Pumpkin steel cut oat square

Every time I went to Costco, I always ended up buying unnecessary stuff. No wonder there’s no sign of direction inside the store. Their design is to make you walk around the store. The more you browse, the more you buy… This explained how the bag of dates sat in my pantry.

Anyhow, I was soaking steel cut oats last night. Suddenly, I remembered reading soaking dates in water for a day to make date syrup on the web. So I dropped about 7 of them in the same bowl that I soaked steel cut oats. This morning, I changed my mind. I wanted to bake steel cut oats so that my son can bring them as snacks. Looking around, the banana weren’t ripe enough for baking. Neither do I have apple sauce. Then, I saw a canned of organic pumpkin purée and smiled.

ingredients:

1 1/2 cup quick cooking steel cut oats (see note)

7 dates

1 1/2 cup hot water

1 cup canned pumpkin purée

1-2 teaspoon cinnamon

pinch of nutmeg

2 tablespoon organic chia seeds

2 tablespoon organic sunflower seeds

1/4 cup no sugar added organic raisins

1/4 cup honey or maple syrup for vegan

The night before, added oats, dates and hot water in a big glass bowl. Since it’s still cold in east coast, I just left the bowl on the kitchen countertop overnight.

The next morning, mesh the dates with a fork. Then, add the rest ingredients in the same bowl. Stir them well and pour the mixture in parchment paper lined glass bakeware (I used Pyrus 7″X11″). Bake at 375F for about 30 minutes. Be careful not overbake them or the oats will turn hard and chewy (that my kids dislike).

Wait until the oats are completely cool. Cut them in generous 12 pieces and enjoy! They are soft but hold their own shapes. Since I used canned pumpkin purée, they weren’t as sweet as those I roasted in the oven (I tasted). Therefore, I added 1/4 cup honey to satisfy my kids’ sweet tooth:-). I couldn’t add nuts due to the allergy concern at kids’ school. But feel free to add dried fruits/nuts/seeds of your preference. They are healthy and delicious, a perfect way to start your morning.

Note:

I used Bob’s Red Mill organic quick cooking steel cut oats. You may need to adjust the amount of liquid if using other brands or non quick cooking oats. Also, you may need to adjust the amount of liquid if adding more dried fruits/seeds/nuts.

 

 

May 5, 2016May 5, 2016 by tracy1153 Categories: recipe, SnackTags: Chia seeds, Dairy free, dates, Easy, Egg free, Gluten free, Healthy, Oil free, Pumpkin purée, quick, raisin, steel cut oats, sugar free, Sunflower seeds, Vegan Leave a comment

Steel cut granola bars

Ever since I bought a HUGE bag of Bob’s Red Mill organic quick cooking steel cut oats from Costco, I have been making a lot of oatmeal and incorporating them into my baking (muffins, crackers, cookies, brownies, you name it).

Adding them into home made granola bars is a no brainer. They are healthy, nutrious, and delicious. This recipe is so versatile that you can use any dried fruits, seeds, and/or nuts of your preference. Most important, they are super easy to make (almost fool prove).

ingredients:

3 small size ripe bananas, meshed about 1 cup or unsweetened apple sauce

1 1/2 cup pre-soaked quick cooking steel cut oats (see note)

3-4 tablespoon chia seeds (see note)

3 tablespoon pumpkin seeds

3 tablespoon sunflower seeds

1-2 teaspoon cinnamon or spice of your preference

1/4 – 1/2 cup no sugar added organic raisins

1/4 cup pecans or walnuts

1/4 cup honey or maple syrup for vegan (optional)

In a big bowl, meshed banana with a fork. Add the rest of ingredients and mix them well. I used a Pyrex 2.2 Qt oblong glass container (about 7″X11″) and lined with parchment paper. Pull in the mixture and smooth it with a spatula. Bake at 375F for 30-35 minutes. I normally turned it over on the cooling rack and then took off the parchment paper. After it’s completely cool, cut it to 16 pieces (my son already finish 4 pieces^^). Store them in a glass container and enjoy them within 3 days if they last that long.

Note:

I normally soaked 1 1/2 cup quick cooking steel cut oats with 1-1 1/4 cup water and a teaspoon organic apple cider vinegar overnight. After soaking, they could be measured to over 2 cups. I used only 1 1/2 cups in this recipe and kept the rest for something else. Sometimes, I swapped 1/4 – 1/2 cup oats with cooked quinoa if I have leftover. If I feel that the mixture is too watery, I add more chia seeds. For nut free version, use more seeds and/or dried fruits.

I also found them sweet enough to my taste without adding honey/maple syrup since ripe bananas are very sweet.

 

 

April 5, 2016 by tracy1153 Categories: recipe, SnackTags: Chia seeds, Dairy free, Easy, Granola bar, Gulten free, Healthy, Oil free, Pumpkin seeds, quick, steel cut oats, sugar free, Sunflower seeds, Vegan 1 Comment

Banana Apple muffin

Ever since coming back from a trip to Madrid and Sevilla on Monday, I have been so swamped with parent teacher meetings, school snack sales, and kids’ well checkup and after school activities. In addition, I have been making every single meal. It’s like making up for the days that I was gone. As the result, I barely had time to read or write for myself… But thanks to the time difference between Spain and here. I have been up before 6 every morning. I have enjoyed my morning coffee while baking:-).

As always, my baking mostly uses what’re available or left in the refrigerator and/or pantry. There’re no exceptions this morning. I modified my one bowl banana chocolate bread recipe in the early posting to make these muffins.

Ingredients:

2 mid-size banana, mashed with a fork

1/2 cup of water or liquid of your preference

2 tablespoon avocado oil or oil in your preference (optional)

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 mid-size apple, shredded about 1 cup

1 1/2 cup white whole wheat flour

2 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon cinnamon

pinch of sea salt (optional)

3-4 tablespoon organic raw sugar

1 heaping tablespoon of each: chia seeds, pumpkin seeds, golden flax seeds, and sunflower seeds (see notes)

In a big bowl, combined the mashed banana, water, oil if using, and the vanilla extract. In a glass measuring cup, mixed together the flour, baking powder, cinnamon, sea salt if using, sugar, and the seeds. Stir the flour mixture into the wet ingredients. Last but not least, fold in the shredded apple. Baked at 350 for about 30 minutes. They are moist and sweet, perfect with coffee. By the way, I like making jumbo muffins instead of feeling guilty after munching more than one muffin^^.

Note:

For any health reasons, you can skip oil and add 1-2 tablespoon more liquid.

Feel free to decorate the top of the muffin with some rolled oats or swap the seeds with nuts and/or dried fruits. I am baking with seeds more nowadays because of the nut-free policy at the school.

 

December 4, 2015 by tracy1153 Categories: recipeTags: Apple, Banana, Chia seeds, Easy, Flaxseed, Healthy, Kids friendly, Muffin, Pumpkin seeds, Sunflower seeds, Vegan, Whole wheat Leave a comment

Sunflower seed cookies

I considered myself rather disciplined and normally shop with a list to buy. However, I do make some impulsive purchases once for a while ><. Like couple months ago, the craisin was on sale at Costco. I then ended up going home with a bag. Have this happened to you? I normally bought enough amount of seeds to be used in a week or two in the bulk section aisle at whole food. I couldn’t really explain why I bought a bag of sunflower seeds (about 8 oz) the other day.

Long story short, that’s why I decided to make sunflower seed butter last Saturday. Without much research, I roasted about one cup of seeds at 350F for about 15 minutes. Do keep an eye on them and make sure that they don’t burn. I left the seeds cool down a bit and then transferred them to my food processer while they were still warm. My daughter and I were very excited about this experiment. We both took turns pressing all different bottoms, pausing, scraping the side, and then repeating the process. By the way, I added about 1 teaspoon of cinnamon while grinding them. However, my “aged” food processer never produced the creamy texture that we were looking for. After 30 minutes, we gave up. So I ended up with a cup of grounded roasted sunflower seeds. They did smell great though!

So I stored them in the air tight glass container inside the refrigerator. This morning I just used them to make cookies.

ingredents:

1 cup of grounded roasted sunflower seeds

1 cup of quick cooking oats

1/2 cup of craisins (or dried fruits of your preference)

2 tablespoon chia seeds (optional)

1 teaspoon cinnamon (optional)

1/4 cup of water or more (see note)

Quickly grinded the quick cooking oats and craisin in food processor. As I mentioned earlier, my aged machine can process them to “crumbles” only. Combined all ingredents in a bowl, formed them into small balls (about the size of golf balls) with your hand, and gently flattened them to cookies on the parchment lined baking sheet. Last, I sprinkled tiny bit of organic cane sugar on the top of these cookies (except one). I did this just to make my son try something weird looking to him.

I baked these cookies at 350F for about 12-15 minutes. I ate the one without sugar and found enough sweetness from the craisin. My son gave me an approved smile after eating one, then grabbed another one, and dashed out of the house to chase the school bus:-).

Note: You can use any milk of your preference. Also, different oats and chia seeds if using absorb liquid differently. You may need to adjust the liquid, one tablespoon a time.

September 28, 2015September 28, 2015 by tracy1153 Categories: recipeTags: 3 ingredent cookies, Easy, Gulten free, Healthy, Oats, Sunflower seeds, Vegan Leave a comment

Chia crackers

Today, I am sharing you the Recipe from http://nyoutritious.com/chia-seed-crispbread-crackers/.

I just made them gulten free.

ingredients:

1/4 cup pumpkin seeds

1/4 cup sunflower seeds

1/4 cup chia seeds

1/4 cup rolled oats

1/4 cup buckwheat flour or cornmeal (spelt or whole wheat flour if not gulten free)

2 TBSP extra virgin olive oil or avocado oil (see note)

2 TBSP flaxseeds, sesame seeds, or more chia seeds

1 cup of water

mixed all ingredients together in a bowl and let the mixture sit for at least 30 minutes.

The original recipe said to roll them out very thin with two pieces of nonstick parchment papers, and then bake at 300 F for 30-40 minutes. However, it didn’t work for me. So I just spread the dough (very sticky) out with the spatula on the parchment paper lined baking sheet, and bake at 350 F for about 40 minutes. But do watch them out in the oven after 30 minutes. Let them cool down, and break them in desired sizes.

I am totally addicted to these crackers. Hopefully, you will like them as much as I do.

The dough before baking

After baking

Note: one time I forgot to add oil, they were just not as crisp as the ones with oil.

July 16, 2015July 18, 2015 by tracy1153 Categories: recipeTags: Chia seeds, Cracker, Flaxseed, Gulten free, Pumpkin seeds, Rolled oats, Sunflower seeds Leave a comment