Recipe | - Part 2

Hey all! How’s your week going so far?! On the blog this week, I have a protein bar giveaway going on and tomorrow is the Lend a {Healthy}Hand round up! So make sure you enter the giveaway and send in some #healthyhelp if you haven’t done so already!

I am just loving the sun and greenery all around right now! Seeing spring flowers totally brightens up the day don’t ya think?! Brings everyone outside too! I can’t tell you how many people I saw out walking, riding, reading, and playing on a walk I took on Tuesday. So nice to see the city come alive!

[rocking the patterned leggings]

As I promised earlier in the week, I have two (well more like 1.5) recipes to share with you today! Both of which feature some major superfood ingredients! We’re talking nutritional power houses right here!

I got packages from two companies this week to sample, and I thought instead of just trying the products, I would try to incorporate them in a recipe of some sort!

Live Superfoods sent me two big bags of Coconut Palm Sugar as well as Deglet Noor Dates!

I love dates and use them in a lot of recipes as well as for dipping in nut butter (an amazing combo if you haven’t tried it!). But I was a little uncertain as to how I would use the coconut sugar because I don’t use a lot of sugar in my recipes or in my day to day life. After doing some research though, I discovered that coconut sugar has a similar taste to brown sugar…caramelly and smooth! This was perfect because I had to make some cookies for the elections last week…and you can’t make chocolate chip cookies without brown sugar! (Well I guess you can…but they’re just not the same…until now!)

So I decided to substitute the brown sugar in my typical cookie recipe with coconut sugar! Here’s where that .5 recipes comes in… I always just follow the recipe on the back of the package, so really the only change I made was in the substitution of the coconut sugar in a 1:1 ratio. Can’t take much credit there! Haha! But I’ll post the recipe I used anyway, incase you’re curious!

Simple Chocolate Chip Cookies

minimally adapted from Wegmans

1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened
1 cup coconut palm sugar, tightly packed
1/2 cup  granulated sugar
2 large  eggs
1 tsp  pure vanilla extract
2 Tbsp water
2 1/2 cups  all-purpose flour
1 tsp  baking soda
1 tsp  salt
1 pkg (12 oz) chocolate chips
1 cup  chopped nuts (optional)

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Beat butter and sugars until light colored and creamy. Beat in eggs, one at a time until completely incorporated. Add vanilla and water; blend well.
Combine flour, soda and salt; gradually stir into butter mixture. Stir in chocolate morsels and nuts (if desired).
Drop rounded teaspoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets, about 2 inches apart. Bake 12-15 min or until crisp and golden brown. Cool on wire racks. Makes about 3 dozen cookies.

The cookies came out exactly as they always do and you couldn’t detect a change in flavor at all! However, by subbing coconut for brown sugar the cookies contained a lot more nutrients and minerals, tons of amino acids, and a low glycemic source of sugar! Granted they were still cookies and obviously a treat…but I felt sort of sneaky giving them put knowing they were a little bit more nutritious than your typical dessert!

Oh and incase you were wondering, the dates were delicious too! Firm, sweet (but not as overly sweet as medjool dates), and caramel-y tasting! Truly natures candy.

Thanks Live Superfoods!

Keeping the superfood train moving…Oriya Organics sent me some of their SuperGreen Medley powder as well as some of their Vegan SuperProtein Medley.

The protein powder contains:

And the green powder has:

I am usually not a fan of green drink powders by themselves (they usually taste verrrry…GREEN!), so I decided to try to do a baking experiment with it! I like coming up with recipes that taste good AND have lots of hidden nutrients in them…especially veggies and greens that can often have a very pronounced flavor!

And seeing as they sent me protein powder (which I love using in baked good too!), I decided to incorporate that as well! Here’s what I came up with:

Super Food Green Monster Muffins

makes 10 muffins

1 cup freeze dried banana

1 pouch of fruit and veggie puree (mine was mango, pear, spinach)

1/2 cup spelt flour

2 tbsp protein powder (I used Oriya’s but WHEY would work great here!)

1 scoop greens powder

1/2 of a small zucchini, finely chopped

1/2 cup applesauce

2 egg whites

a sprinkle of cinnamon

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

Preheat oven to 350. In a food processor, grind flour, powders, and freeze dried banana together. Place in a bowl and set aside. Puree zucchini, applesauce, and fruit/veggie puree together until evenly combined. Mix wet and dry ingredients. Add in baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, and egg whites. Stir until well combined.

Fill muffins tins about half way and bake for approximately 25 mins (check around 22 with a knife).

Remove from oven, let cool, and store in the refrigerator or freezer!

Very rarely do I get a recipe right on the first try, so I was amazed with how well these came out! Sweet, perfect spongy texture, and the green color’s mighty pretty as well!

The green powder tasted amazing in these! No bitterness or harsh taste! Love that.

Thanks Oriya!

Let me know if you try either of these recipes out (although I’m sure most of you have made cookies before ).

See you tomorrow for the Lend a {Healthy} Hand round up and until then…

Party like The Office is NEW this week…because IT IS!

Kaila

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Todays’s Healthy Help: Shared some fresh juice recipes with my cousin.

Never too late to start Lending a {Healthy} Hand for this weeks round-up! Tell me what you’ve done to help someone else lately!

Happy Spring everyone! Forgot to mention in yesterday’s post! Probably because my surroundings are not veyr Spring-like at all…

Seriously we’ve been getting major (and very random!) snow flurries on a daily basis for the past week. The groundhog lied.

But Spring break will be here soon enough and I can jet off to California for some warmer weather and quality time with my sister! Cannot wait.

Today I have a lot to share with you! I’ve been promising to post about this stuff for a few days now and the time has finally arrived to lay it all out…TWO new workouts and TWO new recipes!

First up, the fitness fun! (And speaking of fitness, did you see my guest post over on Tina’s blog yesterday about Best Body Bootcamp? Check it out!)

These are two workouts I’ve done over the past few weeks while trying to stay busy in the transition period between round 4 and 5 of BBBC! I had to get a little creative on my own ya know? The first is a cardio routine that can really be adapted for any machine! I’ve tried it on both the elliptical and the treadmill! I liked it for both and it is very adaptable for your personal fitness level….

The second is an incline walking workout (with a surprise running spurt in the middle!)! I think incline walking is incredibly underrated in the fitness world! It’s SUCH a great workout! I even wrote an article on it for my newspaper this week…I’ll share it with you all when it goes to print on Friday! Let me know if you try either of these out!

And of course, what would a workout be without a great snack afterwards to refuel? I have not one, but TWO mint chocolate chip flavored recipes to share! I’ve been obsessed with this combination lately and have wanted to eat it at any chance I get. So having a few different options on hand to get my fix has been nice! Both of these recipes were inspired by my Frosty Cocoa Mint bars!

Chocolate Mint Protein Muffins

makes 10 muffins

½ c apple sauce

1 (approx. 126g) banana

1/2 scoop (approx.12g) protein powder

½ cup flour

2 tbsp cocoa

2 tsp mint

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

3 tbsp egg whites

Preheat oven to 350. In a food processor combine banana and apple sauce until smooth. In a bowl combines dry ingredients. Mix egg whites in to fruit mixture. Combine wet and dry ingredients. Distribute batter evenly between 10 muffin tins. Bake for approximately 22 minutes.

Remove from oven, let cool, and wait one day for optimal flavor!

*note*-these muffins are not super sweet so if you have a more voracious sweet tooth I recommend adding more sweetener of some kind…date paste, granulated, or even a little liquid sweetener would work I think!

Hidden Veggie Chocolate Bars

makes 15 bars (5 three bar servings)

1/2 (approx. 60g) banana

1/2 (approx. 55g) small zucchini, chopped

1/4 cup (approx. 40g) dates

1/2 cup natural applesauce

2 tbsp cocoa powder

1/2 cup oats

1/2 cup wheat bran

2 tbsp whey protein powder

2 tsp dried mint

1.5 tsp baking powder

1.5 tsp baking soda

Preheat oven to 350. Place dates in a bowl with a 1/2 cup of water. Microwave on high for 1 minute. Pour dates and water into a food processor, as well as banana, zucchini, and applesauce. Process until smooth. Add in cocoa powder and mint. Process until smooth. Add remaining ingredients and process until fully combined. Thinly spread mixture into a rectangle onto a parchment paper lined baking sheet. Bake for 25 minutes.

Remove from oven and place in the freezer for at least one hour. Once chilled, cut into 15 equal sized bars.