recipe

I mentioned last week that our family has eliminated meat, dairy and eggs from our diet. I have been dabbling in this kind of diet for a while now, trying to add more vegetarian choices to our meals, then became convinced of the need to eliminate dairy and eggs altogether as well, but one of the reasons I stalled was the inevitable learning curve of a dietary change. Having switched to a gluten-free lifestyle in the last couple of years, I’m already a serious recipe tweaker. Now there are more tweaks.

However, I ordered a few cookbooks to help me through the transition, and things have been going smoother than I had anticipated.

One of my big kitchen challenges is breakfast. It has always seemed as though my kids were hard to please at breakfast time. Two would really enjoy something and the other one would hate it. And having now eliminated several options, I was not sure how this would work.

However, I’ve managed to find a number of breakfast selections THAT EVERYONE LIKES (!) so that I now have seven breakfast selections–one for each day of the week–that everyone is happy to eat. You have no idea what a breakthrough this is for me!

Here is just one of the delicious breakfast choices:

Rice/Millet Blender Muffins

yield 12 muffins (I actually made 21 smaller muffins from this recipe)

1-1/2 cups long grain brown rice
1/2 cup millet
1-1/2 cups water

Soak the above ingredients overnight. This begins the germination process, breaks down phytic acid, which inhibits nutrient absorption, and makes the grain much easier to blend. It also makes for fluffier muffins.)

1 apple, cored and cut into chunks
1 tsp Himalayan pink salt
2-4 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1-3 Tbsp honey

Blend thoroughly until grain is only slightly gritty.

Add 1 Tbsp baking powder (aluminum free) at the end and blend just until mixed.

Variations: Substitute (non GMO) corn for millet in equal proportions. Substitute one or two ripe bananas in place of the apple. Add cocoa powder or sweetened chocolate chips. Add chopped nuts.

We made this recipe with apple the first time, then tried with banana and chocolate chips. Truly delicious both ways! My kids declared it their favorite muffin recipe (and I have some good ones)! I couldn’t be more thrilled.

Pumpkin and JavaMan are still away. I’ve made a couple of discoveries in their absence:

I now know the source of all my laundry woes: Pumpkin. At least that’s gotta be it, because since he left, I’ve been totally on top of the whole laundry situation. No more overflowing pile, it’s all done, folded, neatly put away. Ask me the last time that happened. Actually, don’t.
I’m exhausted at the end of the day. Remember the slumber party? Well, most nights I’ve packed it in along with the girls. How can two children be more exhausting than three? Not sure about that, but it seems to be the case. Of course, it doesn’t help that it’s been freezing here and a lot of my energy has been going into staying warm. More on that in next week’s Taste of China post–which I was too exhausted to write this week!

And then there’s food. I have been battling what I believe to be is a battle with candida for some time now. I put myself on a very restrictive diet back in September, and was very good until about Christmas, when I was not so very good.

Now, I’m looking in radical directions. Like going raw. In the meantime, however, since there are a lot of logistics to overcome trying to do that 1) here in China and 2) while battling candida, I am cooking as normal and adding a lot more raw veggies to my diet, making sure to start with raw and fill up with that as much as possible before eating anything else. Lunch was totally raw for me today. Yay!

But like I said, in the meantime, life is moving on. I’m always looking for something quick to get us off to a good start before homeschool, and when I saw these two-ingredient pancakes, I knew this was a winner! Are you ready? Here’s the ingredient list: bananas and eggs.

These pancakes can be made with just those two ingredients and turn out just fine, but they are a little fussy, as you’ll see in the picture (flipping is a challenge). So here’s how I tweaked to make them hold together a little better and to add some fiber. The formula below does NOT make enough for our family. I doubled it when it was just me and the girls, tripled it when Pumpkin was here. JavaMan usually fixes his own breakfast, since his schedule’s a little different from ours. I only added the cinnamon once. I think the banana flavor comes out more when it’s not added:

Ingredients

1 banana
two eggs
1/2 tsp. ground flax seeds
dash cinnamon (optional)

Preparation

I use my Magic Bullet to grind the flax seeds, then dump those in with the eggs and bananas, give the whole thing a good puree and then just pour into the pan. (Make sure you rinse out the container afterwards because wet, ground flax seeds will make a sticky mess, once they dry.)

Tada! Breakfast. Just like that. Gotta love it.

Yummy Vegan (and GF) Muffins

Two-Ingredient Pancakes

Ingredients

Preparation