K.I.S.S.!

I tried baking a cake last night to bring to my coworkers. It called for 1 cup of oil. I used 1 cup of coconut oil instead of vegetable oil because I wanted it to have coconut flavor.

But I think the recipe is totally flawed! It ended up being such a greasy mess of a cake! Yuck! I realized I need to take a step back and go to the basics: simple, effective, delicious recipes. I have to remember: "K.I.S.S."

Keep

It

Simple

Stupid!!!

So, tonight I decided to make up for it and bake muffins... for the first time ever I actually created a recipe from scratch! My very own! I just threw together stuff I had in my apartment, but it was triggered by the two over-ripe bananas that had been sitting around.

Black-Eye Banana Muffins

Makes 12 muffins.

Nutrition and recipe here.

1 cup rolled oats

1/2 cup whole wheat flour

2 bananas, mashed

1/4 cup raw agave nectar

1/4 fat free yogurt

2 egg whites

1 tablespoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

12 blackberries

3/4 cup slivered almonds

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease muffin pan with non-stick spray.

Combine flour, oats, baking powder, and cinnamon in a large bowl and set aside.

Mix remaining ingredients except blackberries and almonds until smooth. Gently incorporate the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients.

Spoon batter into each muffin well no more than 1/4 of the way full. Top with a blackberry, followed by remaining batter.

Bake at 350 degrees F until edges are golden, about 18 minutes. NOTE: The toothpick test isn't recommended because the blackberry will mess with the "clean" result! :)

Remove from the oven and keep in the pan for a few minutes before letting them cool on a wire rack.

After making these muffins, I felt really confident. I went for a bike ride and was so motivated and energetic that I decided to attempt making granola yet again! I've tried making granola not once, not twice, but three times in the recent past. Every time... I burned it. :(

But tonight was a success!

I didn't take any photos... maybe I will tomorrow while I enjoy a serving with my breakfast at work. It'll be low-quality (as my camera will be my iPhone!) but we'll see. Anyway, here is the recipe if you want to check it out!

Welcome to My New Kitchen

As I said in a previous blog posts, I moved into a new apartment on the 4th of July weekend. My kitchen is a bit much smaller than my last apartment, but there are benefits: gas range, stainless steel counter top, and more windows (which means better lighting for photos).

So, without further ado...

Welcome!

My workspace!

Yup, it's small. Also, since taking the photo above, I put my microwave to the right of my range... temporarily. I have most of the cabinets full, but I'm waiting on my boyfriend to arrive for me to put most of it away.

See all of my appliances still in boxes? That's because my boyfriend is bringing a 3-tier shelf/cart that I will be using to hold my appliances (including my microwave), as well as other kitchen things.

This will help free up my counter space, which is very little as is! So, until then I will be using hard work (not my Kithchen Aid mxier!) to do my baking, cooking, etc.

I haven't baked anything and haven't even cooked very much at all in the 2 weeks I've lived here. With all of my appliances (except my microwave) and some of my cookware still in boxes, I've been unmotivated to make do with what I have at my disposal thus far. That is... until this afternoon!

First, I had to hunt through my two remaining kitchen boxes to find my mixing bowls, as well as hope when I found them that they were all still in one piece! Luckily they were! Now, it's time to bake!

Mocha Oat Mini-Muffins

Makes approx. 44 mini-muffins.

Nutrition and recipe here.

• 1.25 cups whole wheat flour
• .75 cups rolled oats
• 1/3 cup dutch process cocoa
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• 1 packet Starbucks Via coffee granules
• .5 cup coconut oil
• 3 egg whites
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 cup light soy milk

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Combine all dry ingredients in a large bowl. Mix all wet ingredients ins a small bowl and add to dry mix.

When combined, fill greased mini-muffin tins 3/4 full. Bake for 10 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean. Remove muffins and let them cool on a wire rack.

If you want to make large muffins, bake for about 15 minutes or until it passes the toothpick test.

Feelin' Fancy?

I decided to try creating a fancy version of something basic: cornbread! I took a spin on the more common jalapeno-cheddar cornbread and made it with feta, basil, and a little bit of jalapeno instead. I also omitted all added oil and used grated zucchini instead. It was still incredibly moist, so you won't miss the oil at all, believe me!

Fancy Pants Cornbread

Makes 12 Muffins

Nutrition information is here.

1 cup whole wheat flour
3/4 cup yellow cornmeal
1 cup unsweetened soy milk
3/4 cup grated zucchini (approx. 1 zucchini)
2 egg whites
4 basil leaves, finely chopped (or 1 tsp dried)
1.5 jalapeno peppers, diced
1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese
2 tsp baking powder


Preheat oven to 400 degrees F and lightly coat 12 muffin cups with nonstick spray.

Mix dry ingredients until combined. Add wet ingredients and mix. Pour equally into 12 muffin cups. Bake at 400 degrees F for 15-20 minutes or until crowns are golden.


These were best served immediately. The next day they were good, but the feta when at room-temperature was kind of weird. Next time I think I'll omit the feta and stick with a more melt-able cheese! Otherwise, it was a great success... even my coworkers liked them!

Flavor-full, photo-full, and recipe-full!

It's been a while since I've posted any recipes, and for that I am so sorry! Despite this, I have been baking like crazy lately, so this post will be full of many delicious recipes!

But, first...

My last recipe that was posted was a layered minty brownie. Despite the components of them tasting very good that night, when I brought them to work it was kind of disastrous. The frosting slowly melted while at work. It only took about 10 minutes out on my desk for it to start getting really messy. My coworkers also gave it mediocre reviews. Edible, but not delicious, so I don't think I'll make these again.

Determined, I continued on with the baking and came up with many other delicious things to compensate for this semi-failure.

Apple Doughnuffins

About 15 Muffins

Based on this recipe.

Full nutrition is here.

For muffins:
1.5 cups whole wheat flour
.5 cup sugar
3 packets Truvia sweetener
.25 tsp ground cinnamon
.75 cup light plain soy milk
3 tbsp egg whites
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla extract

For topping:
2 tsp cinnamon
3 tbsp brown sugar
1 tbsp Earth Balance spread, melted

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease muffin tray with non-stick spray.

Mix all wet ingredients until thoroughly combined, followed by dry ingredients. Distribute evenly in muffin tray and bake for 15-20 minutes or until it passes the clean toothpick test.

For topping, melt the margarine. In a separate bowl mix the cinnamon and sugar. When muffins are done baking, brush tops with melted margarine and dunk in cinnamon-sugar mixture. Serve immediately or let cool.

Fun fact: The apple sauce I used was home-made by a friend's mother! It's so so so yummy! I named them "doughnuffins" because they are extremely airy like a doughnut!

What I learned: These muffins stuck to the paper liners. I never used to use liners, but decided on a whim to try them a few months ago. I loved how little clean-up there was after baking (hell, I'm lazy, so this was great!) but now I know that the less butter there is in something, the more it will stick... and holy crap... these were practically PLASTERED to the liners! Whoops. Now I know.

So, this was a bit of a failure, too, but what you could separate from the liner was yummy!

Mocha Brownies

Makes 32 Squares

Based on this recipe.

Full nutrition here.

Because I precisely followed the recipe (for probably the first time ever!) I'm not going to post the full recipe here. I even used all of the ingredients... even heavy cream! *shock!* The only thing I did differently was use two 8x8 glass dishes instead of one 13x9 dish. Because I'm a dork, I know that the usable square inches is nearly identical so I figured it wouldn't affect it too much... and I was right!

These were a complete and utter success!

What I learned: Firstly, I made ganache for the first time! This taught me patience, yet again.

Heating the cream on medium-low heat took a while, especially staring at it waiting for the bubbles to start forming. Letting the hot cream sit on top of the chocolate for 5 minutes was absolutely painstaking! In the end, it was totally worth it and it yielded a creamy, delicious ganache!

I also used a pastry bag for the first time! I only did some simple dots of ganache with a #4 tip, but it was still fun to use!

In the middle of the large dot in the center is not a jelly bean - it's a Trader Joe's Espresso Pillow! These things are delicious just as a snack, but they totally worked with this brownie treat!

Finally, I learned that sometimes the full-fat, original recipes can be the best. I was told by many of my friends and coworkers that this is the best recipe I've ever made. A few wanted the recipe, too, and I totally gave credit to the original!

Strawberry-Banana Bread

Makes 12 Slices

Loosely based off of this recipe.

Nutrition info is here.

1.5 cups whole wheat flour
.25 cup unsweetened apple sauce
2 eggs
1/4 cup agave nectar
1.5 cup diced strawberries
2 tbsp ground flax meal
1/2 tsp vanilla
2 bananas, mashed
2 tsp baking soda
2 tbsp light plain soy milk
1 tbsp quick oats

Spray the bottom and sides of a loaf pan with non-stick spray. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F.

In a small bowl, mix the diced strawberries and agave nectar and set aside.

Mix together the mashed bananas, vanilla, flax meal, soy milk, apple sauce, and eggs in a large bowl. When combined, add the strawberry-agave mixture and mix.

Add all remaining ingredients to the mixture except oats. When everything is mixed together, pour into prepared loaf pan. Sprinkle oats on top.

Bake for 20 minutes. Cover with foil and bake for another 25 minutes. Remove bread from the pan and let cool on a wire rack for 10 minutes before slicing.

...isn't strawberry season the best season??!! :)