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 🙂

Rugelach Cookies

This recipe is an adaptation from the Barefoot Contessa’s recipe.  These are extremely delicious but also a lot of work to make.  I add lemon zest to the pastry dough and it is a delightful clean fresh taste that helps break up the sweetness! Cinnamon, raisins, and walnuts are also shining stars in this cookie.

Dough Ingredients:

• 1 package of cream cheese
• 2 sticks of butter(1/2 pound)
• 1/4 cup of granulated sugar
• pinch of salt
• 2 tsp of vanilla extract
• zest of one lemon
• 2 cups of all-purpose flour

Filling Ingredients:

• 1/4 cup of brown sugar
• 1/4 cup of white sugar
• 1 tsp of cinnamon
• 3/4 cups of raisins
• 3/4 cups of walnuts(chopped medium)
• 1/2 jar of apricot preserves

Top off Ingredients:

• 1 egg beaten with 1 tbsp water
• 3 tbsp of sugar combined with 1 tsp of cinnamon

Directions:

With a hand-held mixer or electric mixer with paddle attachment mix together the cream cheese, and butter till light. Add the sugar, vanilla and lemon zest and mix till fluffy.

Add your flour and mix only till combined. DO NOT over mix you will develop gluten in the flour and you will get a tough dough. Plop mixture on a floured surface and divide dough in 1/4’s.

You can see the flakes of lemon zest in the picture above…yum

Ok so as you see I store them in plastic wrap and pop them in the fridge for at least an hour to firm up.

In the mean time I mix all ingredients together for the filling minus the apricot preserves, I also get my cinnamon sugar ready for the topping of the cookie:

When you are ready to roll the dough out turn your oven on to 350 degrees. On a well floured surface you will spread the dough out as you would for a pie crust.

Next add the apricot preserves approx 2 heaping tbsp and spread over dough with pastry brush. Next sprinkle on your sugar, raisin, nut mixture in even layer. You will divide this circle in 12ths or 16ths depending how big you want your cookie to be.

 

Starting at the large end roll up your cookie and place on a cookie sheet lined with parchment or silpat.

 

Brush the tops of the cookies with your egg wash and sprinkle cinnamon sugar on top. Place in 350 degree oven for 15-20 minutes till slightly golden.

Enjoy and have a great week 🙂

PS: I also think these cookies would be great with fig preserves or orange preserves instead of the apricots.

Rugelach Cookies

• Servings: 8
• Time: 2hrs
• Difficulty: medium
• Print

Dough Ingredients:

• 1 package of cream cheese
• 2 sticks of butter(1/2 pound)
• 1/4 cup of granulated sugar
• pinch of salt
• 2 tsp of vanilla extract
• zest of one lemon
• 2 cups of all-purpose flour

Filling Ingredients:

• 1/4 cup of brown sugar
• 1/4 cup of white sugar
• 1 tsp of cinnamon
• 3/4 cups of raisins
• 3/4 cups of walnuts(chopped medium)
• 1/2 jar of apricot preserves

Top off Ingredients:

• 1 egg beaten with 1 tbsp water
• 3 tbsp of sugar combined with 1 tsp of cinnamon

Directions:

With a hand-held mixer or electric mixer with paddle attachment mix together the cream cheese, and butter till light. Add the sugar, vanilla and lemon zest and mix till fluffy.

Add your flour and mix only till combined. DO NOT over mix you will develop gluten in the flour and you will get a tough dough. Plop mixture on a floured surface and divide dough in 1/4’s.

I store them in plastic wrap and pop them in the fridge for at least an hour to firm up.

In the mean time I mix all ingredients together for the filling minus the apricot preserves, I also get my cinnamon sugar ready for the topping of the cookie.

When you are ready to roll the dough out turn your oven on to 350 degrees. On a well floured surface you will spread the dough out as you would for a pie crust.

Next add the apricot preserves approx 2 heaping tbsp and spread over dough with pastry brush. Next sprinkle on your sugar, raisin, nut mixture in even layer. You will divide this circle in 12ths or 16ths depending how big you want your cookie to be.

Starting at the large end roll up your cookie and place on a cookie sheet lined with parchment or silpat.

Brush the tops of the cookies with your egg wash and sprinkle cinnamon sugar on top. Place in 350 degree oven for 15-20 minutes till slightly golden.

Remove from oven and let cool on a wire rack.

Enjoy 🙂

Super Moist Banana Bread

When I was in nursing school my best friends mother made this killer banana bread. It was the best I ever had, super moist! The ultimate comfort loaf. I never did get the recipe but I have been playing around with different fats and ratio’s in baking and I have to say this one is pretty close!

Ingredients:

• 1  3/4 cups of flour
• 1 teaspoon of baking soda
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup oil
• 4 bananas mashed
• 2 heaping tablespoons of sour cream
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 2/3 cup of chopped walnuts or you can substitute the walnuts for semi sweet chocolate chips

Directions:

Turn the oven on to 350 degrees farenheit.  Prepare your loaf pans. I spray them with pam and add  parchment paper to “cradle the loaf” it allows easy removal of the loaf and without the parchment paper I find the loafs get to dark on the bottom.

Next take all your dry ingredients and whisk together:

Now we take our sugar and eggs and beat with a mixer till light in color:

I drizzle in the vegetable oil a little at a time to keep the consistency of the batter.  Now add the mashed bananas, sour cream and vanilla.

Add your dry ingredients, nuts or chocolate, and mix till just combined! DO NOT OVER MIX!!!!!! You will have wrecked all that hard work you have done so far and end up with a tough loaf. I, in fact stop mixing when there is still bits of dry flour not incorporated. By the time I take my spatula and give it a final turn into the loaf pan  it will be mixed enough.

Oh no some batter got dribbled on the side of my parchment paper! We can’t have that (LICK, LICK, finger Licking good)

Bake for 45min-1 hour.

A bit of butter while the loaf is still warm and the butter melts is heavenly. I can’t help it I love butter and I am french. That’s my story and I am sticking to it.

Banana Loaf

• Servings: 6-8
• Time: 1 1/2hrs
• Difficulty: easy
• Print

Ingredients:

• 1  3/4 cups of flour
• 1 teaspoon of baking soda
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup oil
• 4 bananas mashed
• 2 heaping tablespoons of sour cream
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 2/3 cup of chopped walnuts or you can substitute the walnuts for semi sweet chocolate chips

Directions:

Turn the oven on to 350 degrees farenheit.  Prepare your loaf pans. I spray them with pam and add  parchment paper to “cradle the loaf” it allows easy removal of the loaf and without the parchment paper I find the loafs get to dark on the bottom.

In a separate bowl take all your dry ingredients and whisk together.  Take your sugar and eggs and beat with a mixer till light in color. Drizzle in the vegetable oil a little at a time to keep the consistency of the batter. Then add the mashed bananas, sour cream and vanilla.

Add your dry ingredients, nuts or chocolate, and mix until just combined. Turn mixture into your loaf pan.

Bake for 45min-1 hour. Remove from oven let rest for 20 min and enjoy.

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!