Chocolate Covered Bananas

I found this yummy idea from the Unconventional Kitchen.

I was busy and didn't wait for the ice on these to melt a little. These were straight out of the freezer.

So simple and good!

Chocolate Covered Bananas

Slice bananas

Put on plate and freeze

Remove from freezer and top with almond butter and another banana

Put back in freezer

Make chocolate 

Dip bananas in chocolate

Freeze

The chocolate icing was from here:

• 1/4 cup plus 1 tbsp cocoa powder 
• 2-3 tbsp pure maple syrup or agave
• 1/4 cup liquid virgin coconut oil 

Yum!!

Yogurt Parfaits, Homemade Donuts, Pecan Granola, and Pineapple Bliss Green Smoothie

This was breakfast this morning. 

Pineapple Bliss Green Smoothies!

Pineapple Bliss Green Smoothie

1/4 large pineapple frozen

1 frozen banana

2 cups frozen grapes

3-4 handfuls of spinach

2 cups of water (or more if needed)

Blend.

I found this at www.unnconventionalkitchen.com. 

G told me this was a keeper! So cute!

Yummy Yogurt Parfaits!

Yogurt Parfaits

Organic yogurt

Sliced fruit

Granola

Layer in a pretty cup and serve

Homemade Glazed Donuts (without the glaze)!

Recipe is here

Pecan Granola!

Pecan Granola

1/3 cup melted coconut oil

1/2 cup coconut sugar

1/2 cup honey

1 tbsp vanilla

3/4 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp salt

3 cups rolled oats

2 cups pecans, coarsely chopped

1/2 cup coconut

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Spray large baking sheet with Pam.

In large bowl, combine oil, sugar, honey, vanilla, cinnamon, and salt.

Add oats and pecans. Mix with hands.

Place on baking sheet and bake 15 minutes - stirring occasionally.

Add coconut and back 15 more minutes.

Let cool.

Options: Add 1 cup dried fruit or chocolate chips after cooled

Kids loved it!!

(Kids are thinking I'm a little weird because I had to do a photo-shoot before I would let them eat! They did help me line everything up nicely :) Ha!

Carrot Cake Carrot Cake Cookie Balls

I found these at the Unconventional Kitchen and I just had to try them.

Easy to make and really yummy! Couldn't get the kids to try them - carrots and raisins?

Carrot Cake No Bake Cookie Balls
Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 C rolled oats
• 3/4 C grated carrot
• 1/4 C raisins
• 3 Tbsp honey
• 1/2 C nut butter (I used Almond butter)
• 1/4 C chopped walnuts (chop them small)
• 2 Tbsp unsweetened coconut
• 1 Tbsp mini chocolate chips
• 1 Tbsp chia seeds
• 1/2 cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 Tbsp coconut sugar (optional)

Mix all ingredients together (with your hands). Form into balls. Place in the refrigerator for a couple of hours. Eat and enjoy!

Smoothies

I love smoothies!

And so do my kids (well most of them).

Here are some of our most recent ones.

 Frozen Mango and yogurt is one of our favorites!

We also liked Frozen Mango, Frozen Pineapple, Orange Juice and Coconut Water!

This next one however wasn't a huge hit though. I just added some leftover strawberries and bananas, spinach and frozen strawberries. The kids weren't too excited but it did taste pretty good. BUT you eat with your eyes first and this wasn't very appetizing :)

For more smoothie ideas visit The Happy Gal, Unconventional Kitchen, and Chocolate Covered Katie.

Banana Bread

A family favorite.

I bought a whole bunch of bananas earlier in the week so that I could freeze them and make all sorts or yummy things (like nice cream!) But, life got busy and the bananas didn't make it to the freezer. Instead they got to the perfect ripeness to make banana bread.

Here is the recipe from my Betty Crocker cookbook but with my ingredients:

Banana Bread

1 1/4 cups coconut sugar
1/2 cup of butter
2 large eggs

Mix.

Add:
1 1/2 cups mashed ripe bananas (3-4)
1/2 cup rice milk
1 tsp vanilla

Mix.

Add:
2 1/2 cups whole grain flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt

Mix.

Pour into greased loaf pans. Bake 350 degrees (8" pans about 1 hour, 9" pans about 1 1/4 hours and smaller pans 30-45 minutes).

Cheesecake Stuffed Strawberries

I just love these!

Especially since they are so much easier to make than cheesecake AND they taste so good!!

You can find the original recipe here. (I love www.makeit-loveit.com BTW)

This is the "Cheesecake" filling recipe that I used:

Cream Cheese Frosting
2 boxes of cream cheese
1/2 cup honey
1/3 cup softened butter
1 1/4 tsp vanilla

Mix together.

Cut the bottoms of the strawberries so they will stand up. Hollow out the middle of the strawberry slightly. Fill with Cream Cheese Frosting.

Try not to eat them all at once!

And here is what it looked like when we were done:

(I obviously need to work on my photography skills but we were having fun! I just love this new app that I got for Instagram that makes 4 pictures into one in a snap!)

Breakfast

This was our breakfast one day last week.

A yummy Mango smoothie (frozen mangos, orange juice, coconut water)

Yogurt parfaits

Berry Breakfast Bowls (found here). These were NOT my kids favorite. So I won't post here. We threw out a lot of food that morning.

I guess that's how it goes. Some are great hits and others fail. But we keep on trying.

My poor kids - ha!

Baked Omelet Timer Saver

This recipe came from Super Healthy Kids here.

Baked Omelet Time Saver

6 large eggs
1 cup milk
1/2 cup whole grain flour

Optional:
1 tomato
1/2 medium green bell pepper
1/2 cup sliced mushrooms
1/2 cup salsa
2 oz cheese

Blend eggs, milk, and flour in blender. Pour into well greased pan.
Add diced veggies.
Bake at 450 degrees for 20 minutes.
When eggs are cooked through, top with cheese. Add salsa now.
Roll up starting with the short end of the pan. Place on platter and slice.

Here's what I did:
I added ALL of the options and after that, I couldn't roll it up. This was pretty tasty! But since all of those veggies didn't go over well with my kids (they just picked the eggs and mushrooms out to eat) I will save this for a meal when we have company :)

But next time I won't ALL of the options and see how it goes. I think I would be safe to just add cheese, salsa and mushrooms.

I love Super Healthy Kids website!

Leprechaun Ice Cream

One of the recipes I tried last week was Leprechaun Ice Cream. I found it here.

I just love this new website that I found - Unconventional Kitchen

All you need is frozen bananas, spinach and some almond milk!

Leprechaun Ice Cream

3 frozen banans

Handful of Spinach

1. Put frozen bananas and spinach in the food processor or a high powered blender.

2. Process the ice cream until it is all incorporated.  If using a blender, blend the bananas and spinach on medium.  Stop the blender and mash it down with a spatula, blend again.  Repeat this process until it is the consistency that you want. Add almond milk to desired consistency.

My kids thought this was ok once a year (on St. Patricks Day). I'm finding that by kids either like bananas or don't like them at all. So it just depended on that little fact. I thought it was pretty tasty.

Glazed Homemade Donuts

The other day I told the kids that we were having donuts for breakfast! They just about fell on the floor and couldn't believe what they were hearing! It was kinda funny :)

I found this recipe somewhere online and I can't remember where! I'm sure it was from one of the sites on by bloglist.

These were a hit and we even had them again today.

Glazed Homemade Donuts:
1 tsp vinegar
2/3 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla
3 Tbsp melted coconut oil
1 cup spelt
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/3 cup + 2 Tbsp xylitol
1/4 tsp salt

Mix wet ingredients. Mix dry ingredients. Combine. Bake in a donut maker.

The chocolate icing was from here:

• 1/4 cup plus 1 tbsp cocoa powder 
• 2-3 tbsp pure maple syrup or agave
• 1/4 cup liquid virgin coconut oil 

Enjoy!