Cantaloupe banana smoothie

My daughter got another "fat" lecture from her doctor.

The junk will be removed from our house. Part of this is my fault, as my daughter loves carrots, cucumbers & peppers yet I don't keep enough of these foods in the house.

Breakfast:

In the blender

For 2

- 3 slices cantaloupe

- 2 bananas 

- 1 cup milk

- 1 serving green vegan protein powder

- 1 serving EAS vanilla whey 

Strawberry Protein Smoothie

I slapped all this (plus a last minute addition of mango) in the blender today:

- 1 cup frozen strawberry banana blend

- 1/2 cup frozen mango chunks

- vanilla cream protein powder 

- 1 serving Oikos vanilla coconut Greek yogurt

- 1/2 cup skim milk

Funny part is that it looks like the blender wasn't put together correctly and most of the milk ran out the bottom.

It was my favorite smoothie ever but it was so thick I had to eat it with a spoon!

Green ginger smoothie

This should be awesome:

- 6 ounces water

- 4 ounces Naked boosted green machine juice smoothie 

- 1 banana

- 1/4 nonfat plain yogurt

- 1 packet instant ginger honey crystals

- 1 scoop vanilla cream Pure Protein whey

New banana protein smoothie

While smoothies and protein powder certainly shouldn't be the mainstay of the family diet, I need the supplements right now because the amount if protein I consume doesn't get close to what the guidelines suggest for a person trying to build muscle.

I bought Pure Protein vanilla cream whey powder at Target. Certainly not as wholesome as the products I've been trying from the natural food store but economical. I started blending it with skim milk and a banana, in part because I bought real cow milk to play with my matcha powder I got for Christmas.

I also started putting honey ginger crystals in my smoothie for some zing. 

Today I tried this:

- 1 cup (maybe 1 1/4, not sure) skim milk

- 1 banana 

- 1 scoop protein powder

- 1/2 serving Prince of Peace honey ginger crystals

- 1 heaping tablespoon matcha

The ginger level was almost perfect, maybe a tiny bit strong, and in my opinion the matcha could have been doubled but I love matcha.

Weight training smoothie

It's 9:20 a.m. and between the cold weather, the everyday aches and pains of this body and PMS, my diet has consisted of too much Halloween candy and too many potato chips.

My fitness goals have been challenged by the cold snap and my unheated work out space coupled with ankle pain that may be related to my cerebral palsy and/or preliminary phases of arthritis. 

So today I brought some weights inside. I did 20 minutes of yoga for abs and 15 or so of lower body yoga. I'd never done that routine. The results were indeed awkward. I added to that 15 minutes of upper body free weights while watching an old episode of ER and ended up getting more reps than usual in because I enjoyed watching TV.

I "rewarded" myself with a breakfast smoothie, vegan:

 It's sweeter than I expected. I used 4 ounces coconut water with pulp, 4 ounces very vanilla silk soy milk, one tablespoon unsalted organic almond butter from Wegmans (a friend hates it and passed it off to be knowing I do love almond butter in all shapes, sizes and varieties), a banana, and Biochem Sports vegan protein powder in vanilla.

Makes me feel stronger already.

Peanut butter banana smoothie for two

This peanut butter banana smoothie turned out to be a delight.

For two people, throw in the blender:

- two bananas

- about four ounces coconut water with pulp

- about two tablespoons peanut butter

- about one cup plain yogurt

- one packet carnation breakfast essentials vanilla

A little bit of everything thing

Last night I walked to the neighborhood "corner store," a place full of candy and oddities.

I got a soursop smoothie that child and I split as part of our massive but healthy breakfast before she heads out to the amusement park with her grandparents.

This coupled with big glasses of water and the following constituted our "this might be all the fruits and veggies you get for the day" breakfast:

- medjool dates 

- half a banana, sliced in banana split fashion to serve as bread for peanut butter and imported Turkish "crushing nuts" with honey (crushed nuts = pistachio, hazelnut, apricot kernel and peanuts)

- salad tacos, both with one six inch flour tortilla and about 1/2 cup of iceberg garden salad mix and 1/2 cup green and crisp salad mix and about 3/4 ounce Bulgarian feta. Hers had Annie's Goddess dressing. Mine had hummus.

Chocolate PB banana smoothie

My daughter was cleaning her room this morning and I offered her a banana as a snack. She asked if she could have a smoothie instead.

We came up with this delicious concoction.

- two ripe bananas 

- two and a half tablespoons plain yogurt

- about two tablespoons peanut butter

- about 1 cup chocolate soy milk

- about two tablespoons dark chocolate chips

Into the blender it went...

Breakfast banana cookies

No school today.

Breakfast for the little one is Girl Scout shortbread cookies, homemade nut butter and banana, stacked up like an open-faced sandwich.

Peanut butter banana frozen dessert

I cook with an eight and a half year old. This dessert has two ingredients:
Equal parts ripe bananas & peanut butter

I had one ripe banana in the freezer and an almost ripe banana on the counter. So we heated the ripe banana and combined it with the fresh one and mashed them with a potato masher.

Then we took the banana and the peanut butter and placed it all in the blender with just a splash of water to lubricate it.

It tasted how I remember the filling in a "funny bone" cupcake to taste.

We put it in the ice cream machine and since it took forever to get the sticky mess out of the blender we ended up with a thick layer that was just like peanut butter ripple in commercial ice cream and a creamier filling on top.

I got it all out and mixed it well before I transferred it to the freezer.

No sugar.
No dairy.
No soy.

Raspberry smoothie

I'm not a fan of smoothies. Maybe it's a psychological throwback to when I broke my teeth and survived on an all liquid diet for a month.

But today I wanted something different.

So, for breakfast, I prepared some salad in a wrap.

And got out the blender.

Ingredients:
- one banana
- about 1/4 cup vanilla maple yogurt from Klein farm
- about 3/4 cup frozen raspberries
- about 2 tablespoons apple cider from Heckman Orchards
- about 3 tablespoons Very VanillaSilk

This is delightful.

Honey Fried Bananas

I imagine if you'd like to make this vegan, swap the honey with agave nectar.

Coat bottom of frying pan with honey. Warm. Add sliced bananas. Sprinkle with lemon juice and cinnamon.

For one banana, use roughly 2 tablespoons honey and 1 teaspoon lemon juice.

Another Banana bread

According to my last banana bread making adventure, this was the best banana bread I ever made:

http://angelfoodcooking.blogspot.com/2011/04/dairy-free-banana-bread.html?m=1

But knowing that, and not having the ingredients to replicate it, it doesn't help me.

INGREDIENTS
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 stick butter, softened
- 1 egg
- 4 tablespoons unsweetened applesauce
- 4 ripe bananas mashed
- almost 2 tablespoons lemon juice
- 1/2 (slightly more)cup unsweetened soy milk
- 1 teaspoon vinegar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 2 1/2 cups flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 tablespoons cashew butter
- 1/4 cup almond butter

Now this is another adaptation of Betty Crocker's recipe.

I preheated the oven to 375, hoping to shave some time off the 350 degrees/ one hour cook time.

Mash bananas with lemon juice in bowl.

In separate bowl, cream butter and sugar. Add bananas, egg, applesauce, and vanilla. Stir vinegar into milk. Add that to batter. Mix. Add remaining ingredients. Mix until moistened. I used beaters to mix in the nut butters.

Pour batter into loaf pans with bottoms only greased. I'm thinking 40 minutes in the oven.

Banana Bread and Nutella

At the Easton Farmers Market, we met a delightful woman who bakes via Spreading Joy Bakery in Stroudsburg. My daughter fell in love with her sample of banana bread so we bought a loaf and sliced it for breakfast. We had it with peanut butter or Nutella and wow was it heavenly.

Also-- my daughter leaves for camp today so does this mean I'll cook like a fiend to amuse myself or not cook at all?

Crêpes de la Canicule (Heat Wave Crepes)

I have had a batch of crêpes in the freezer. I don't even remember when I made them. I got them out of the freezer thinking i'd make a nice fresh berry sauce for them as breakfast. But my mom showed up and stole my daughter before I had a chance to feed her. So I moved that plan to dinner.

Okay, but I worked today and by the time I got home it was hot and I was tired. Knowing eventually I had to eat this crêpes, I had my husband buy berries, bananas and Nutella at Target yesterday. The Nutella was $3.19, for a jar I saw on sale elsewhere for $3.99. (of course, this was a specialty retailer.)

Tonight's dinner became a crêpe with a nice layer of Nutella and topped with a slice of banana the length of the crêpe and rolled. Sides of watermelon and raspberries.

I had separated these crêpes before freezing by slipping wax paper between each one and placing the stack in a ziploc bag. They tasted fresh even though I froze them months ago. Yup, crêpes are gone...

Daddy's Oatmeal

My husband made delectable oatmeal this morning. He used:

- old fashioned oats
- vanilla soy milk
- cinnamon
- brown sugar
- finely chopped dried pears
- golden raisins
- finely chopped banana

Dairy Free Banana Bread

I needed something to accompany my sweet potato soup and somehow I thought of banana bread. I adapted this recipe from the Betty Crocker 40th anniversary cookbook.

- 1 cup sugar (mine was more like a 1/2 cup, I ran out)
- 1/2 cup margarine (I used 1/4 cup of Earth Balance)
- 2 eggs (mine are fresh off the farm)
- 4 medium ripe bananas, mashed
- 1/2 cup vanilla almond milk
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 2 1/2 cups unbleached white flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup chopped walnuts
- that raisin syrup I had in the back of the freezer for ages

Place oven rack in lowest position. Grease bottom of small cake pan with walnut oil. Preheat oven to 350. Mix margarine and sugar. Add eggs and stir. Add bananas, milk and vanilla. Mix. Stir in remaining ingredients except nuts. Stir.

Put 3/4 of batter in pan and spread evenly. Add raisin syrup and half the nuts. Add the remaining nuts to the remaining batter and top the "cake." bake an hour? Or will it go quicker? Because it's shallower than a loaf.

I cooked it about 40 minutes. It is the best banana bread/cake I ever made!!!

Honeyed Fruit

As I was prepping the fruit salad yesterday, at the last minute I decided to make white wine-honey sauce for it. It's a French recipe I found online for a dinner party, that depending on the dryness of the wine used to make the sauce can be enjoyable for children and adults alike. But that's if you use a sweet wine, like a Vouvray. I, in this case, used a dry Reisling made by a friend. (I save my old wine bottles for him and he returns one from the batch filled with home brew.)

My original experience with this recipe can be found here:
http://angelfoodcooking.blogspot.com/2009/04/fruit-salad-with-honey-wine-dressing.html

I thought yesterday's version was worth noting, in part because of the local nature of some of the ingredients. The honey was local honey and the wine, as I mentioned, came from a friend.

This is the list of ingredients for the sauce:
1/2 cup dry white wine
3 tablespoons plus two teaspoons honey
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon lemon zest
1 tablespoon granulated sugar

It's all supposed to be mixed in the blender. I used a measuring glass and a whisk. And I didn't use as much sugar. I never do. After you mix it, you're supposed to chill it in the fridge for 20 minutes. I slapped mine in the freezer for ten.

My fruits, as mentioned in the earlier post about this meal, were the leftovers of a fresh pineapple, a banana and the last of my strawberries sliced.

What was leftover, I let soak in the fridge (with some sauce left in reserve and I'm thinking ice cream). That became my breakfast this morning.

Blueberry Banana Nut Muffins

The starting point:
http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/banana_nut_muffins/

Because baking is only fun if you break the rules and do your own thing:

• 2 large ripe bananas
• 1.5 sticks butter, melted
• 1 cup and a little more unsweetened applesauce
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 egg beaten
• 2.5 tablespoons coffee
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 2 pinches iodized sea salt
• 1 cup wheat flour
• 1 cup unbleached white flour
• 1 cup regular flour
  
• (I should have added some oats but forgot)
• 2 cups walnuts
• about 1.5 cups fresh blueberries

1 Preheat the oven to 350°F. With a wooden spoon, mix butter into the mashed bananas in a large mixing bowl.

2 Mix in the sugar, egg, applesauce, coffee and vanilla.

3 Sprinkle the baking soda and salt over the mixture and mix in.

4 Add the flour, mix until it is just incorporated. Fold in the walnuts and blueberries.

5 Pour mixture into a prepared muffin tin. Bake for 25-30 minutes. Check for doneness with a toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin. I made about 26 muffins.

Work snacks

I packed myself lots of snacks for work as I'm expecting to work late. I don't want to pack a meal, because I'd like to be optimistic and think I'll be home in time to eat a meal before bed.

So, I filled my Sigg water bottle. Packed a banana, a Nature Valley granola bar, a Special K meal bar, some trail mix with lots of extra cashews and almonds, one of my daughter's Very Berry juice boxes and some sugarless gum.

Hope it keeps me happy.