Apple Butter Quinoa Muffins

10.29.12
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Hi friends! I’m currently admist the frankenstorm of 2012 (aka hurricane Sandy) and luckily we still have power and warm water, so I’m trying to go about my business as I normally do on Monday. Usually when there is a crazy storm approaching, I try to get a few items baked so we have something to eat besides canned tuna, which my husband stocks up on y2k style. So last night I whipped a batch of super healthy apple butter quinoa muffins.

Oh my gawd, why have I never put quinoa in a baked good before? There are three reasons for this recipe. One, it was inspired by last week’s episode of Parenthood. Julie made the family 3 dozen batches of quinoa muffins because Kristina was having surgery. So, while watching, I thought “quinoa? In muffins?” Then while browsing the interwebs, I found this recipe for apple, pecan and quinoa muffins and was intrigued again. Lastly, I had a big jar of Musselman’s Apple Bar that was sent to me that was begging to be used.

Apple butter should be called “crack,” or “herion” or your drug of choice because holy crap, it’s good. The lovely folks at Musselman’s sent me a huge jar, a spurtle (which I have not been using to scoop apple butter directly into my mouth) and a few recipes they whipped up using the butter! The recipes were apple butter marinated chicken, sweet potato casserole and apple butter monkey bread. All of which looked amazing and I will try if I don’t die of apple butter consumption related complications this week.

As yummy as the recipes sounded, I really wanted to get creative with this stuff in my baking. So, I took Julia and Christal’s suggestions to make quinoa muffins and whipped up a batch with a few tablespoons of Musselman’s crack butter and applesauce.

These fluffy little muffins have no real butter and no oil in them whatsoever and only have 3 grams of fat per muffin! And they are still as moist as Paula Deen’s muffins made with 14 sticks of butter. Plus, the addition of quinoa is a great source of fiber and protein so one of these bad boys will keep you full well into lunchtime. Or keep you full while you’re hiding in the basement because a B named Sandy is terrorizing you.

Apple Butter Quinoa Muffins

Yields 12 muffins. Recipe adapted from Nutritionist in the Kitch.
Prep time: 8 minutes
Cook time: 15 – 18 minutes

Ingredients:

  • 1 cup flour
  • 1 1/4 cup cooked quinoa
  • 1/3 cup sugar
  • 2 teaspoons baking soda
  • Dash of salt
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
  • 2 tablespoons Musselman’s apple butter
  • 2 tablespoons unsweetened applesauce
  • 1 egg
  • 2/3 cup low fat milk
  • 1/2 cup chopped granny smith apple
  • 1/3 cup chopped walnuts

Directions: 

  1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Liberally grease a 12 cavity muffin tin with nonstick cooking spray or line with paper liners. Set aside.
  2. In a large bowl, mix flour, quinoa, sugar, baking soda, salt and pumpkin pie spice together. Mix well. Stir in apple butter, unsweetened applesauce, egg and low-fat milk until fully combined. Stir in apples and walnuts.
  3. Fill cavities about 2/3 – 3/4 the way full with batter.
  4. Bake for 13 – 15 minutes, or until deep brown. Serve warm with butter and enjoy!

Nutritional information per muffin:

Calories: 117.25
Fat: 3 grams
Carbohydrates: 20.91 grams
Fiber: 2.8 grams
Protein: 3.56 grams
Weight Watchers Points:  3

Musselman’s Apple Butter sent me a sample of this product at no cost to review. However, all opinions, ideas and photographs are all my own.

Sunday Suppers: Ogre Eye Cookies

10.28.12
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Can you believe Halloween is in 3 days? Even though I’ve been crafting Halloween edibles, like bloody teeth & spooky spider snacks, for weeks, I still can’t believe it’s here already. I also still can’t believe it’s ALMOST NOVEMBER, but that’s a different story entirely. To celebrate all Hallow’s Eve and the day of ghosts, ghouls and goblins, the theme for today’s #SundaySuppers was trick or treat! And nothing says trick, treat or Halloween quick like a batch of ogre eye cookies, am I right?

And you know what makes ogre eye cookies even more fun? CHALKBOARDS! I honestly can’t tell you how absurdly happy I was drawing weird ogre mouths to put underneath these cookies. I was giggling and snorting like a 6 year old. I mean, isn’t that kind of what Halloween is all about? It gives us adults a chance to act like complete weirdos, play with our food and eat candy all night without any guilt!

I mean, I can’t even get over how much I love these, even if they turned out nothing like the original recipe they were based off. I’m really not sure who made these cookies look like that at My Recipes, but um, it’s darn near impossible. For one, any cookie batter with butter or applesauce needs to be chilled at least an hour before you handle it or else the cookies will turn out flat. Secondly, in order to handle the dough you need to flour your hands, which will then make the sprinkles less likely to stick. After one failed attempt at their method (and choice cuss words) I decided to do my own thing.

“SOMEONE CHEWED PART OF MY EYE!”

For one, I added some green food dye to the dough to make it ogrey! Then, instead of rolling them into balls, I just made them regular drop cookies. Even though they aren’t AS cute as the others, I still LOVE them. They are an absolute breeze to make and are even more fun to play with. Plus, I made these with half applesauce so they are more moist and lower in fat! Your kids (or husbands) will love these, especially if you let them draw spooky mouths with chalk!

Ogre Eye Cookies

Yields about 14 cookies. Recipe inspired by My Recipes.
Prep time: 10 minutes
Chill time: 1 hour
Cook time: 8 minutes

Ingredients: 

  • 4 tablespoons butter, softened
  • 1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce
  • 1/3 cup sugar
  • 1 egg yolk
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 1/4 cups flour
  • Dash of salt
  • Green food coloring
  • Mini chocolate chips
  • White icing gel

Directions: 

  1. In a large mixing bowl, beat butter, applesauce and sugar together until creamed. Add in egg yolk and vanilla, stir until fully mixed. Gradually add flour (about 1/4 cup at a time) until fully incorporated. Add green food coloring until dough is bright green. Cover mixture with foil or saran wrap and chill for at least an hour.
  2. Once dough has chilled, preheat oven to 350 degrees F and grease a baking sheet with nonstick cooking spray. Scoop about 1 tablespoon of dough onto the sheets about 1 inch apart. Bake for about 8 – 10 minutes. (Cookies will be done with they spring back lightly when you touch them).
  3. Let cookies chill completely. Once chilled, use your white icing gel to make a large circle in the center of the cookie. Then, carefully press a mini chocolate chip in the center (to make the pupil). Then serve, play with and enjoy!

Nutritional information per cookie:

Calories: 85.25
Fat: 3.4 grams
Carbohydrates: 12.4 grams
Fiber: > 1 gram
Protein: 1.7 grams
Weight Watchers Points:  2

Be sure to check out these other haunted inspired edibles for Sunday Suppers!

Bewitching Brews

Ghoulish Gruel:

Haunted Snacks:

Spooky Sweets:

Sponsor Spotlight: Studio Cuisine

10.26.12
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Is anyone else EXTREMELY excited that it’s Friday? I’ve had a crazy busy week and today isn’t looking much better with 4 recipes, a craft & 4 articles to do. I’m sweaty just thinking about it. But I couldn’t leave you without introducing one of my beautiful October sponsors, Rachel from Studio Cuisine. Check her out on Twitter, Facebook and Pinterest, too!

Rachel is a DC transplant like myself and also a grad student. She lives in a teeny tiny studio (hence the name studio cuisine) yet still manages to take gorgeous photos of her food. She makes super healthy, vegan and low-fat dishes that still taste great with a “pinch of sugar.” While I was perusing her site, I found some fabulous recipes I just have to share with y’all, including these to die for vegan pumpkin muffins.

Yeah. I know, right? You just want to eat your screen. She has a ton of other great looking recipes too, like this roasted garlic and carrot hummus. Carrots in hummus, who knew?

However, my favorite would have to be the chocolate covered berry smoothie she made just for my readers. So Rachel, please, take it away!

This smoothie is my go-to post workout drink. It’s got all the protein and carbs you need to replenish your tired muscles. Using frozen berries ensures you can drink it all year round, but feel free to toss in a few ice cubes and replace them with fresh ones in the summer. The addition of almond extract makes this smoothie feel like a real treat, and I promise if you close your eyes you might even be convinced you’re drinking a berry milkshake!

Chocolate Covered Berry Protein Smoothie

Serves 1.
Preperation time: >5 minutes

Ingredients: 

  • 1 cup unsweetened almond milk
  • 1 scoop chocolate protein powder
  • 3/4 cup frozen mixed berries
  • dash almond extract (don’t leave this out, it makes the smoothie so decadent)
  • sweetener of choice, added to taste

Directions: 

1. Combine all ingredients in a blender and mix about 30 seconds until fully combined!

Nutritional information per smoothie:

Calories: 185
Fat: 4 grams
Carbohydrates: 22 grams
Fiber: 6 grams
Protein: 15 grams
Weight Watchers Points:  4

Taste of Michigan Recap

10.25.12
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I wish I had a more clever title than that, but I’m facing a bit of a head cold and all of the creativity in my brain is currently being suppressed by daytime cold medicine. But I’ll try my very best to be sassy, snarky and hilarious so you don’t feel the need to poke your eyeballs out of boredom or click that little x on the left hand corner of the screen. Let’s kick this off with a photo, mmk?

This lush landscape is what greeted me when I landed into Grand Rapids. That was 2 weeks ago, I can’t even fathom how gorgeous it is now that all the green is gone! I grew up in Cleveland (which is practically a stones throw from Michigan) and don’t ever remember going there. Weird. As soon as I landed, I was greeted by the prettiest little pregnant lady you ever did see (and one of the hostesses of TOM), Rachel (aka Rachel Cooks).

She agreed to pick me up from the airport and tote me back to my hotel before we had lunch. My hotel? Was SWANKKYY. I stayed at the JW Marriott in Downtown Grand Rapids and it was, honestly, one of the nicest urban hotels I’ve ever stayed in. The manager upgraded me to a super fancy concierge level sweet as well so this was my view. Y’all, if you are ever in Grand Rapids, STAY HERE.

The view from the elevator banks:

If you want photos of my actual room, be sure to check out my feed on instagram! As soon as I unpacked, Rachel and I (and her adorable mini-me) went to a pizza place to get some grub with Liz. After lunch, I took a little nap then went out to do some exploring on my own of Grand Rapids. I have to say, the city is cute. It’s a small town (compared to DC) and has such a cozy feel to it. Plus, I was there during ArtPrize, which is their annual art competition where artists from all over the country submit work in hopes to win a quarter of a million bucks! Plus, their work is displayed all over the city so it’s a great tourist attraction.

After some exploring, I stopped into the cutest little restaurant, Hop Cat. It turned out to be a brew pub (they make a few varieties of their own beer) and it was PACKED. I grabbed a seat at the bar, next to a cute local couple actually. We ended up talking for a few hours over some beers and great food. The vibe was really laid back. I felt like I was back in Portland. The service was good, the beer was good (I had a few good pumpkin brews) but the food was incredible. You can’t go wrong with bacon mac n’ cheese.

After dinner and a few drinks, I went back to my hotel and passed out. Only to be woken up by room service because the manager prepared a fondue tray for me! JW FOR THE WIN!

So, the actual event of Taste of Michigan was on Saturday. One of the reasons I was able to attend was because Beanilla sponsored me! I’ll be honest, I wish I knew more about the company that brought me, but I’m pretty obsessed with their products. They contributed whole vanilla beans and extract in our bags and I’m STOKED to bake with them. But the event itself was fun. The day started out at the market, cold and very rainy. I got some cider and walked around, plus was able to snag a whole bunch of fabulous mini squashes and pumpkins for a steal!

After that, we hit up a cute little shop (Art of the Table) where we could buy little knick knacks for food photos and stuff. It was a cool shop, but we definitely spent an hour in there sort of just standing around. After that, we had a few hours to kill so a few of us decided to explore the surrounding area. I have to say something here, there are A TON of cute boys in Grand Rapids. Like almost every boy I saw was real cute. So if you’re single, go there. You’ll meet a hottie. Case in point, the roaster at one of the local coffee places (Rowsters) we stopped in.

Ooooo mama. They roasted their own beans there too, which I thought was neat. My favorite place we went to while exploring had to be the church turned brew pub, Brewery Vivant.

The beer was so-so but the place? Coolest bar I’ve ever been to! After that we went to lunch which was being hosted by a local restaurant, Bistro Bella Vita. This place was amazing. The food was top notch and we had an entire room to ourselves. Liz kicked off lunch with a demonstration of a food processor by Kitchen Aid and a little taste of some of her family’s homemade hummus. That stuff was amazing. Liz is pretty incredible, too! 🙂

After lunch we skipped to Reserve Wine Bar, which apparently has the most wines on tap than any other restaurant in the US? It was really cute inside, very swanky and upscale. The GM/Sommelier wasn’t bad to look at either. (I wasn’t kidding when I said all the boys were cute).

We had some bubbly and charcuterie there waiting for us, which was nice! The bubbly was…not for me. I ended up getting a HORRIBLE headache from it later. But the atmosphere was fabulous. This is a GREAT place to have a birthday dinner or lunch or even a bridal shower!

Then, shockingly, we ate more! We had dinner at Six One Six, the restaurant in the JW. It was amazing. I didn’t get any photos because it was way dark but I did snag a photo of me and my new favorite person ever in the world, Ashley (aka, Baker by Nature).

Have you ever met someone you just click with? That’s totally how it was with this girl. We were on the same wave lengths all day and it was just fabulous to have someone you can can really connect with and talk with! It was honestly like we knew each-other for years. Definitely planning a trip to the Big Apple to see her soon!

All in all, I think the event was amazing. We got some SERIOUS swag (which is still not unpacked, oh god don’t judge me) and got to hang out on a smaller scale with some fellow food bloggers. There were about 98% Michigan local bloggers there but I totally think Rachel and Liz should market this more to out of state people like me! It was SO cool seeing the state and getting to taste a part of the country I hadn’t been to (well, state I should say). Good job ladies, you did good 🙂

Garlic Meatballs with Red Potatoes & Yellow Wax Beans

10.24.12
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I’ve wanted to share this meal with you ever since I took my very first bite of this MAGNIFICENT bowl of garlic meatballs with red potatoes & yellow wax beans. It’s one of those meals inspired by Hello Fresh (thanks for the AMAZING BOX!) and is one I would have never made without their help. Because well, who has ever had meatballs and potatoes together before?

Honestly, it sounds (and looks) a little wacky but as soon as you dig in, your mouth explodes in an array of orgasmic flavors and you’re left wondering “why the heck haven’t I married these ingredients together before?” Besides the flavor, what is amazing about this meal is because of the addition of the fresh vegetables and canned tomatoes, you don’t need rich, heavy (high-fat) sauces or those loaded with sugar! Healthy & delicious FOR THE WIN!

Not only is this dinner jam-packed with amazing, fresh produce, it’s real darn pretty to look at. The bright red from the tomatoes, the yellow from the wax beans and the green from the parsley make it resemble an autumn tree, wouldn’t you say? Or is comparing meatballs and the changing of seasons a bit of a stretch, even for me?

Normally when I make dinner and then photograph it, I always double the serving size. Don’t ask me why but a big ol’ plate of pasta looks more appealing to me than the actual recommended serving size of like 5 ounces. Usually then I distribute the recipe into two dishes, one for me and one for E. Well, um. That didn’t happen with this one. I took this HUGE plate of pasta & meat magic straight to the face and 3 minutes later, it was gone. I felt a little ashamed so I also took the entire glass of white wine you see there to the face too.

One shameless plug here, but if you haven’t heard of Hello Fresh yet (or haven’t visited them since my last post) PLEASE. Do it now. The boxes come with EVERY SINGLE INGREDIENT you need for the dish and a fancy step by step photo card with directions. Plus they have chefs who create dishes like meatballs, beans and potatoes that taste better than any other pasta you’ve ever had.

If there’s one thing this dish taught me, it’s this: be creative in the kitchen. Mix meatballs, potatoes and wax beans together. Use a spice you’ve never heard of. Bake with olive oil instead of butter. It may not always end up good but when it does? You get this incredible dish that YOU MADE UP. A dish you can say “Yeah, it’s mine.” You never know, your next experiment could end up being someone’s new favorite dish (like this meatball adventure is to me!)

Garlic Meatballs with Red Potatoes & Yellow Wax Beans

Serves about 3. Recipe adapted from Hello Fresh.
Prep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

  • 10 ounces of lean 93/7% ground beef (or ground turkey)
  • 1 1/2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
  • 4 red potatoes, quartered
  • 2 tablespoons panko bread crumbs
  • 1 1/2 tablespoons parmesan cheese
  • 1 cup yellow wax beans, tips removed
  • 10 ounces of spicy canned tomatoes
  • 1/4 cup chopped red onion
  • 3 cloves garlic, chopped
  • 9 ounces spaghetti noodles
  • 1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley
  • 2 tablespoons mozzarella cheese* (optional)
  • Salt and pepper to taste

Directions: 

  1. Bring two pots of water to boil. In one pot, add quartered potatoes with a dash of salt and boil on high for 15 minutes, or until soft. In the second pot, add spaghetti and cook until al-dente, about 6 minutes. Rinse and set aside.
  2. While potatoes boil, mix together the meat, panko, cheese, salt and pepper in a large bowl. Using your hands (or a spoon), mix until combined. Then, carefully roll the meat into meatballs the size of a ping pong ball.
  3. In a large size skillet, heat oil over medium high heat. Add meatballs and cook for about 3 minutes, turning constantly, until meatballs start to brown.
  4. Add wax beans to the boiling potatoes and cook just 2 minutes, or until soft but still slightly crunchy. Strain both and rinse.
  5. Add onions, garlic and tomatoes to the meatball skillet. Cook about 2 minutes, or until onions/garlic are fragrant. Add in yellow beans, potatoes and salt and pepper. Reduce heat to medium low and cover, simmering for about 6 – 8 minutes, or until meatballs are fully cooked through.
  6. Scoop meatball and vegetable mixture over pasta. Garnish with fresh parsley and mozzarella and enjoy!

Nutritional information per serving ( 3 ounces of pasta, 2 meatballs & 1/3 cup vegetable mixture):

Calories: 422
Fat: 12.5 grams
Carbohydrates: 46.5 grams
Fiber: 9.5 grams
Protein: 29 grams
Weight Watchers Points:  10

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