Super Muffins

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I wanted to make muffins that taste good and you don’t have to feel super guilty about eating six, four, one.  Not like I did that or anything…

Here’s the result, mightily loaded with chia (protein, omega-3 & fiber, essential minerals like phosphorus, manganese, calcium, potassium and sodium) and flax seeds (omega-3), coconut (medium chain triglycerides are more likely to be used as energy than stored as fat), sunflower seeds (essential fatty acids, B1, B5, magnesium, manganese and various other minerals) and ground almond (monounsaturated fats, vitamin E, fiber, B complex vitamins and essential minerals)

While I am in no way suggesting you should live on these, they have nutritional value versus just empty calories, which makes me happy.

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Super as in mighty good and good for you too, yummo!

Ingredients

  • 1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
  • 1/3 cup sugar (sucanat, coconut sugar or regular)
  • 1/2 cup ground whole almonds
  • 2 tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • 1/4 cup coconut, unsweetened
  • 2 tbsp chia seed
  • 3 tbsp raw sunflower seeds
  • 2 tbsp flax seeds (brown or golden)
  • 2 tbsp ground flax seed
  • 1 cup milk
  • 2 lg eggs

Directions

  1. Preheat oven to 400F
  2. In a bowl, combine all the dry ingredients (up to ground flax seed)
  3. Add the milk and eggs, mix just until all the dry ingredients are incorporated, (do not over mix or the dough becomes tough)
  4. Drop into paper lined muffin cups and bake at 400F for 15-20 minutes or until golden brown and a tooth pick inserted comes out clean.
  5. Let cool in the muffin pan for 5 minutes before removing individual muffins to a cooling rack.

image unbaked…

image…baked!

Okay, maybe I did have like 5… had to make sure they were really, really good before I posted it. You know, I am looking out for you guys 🙂

Copyright © 2011 Simple Healthy Homemade. All rights reserved

Pumpkin Apricot White Chocolate Muffins

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What to do if you were blinded by the fact that all pumpkins were the same price, but one person can only eat so much pumpkin and still you picked the BIGGEST one at the farmers marked? My solution was this: You make another pumpkin muffin! This one with dried apricots and some white chocolate chips. They are not super sweet, therefore the white chocolate chips make for a nice addition. Enjoy!

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Ingredients

  • 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
  • 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
  • 1/2 cup sugar ( sucanat, coconut sugar or regular)
  • 1 1/2  tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • 1/2 tsp cinnamon
  •  1/2 cup chopped dried apricots
  • 1/2 cup white chocolate chips
  • 2 tbsp oil
  • 2 tbsp to 1/4 cup water
  • 1 cup pumpkin puree
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract

Directions

  1. Preheat oven to 400
  2. Combine dry ingredients up to cinnamon, add the chopped apricots by sprinkling them over the flour mixture so they don’t clump together
  3. Add the chocolate chips
  4. Stir in pumpkin puree, vanilla, oil and water. Stir until just combined and you can see  no more floury pieces of apricot
  5. Drop by the tablespoon full into prepared muffin tin
  6. Bake 15-20 minutes or until toothpick inserted into a muffin comes out clean

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Copyright © 2011 Simple Healthy Homemade. All rights reserved

Gingerbread Pear Muffins

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Sugar and spice and everything nice… The temps are down and it’s getting darker earlier every day. Stealthily they already play Christmas songs at Home Depot (did I mention, I have been there quite a lot lately?), it’s not even past Halloween, yet they sneak in one ore two songs, then go back to regular music. Hoping no one would notice, but HA! as it so happens, apparently my brain was a sponge for this kinda thing this past weekend and kept doing an endless playback for me until I finally caved in and made these Gingerbread Muffins.  …lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with you…

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Even thought the name in English is Ginger Bread, the French origin of this recipe had several spices, but originally no ginger in it. It is after all called pain d’épices (spice bread) and in German there are two words ‘Lebkuchen’ (no one knows what the ‘Leb’ really stands for, kuchen is cake) or Pfefferkuchen (Pepper cake) and that recipe, you guessed, contains pepper. So apparently there are regional differences in what goes into the Gingerbread Spice mix, and the one I used had ginger, cloves, cinnamon, coriander and star anis. But any old mix would work, heck, you can even make your own, if you’re so inclined. Or you could use Pumpkin Pie spice and add ginger … and comfy cozy are we…

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They are super delish with a hot cup of tea (or coffee)

Ingredients

  • 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
  • 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
  • 1 ripe banana
  • 1 1/4 cup chopped pear
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • 1/3 cup granulated coconut sugar, sucanat or sugar
  • 1 tsp gingerbread spice mix (if you like it real spiced, add up to 2 tsp)
  • 1/2 tsp cinnamon
  • 2-3 tbsp water

Directions

  1.  In a mixing bowl, mash banana with a fork until well mixed
  2. Combine flours, baking powder, baking soda, sugar and spices and add to the banana
  3. Add chopped pear, and stir to combine adding water by the tablespoon as needed (You don’t want the batter to be too dry)
  4. Spoon into paper lined muffin tin and bake at 400F for 15-20 minutes or until toothpick inserted comes out clean.

Copyright © 2011 Simple Healthy Homemade. All rights reserved.

Pear Almond Muffins

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Guess what was on sale at the farmers market this week-end? 🙂 Pears! Yumm! I love pears, when  you get them when they are juuust right, juicy, ripe but not too soft. Which is a fine balance and therefore, having bought a bunch I now gotta ‘consume’ them rather quickly.  I like apples but, let’s face it, pears are almost regal compared to a ‘commoner’ apple (No offense, Apple, love you too), maybe I just have this opinion because we can now get pretty good apples year round and they ceased to feel special, not being really seasonal anymore whereas pears are just never quite like they are in the fall… or maybe it’s because of this memory of my Mom saying ‘Pears are the queen of fruits’, who knows 🙂      Ahh the things we remember…

Besides eating pears fresh, melt chocolate chips as a sauce ( a personal favorite, use dark chocolate), roasting as a side, or baking a pear upside down cake or Tarte Tatin, oh and don’t forget, making pear vanilla butter (getting to that one later on, but it’s the very best thing you can do with your time if you have pears…and time, promise) what is one to do with  a bushel of pears?

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Muffins! Quick, easy and portable, now we are talking!

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Makes 12 regular size

Ingredients

  • 1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour
  • 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour (I have used all whole wheat, it just gets a bit denser)
  • 2 tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • 1 1/4 cup ripe but firm pear, diced finely (from 1 to 2 pears, depending on size)
  • 1/2 cup coconut palm sugar, sugar or sucanat
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1/2 tsp almond extract
  • 2 tbsp almond butter
  • 2 tbsp oil (you can leave the oil out, the consistency will change a little, but it’s still yum)
  • 1 lg egg
  • 1/4 cup milk (dairy or almond milk)

 Directions

  1. In a large bowl, mix together the first four ingredients
  2. add sucanat or coconut sugar, and diced pear and stir to coat
  3. add the remainder of the ingredients and stir until just combined then drop by the table spoons into lines muffin pan
  4. bake in a preheated oven at 400F for 15-20 minutes or until tester inserted into muffin comes out clear
  5. Let cool slightly before serving.

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And just like that, they are all gone:)

Gotta get back to the oven, I am seeing some Pear Gingerbread Muffins in my near future…

Copyright © 2011 Simple Healthy Homemade. All rights reserved.

Pumpkin Cheesecake Minis

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Ahhh it’s Fall, and I love me some pumpkin cheese cake. But ever notice how heavy that stuff is? I have a hard time finishing those huge pieces one is supposed to eat. How about bite sized, nah, too small maybe 3-4 bites? Now we’re talking! And while we’re at it, make it easy and quick as well.

That’s right, my friends, I want my (cheese) cake and eat it too (could not resist that one) And as you might know, I am not one for letting anything go to waste and so I was going through my fridge to see what’s on hand that might be useful.

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The result? SUPER EASY, and besides the crust, NO BAKING! And to top that, you can make these in the toaster oven, in fact they turn out better in the toaster oven 🙂 Win!
Here is my secret weapon of choice: left over pot sticker wrappers! That’s right, and we are going to blind bake (or toasterize)  them into crunchy littlte tartlet shells.

You need:

  • 4 oz cream cheese (1/2 bar, pack, block? what do you call that?), softened
  • 3-4 tbsp pumpkin puree (from can)
  • 2 tbsp suconat or coconut sugar
  • 1/8 tsp cinnamon
  • 1/8 tsp pumpkin pie spice mix
  • 1/8 tsp vanilla
  • 8-10 pot sticker wrappers (or wonton wrappers, trimmed to a round shape)

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Directions

  1. Place pot sticker wrappers in individual Madeleine forms or muffin tins, place in toaster oven for about 5-6 minutes, being careful not to let them get too brown, trust me, it goes quickly. On mine I set it right between the light and the dark setting. If your toaster oven has a temp setting, turn it down to 400, but leave it on toast (depending on your muffin cups/ Madeleine forms it might take more or less time, shiny metal reflects the heat…)   Alternately, using your oven, bake at 350 for 10 to 12 minutes, or until just slightly golden. They will crisp up more as they cool.
  2. In the meantime place softened cream cheese in a bowl, add the coconut sugar/sweetener of choice, and stir until completely incorporated.
  3. Add spices and pumpkin and mix until uniform.
  4. When the shells are cooled a bit, fill each using a tablespoon.
  5. Refrigerated for min. 1 hour to allow to get firm, prior to serving.

Note: these are best made and eaten within a day or so, since the crust will soak up the moisture from the filling and get progressively less crunchy.

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Copyright © 2011 Simple Healthy Homemade. All rights reserved.

Healthy Carrot Cake

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The last couple of days I have been thinking about home (the old home, where I was born and where I used to live) maybe it was brought on by roasting and eating those amazing chestnuts the other day, who can say? Anyway, we have a lot of regional specialties in Switzerland and this recipe pays homage to a Carrot Cake from the region of Aargau, and juuust in case any of you are into linguistics, the name of the dish I am going after is ‘Aargauer Rüebli Torte’. In my recipe, there is no butter or oil in the cake batter, there is limited amount of sugar compared to most regular muffin or cake recipes, hardly any flour and it can be made gluten free. It’s moist crumb is achieved without the addition of fat, in fact the only fat in it, comes from the egg yolks and the ground almonds used. Still it’s cake, it’s a desert and should be enjoyed as such, in moderation 😉 Not saying this would be a good idea, but it’s quite a way to sneak some veggies past certain people called kids 🙂

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For simplicity reasons, you can also make muffins (simplicity, because you don’t have to try to come up with believable stories on where the missing piece of cake went 😉

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Ingredients

  • 1/2 cup + 2 tbsp sugar
  • 5 organic eggs, seperated
  • 1 pinch salt
  • 2 tbsp warm water
  • 1/2 lemon peel
  • 1 lb carrots
  • 2 cups ground almonds, natural, not blanched (also known as almond flour)
  • 1/8 tsp allspice
  • 1/2 tsp cinnamon
  • 1/2 cup + 2 tbsp flour (use oat flour to make it gluten free)
  • 1/2 tsp baking powder

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egg yolks , and sugar: looking dark yellow to start…


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…and light in color after stirring

Directions

  1. Mix first four ingredients in a bowl and stir until light in color and airy
  2. add lemon peel
  3. Shred the carrots on the fine side of a grater into the egg mixture
  4. add the cinnamon and allspice, stir to combine
  5. in a separate bowl, beat the egg whites  until soft peaks form, add on top of the mix
  6. sprinkle the ground almonds on top
  7. sift flour and baking powder over top and gently incorporate the almonds, egg whites and flour.
  8. Fill into prepares 8″ spring form pan ( or grease muffin cups, you can use paper liners, only bake 25 minutes) and bake at 350 F for 50 minutes, or until tester comes out clean.
  9. After cooled completely, coat top of cake with sifted confectioners sugar, and marzipan carrots. Or make a white glaze by mixing  1tbsp lemon juice, 1-2 tbsp water and 1 1/2 cups of confectioners sugar until mixture coats back of spoon evenly. Spread over entire top and sides of cake.

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By the way: My boyfriend, who was very adamant about not liking carrot cake, never having liked carrot cake, finally agreed to try a tiny piece, after my: ‘this is not your typical extremely sweet american carrot cake, just saying. But, alright, more for me!’ Well, he revised his opinion, in his own words: ‘OMG, this is delicious!’

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Copyright © 2011 Simple Healthy Homemade. All rights reserved.

Surprise Visit ‘Cake-to-Biscotti’ (Vorrats Cake)

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My sweet tooth hijacked me completely today. I think it the days getting shorter and the nights colder. Makes me wanna eat cake. Or at least make some and have on hand for when I want some, or need some because of a surprise visit or something (okay, this might just be an excuse, since I am really not sure just how long I will be able to keep my hands off of them)
The German title translates to something along the lines of stock/supply/storage cake since it is baked in canning jars and can then be kept for up to 6 months
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( yeah right, as if anyone is going to manage that)

The idea is that before you serve it or gift it, you remove cake from the jar, slice it thin and bake it up till crisp, = biscotti.
imageIdeal with tea or coffee 🙂
In the background: that’s what they are supposed to look like, foreground, ‘first try’ with 12 oz jelly jars… I basically had to carve the cake out of the jars and slice them lengthwise

You wanna make sure you use wide mouth pint jars from Ball. Or any other jar that is truly straight on the inside and DOES NOT curve in at the top for the lid to thread on. I tried it with 12 oz jelly jars, they LOOK  straight on the outside, but as we all known, it’s the inside that matters much more than the outside 🙂

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Ingredients

  • 4-5 canning jars, pint size
  • 5 eggs
  • 1/4 tsp salt
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 3 cups (+ 2 tbsp*) Flour
  • 1 cups ground almond or hazelnuts, divided
  • 1/2 cup almonds and/or hazelnuts
  • 1 tsp vanilla
  • 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 stick butter, melted

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Directions

  1. butter and coat jars with 1/4 cup of the ground almonds
  2. In a big bowl in warm water bath, beat eggs, salt and sugar until light and airy
  3. remove from water bath, beat a little more then stir in vanilla and gently mix in flour, baking powder, ground almonds and whole nuts
  4. fold molten butter into mixture
  5. Fill canning jars about half with mixture, tap several times to remove any air bubbles. Close jars and cover lids with aluminum foil
  6. Preheat oven to 350 F. Place large rimmed baking sheet in lower part of the oven and fill as much as possible with hot water, place jars right above that on the rack.
  7. Bake 1 1/2 hours. Let cool in the glass.
  8. To enjoy, open jar, remove cake. If you got the truly straight pint jars, it’s a piece of cake (could not resist that one) will keep up to 6 months
  9.  When unexpected guests show up, not to worry, you’re prepared! Pop a jar open, cut into 1/4″ thick slices and bake in a 250 F oven until crisp!

imageMmmmhhh!

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only fill about half way up

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baking (this time the right jars…)

imagethis is the lemon versions ( will be up soon, still lives in metric land right now)

imagesliced and ‘biscotti-ed’ 

Copyright © 2011 Simple Healthy Homemade. All rights reserved.