Banana Buckwheat Flax Pancakes with Pecans

Yes, pancakes.  These fall more into the fruit and whole grains for breakfast category than veggies for dinner, but people have been asking about breakfast, especially for kids, and this puts a pretty good spin on the old classic.  Pancakes are typically problematic with the refined white flour, dairy, eggs, sugar, and additives and preservatives.  This version is pure whole, lightly refined, plant food, and they are delicious!

Banana Buckwheat Flax Pancakes cooked with Pecans and topped with Blueberries

Serves: 6
Prep Time: 10 min
Cook Time: 20 min

Ingredients:

2 cups whole wheat flour
1 cup buckwheat flour 
1 cup freshly ground flax seed
1 tbsp cinnamon
1 tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
3 cups nut/soy/seed milk (we use homemade hemp milk, or whatever we have on-hand)
1 cup applesauce
2 mashed bananas 
1/4 cup water (adjust to achieve a good batter consistency)

Optional:

Pecans or walnuts to cook into the pancaked
Frozen blueberries, raspberries, diced apples, sliced bananas, or any other fruit for toppings

Instructions:

Combine the dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl and mix.  Mash 2 bananas really well with a fork until they become soft like the applesauce.  Add the mashed banana and other wet ingredients on top of the dry ingredients and whisk to mix thoroughly.  

Preheat a large pan or skillet on the stove.  Lightly coat the pan with a spritz/spray oil to avoid sticking.  Ladle the batter into the pan to make whatever size and shape pancakes you like.  Add nuts and another dash of cinnamon if you like. Once they start to cook around the edges and bubble in the middle, flip them over and finish cooking on the other side.  

Server warm topped with warmed frozen or fresh fruit.  I like to heat frozen berries until they get soft and juicy like a fruity syrup, or dice fresh apples and bananas to put on top.  Now you have a delicious and healthy breakfast that will fuel you up and start your day off right!

The dry ingredients.  Clockwise whole wheat flour, buckwheat flour, ground flax seed, baking powder, cinnamon, and baking soda.

The wet ingredients.  Nut/soy/seed mild, mashed bananas, applesauce, and water.

A pancake that's ready to be flipped

Ready to go, eat it up!

A quick and easy lunch

We have been posting some complex recipes recently.   While they are totally delicious and worth the effort, especially when entertaining around the holidays, they can't really be thrown together without doing some up-front planning, specialty shopping, and taking the time to prepare the dishes.  To switch things up a bit, I want to share with you what I had for lunch today.

A sunshine burger sandwich, with a side salad, baby carrots, and black beans

While there isn't a specific recipe, I will explain what it all is, and how I brought it all together into a quick, nutritious and very satisfying lunch.

Everything I pulled out of the fridge, freezer, and pantry

Serves: 1

Prep time: 11 minutes (I timed myself, without rushing or leaving a mess)

Ingredients:

2 slices of Ezekiel 4:9 Sesame Sprouted Whole Grain Bread
1 Sunshine burger
1 cup of black beans
2 tablespoons of salsa
10 baby carrots
1 tomato
1/2 an avocado
1/2 romain lettuce heart
mustard to taste

Instructions:

Put one cup of black beans and two tablespoons of salsa into a small pot and heat on medium high.  I used black beans that I had previously prepared in the pressure cooker, and keep in that big jar in the fridge, but half a can of black beans would work just as well.  While black beans typically taste fine on their own, I wanted to spice them up a bit today and adding low or no-salt salsa while reheating them is a simple way to do that.  It also sneaks a few more veggies into your lunch.

Heat the sunshine burger, either on the stove, in the microwave, or in a toaster oven.  Today I heated mine on the stove, other times I'll start it in the microwave for 40 seconds and then finish it in the toaster with the Ezekiel bread to keep it from getting soggy.

Lightly toast two slices of Ezekiel bread, being careful not to make it too crunchy or dark.

Peel off two leaves of lettuce to use on your sandwich, and chop some more and put it on your plate to start the salad.  Cut three slices of tomato, and dice the rest and put it on top of the lettuce.  Cut and slice half the avocado putting half of the slices on top of your salad and leaving the rest for your sandwich.

By this time the beans should be boiling, the bread should be toasted, and the sunshine burger should be flipped and almost done.  Assemble your sandwich, and put it on your plate next to the salad and add some baby carrots.  Put the beans in a bowl, pour yourself a glass of water, and sit down and enjoy your quick, easy, nutritious, and delicious lunch!  That's all there is to it.

A Sunshine burger with lettuce, tomato, avocado, and mustard on Ezekiel toast 

Black beans with salsa

Lentil Shepherd's pie

Dr. Fuhrman emailed out this recipe in his newsletter and I was really excited to try it!  When the weather gets cold, I really enjoy really hot, comfort food and I think this recipe satisfies both while being totally plant based.  His recipe can be found here.

Serves: 6
Prep Time: 30 - 45 min (this took me a while the first time, but will be faster as I make it more often)
Cook Time: about 60 min (including time to cook lentils)

Ingredients:

1 bulb garlic
1 medium head cauliflower, cut into chunks
1/2 cup raw cashew butter
2 tablespoons nutritional yeast
1/4 teaspoon black pepper, divided
1/4 cup soy, hemp or almond milk, if needed to adjust consistency
1 1/2 cups dry lentils
1 large onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 large carrots, diced
2 ribs celery, diced
10 ounces mushrooms, sliced
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 cup low sodium or no-salt-added vegetable broth
1 teaspoon dried rosemary or 2 teaspoons fresh rosemary, chopped
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme or 1 teaspoon fresh thyme, chopped


Instructions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Bring lentils and 3 cups water to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer until lentils have absorbed all liquid and are soft, about 30 minutes. Set aside.  If you are trying to speed up this recipe, canned lentils can also be used, but try to get unsalted lentils.

While lentils are cooking, roast unpeeled garlic for about 25 minutes or until soft.  I like to chop off a small portion of the non-stemmed side of the garlic, wrap it in foil, and place the garlic right on the rack in the oven.  I absolutely love roasted garlic and I think it adds lots of flavor, but if you are trying to speed up the recipe, maybe for a weeknight meal, I think this step could be skipped.  If you do choose to roast the garlic, when it's cool enough to handle, squeeze out the soft cooked garlic, removing and discarding the skins and set aside.

Steam chopped cauliflower for about 8 to 10 minutes or until tender. Place in a high-powered blender along with roasted garlic, cashew butter, nutritional yeast and 1/8 teaspoon of the black pepper and blend until smooth, adding a splash of non-dairy milk if needed to adjust consistency.  I did end up adding some non-dairy milk, but afterwards I think I would have like have the cauliflower mash more chunky and would probably add less next time around.  I wouldn't blend as much as I did either too keep it more chunky, but this you can adjust based on your preference.  I also didn't have cashew butter, so I blended some raw cashews ahead of time to make my own cashew butter.  Once the mash is blended, set aside.

Heat 2-3 tablespoons water in a large saute pan, add carrots and celery and cook for 5 minutes, then add onions and garlic and cook until vegetables are tender. Add the mushrooms and cook for an additional 5 minutes. Stir in tomato paste. Add the lentils, rosemary, thyme, remaining black pepper and 1/2 cup of the vegetable broth. Simmer for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add remaining vegetable broth as needed; mixture should be moist but not runny.  Everything is starting to smell delicious at this point!

Place the lentil mixture in a large casserole dish and spread mashed cauliflower evenly over the top. Bake at 350 degrees F for 20 minutes or until the cauliflower starts to brown.

Enjoy!  We loved this recipe and all four of us almost ate the entire thing for dinner one night!

Stuffed Cabbage Rolls

This recipe is slightly modified from a recipe I found from Vegan Lunchbox blogger Jennifer Schmoo (recipe here).  It's a great recipe for around the holidays and a real crowd pleaser!  It is fairly easy too, the only time consuming part is separating the leaves of cabbage.

Makes: 10 cabbage rolls
Prep Time: 45 min (not including cooking the rice)
Cook Time: 50 min

Ingredients:

1 cup walnuts
1 cup cooked brown rice
1 cup canned or cooked garbanzo beans, drained and rinsed
1 cup oat bran
1/2 tsp marjoram
1/4 tsp thyme
1/4 tsp onion powder
2 tbsp Braggs liquid aminos or low sodium soy sauce 
2 tbsp Dijon mustard
10 cabbage leaves for stuffing and extra leaves for chopping
1 jar tomato sauce (I like Muir Glen Roasted Garlic)
pepper to taste


Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 350°F and bring a large pot of water to a boil.

While the water is boiling, separate the cabbage leaves.  To make this easier, try to buy a cabbage that has very green outside leaves.  This means the cabbage is fresh and it will be much easier to peel back the leaves.  If the leaves rip while while peeling off the cabbage, don't worry, you can still use them and just patch it up with an extra leaf.

Next, make the cabbage stuffing.  Use a food processor with the metal blade to chop the walnuts into tiny pieces.  Pour the the walnuts into a large bowl and set aside for later.

Then, process the garbanzo beans and brown rice with the food processor until a course mash forms as shown below.  

Add the mash to the walnuts and then add the oat bran, marjoram, thyme, onion powder, liquid aminos and mustard.  This is the fun part!  Mash the mixture together with your hands until it is all mixed together and will stick together.  Divide the filling mixture into ten equal pieces and make a tiny loaf out of each.  Set aside until we are ready to stuff the cabbage. 

Add the cabbage leaves to the boiling water and cook for 3 to 5 minutes.  They shouldn't be cooked all the way through, but should be soft enough to roll them.  Drain the leaves thoroughly.
 
Next, get your pan ready for the cabbage by adding enough tomato sauce to just cover the bottom of the pan.

Place a cabbage leaf on a cutting board and add a loaf to one edge of the leaf and roll it up.  Fold in the edges as you go like you would a burrito.  If the cabbage leaf has a tough stem, you can cut it out before rolling and just overlap the remaining leaf.  Also, if there is a rip, just add another smaller leaf to patch it.  Add the cabbage roll to the pan seam side down.  Repeat the process with the rest of the loafs and leaves.

Chop up the remaining cabbage leaves and pieces you have left over and sprinkle over and around the cabbage rolls in your pan.  Pour the remaining tomato sauce over the cabbage rolls.  Season with pepper to taste.

Bake the rolls for 45 to 50 minutes, until slightly brown on top and enjoy!

These went over really well this holiday with my kids.  They also taste better if they are reheated for the second time, so I tend to make a double batch so we have leftovers.  If you are reheating them in the pan, it works well to add some water to the pan so the cabbage rolls stay moist.  We have eaten them all up this week, but I am now wishing that we had more!!

Cashew Hot Chocolate

My 10 year old and I were invited to a get together where hot chocolate was going to be served.  Since we try to eat as healthy as possible, avoiding all dairy, sugar, and processed foods, I’m not into giving him traditional hot chocolate…  I still wanted to go, and I was thrilled when I found this recipe!  I made a batch and brought it with us so he wouldn't feel like he was missing out on the treat.   It was a huge hit, and if you like hot chocolate you MUST give it a try!!


I found the recipe on Our Fresh Kitchen.  Check out their site, I'm sure they have plenty of other healthy recipes to try!  http://www.ourfreshkitchen.com/snacks/cashew-hot-chocolate/

Serves: 4
Prep Time: 5 minutes

Ingredients:
4 pitted dates
3 cups of hot water
2 tsp. cocoa powder
1 cup of raw cashews

Instructions:

Boil the water, put everything in the blender and blend until very smooth.  That's it!

Cashews, Dates, Coco powder, and water.

The Taste Test...

They love it!!

Cara's Apple Strudel

This apple strudel is from the Eat to Live Cookbook by Dr. Joel Fuhrman on p. 285.  It is a great dessert and a real crowd pleaser!  I don't have pictures of it after we cooked it because we ate it up too fast!

Serves: 4
Prep Time: 15 minutes (a little longer if  you don't have an apple peeler)
Cook Time: 1 hour

Ingredients:
1/2 cup vanilla almond, soy or hemp milk
3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon cinnamon
3 apples, cored, peeled and chopped
1/4 cup raisins
1/2 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
1/4 cup ground raw walnuts
2 tablespoons ground flax seeds

Instructions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a bowl, mix the milk, vanilla, and cinnamon until combined.  Stir in the chopped apples, raisins, oats, ground walnuts and flax seeds.
Pour into an 8×8 inch baking dish. Bake uncovered for 1 hour.


I made the recipe recently for a communion party and quadrupled the recipe.  Below are the pictures of the strudel before I put it in the oven:



On my friend Jenn's recommendation I bought an apple pealer from Amazon specifically for this recipe and it makes it so much easier!  Check it out!

http://www.amazon.com/Back-Basics-Apple-Potato-Peeler/dp/B0000DE2SS/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1383157903&sr=8-2&keywords=apple+peeler+corer+slicer\



I hope you enjoy this recipe as much as we do! 

Avocado and Tomato sandwich

I don't know if it's fair for me to say, since I haven't had one in so long, but this really feels to me like a direct replacement for a grilled cheese and tomato sandwich.  I pile the avocado pretty high, and it has that same creamy consistency that I remember from open faced toasted cheese and tomato sandwiches.

Serves: 1
Prep Time: 5 minutes
Cook Time: 2 minutes

Ingredients:
1 avocado
1 tomato
2 slices of sprouted whole grain bread

Instructions:

Toast the bread, and slice the avocado and tomato.  Spread half the avocado one one slice of toast, and the other half on the other slice.  It may seem like a lot of avocado, but pile it high, and smash it into the toast with a fork so it gets nice and creamy.  It might end up being a 1/4 inch or so thick.  Then pile on the tomato and press it into the avocado a little so it won't slide off.  That's it, you are done and ready to eat!!

Try this on it's own for breakfast, as a snack, or even a small meal.  Or have one with a bowl of hot soup to recreate that grilled cheese and soup combination that I remember eating as a kid.  No matter how you decide to enjoy it, be happy to know that this simple version is much healthier than the old classic.