Whole Wheat Rum Raisin Pancakes (& a Giveaway!)
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I’m having one of those long forgotten perfect Saturday mornings. I woke up with a puppy sneezing in my face (it’s cuter when he looks like this). No alarms, horns or nagging husband shrugs, just a cute little puppy eager to start his day (of sleeping). I made my favorite coffee and started on breakfast immediately in a clean kitchen. This may be a normal Saturday morning for all of you, but I can’t tell you the last time I could just do this without rushing off to work or stressing over errands. I think this quintessential perfect Saturday is what led to these whole wheat rum raisin pancakes tasting so…well…perfect.
I’m a little sad brunch week is over. I’ve had such a blast whipping up lighter brunch recipes for all of you and I’ve envisioned us chatting over the computers, clinking pretty champagne flutes as we looked at the photos. In a perfect world that would happen, don’t you think? Well, either way, I’m totally pretending all of you are sitting right across from me as I sip my coffee and type up this amazing, super fluffy, a little boozy pancake recipe.
I thought long and hard about what kind of recipe I was going to end brunch week with. Should it be a fancy waffle with infused whipped cream? Or maybe an omelete or eggs florentine? Perhaps make some french toast casserole with some exotic spices? And then I thought why not just pancakes? I feel like pancakes are often overlooked for brunch menus and parties because of their simplicity and triviality. But trust me y’all, this recipe may be simple, but there’s nothing boring about this stack.
I mean, look at it! Does this look like something you’d get in one of those rusty, scratchy sounding, squeaky diners on the road somewhere? Add this to your brunch menu and watch your friends and family’s mouths drop. And, may I suggest a pairing? Serve each stack with a cup of amazing Nespresso espresso. Now that is what I envision when I picture the most perfect Saturday brunch.
Friends, I can’t tell you how much I am in love with my Nespresso U machine. I’m absolutely, 100% addicted to it. I promise it’ll change your life (and all of your brunches to follow). Lucky for one of you, the amazing folks at Nespresso are giving away a U machine! Make sure you enter to win one down below!
Whole Wheat Rum Raisin Pancakes
CLICK HERE FOR THE PRINTABLE VERSION OF THIS RECIPE!
Serves about 3 (2 pancakes each). Recipe slightly adapted from Hub Pages.
Prep time: 10 minutes
Cook time: About 4 – 5 minutes
Ingredients:
For the raisins:
- 3 1/2 snack size packages raisins
- 2 tablespoons brown rum (I used Brugal)
- 1 teaspoon brown sugar
For the pancakes:
- 3/4 cup whole wheat flour
- 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
- 3 tablespoons sugar
- 3 tablespoons Chobani nonfat vanilla yogurt
- 1/2 cup + 2 1/2 tablespoons nonfat milk
- 1 1/2 tablespoons brown rum *
- 1 egg, beaten
*If you don’t want to add rum to the pancake batter, omit the rum and add additional milk or add rum extract.
Directions:
- In a shallow bowl, mix the raisins, rum and brown sugar together. Let sit for at least 15 – 20 minutes. Strain the raisins once they’ve soaked and discard the liquid.
- To make the pancakes: Using a wire mesh strainer, sift the flours, baking powder, cinnamon and sugar together in a large mixing bowl. Add the egg, milk, rum, yogurt and rum soaked raisins. Mix to combine. Stir gently. Do not overmix, it’s okay if you have a few chunks or lumps.
- Let batter sit for 5 – 10 minutes.
- Liberally spray a skillet with nonstick cooking spray and heat over medium high heat. Using an ice cream scoop, add about 2 scoops of batter into the center of the pan. Once the batter starts to bubble in the middle, flip over (about 2 minutes). Let cook an additional 2 – 3 minutes until golden brown on both sides.
- Serve with syrup, whipped cream and butter and enjoy!
Nutritional information per serving (2 pancakes):
Calories: 393
Fat: 3 grams
Carbohydrates: 70 grams
Fiber: 5.5 grams
Protein: 12.6 grams
Weight Watchers Points: 9
NOW, for the really fun part! One of you lucky readers will win a Nespresso U machine!
I’m utterly obsessed with mine (as shown here and here). Because I miss Paris more than anything, having a cup of espresso every morning takes me back to the ways of France 🙂 To enter, simply fill out the prompts below!
Giveaway ends January 31st at midnight. Good luck!
Claire
Tags:brunch recipes, healthy recipe, low fat recipe, pancake recipe, raisin recipes, rum raisin recipe, whole wheat recipes
Easy Breakfast Pizza
Skinny brunch week continues with, probably, my favorite recipe of the bunch. This easy breakfast pizza needs to be on every single brunch menu ever in the history of the world. It’s legitimately that good.
Now, you’re probably like “Hey Claire. There’s cheese, and sausage, and bacon on this B, how the heck is it healthy!” And then to which I respond “Great observation dear fellow. You are right, except here’s what you don’t know. The cheese is part-skim (half the fat), the sausage is VEGAN (NO FAT) and the bacon is low-sodium!” And then you hug me and we rejoice together as we stuff piece after piece of this delicious breakfast pizza into our mouths.
What, that’s not how it played out for you? FOR SHAME. Vegetarian sausage (or Gimme Lean) is the best stuff in the world. It has the flavor, the texture and the look of sausage, just without any fat. At all. Okay, so maybe like a fraction of fat. I don’t know, I’m not a food scientist. I’ve used it before and always wonder why I don’t use it more often.
If you’re squeevy about putting an egg on top, don’t! You can forgo it all together. I just wanted the egg on top because I’m addicted to runny yolk. It’s absurd. I’d drink runny yolk if I could. Too far? Fine. It’s not like I said I’m going all Gaston in this piece and drinking glasses of raw egg. Now that? Would be weird.
Easy Breakfast Pizza
CLICK HERE FOR THE PRINTABLE VERSION OF THIS RECIPE!
Serves about 8 – 9.
Prep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: About 12 – 14 minutes
Ingredients:
- 1 homemade pizza crust (use this recipe)
- 1 cup part-skim cheddar cheese
- Cooking spray
- 1 small white onion, chopped
- 1/2 yellow pepper, chopped
- 7 ounces gimme lean breakfast sausage
- 4 pieces of low-sodium bacon, cooked & crumbled
- 3 tablespoons fresh mozzarella, cut into small balls
- 2 eggs
- Salt and pepper to taste
Directions:
- Roll pizza dough out to a large circle. Place on a floured pizza pan and set aside. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
- Heat cooking spray in a large skillet over medium heat. Add onion and pepper and cook until soft, about 4 minutes. Add sausage and cook until it’s fully crumbled (you may need to push it apart with a spatula). Add salt and pepper to taste.
- Cover the dough with cheddar cheese. Add the sausage and onion mixture to the top and spread out evenly. Add mozzarella cheese and bacon.
- Crack both eggs over the pizza. Bake for about 12 minutes, or until crust is golden brown and egg whites are fully cooked.
Nutritional information per slice:
Calories: 225
Fat: 9.2 grams
Carbohydrates: 21 grams
Fiber: 2.5 grams
Protein: 12.6 grams
Weight Watchers Points: 5
Top Chef Fried Chicken Recap
Okay, finally caught up on my Top Chef! And omg I have so many things to talk about.
Let’s start with Restaurant Wars. Beginning with Sheldon. I love him. He’s just a big ball of happiness. I don’t see how anyone could be sad, mad or angry working with him. I don’t fully forgive him for screwing up the tempura in the roller derby episode, but I can forget. His dishes looked amazing. So did Josh’s! That egg? I would have eaten that in a heartbeat (and I know of that infamous egg dish they were basing it on, yuck!) I think Stefan bombed the service, but I wasn’t surprised by that. He’s cocky and full of himself, he’s a dick no matter what. Okay, now onto the girls.
Let me preface this by saying I don’t LOVE Kristen. I think she’s a very talented chef, but she seems sort of stuck up to me. She thinks she’s better than everyone else or something. Which, I get, you’re good and have been on top, but still. I just…don’t like that kind of attitude. However, she SHOULD NOT have gone home. I know it was her restaurant, her vision, her idea, but at the same time, Josie screwed up the dish. Once again. I will say again though that the concept was whack. If you’re going to do deconstructed French food, do it. Don’t just remake the same dishes but on a different scale. French food is typically always the same, why not add some of your heritage to it and make it a fusion? I’m glad the judges saw this too.
Okay, moving on to last night’s episode. The elimination challenge was simple, make a damn good piece of fried chicken. Didn’t see it? Watch the episode here. Also, stop reading below because I have a major (SPOILER ALERT!) Content and/or other value provided by our partner, Bravo.
Okay, so last night. I’ll begin with the quick fire. Josh, I like you, but eggs and bacon with rice? Ew. Stefan? Congrats. You’re cocky but you deserved that. Your sushi looked BOMB! Moving onto the elimination challenge, the fried chicken. I would have loved to be sitting at that table last night. Probably the most fun I’ve ever seen the judges have!
Image via Bravo.
Can I just stop, scream of happiness, and then go on because JOSIE FINALLY GOT THE BOOT? I’ve never been more happy to see anyone go than her. She’s awful. Her voice, her laugh, her not good food. I mean, she’s been on the bottom since she came back, why on earth did she stick around this long? I mean, seriously? I saw a tweet last night that was like “Is Josie blackmailing Padma? Is that how she’s stayed on so long?” I couldn’t agree more. Putting my thoughts of her to the side and just judging on the dish, that wasn’t traditional Southern fried chicken. You live in Miami. Hunny, you don’t know anything about fried chicken.
This? This is southern fried chicken.
Super crispy, super moist and served with butter on a waffle. That is what the chefs wanted, dear Josie. And now that’s all I want to eat! Moving on, I definitely think Josh deserved the win. His recipe looked amazing and I love that he did a buffalo twist to it making it his own. Fried chicken is one of the easiest things to make and one of the easiest things to mess up. So, I totally see how so many chefs failed at that. And I’m not even going to talk about Brooke. I love Brooke but that chicken was an atrocity.
Photo via Bravo.
Anyone super excited for next week? They are going on an Alaskan cruise and the super hunky Curtis Stone joins as a guest judge. I’m not lying when I say that’s probably a main reason I’m going to tune in (besides loving the show). That man is SEXY!
Remember, you can help Save a Chef by voting in the Save a Chef Competition by using the Chefs unique #hashtags – #SaveChef (insert chef’s name) Chefs up for elimination this week for the Save A Chef competition. So make sure you vote to save your favorite Chef !
This post is sponsored by the folks at Bravo. I am receiving compensation in return for this post, but all opinions and ideas expressed are 100% my own. This post also contains affiliate links.
Cherry Chocolate Chip Wheat Germ Muffins
Well, it finally snowed here in Northern Virginia! My cozy little cottage looks so adorable spruced up with some fresh white powder. I just love it. I’ve been dying for a real winter since the snowpocalypse so this is quite refreshing. And, nothing goes better with snow (or brunch for that matter) than a big cup of French Toast Coffee (your life will forever changed) and a batch of these cherry chocolate chip wheat germ muffins!
Okay, so I get it. Wheat germ doesn’t sound…appetizing. It sounds like germ, which is not something you want associated with food. And that’s totally fine since that was my first reaction too when I received a few samples to try from Kretschmer. However, after some research, I found out some important things about this super-food!
For one, wheat germ is actually a GOOD thing for food and you! Two tablespoons of raw wheat germ have 4 grams of protein, 2 grams of fiber, no cholesterol and a mere 60 calories. That’s a lot of protein for something so tiny, don’t you think? I always love trying new healthy ingredients, so I immediately starting thinking of ways I could use the Kretschmer wheat germ in some of my baking. And then, one day it just hit me. I’ll make muffins! With chocolate chips and cherry! By Golly Gee!
Best. idea. ever. All you taste is the gooey melted chocolate, the sweet cherries and a slight nuttiness from the almond extract and wheat germ. Be sure to ONLY USE fresh wheat germ. You’ll be able to tell by the smell. It should smell slightly sweet, not bitter or sour. Because of the germ, you get an added 2 grams of protein in each muffin. More protein = fuller longer = less need for fat pants. Real scientist right here, guys.
These little muffins make the perfect side sweet for your traditional brunching fare or work just as delicious standalone (with a giant mimosa, of course). Although I’m sure Dr. Oz would scold me for eating something healthy and then downing empty calories in champagne. But brunch without cocktails is sacrilegious (and I’m sure illegal in some establishments), so I think I’ll take my chances with OZ (and his frightening botox).
Cherry Chocolate Chip Wheat Germ Muffins
CLICK HERE FOR THE PRINTABLE VERSION OF THIS RECIPE!
Yields about 12 muffins. Recipe adapted from Cooking Light.
Prep time: 10 minutes
Cook time: About 13 minutes.
Ingredients:
- 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
- 1/2 cup toasted wheat germ (I used Kretschmer)
- 2/3 cup packed brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- dash of salt
- 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon almond extract
- 1 cup milk (I used skim)
- 2 tablespoons canola oil
- 2 tablespoons unsweetened applesauce
- 1 egg
- 3/4 cup chopped fresh cherries*
- 1/2 cup milk chocolate chips
*Dried works just as well!
Directions:
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Line a muffin tin with liners.
- In a large mixing bowl, stir the flour, wheat germ, brown sugar, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon and salt together. Make a well in the center.
- In another bowl, mix the egg, skim milk, canola oil, applesauce and egg together. Pour the wet mixture into the well of the dry mixture and stir to combine. Gently stir in cherries and chocolate chips until fully incorporated.
- Fill muffin liners about 2/3 – 3/4 the way full with batter. Bake for about 13 – 15 minutes, or until golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.
Nutritional information per muffin:
Calories: 203
Fat: 6.1 grams
Carbohydrates: 33 grams
Fiber: 2.5 grams
Protein: 4.2 grams
Weight Watchers Points: 5
Claire
Tags:brunch recipes, healthy muffin recipes, healthy recipes, low fat recipes, muffin recipes
Boozy Banana Cream Pie Milkshake
So, it seems a little absurd to be posting a milkshake recipe when it’s 14 degrees out. I know. But when I made this luscious shake and planned my post, it was 62 degrees out so I promise I’m not that far off my rocker. Back to brunch week, one of my favorite parts of this meal are the fabulous cocktails! Even though you can’t go wrong with a mimosa, sometimes it’s fun to shake things up a bit (get it, get it?!) So, instead of an OJ/bubble cocktail, why not have one of these boozy banana cream pie milkshakes instead? Just as boozy and even more fun to drink!
During the summer, I always whip up boozy milkshakes for brunch. Mainly just for me while I watch horrible tv shows, but I’m still eating brunch food at a brunch hour on the weekends, so it totally counts. I’m going to host more brunches this spring (with actual friends!) so you better believe this banana cream pie shake will be on the menu.
I love boozy shakes for a few reasons. For one, they are delicious, obv. Two, they are so nostalgic There’s something so retro, 50’s and fun about them. I always close my eyes and pretend I’m wearing a poodle skirt, sipping this in a diner while Fonzie eyes me by the jute-box machine. And they are so flipping fun to make and drink. Have you ever met anyone who was unhappy while drinking a milkshake? (Lactose intolerant folks excluded).
Milkshakes, however, aren’t always healthy. Or low-fat. Or good for you in any sort of way at all. So, I decided to add only a quarter of ice cream and replace it with frozen bananas (one banana, two bananas, one for me and one for you bananas…) and graham crackers! The end result is still thick and oh so creamy, just with a scant 2 grams of fat! With how it tastes, you’d think it was filled to the brim with ice cream.
And I’m not going to apologize for that banana song. You get 100000 trillion dollars if you can guess where it’s from or finish the chorus.
Boozy Banana Cream Pie Milkshake
CLICK HERE FOR THE PRINTABLE VERSION OF THIS RECIPE!
Yields 2 1/2 cup servings. Recipe inspired by Unsophistic Cook.
Prep time: 5 minutes
Ingredients:
- 2 large bananas, frozen and peeled
- 3/4 cup nonfat vanilla Chobani
- 1/4 cup low-fat vanilla ice cream
- 1/4 cup graham crackers, broken into pieces (about 1/2 sheet)
- 3 tablespoons – 1/4 cup whipped cream flavored vodka
- 1 tablespoon light cream
- 1/4 cup whipped cream
- Graham cracker crumbs for garnish
Directions:
- Place the bananas, Greek yogurt, ice cream, vodka and light cream in a blender. Blend until smooth. Add graham crackers and whipped cream and pulse a few times to combine. Add additional vodka for taste (or extra booziness).
- Pour into mason jars or milkshake glasses and garnish with additional whipped cream and graham cracker crumbs.
Nutritional information per serving (1/2 cup):
Calories: 360
Fat: 2 grams
Carbohydrates: 48 grams
Protein: 11 grams
Fiber: >1 gram
Weight Watchers Points: 7
This post contains affiliate links.
Claire
Tags:boozy recipes, greek yogurt recipes, healthy recipes, low fat recipes, milkshake recipes
