Healthy Breakfast

Waffles/Pancakes

1 1/2 C. milk

1 C. instant oats

3/4 C. wheat flour

1/4 C. ground flax seed

1 T. baking powder

1 t. salt

2 T. honey

2 t. vanilla

2 eggs beaten

Pour milk over oats, set aside. Mix together flour, flax, baking powder, salt. Mix eggs, honey and vanilla into the oat/milk mixture. Combine wet and dry, then cook in waffle iron. These make some really good pancakes, too, I highly recommend adding blueberries to the pancakes! I like to spread with some almond butter then drizzle with honey, but it's delicious with good ol' butter and syrup, too.

Green Smoothie

1-2 bananas

1/2 C. frozen peaches

1/2 C. frozen mango

a couple handfuls spinach

1/3 C. greek yogurt

water or juice

Blend until smooth. (today I actually had fresh EVERYTHING, including kiwis, and it was soooo good!)

Instant Oatmeal

Yes, it looks like mush, but I'm kind of excited about this little recipe. All the ingredients are optional, and they can all be adjusted by preference, but here's what I did.

4 cups oatmeal

3 tablespoons powder coffee creamer

1/4 cup oatmeal that's been ground in the food processor (makes it nice and thick)

1 cup dried apples, chopped up (I'd add more if I had more)

3 tablespoons sugar

2 teaspoons cinnamon

1 cup almonds and pecans

1 tablespoon butter

2 tablespoons brown sugar

Toast the nuts on a skillet in melted butter, add brown sugar until everything's toasted and coated. Let cool for a minute, then throw everything together in a bowl or ziplock bag and mix it up. Put some in a bowl, add hot water and/or milk and eat!

If my dried peaches hadn't gone bad, I'd do a 'peaches and cream' oatmeal. Also, I'll do dried cranberries in my next batch. I'm looking for ideas of what to add to this, what other grains would go well?

Whole Wheat Waffles

I got this recipe from here, but didn't have all the ingredients, so this is what I made:

• 2 eggs, beaten
• 1 3/4 cups milk
• 1/4 cup canola oil
• 1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract (if you have mexican vanilla, this is a great excuse to use it... HEAVEN!)
• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 1/2 cup flax seed meal
• 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 4 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 
  
• In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs, milk, oil, applesauce, and vanilla. Beat in whole wheat flour, flax seed meal, all-purpose flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt until batter is smooth.
• 
  
• Preheat a waffle iron, and coat with cooking spray. Pour batter into waffle iron in batches, and cook until crisp and golden brown.

We topped this with syrup and halloween sprinkles- bit hit!

I told LeRoy I had waffles ready, so when he sat down and saw them, he looked at me with disgust and said, "Wheat waffles?" But even Mr. Picky admitted they were really good. And they were- fluffy and delicious! I actually made the batter the night before and had everything set out, so even in the before school rush, we still had a yummy breakfast.