Tag: Cinnamon

Carrot and Date Breakfast Cookies

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Hey guys! Fall just sort of snuck up on my and now WHAM! It’s here. The other day I made this tea and berry drink thing and I realized that the time for berries has passed. We need some warm spices and things that are orange😂 So, I present to you, Carrot and Date Breakfast Cookies! These babes are simple, sweet, and hearty, and contain a very special secret ingredient.

Do you want to know what it is? The secret ingredient? It’s tahini!! I’ve only ever used tahini in hummus before, but in these breakfast cookies it gives such a nice nutty flavour! The other not-so-secret ingredients are carrots, dates, oats, and a bunch of fall spices. Let me just list all of the things that these are: REFINED SUGAR FREE. VEGAN. GLUTEN FREE. DAIRY FREE. DELICIOUS. Delicious is now a legit food category. These cookies just made it one.

If you don’t have tahini (you should get some) you can use a nut butter of choice👌 Also, play around with some add ins because raisins, chocolate chips, or dried fruit and nuts would be great in these. In this recipe, you have a perfect autumn-ish foundation for all of your fall baking dreams. Not to mention a great breakfast✌️ Enjoy my friends!!

Carrot and Date Breakfast Cookies

Serves: Makes 9 cookies

Total Time: 45 minutes

Ingredients:

  • 10 large Medjool Dates, pitted
  • 2/3 cup grated carrot
  • 2/3 cup rolled oats
  • 2 tbsp tahini
  • 1/2 tsp cinnamon
  • 1/2 tsp nutmeg
  • 1/4 tsp allspice

Directions:

  1. Bring a small pot to a simmer, then remove it from the heat. Add in the dates and let them sit in the warm water for 7-10 minutes to soften up.
  2. Preheat your oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
  3. Add the softened dates into a blender or food processor and blend until a smooth paste forms. Scoop it into a bowl.
  4. Add the oats, carrot, tahini, and spices to the date paste. Stir until combined.
  5. Line a pan with parchment paper, and scoop out tablespoon sized balls of cookie dough. Place them on the pan and press down with your fingers to form cookies. Bake the cookies for 10-15 minutes, until the bottoms are golden brown.
  6. Remove from the oven and let cool completely before enjoying.

Hope you like this first taste of fall! Stay tuned for some apple and pumpkin recipes coming soon 🙌🙌

Yours Truly,

Olivia:))

Applesauce

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It’s pretty much fall now so all of the apple and pumpkin recipes are going strong. I’m going to have to buy some canned pumpkin, but thankfully my grandma has an apple tree in her backyard, so we’ve got LOTS of apples. Apples are great! I have one literally every night with peanut butter. There are so many things you can do with apples, and I’ll be posting more apple recipes, but today we’re just going simple with some applesauce.

I’m a sucker for some good applesauce. You know those little applesauce pouches you got as a kid? Yep. The best. I recently learned that my family doesn’t actually like it that much, but hey, more sauce for me. It makes a great snack, and can be used in a ton of fall desserts. Or just heat it up and add a little nice cream and you’re set. Anyways, applesauce isn’t very hard to make. You just cook down the apples with some cinnamon and water, and then blend em all up and then boom. Applesauce. No sugar, no preservative thingies, just the good stuff.

I ate about half of this batch, then froze the rest for later so I can bake something tasty with it. That’ll probably be my next fall apple recipe. Or I’ll just defrost it and eat it plain because it’s great like that too. So many options! Anyway you like your sauce, you should just go make some because it’s delicious and autumn-y and good for you. Check out the recipe!

Applesauce

Serves: 4

Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

  • 6 cups of peeled and chopped apples (I’m not sure what kind mine were because they came from my grandma’s tree. If you like your sauce sweeter use sweet apples like Fuji or Gala, and if you like it less sweet, use varieties such as Honey Crisp or Red Delicious.
  • 3 cups water
  • 1/2 tbsp ground cinnamon

Directions:

  1. Bring the water, cinnamon, and apples to boil in a large pot. Lower to a simmer and cook until all of the apples are soft, about 10-12 minutes.
  2. Scoop out a 1/2 cup of the boiling liquid and set aside. Then strain the rest of the apples and add them to a blender along with the 1/2 cup of liquid.
  3. Blend the apples until smooth, then let cool and use in baking, eat it by itself, or freeze for later use.

Hope you enjoy this simple and versatile recipe! It’s perfect for fall:)

Yours Truly,

Olivia:)))

Vanilla Protein Oats

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Before you ask, Karen, I know I’ve done breakfast bowl posts lately, but they’re just so good. If I keep making freaking awesome breakfasts, am I not supposed to share them?!!?? Didn’t think so. Yes, these protein oats fall into the awesome category, and yes, you get to see the recipe.

I’ve just been really into the protein powder recently, as you can tell by my recipe for Mini Berry Protein Muffins, which you should DEFINITELY check out. It makes stuff super creamy and adds a nice flavour. And adds protein😂 Usually I’ll add a scoop to my morning smoothie bowl, but today I didn’t have any frozen bananas at the ready, so I tried these Vanilla Protein Oats!

They’re super simple and taste AMAZING (like most of my recipes, tbh). These oats will definitely fill you up and fuel you through your day! (I need this because of this pesky little thing called summer school😂) Don’t forget to throw lots toppings on there- toppings MAKE the bowl. Am I right or am I right? I used cherries, bananas, and lots of crunchy peanut butter, which is my new obsession. Any other fruits or nuts or other good stuff also works though, because the base of these oats is vanilla.

In a nutshell: THESE OATS ARE DELISH AND THEY’RE FULL OF PROTEIN AND CARBS AND GOOD STUFF AND YOU SHOULD MAKE THEM EVERY DAY OF THE WEEK AND TOP THEM WITH MORE DIFFERENT AWESOME STUFF EACH DAY. Sign me up!! Enjoy your oats☺️😋😉😉

Vanilla Protein Oats

Serves: 1

Total Time: 15 minutes

Ingredients:

  • 1/4 cup quick cooking steel cut oats
  • 1 scoop vanilla protein powder (about 1/2 cup)
  • 1 banana
  • 1 cup water
  • 1/2 tsp cinnamon
  • Some cherries for topping
  • Lots of peanut butter for topping;)

Directions:

  1. Mash half of the banana in a small pot, then stir in the oats, protein powder, cinnamon, and water.
  2. Bring the mixture to a simmer on the stove, then let cook for about 7-8 minutes, until the oats are cooked through. Add more water if needed, because the protein powder sure soaked up a lot!
  3. Remove the oats from the heat, scoop into a bowl, and top with the rest of the banana, some cherries, and some peanut butter. Yum!!

See you tomorrow with a new post!!:)

Yours Truly,

Olivia:))

Rhubarb Purée

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What the heck do you do with rhubarb other than making a pie or crisp out of it?!!?! This is the question that has faced me as I stared down the rhubarb I had in my fridge for the past while. We got it as a gift and I was kind of like, well I appreciate the sentiment but WHAT DO I DO. I made a crisp and it was delish but I needed some more options! So I poked around Pinterest and decided to purée it.

I came up with my own recipe and let me tell you, this purée came to PLAY. It has some homey spices like cinnamon and nutmeg, plus some maple syrup to sweeten it up (rhubarb can be kind of bitter) and some lemon juice as a flavour-enhancer. You just simmer everything together until it gets nice and soft, which surprisingly doesn’t take long at all, and then blend it up and you’ve got a smooth, delicious purée.

Ok, now you’re like “my question of what do I do with rhubarb has been answered, but WHAT DO I DO WITH THIS PURÉE?”. Valid question, my friend. But don’t worry, there are a gazillion different things you can use this for! Add it into muffins, quick breads, icing, cakes, smoothies or oats, make popsicles out of it, put it on nice cream, or just eat it with a spoon. Think of it as applesauce on steroids. And it tastes so good!!!!!! I froze mine in a freezer bag after so I can take it out when needed.

Hope you enjoy this rhubarb purée, and that you never have to waste any rhubarb again! There will definitely be some recipes that use this coming soon so keep your eyes open!

Rhubarb Purée

Serves: Makes about 4 1/2 cups

Total Time: 20 minutes

Ingredients:

  • 6 cups chopped rhubarb
  • 1 tbsp lemon juice
  • 1/2 cup maple syrup
  • 1 tsp cinnamon
  • 1/2 tsp nutmeg
  • 2 cups water

Directions:

  1. Add all of the ingredients to a large pot and place over high heat on the stove. Bring the mixture to a boil, then lower the heat and let it simmer until the rhubarb is soft. This should only take about 3-5 minutes.
  2. Pour the contents of the pot into a good blender, and blend until smooth.
  3. Let the purée cool, then store in an airtight container in the fridge, or pour into freezer bags and freeze until needed:)

So good and so easy!! See you on Wednesday:))

Yours Truly,

Olivia:)))

Carrot Cake Oatmeal

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Although I’ve kind of been obsessed with smoothie bowls lately, I took a little oatmeal break and BOY WAS I IMPRESSED. I kind of forgot how good oatmeal was! Then the next day I came up with this Carrot Cake Oatmeal and it’s on another level. It’s sweet and warm and full of cinnamon and a ton of other good stuff. Perfect for a rainy day! Or any day, really.

Carrot cake is amazing (I need to come up with a recipe for this blog), and I would enjoy it in any form. But I’d have to say that eating it as oatmeal is probably second only to actual carrot cake. I used banana for some sweetness, carrots for carrotyness (duh) and some vanilla and cinnamon for that warm, spiced flavour. A good carrot cake also has raisins in it. I REALLY hope you like raisins because they’re awesome. In this oatmeal I used chopped dates, which are possibly even better than raisins. But you can use a handful of raisins if you ain’t got no dates lying around.

Enough talk about raisins. Lets discuss how freaking easy these oats are to make! Just shave some carrot, mash some banana, chop some dates and voila! You’ve got an awesome breakfast that is filling and can be topped just the way you want it, like a HARVEY’S for oatmeal. I topped mine with banana, some more cinnamon (I got the really big thing of cinnamon from Costco so I won’t be running out of that anytime soon), and some peanut butter, because what’s the point of breakfast without peanut butter? I think I’m going to spread some peanut butter on the next piece of carrot cake I have because it is a great combo. Go ahead and make these oats already so you can slap some pb on there!

Carrot Cake Oatmeal

Serves: 1

Total Time: 10-15 minutes

Ingredients:

  • 1/4 cup quick cooking steel cut oats (or rolled oats or quick oats; just adjust the cooking time accordingly)
  • 1/4 cup shredded carrot
  • 1/2 a ripe banana (I like to save the other half for topping)
  • 1 large medjool date, chopped (or a handful of raisins)
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1/2 tsp cinnamon
  • 1/2 cup water
  • Peanut butter and more cinnamon for topping:)

Directions:

  1. Mash the banana in a small pot. Add in the carrot, oats, chopped date, vanilla, cinnamon, and water and stir until combined.
  2. Place the pot over medium-high heat and bring the oatmeal to a boil. Then turn the heat to low and cook until your desired thickness is reached (I cook my quick cooking steel cut oats for 5-7 minutes. Read your oat package for more oat guidance)
  3. Scoop the oats into a bowl and top with the other half of the banana, some peanut butter, more cinnamon, or anything else your heart desires! Proceed to eat and enjoy;))

Hope you try out this DELICIOUS breakfast sometime! Have a great rest of the week and I will see you Friday!

Yours Truly,

Olivia