Spiced Applesauce Muffins

 

Another snow day, another reason for me to try a new muffin recipe! I found these on the blog A Homemade Living. They are light and airy and super yummy! The perfect muffin for breakfast or an afternoon snack. Hope you enjoy!

Here is the recipe word for word from A Homemade Living:

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground allspice
1/4 tsp freshly grated nutmeg
2 large eggs
1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 cup light brown sugar
1/2 cup (1 stick) + 3 tbs unsalted butter, melted <I only used one sick of butter>
1 cup applesauce, unsweetened
1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans
Topping:
1 tbs granulated sugar
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon


Directions:

1. First, preheat your oven to 400 deg F, and line a standard sized muffin pan with 12 paper liners. In a medium sized bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, ground cinnamon, ground allspice and nutmeg. Set aside.

2. In your electric mixer bowl, whisk together the eggs and the brown sugar, then slowly begin pouring in the melted butter, and mix until you have a smooth mixture. Add in the vanilla extract and applesauce, then begin adding in the dry ingredient mixture. Gently fold in the chopped nuts (you could substitute raisins for chopped nuts, those would work well too!) and then divide the batter equally between the 12 muffin cups (you want them to be about 3/4 full). Sprinkle the tops with the cinnamon sugar topping mixture (this will form a thin “crust” on top of the muffins as they bake), then bake the muffins for 18 – 20 minutes <I only baked mine for 16 minutes>, or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean. Once baked, let the muffins cool for a couple minutes before eating.

Pesto Potato & Burrata Pizza

 

 This pizza was downright delicious! The little seed/spice/zest mix that is added to the dough is completely delicious and I wonder if I can ever make a pizza now without sprinkling lemon zest all over it!!!  The recipe comes from the blog Half Baked Harvest and the blogger instructs using thinly sliced potatoes (which look so pretty). We actually had some fried potatoes left over from our Sunday morning breakfast so I used those instead and really the whole thing was so amazingly good. Please try this recipe!!! Here it is from Half Baked Harvest word for word (and also check out her blog because her pictures are so much prettier than mine!):

• 2 teaspoons dried oregano
• 1 tablespoon raw sesame seeds
• 1 tablespoon fresh grated lemon zest
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• kosher salt and black pepper
• 1/2 pound homemade or store-bought pizza dough, at room temperature
• extra virgin olive oil, for drizzling
• 1/3 cup basil pesto
• 1 medium potato, very thinly sliced
• 8 ounces burrata cheese
• 1/2 cup fresh lemon micro basil or basil leaves
• crushed red pepper flakes

 Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F. Grease a large baking sheet with olive oil.
In a small bowl, combine the oregano, sesame seeds, lemon zest, cumin, an a generous pinch of both salt and pepper.

On a lightly floured surface, push/roll the dough out until it is pretty thin (about a 10-12 inch circle). Transfer the dough to the prepared baking sheet. Rub the dough with olive oil and sprinkle with the seed mix, using as little or as much as you'd like. Dollop the dough with pesto and layer on the sliced potatoes, drizzling them lightly with olive oil, salt and pepper.

 Transfer the pizza to the oven and bake for 10-15 minutes or until the crust is golden and the potatoes are crisp. Remove from the oven and top with burrata. Allow the burrata to sit on the pizza and warm through, about 5 minutes. Sprinkle on the basil, and crushed red pepper flakes. Slice and enjoy!

1. 
   

 

Chocolate Banana Milkshake

Smoothie or healthy milkshake!? You decide! I drank this for dessert tonight and it was just delicious!!! I absolutely LOVE cacao nibs- they are a superfood full of antioxidants. I sprinkled them on top of the milkshake (to me this is definitely a milkshake) and it was super yum.

You can also put your shake in the freezer for a few hours and let it freeze a bit. You can then eat it with a spoon and it'll be more like an ice cream-ish slushy.

This makes one smoothie:

1 ripe banana
2 dates, pitted
1 heaping Tbl of nut butter (I used almond)
1 Tbl hemp seeds
1 tsp cocoa powder
1/2 cup of milk (I used almond milk)
3 - 4 ice cubes
1 tsp raw cacao nibs, optional

Put all the ingredients, except the cacao nibs, into a high speed blender and blend until smooth. Sprinkle with cacao nibs if you like.

You can also put it in the freezer for 3 - 4 hours and turn it into a pseudo ice cream - YUM-O!! Enjoy!