Better Oatmeal

I have been slacking in the kitchen soooo bad!!! Thought I would give a few tips for adding some punches of flavor and texture to your morning oatmeal.

First off I love the large flake oatmeal not instant or minute. Why? Texture and health reasons. You can go for steel-cut oatmeal too but it takes sooooo long to cook and I am damn hungry 😉 The hardier the grain the healthier it is.  The more natural foods are, the longer it will take for your body to break it down; this is also known as low glycemic index foods. Great for diabetics!! The longer it takes to digest the longer we feel full and satisfied and won’t snack in-between meals. Also if our guts have to work so much to break down all this hardy goodness then our metabolism increases and burns more calories!! Yay! Ok I know boring science food nutrition garbage! Lets get on to the good stuff!!

Here I have 1 serving of milk I heated up with a bit of orange zest till it started to boil then plop in your serving of oatmeal and let it simmer till it is cooked.

Off heat I added a few drops of vanilla, few sprinkles of cinnamon and mixed that up.

Put that in a bowl, now comes the not so healthy part but hey you counteracted that with the whole grains right??? Drizzle a bit of maple syrup on it and because I am french a dollop of butter!! Ahhhhh.

Ok what am I missing?? Lets get a bit of crunch going on in this bowl…. slivered almond, pecan bits, walnuts or this:

Take a spoon and dig in!!

And I took some pics of some latte art me and my hubby enjoyed the day before 🙂

Baking With My Little Sweet Tooth

 

Did I ever tell you my daughter looooooves loves, loves, loves ok one more LOVES sweets! She asked if we can make cookies and together we came up with some great comfort autumn cookies great for school snacks and maybe even a breakfast pick me up. First off we made traditional oatmeal raison cookies with fresh nutmeg to really boast up the taste and compliment the oats.

 

 

Next I made a cakey like texture cookie with freshly grated granny smiths paired with cinnamon and more fresh nutmeg. I wanted some sort of texture to contrast with this soft cookie and I came across some dried figs and thought “brilliant” this will work nicely. I love the grainy toothy-ness of the figs in this cookie and I paired all this yumminess  with caramel icing drizzled on top.

 

Anyone interest in the recipes? 🙂

Cranberry Walnut Oatmeal Cookies

Ingredients:

• 1 cup of butter
• 1 cup of brown sugar
• 1/2 cup of white sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp of vanilla extract
• zest from one orange
• 1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp of baking soda
• 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg
• 1/4 tsp cloves
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 3 cups rolled oats
• 3/4 cup dried cranberries
• 1/2 cup white chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Directions:

Turn your oven on to 350 degrees

In a mixing bowl, cream together your sugars and butter.

Add your eggs and vanilla and orange zest and cream together till fluffy.

Stir together your dry ingredients with a whisk

Add to your mixing bowl and mix only till flour is incorporated (otherwise tough cookies). Then throw in your oats and give it a few more whirls.

Now comes the cranberries, white chocolate chips and walnuts. I wanted to let you know of a little trick of mine to “unclump” your cranberries or raisins when you need to add them in the baking process. I dust them with a bit of flour and mix them up with a spoon till they are all coated with a dusting of flour. This helps  to get them in individual pieces which then gets distributed through  the cookie dough a lot more evenly.

Throw these yummy morsels in your mixture and give one last good whirl. It should look something like this:

Ok take a cookie sheet and line with parchment paper or a Silpat (way better than greasing a cookie sheet I find the extra fat burns the bottom of the cookies faster, parchment is a great way to get perfect cookies, less messy and doesn’t stick!! Place them evenly on the cookie sheet. Also important is keep the size of your cookies consistent. I use a cookie scooper they will cook more evenly if they are all the same size.

In the oven they go at 350 degrees for about 12 min depending on the size of your cookie. Mine are pretty big 🙂  Turn your cookie sheet around 1/2 way through cooking will also help them cook more evenly 🙂

Ta daaaa!!

  

 

Cranberry Walnut Oatmeal Cookies

• Servings: 2 dozen
• Time: 1hr
• Difficulty: easy
• Print

Ingredients:

• 1 cup of butter
• 1 cup of brown sugar
• 1/2 cup of white sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp of vanilla extract
• zest from one orange
• 1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp of baking soda
• 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg
• 1/4 tsp cloves
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 3 cups rolled oats
• 3/4 cup dried cranberries
• 1/2 cup white chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Directions:

Turn your oven on to 350 degrees

In a mixing bowl, cream together your sugars and butter.

Add your eggs and vanilla and orange zest and cream together till fluffy.

Stir together your dry ingredients with a whisk.

Add to your mixing bowl and mix only till flour is incorporated (otherwise tough cookies). Then throw in your oats and give it a few more whirls.

Now comes the cranberries, white chocolate chips and walnuts. I wanted to let you know of a little trick of mine to “unclump” your cranberries or raisins when you need to add them in the baking process. I dust them with a bit of flour and mix them up with a spoon till they are all coated with a dusting of flour. This helps  to get them in individual pieces which then gets distributed through  the cookie dough a lot more evenly.

Throw these yummy morsels in your mixture and give one last good whirl.

Ok take a cookie sheet and line with parchment paper or a Silpat (way better than greasing a cookie sheet I find the extra fat burns the bottom of the cookies faster, parchment is a great way to get perfect cookies, less messy and doesn’t stick!! Place them evenly on the cookie sheet. Also important is keep the size of your cookies consistent. I use a cookie scooper they will cook more evenly if they are all the same size.

In the oven they go at 350 degrees for about 12 min depending on the size of your cookie. Mine are pretty big 🙂  Turn your cookie sheet around 1/2 way through cooking will also help them cook more evenly 🙂

Let cool on a wire rack, enjoy!