2 cup Kamut puffs (you could use rice puffs or any other "grain filler")
1 TBLSP almond meal
3 TBLSP  raisins
1 TBLSP maple syrup
1 tsp cinnamon
dash salt
sprinkle of flax seeds (on top)

1. Peel and chop pear, putting it into a mixing bowl, with chopped walnuts and oats.
2. Add everything else except the flax seeds, spooning this not-quite-sticking-together mixture into silicone muffin cups, half full.
3. Press gently with fingers into a mounded shape, sprinkle sparingly with flax seeds, and bake 20-25 minutes at 350F. Let them cool before trying to pull off the cups.  You can DEFINITELY use a tablespoon onto parchment paper in a baking pan and make bite-sized crisp sweet snack treats!

Pear Walnut Oat Need-A-Sweet-Ball Nutrition Facts Serving Size: 1 Serving (44g) Amount Per Serving % Daily Value* Calories 139 7% Total Fat 8g 12% Saturated Fat 1g 4% Trans Fat Cholesterol 0% Sodium 28mg 1% Total Carbohydrate 16g 5% Dietary Fiber 3g 10% Sugars 7g 0% Protein 3g 7% Vitamin A 0% • Vitamin C 1% Calcium 3% • Iron 5% * Percent Daily Values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet. Your daily values may be higher or lower depending on your calories needs. courtesy of cronometer.com using my data.

Banana Blueberry Oat Walnut Muffins

I was remembering when my oldest son was a very little guy and we met another family in the park who were eating the most delicious muffins for their playtime snack. The mother had made them, of course, but she was talking about how her skinny little roadrunner of a child wouldn't eat much. She had packed those muffins with nutrition. I asked about it and she told me that she used orange juice and zucchini and applesauce and amaranth and on and on.  This morning I decided to revisit my unsatisfactory blueberry breakfast treat project (you haven't seen that blog because I removed it as soon as I posted it!).  I used a small grated zucchini and a smashed banana, along with a little buckwheat flour and ground up whole oats. My encouragement to grind up my own oats into flour came from another recipe I had run into somewhere. These muffins remain moist because of the zucchini, banana and blueberries. Be sure to let them cool enough before removing the cups. You can let them sit  upside down for a couple minutes to release a little of the internal moisture. But it's hard to resist them when they are still just a little warm. Oh, did I say that one muffin seems to provide 11% of my daily protein?? Here's how it all shook out.

Banana Blueberry Oat Walnut Muffins (makes 6)

2/3 cup rolled oats - grind into flour

1/3 cup buckwheat flour

2 Tblsp flaxseed meal

1 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

dash salt

1 Tblsp agave syrup

1 cup grated zucchini 

1 large smashed banana

1/3 cup oat milk

1/3 cup frozen Maine blueberries

1/4 cup walnuts pieces

1. Grind the oats, combine with flour, meal, baking powder and soda and salt. 

2. In a separate bowl, grate the zucchini, smash in the banana, add the agave, oat milk and blueberries.

3. Mix the wet into the dry, until it is one thick doughlike batter. Gently stir in the walnuts. 

4. Over fill 6 muffin cups and bake at 350F for 45-50 minutes.  You must let these cool before trying to remove them from the cups.

Banana Blueberry Oat Walnut Muffins Nutrition Facts Serving Size: 1 muffin (96g) Amount Per Serving % Daily Value* Calories 170 9% Total Fat 6g 9% Saturated Fat 1g 3% Trans Fat Cholesterol 0% Sodium 194mg 8% Total Carbohydrate 27g 9% Dietary Fiber 5g 18% Sugars 6g 0% Protein 6g 11% Vitamin A 0% • Vitamin C 9% Calcium 8% • Iron 9% * Percent Daily Values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet. Your daily values may be higher or lower depending on your calories needs. Courtesy of cronometer.com using my data.

Morning Baking: Many Flours + Parchment Paper

What's for breakfast? Used to be, I'd whip up muffins or scones with whatever fruit was around. So why not try it today? This is when it matters to have the materials you need near to hand. I started with two bowls, one for wet, one for dry. (That felt normal enough.) Then I made the fruit choice - a Fuji apple and a handful of blueberries. Peeled and then slivered the apple (cut in quarters, cut the quarters into slices, sliced the quarters into slivers). Let the games begin. What to use for sweetner? Okay, maple syrup. What to use for substance and some nutrition? Here's what happened:

1 3.5" diameter apple, chopped
25 blueberries (you don't have to count 'em)
1/3 c brown rice flour
1/4 cup whole oats
1/6 cup chick pea flour (I filled the 1/3 scoop halfway)
2 Tblsp almond meal
1 Tblsp corn meal (medium fine)
1 tsp baking powder
2 TBSP real maple syrup
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4-1/2 tsp ground ginger (how much do you like?)
dash of salt.

Put the dry together. Put the wet together. Put the dry into the wet.
Oven at 350 F. Spread parchment paper (I use "Beyond Gourmet unbleached) into a flat 9X12" pan and space out the blobs in two rows. I made 6 with this recipe. Baked 25-30 minutes to be sure the apples softened fully.  You could definitely use raisins, or cranberries, or dry tart cherries...and add walnuts!

My husband at his with plain coconut yogurt and fresh blueberries on them. I had mine straight up!

Apple Oat Sweet Morning Bites 

Nutrition Facts courtesy of cronometer.com based on my estimates

Serving Size: 1 Serving (88g)

Amount Per Serving		% Daily Value*
Calories	115	6%
Total Fat	1g	2%
Saturated Fat	0g	1%
Trans Fat
Cholesterol		0%
Sodium	45mg	2%
Total Carbohydrate	24g	8%
Dietary Fiber	2g	9%
Sugars	10g	0%
Protein	3g	5%

Vitamin A	1%	•	Vitamin C	3%
Calcium	6%	•	Iron	4%

* Percent Daily Values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet. Your daily values may be higher or lower depending on your calories needs.