Pumpkin Chocolate Swirl Cake (whole grain)

 This cake combines two great flavors chocolate and pumpkin into a wonderful moist cake that would be great for the holidays. I cut the sweetener way down from a typical cake and I used whole grain flour. I also used coconut oil.  The end result was wonderful and was enjoyed by my family.

We are entering this cake into The Great Denby Cake-Off Blogging Competition! Wish us luck! If you have interest in joining the fun, see the official rules here.

Ingredients

3/4 C coconut oil
1 C honey
5 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 15oz can of pumpkin
1 3/4 C spelt or whole grain flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp cloves
1 C spelt flour or whole grain flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 C cocoa
1/2 C almond milk
1/2 C dark chocolate chips melted
1 T coconut oil
1/2 C finely chopped pecans for garnish

Directions  Heat oven to 350

1. In a medium sized bowl beat together oil and honey. Then beat in each egg one at a time until all combined. Beat in the vanilla.
2. Take out 1 1/4 C of mixture and set aside in a small bowl.
3. With the remaining batter make the pumpkin batter. Beat in the pumpkin.
4. Then beat in flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves. Set aside.
5. Then for the chocolate batter beat in flour, baking powder, salt and cocoa. Then stir in or beat almond milk into batter. Set aside.
6. Spray bunt pan with cooking spray.
7. Pour in half of the pumpkin batter into the pan.
8. Then spoon on top half of the chocolate batter.
9. Spoon on the remaining pumpkin batter .
10. Then spoon on the remaining chocolate batter.
11. Swirl around a knife in the pan to combine batters a little.
12. Place pan in preheated oven.
13. Bake 45-50 min or until toothpick comes out clean.
14. Cool upright in pan on cooling rack for 10 min.
15. Combine melted chips and oil together in a small bowl.
16. Loosen cake around the edges and place on cooling rack for a 10 min.
17. Place cake on cake platter. Drizzle on chocolate. Garnish with nuts.
18. Serve and enjoy.

Chocolate Zucchini Quinoa Bread (Gluten Free)

So do you have a lot of zucchini from your garden. This is a great healthy way to use it. It is even gluten free. Today I should be finishing up the quinoa recipes for the book. It has been interesting learning about all the things I can make with quinoa. The book is going to be gluten free for those of you who are trying to eat gluten free. It will be coming out around the first of the year. We will keep you posted. It will have a large assortment of recipes.  It is a great way to use up some zucchini without a lot of sweetener. Hope you have a great weekend.

Ingredients

1/3 C coconut oil
2/3 C honey
2 eggs
2 C grated zucchini
2 T cocoa powder
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 + 2 T quinoa flour (You could replace w/  a different wholegrain flour)
2 T cornstarch
1 tsp vanilla

Directions Bake 350 makes 1 loaf

1. In a bowl beat together oil, honey, eggs, and zucchini. Set aside.
2. In a small bowl pour in all the dry ingredients and stir with a wire whisk.
3. Combine the two mixtures together into one bowl. Just stir until all combined.
4. Pour into greased loaf pan. Place in preheated oven. Bake about 50 min. or until toothpick comes out clean.
5. Cool a few minutes and then take out of pan and cool on cooling rack.

* You could put in a square pan or muffin pans instead of loaf pan.

Chocolate Apple Cupcakes filled with Almond Butter for Valentines

We hit the jackpot with this recipe! These cupcakes are healthy and delicious at the same time. They are healthy enough to have for breakfast but can also be served as a dessert. We loved them when we bit into them. They tasted sooo good! These would be great for Valentines Day to keep it healthy or for any day of the year. You can fill the almond butter as deep as you want.

If you don't want to go to the effort to make them so cute, just frost the whole top with the almond butter icing, place a paper template of a heart on the cupcake, dust with powdered sugar on the remaining cupcake, and then remove the paper. I think they could be just as cute!

They can be made gluten free, if you prefer, or using whole grains. They use no butter, no white sugar (except for the dusting of powdered sugar), are egg free, and yet are incredibly moist! You will love them!

Ingredients
2 C gluten free flour or 1 3/4 C spelt, kamut or wheat and 1/4 C quinoa flour
1/4 cocoa powder
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp sea salt
1/4 C grape seed oil
1/2 C honey
2 T plain Greek yogurt
3/4 C almond milk
1/4 C water
1 apple, grated

Filling
1 C almond butter
2 T honey
1 tsp vanilla

cupcake liners (found these cute ones at Walmart)
powdered sugar to sift on top
heart cut out of paper

Directions (makes 12)
1.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a medium sized bowl pour in flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt. Stir with a wire whisk until all combined.
2. In a separate bowl pour oil, honey, yogurt, milk and water. Blend with a wire whisk for a couple of minutes. 
3. Make a well in the dry ingredients and pour in the liquid mixture. Stir until just combined.
4. Fold in the grated apples until all combined.
5. Place cupcake liners in the muffin pan. Pour evenly among the cups.
6. Bake about 18 minutes or until cooked all the way through. Cool on a wire rack.

Don't the cupcake liners look so cute?!

7. In a small bowl combine almond butter, honey and vanilla until all combined and nice and smooth.
8. Sift powdered sugar on the cupcakes.
9. Place small paper heart on top of each cupcake and cut around it into the cupcake as deep as you want the filling. We did about 1 inch down.

cutting out the shape using the paper heart as a template

10. Scoop filling into a plastic sandwich bag. Seal shut, releasing the air first. Cut a small piece off of one corner of the bag.

squeezing in the icing from the plastic bag

See the cute little heart?

11. Squeeze the filling into the heart. You can get a butter knife and smooth over the top. I dipped my finger in a little water to make it all smooth. Enjoy! You will want to serve these soon after making them, because otherwise the powdered sugar will be absorbed into the cupcake because it is so moist.

So pretty! Dig in! They taste as good as they look!

Whole Grain Pumpkin Snickerdoodles

Enjoying the Season!

Pure Delight

Pure Joy!

We went to the store the other day looking for pumpkin and the whole shelf was empty! It is one of the signs of Fall. Everyone runs to the store, buys pumpkin, and goes home and turns on their ovens and starts baking.  I can't get enough of the smell of fall baking. Yum! I bet we all have some fun memories associated with Fall. What are yours? I had a sweet daughter, and also my first grandson was born in the Fall. I love watching the children jump in the leaves with pure delight, and it doesn't cost a dime. It is nice to have a warm cozy house to snuggle up in and enjoy the fall baking seaon.

I have always enjoyed snickerdoodles. I found some recipes for them and tweaked them and made them into some pumpkin snickerdoodles. they are slightly bread-like inside with a just crispy exterior. I hope you enjoy them as much as we did. Happy baking!   

Ingredients
3/4 C coconut oil
2 T honey
1/2 C dark brown sugar
1 egg
2 tsp vanilla
1 C canned pumpkin
4 C whole wheat flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cream of tartar
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp cardamom

Sugar coating:
1/4 C sugar
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/8 cardamom

Directions

1. Cream together oil, honey, and brown sugar. Beat in eggs and vanilla, then stir in pumpkin.

2. In a separate bowl, mix together flour, baking soda, cream of tartar, cinnamon, ginger, and cardamom.

3. Mix together wet and dry ingredient mixtures.

4. Chill dough for 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a small bowl, mix up topping ingredients. Roll dough into 1-inch balls, roll in topping, and place on parchment paper.

5. Gently flatten ball with the underside of a glass. Place in oven and cook for 8 to 10 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool. Don't over bake them. 

Makes 2.5 dozen

Whole Grain Buttermilk Waffles

Beautiful world!

Yummy waffles

I hope that you like me are getting to enjoy the colors this time of year. I am amazed each year how pretty they are. These are some trees I saw this weekend. I loved the color of them. I was out on errands yesterday and there were so many pretty colors all around it was wonderful. :) We live in a beautiful world.

We found another great waffle recipe. I loved how they turned out crispy and not soggy. This picture turned out to be a fun one. We captured the powdered sugar falling on the the waffle. I love it! It was nice to have them whole grain and very tasty. They are easy to make too.   

Ingredients:

1 3/4 C buttermilk (I used milk and added 1 3/4 T vinegar)

2 eggs separated

1 pinch of cream of tarter

4 T oil (I used grape seed oil)

3 T maple syrup or honey  

2 C whole grain flour ( I used 1 C kamut and 1 C spelt)

toppings of choice

non stick spray

Directions: Heat waffle iron
1. Beat milk and egg yolks, oil and syrup together. In another bowl beat eggs whites with a wire whisk or hand beater. Beat in the cream of tarter. They should get nice and foamy in a couple minutes.

2. Stir in the flour to the egg yolk mixture. Then fold in the egg whites until all combined.

3. Grease waffle iron. Pour batter into iron. Cook according to your iron directions.

4. Serve while they are nice and hot. .

Enjoy!

Healthy Carrot Snack Bread

I whipped this up Saturday night after working a long time in the yard. It tasted so good! I was looking forward to a piece the next morning, but it was all gone. With only 4 of us eating it that must of meant others liked it too. :)

Ingredients:

1/3 C coconut oil
1/2 C coconut sugar or sweetener of your choice
2 T honey
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 C carrots grated
1 1/2 C whole grain flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp pumpkin spice
1/2 tsp cinnamon

Directions: heat oven to 350

1.Cream oil, sugar and honey together. Then beat eggs in one at and a time. Then beat in vanilla.

2.Stir in carrots, flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, pumpkin spice and cinnamon.

3. Pour batter into greased pan. Place in oven and bake 20 to 25 min. Rub butter on the top of the bread. Serve  

Whole Grain Thin Crust Pizza

This pizza was inspired by getting a free sample from from a Bistro yesterday. :) I thought it would be fun to try and recreate it with wholegrain flour. It was a fun change not having sauce, just cheeses, spices, tomatoes and olive oil. It made a light nice meal. I have found adding a little bit of vinegar works as a nice leavening agent with whole grains.

Ingredients:
Whole Grain Pizza Dough:
1 T Yeast
6 C whole grain flour (I used spelt with)
2 1/2 T kosher salt
1 T olive oil
1 T apple cider vinegar
2 C warm water

Pizza toppings: (Choose your preference)
fresh grated Parmesan cheese
fresh cut tomatoes (Roma would be great) sun dried would be yummy
2 minced garlic
Italian seasoning, basil, oregano and rosemary and ?
mozzarella cheese
a little kosher salt
aged provolone and or Romano
olive oil

Directions:
1. Pour all the ingredients for the dough into the bowl at the same time. Except start with 5 cups of flour and add more slowly. Keep adding flour until the dough leaves the sides of the bowl. Knead about 3-5 min. Take dough out, rub olive oil all over the dough. Place in bowl. Cover and let double in warm spot. Punch down and let rise another 20 min. Then punch down.

2. Heat oven to 400. Roll out dough thin on oiled parchment paper. That is on the back of a cookie sheet.

3. Rub olive oil on to the dough and place the toppings you choose on top.

4. If you have a pizza stone. Slide the pizza off the cookie sheet (keeping the parchment paper underneath) on to the pizza stone. The other option is just cook it on the cookie sheet.

5. Bake about 15 min. or until cheese bubbles. Enjoy!

Moist Whole Grain Banana Bread

This is a wonderful moist Banana Bread. I loved the wonderful Banana flavor. My daughter found a great recipe, that used a lot of Bananas to give it a great flavor. I did some adjustments and made it whole grain.
This is what it looked like prior to cooking.

Ingredients: Makes one 4 1/2" by 8 1/2" loaf

5 bananas *
1 3/4 C whole grain flour*
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 C melted coconut oil * or butter
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
3/4 C coconut sugar or brown sugar*
1 tsp coconut sugar or other sugar.

Directions:

1. Heat oven to 350. Grease pan with non stick oil.

2. Peel all the bananas place in microwave safe dish. Cover with plastic and poke a few wholes to vent. Place in microwave for 5 min on high. Take out and put bananas in a strainer over a bowl. Stir and mash the bananas to get out the liquid. It should be about 1/2 to 3/4 C in the bowl. I got a 1/2 C. Then pour liquid in a small saucepan on the stove. Turn on to med heat. Cook until it cooks down to 1/4 C of liquid. The goal is to have a concentrated liquid, that will add a lot of flavor to the bread. :)

3. Add the 1/4 C liquid to bananas. Mash the bananas till they are all mashed. You could use a masher. I used the back of a plastic spoon. Then add sugar, eggs, oil, and vanilla. Beat together, and set aside.

4. In another bowl whisk the flour, salt and baking soda.

5. Stir the flour mixture into banana mixture until just combined.

6. Pour into greased loaf pan. Optional Sprinkle 1 tsp of sugar on top.

7. Place in preheated oven. Bake 45-55 min. Till toothpick comes out clean.

8. Cool in pan on wire rack for 15 min. Then remove from pan and serve.


* (The key is bananas that have lots and lots of dark spots on them. Even all brown. Unripened will give a bland flavor.)

*I ground of 1 c spelt, 1/2c kamut, 1/2 c brown rice. I had 1 extra cup. You could use all wheat. You could use 1/2 white and 1/2 wheat. My daughter used the 1/2 and 1/2 version . It was less dense. It's your choice. I love to make it whole grain. You could also use a gluten free mixture.

* I think I could cut down the sugar to 1/3 1/2 C next time. The Bananas give it a lot of sweetness. I am enjoying eating things that aren't quite as sweet. Coconut sugar is sweet too. Natural sweet is the best!

This is a tasty recipe! Yum!