Fluffy French Toast

A breakfast favourite in our home is french toast topped with fresh fruit and whipped cream. So good! I found this recipe on All Recipes with tons of great reviews so it seemed like a no brainer to try it. And we were not disappointed. The recipe uses flour which helps to make them super fluffy.

Oatmeal Pancakes (Clean Eating)

At the beginning of the year I bought myself a couple of clean eating books, with every intention of trying to cut out the bad foods most of North America has in their cupboards. While I know we are not the worst eaters out there, I know we can improve. I found this recipe online that's chalk full of clean eating recipes (kind of ironic that I would search online when I spent the money for the actual cookbooks, lol) and it is so filling, seriously! I had two pancakes with one cup of strawberries and I could barely finish the last few bites. Next time I'll have one pancake with maybe a little more fruit. Either way, it's filling and good for you.

Oatmeal Pancakes

1 1/2 cups dry oatmeal (I used instant)
1 1/4 cups milk
1 lg egg
1 Tbsp oil
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla

Mix the milk and rolled oats together and let this soak for 5 minutes. Add the oil and egg, and vanilla and mix well. Stir in the dry ingredients. I found that when I made this as stated, the dough was a little too stiff for pancake batter. So I added more milk until I had a normal pancake batter, all together I used about 1 3/4 - 2 cups of milk. Cook on a pancake griddle and serve with fruit. If you want to keep in line with the Clean Eating plan you would eat this with pure maple syrup or you could use regular pancake syrup.

This makes 9 pancakes at 136 calories each. So my breakfast of 2 pancakes, 1 cup of strawberries and maple syrup was just over 400 calories! And if left me feeling full right up until lunch.

Enjoy!
Tina

Breakfast casserole

I hate serving the kids cereal for breakfast everyday, even the "healthy" stuff, isn't healthy. So even though hashbrowns might not be much better, this casserole is perfect for us in the morning. I prepare everything the night before, and my husband puts in the oven when he gets up for work and it's done once the rest of us have to get ready for school. Very easy!

The original recipe asks for bacon and normally I would make it with bacon but I had some honey ham that needed to be used so I went with that. This is also a great meal to take along when you go camping! Prepare it at home and bake it either on the bbq or in your stove, but you'll probably want to use the disposable baking pans.


Breakfast Casserole
1 bag frozen hash browns (1kg)
1 green or red bell pepper, chopped
1 small onion, chopped
1 cup chopped ham or 1 pk cooked bacon, crumbled
salt & pepper to taste
7-8 eggs
1 cup milk
1 cup shredded cheese of your choice

Mix the first 5 ingredients together in a 9x13 cake pan. Whisk together the milk and eggs, pour evenly over the hash browns. At this point you cook bake it but I find it bakes better if you let this soak together for a while. I prepare this the night before and let it soak overnight in the fridge and then bake in the morning. Bake uncovered at 350F for about 45-60 minutes.

*Note: I have made this a few times and have had to adjust the amount of milk, sometimes the centre wants to stay a little too juicy. The original recipe would use 2 cups milk and 10 eggs, but the above seams to work well for me.

Have a great day!
Tina

Waffles & Pudding

We had such a great start to our Sunday morning with fresh waffles and homemade pudding. The pudding is not really a traditional pudding but it's what we grew up with and continue to make, the kids love this for breakfast, or lunch, or... well you get the idea!

Waffles
2 cups flour
4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 tbsp sugar
1 1/2 cups milk
2 eggs, separated
1/4 cup butter, melted
1 tsp vanilla

Beat egg whites until peaks form. In a separate bowl, beat the yolks until creamy, add milk and vanilla. In another bowl combine the dry ingredients and add to the milk mixture, beat until smooth. Fold in the egg whites and margarine. Bake in a waffle maker for 3 minutes or until golden.

Pudding
2 cups milk
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla
2-3 tbsp cornstarch

Pour milk into a saucepan and add sugar and bring to a boil. Meanwhile, put the cornstarch in a small bowl or cup and add just enough milk to allow you to mix the cornstarch so that it is lump free. Right before the milk boils I slowly stir this into the saucepan of milk. Stir until thickened, you might have to adjust the amount of cornstarch that you use. Add vanilla. Now to eat this all you do is dip the waffles in the pudding and enjoy!

*Note: You might have to adjust the sugar in the pudding. This is usually just done by eye, just taste it and adjust to your family's liking.

Have a great day!
Tina