Tag Archives: chocolate

Mini Granola Bars

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Back to my favorite combo; oatmeal and chocolate. Now in bite size travel friendly form. One note of caution for these summer months. These little bars will melt in your mouth and your hand Smile.  They are an easy healthy sweet snack for the kid in all of us, or for your kiddies. I place them in individual wraps, and freeze them for easy travel to work.

I’ve seen similar recipes floating around on a variety of sites, but after many delicious trials Sally’s was the one where the bars stuck together the best. I’ve substituted honey for the sugar because I love the combo, and used just chocolate chips.  Check out the original recipe at Sally’s Baking Addiction.

Mini Granola Bars

Makes 16 mini bars

 

Ingredients

2.5 cups old-fashioned rolled oats

3 Tbsp honey

1 Tsp baking powder

1/2 Tsp salt

2 Tsp cinnamon

1 Tsp vanilla extract

1/2 cup almond milk

1 egg (or can substitute using chia seeds)

2 ripe bananas mashed

1/3 cup creamy peanut butter

3/4 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350. Grease 8×8 baking pan and set aside.

2. mix together oats, baking powder, salt and cinnamon.

3. Add in milk, vanilla, and egg. Then stir in honey and peanut butter. Mix together until evenly combined.

4. Add in mashed bananas and chocolate chips. Stir well.

5. Pour mixture into pan and bake for 20 minutes. Cut into bars and enjoy.

 

Talkin’ 2 Myself

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Sometimes you just feel like playing a little Eminem song.

Take for example the today. It started off pretty good. Was on the way to the gym for a morning workout. My car took a bit to start.

No biggie, it is 13 years old with 187,000 miles and it has been cooler at night and in the morning. I’ll just warm it up a bit, get some gas and then I’ll be at the gym.

Turns out I wouldn’t be running on the treadmill, instead I would be meeting some new helpful friends at the gas station. After getting gas my car decided that it needed a break. After I refueled, it just would not start again.

Some nice guy heard the problem, and offered a jump. The jeep apparently decided the Shell station was a nice place for a long nap. All we got was click, click, click. I thanked him and he was on his way.

Ok, no stress I’ll just call my husband. Through the years he has had many intimate experiences with the jeep. Maybe he can awaken her from the slumber.

Well, being the techy savy person I am I finally updated my iphone this morning, unplugged it and ran out the door. I think I was a little frazzled and couldn’t remember my password to sign into the phone to get past the new updates. Arrrggggg.

I notified the gas station attendant of the situation who exclaimed “let’s get a group of guys to push the car into a parking spot so you can leave it there for awhile.” Great. Hello more new friends, who lent some helping hands.

Did you know its very hard to turn the steering wheel when the car is not on???

Good thing I had my running shoes on. I ended up running back home to reset my password and unlock my phone through e-mail. When my savior gets home we are going to buy a new battery. Hopefully this will be the solution.

In the meantime I made comfort in a bowl.

Chocolate Icebox Oatmeal

Remember banana icebox pudding with graham cracker crust? This is the healthy chocolate version.

SDC12496

1/2 cup oatmeal

1/4 cup oatbran

1/4 cup chocolate almond milk

1 chopped frozen banana

1 Tbsp chocolate instant pudding mix

1 scoop chocolate protein powder

2-3 graham crackers

1. Make oatmeal according to directions. Substitute 1/2 cup of water for 1/2 cup of chocolate almond milk. Add in oatbran as well.

2. As the oatmeal nears the consistency you prefer stir in remaining ingredients.

3. Let set for a few minutes. You can sweeten to taste by adding in more chocolate milk.

4. Crumble in one graham cracker. Use remaining ones for dipping.

5. Change Eminem cd to Jack Johnson and chill.

Leaving as…

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Ms. – the next post I will be a Mrs.! This will be the last post for me for about a week. My fiance and I are heading East to get married! And I don’t have a laptop (gasp).  Yes, this blog is a huge technologic leap for me. But that is another story for another time. Instead I will leave you with a somewhat unhealthy sweet treat. But in all fairness I’ve see way worse.  It’s my husband to be’s specialty ;) .

But first check out what he found last night:

            I think that’s a good luck sign and very symbolic of the joining of our lives! How cool! Talk about perfect timing.

Ok, here is the sweet treat:

Flourless Chocolate chip Peanut Butter Cookies

1 cup all natural peanut butter

2 Tbsp Butter

1 Cup Raw sugar ( This is key since it adds a little crunch, I use Trader Joe’s Organic Turbinado Raw Cane Sugar )

1 Tsp Vanilla Extract

1 Cup Semi Sweet Chocolate chips

1 egg

Pre heat oven to 375. Mix PB and butter together. Stir in sugar and then vanilla extract. Add in egg, stir until well combined then fold in chocolate chips. Drop into little balls ( he he he she said…)  on greased cookie sheet. Bake for 8-10 minutes. Makes approx 18 cookies.   Delicious! We’ve tried almond butter, that works as well, but the Peanut butter gives a better contrast.  I am already thinking about other twists to this one- like Rice Krispy treats for crunch… Hmmmm… Stay tuned…Ok off to become a Mrs.!!!!! Wish us luck!

Warning

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Proceed with caution

These are highly addictive. And even though I found the recipe in an old Cooking Light (2008) magazine they are anything but light, in my opinion. I went the non healthy route this weekend because I was craving comfort food. A good friend and her husband are moving up north to San Fransisco and these brownies were for their going away BBQ. Ok, I am not going to talk any more about that because it is very bittersweet. Great opportunity for them, sad for those they leave down here in SD.

Moving onto the food that will help to boost serotonin levels, and cause family members to love or hate you ;) . Fudgy addictive brownies…

You start with these:

          And end with these:  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Strawberry Brownies

Adapted From Cooking Light Sept. 2008

Ingredients:

3/4 cup all purpose flour

1 cup sugar

3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa

1 teaspoon baking powder

3/4 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup strawberry preserves

1/3 cup water

5 Tablespoons butter

1 large egg, lightly beaten

1 large egg white

1/3 cup semisweet chocolate chips

6-8 ounces of strawberries

powdered sugar (optional)

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350.

2. Line a 9 inch square baking pan with parchment paper; coat with cooking spray.  (I made two batches, so I used larger pan)

3. Weigh or lightly spoon flour into dry measuring cups; level with knife. Combine flour, 1 cup sugar, unsweetened cocoa, baking powder, and salt in large bowl; stir with a whisk. Combine strawberry preserves, water, and butter in a small saucepan; bring to a boil. Add preserves mixture to flour mixture; stir well. Add egg add egg white; stir until smooth. Stir in semisweet chocolate chips. Scrape batter into prepared pan. Bake at 350 for 25 minutes or until wooden pick comes up clean. Cool in pan on wire rack. Garnish with powdered sugar and strawberries. Yeild: 16


End result of indecisiviness

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Is indecisiveness even a word?

At work its go, go, go. Then I come home and I have the hardest time making the simplest decisions. Does this sound familiar? These tasty snack cookies are the result of this inability to decide.

I say snack cookies because they have a whole bunch of good nutrients not to mention protein from yogurt and eggs, and healthy fat from almond butter with very little added sugar.  The recipe came about because I had a whole bunch of bananas quickly turning brown, and I wanted to make a somewhat healthy cookie. I had a hard time choosing what would go best with bananas: coconut or chocolate. It all sounded good together, so I thought why not?? Then I had to decided what type of chocolate: chips or M&Ms? Apparently my inner kid made an appearance because both were chosen as well. And as you can see by my flour list I stuck to the variety theme. It’s the spice of life right??  You could make your life easier and just use 1 or 2 different types of flour, but that isn’t fun right??

I lucked out- they ended up really moist and delicious! Got a thumbs up from the fiance. Next challenge- sticking to very small ingredient list while baking. Hmmm

Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies (with a twist)

              Ingredients:

Trader Joe’s – Oatmeal Organic, 3/4 cup

Hodgson Mill Oat Bran Hot Cereal – Oatbran, 1/4 cup dry

Bob’s Red Mill – Almond Meal/Flour, 1/4 cup

Trader Joes – White Whole Wheat Flour, 3/4 cup

Bob’s Red Mill – High Fiber Coconut Flour  ¼ cup

Bob’s Red Mill – Tapioca Flour, ½ cup

Trader Joe’s – Organic Turbinado Raw Cane Sugar, 1 tsp

Trader Joe’s – Organic Blue Agave Sweetener, 4 tbsp

Whole Foods – Unsweetened Shredded Organic Coconut, 8 tbsp

Trader Joe’s – Organic Nonfat Plain Yogurt, 3/4 cup

Eggs – Whole Egg, Large, Canada Gr A, 2 egg, large

4 Bananas mashed

Trader Joe’s – Semi Sweet Chocolate Chips, ¾ cup

M&Ms Plain ¼ cup

Earth Balance – Butter – Original, 1 Tbsp

Trader Joe’s – Almond Butter, Creamy With Sea Salt, 1 Tbsp

1 TBsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 Tsp salt

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350. Grease cookie pan

2. Combine flours, add other dry ingredients (minus sugar).

3. Whisk eggs, add in yogurt, butter and sugar. When mixed, then add in remaining wet ingredients.

4. Gently add wet ingredients to dry stirring carefully. When mixed, add in mashed bananas. Fold in chocolate goodies.

5. Drop onto cookie sheet. Bake for 8-10 minutes. Be careful not to overcook, they will not brown too much.

Depending on the size of your cookie you can get 60-70 cookies out of this recipe!