From my mama's kitchen...

I consider my mom to be a good cook (Are you reading this mom?). She always makes relatively healthy meals and does a great job entertaining a crowd when all the kids, spouses and grandkids come to their house for special occasions.

A few weeks ago, we went to my mom's house to have a joint summer birthday party. My dad was turning 60 and we were celebrating the 3rd birthday of my niece and an early 1st birthday for Finley. She wanted a special cake and asked a friend for her "Strawberry Cheesecake Torte" recipe. Turns out it is an old Pampered Chef recipe - you know, the kind that tries to convince you to buy all their special items. Well, even without the special items it turned out delicious. I couldn't find the original recipe on the Pampered Chef website but there were several ways to make this a bit healthier.

Strawberry Cheesecake Torte

1 package (16 oz) pound cake mix (plus ingredients to make cake, low fat version)
1/2 cup water
1 package sugar free strawberry gelatin
1/4 cup seedless strawberry jam
1 lemon
1 package reduced fat cream cheese, softened
1/3 cup cold skim milk
1 container (12 oz) lite frozen whipped topping, thawed
1 pkg (3.4 oz) cheesecake instant pudding and pie filling
1 kiwi, peeled, sliced and halved
1 cup hulled and sliced strawberries

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Line jelly roll pan with parchment paper. Prepare cake mix to low fat package directions (usually using egg whites, decreasing oil, etc). Pour into pan, spreading evenly. Bake 15-18 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean: Cool 10 minutes. Carefully lift cake out of pan and onto cooling rack. Allow to cool completely.

In a microwave safe container, microwave water on high for 1-2 minutes or until boiling. Add sugar free gelatin; stir until dissolved. Add jam; whisk until smooth. Invert cake onto large cutting board. Prick cake at 1/2 inch intervals with a toothpick or fork. Brush cake evenly with all but 2 Tbsp of the gelatin mixture. Trim 1/4 inch around edge of cake and discard edges. Cut cake crosswise into 3 equal layers.

Zest lemon; set zest aside. Juice lemon to measure 2 Tbsp juice. In medium bowl, combine cream cheese and lemon juice; whisk until smooth. Add milk; whisk until smooth. Spoon whipped topping over cream cheese mixture (Do not mix). Sprinkle with pudding mix: mix well (Mixture will be thick).

Place one layer of the cake onto serving platter. Place a little less than half of the cream mixture on cake layer and spread evenly. Top with second cake layer and repeat cream mixture leaving behind enough cream mixture to pipe a border. Top with third layer, pipe a decorative border around edge. Spread any remaining filling down center.

Arrange kiwi on top of cake. Place strawberries and reserved gelatin mixture in small bowl. Mix gently. Spoon berries over top of cake and sprinkle with remaining lemon zest.

Peanut Butter Truffle Brownies

Husband: "Those are definitely not making the blog."

Me: "Ehhh, I'll probably still put them in because they are darn tasty, even if they aren't healthy!"

So as I state in the description, not everything on this blog is a healthy option. I made these brownies to take to a friend's house for a cook out and HAD to take the leftovers to work otherwise I would have eaten the entire pan in two days. They were awesome.

I have seen the recipe on two different sites, both The Girl Who Ate Everything and Real Mom Kitchen. In the peanut butter filling, I used 3/4 cup peanut butter and 1/4 cup butter instead of 1/2 cup of each. I figured this decreased the saturated fat a little and increased the heart healthy fat a little (although likely had about the same amount of calories and total fat).

Although I didn't make any of these changes, here are some other ways you could health-up this recipe a bit:

• Use natural peanut butter instead of the high fat, high sugar, high salt kind.
• Use the low fat variation on your brownie recipe box
• Substitute applesauce for oil in the brownie recipe
• Use a healthier brownie recipe like this black bean brownie recipe instead of boxed brownie mix.
  
• Cut your brownies insanely small and share with 60 of your friends so you aren't temped to eat ENTIRE ROWS of the pan!

Good luck!!!

Peanut Butter Truffle Brownies

Brownie Base
1 box (1 lb 6.5 oz) Betty Crocker Original Supreme brownie mix
water, oil and eggs called for on brownie box

Filling
1/4 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup creamy peanut butter
2 cups powdered sugar
2 tsp milk

Topping
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
1/4 cup butter

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease bottom only of 9x13 inch pan with cooking spray.

Prepare brownie batter according to package directions. Spread in the bottom of prepared pan. Bake 28 to 30 minutes. Cool completely, at least 1 hour.

In a medium bowl, beat filling ingredients with electric mixer on medium speed until smooth. Spread filling evenly over brownie base.

In a small microwavable bowl, microwave topping ingredients uncovered on high 30 to 60 seconds; stir until smooth. Cool 10 minutes; spread over filling. Refrigerate about 30 minutes or until set. Cut into small brownies and store in the refrigerator.

Enjoy :)

Spicy Zucchini Raisin Cookies

Coming in to summer its always great to have recipe ideas for the abundant summer produce that will soon be available. I'm pretty excited to have my vegetable garden begin to bear veggies but in the meant time, I guess I'll rely on my grocery store.

Does your grocery store have a produce clearance rack? Mine does. I know that Carrots-n-Cake has posted about her produce clearance rack as well. I'm in love with my grocery store's produce clearance rack. I tend to go grocery shopping in the mid afternoon - which is perfect. They have finished stocking the produce area for the morning and have taken away any of their imperfect produce. My store packages it back up at a significantly reduced price. It might not always be the prettiest produce but its much cheaper. I usually go there first to see what fruits and veggies I can score, then hit the regular produce section to supplement my bargains. I often get slightly over ripe bananas which I freeze and use in smoothies or replace for fat in recipes. I almost always get my peppers from the clearance rack. Sometimes I can get romaine, potatoes, apples, oranges, .... really anything.

Last week there was a giant package of zucchini. There were about 10 medium sized zucchinis and it was listed for $0.59. Steal. Thankfully, zucchinis are pretty easy to incorporate into recipes. There was a bake sale coming up at church for Relay for Life and I thought I'd try to bring the healthy option to sell.

I found this recipe on allrecipes.com. The only change I made was substituted applesauce for margarine. You could also try this with wheat flour or ground oat flour instead of white flour or some kind of substitute like Splenda for the sugar. After making these I realized they sounded very similar to Megan's Low Fat Zucchini cookies but these have raisins instead of chocolate chips. (either way - sounds pretty tasty!!!)

As originally posted, each cookie provides: 84 calories 2.8 g fat 14.3 g carbohydrate 0.4 g fiber 1.1 g protein

Zucchini Raisin Cookies - BETTER

1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
1 cup white sugar
1 egg
1 cup grated zucchini
2 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground cloves
1 cup raisins

In a medium bowl, cream together the margarine and sugar until smooth. Beat in the egg then stir in the zucchini. Combine the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and cloves; stir into the zucchini mixture. Mix in raisins. Cover dough and chill for at least 1 hour or overnight.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper (or spray with nonstick spray). Drop by teaspoonfuls onto the prepared cookie sheets. Cookies should be about 2 inches apart.

Bake for 8 to 10 minutes in the preheated oven until set. Allow cookies to cool slightly on the cookie sheets before removing to wire racks to cool completely.

Makes 36 cookies. Per cookie: 63 calories 0.2 g fat 14.7 g carbohydrate 0.5 g fiber 1.1 g protein

Peaches and Cream Cake

A couple of weeks ago my parents came out to stay with us for the weekend. Both my husband and I were running in a race on Saturday morning (he ran in the 25k and I just stuck with the 10k) and we needed someone to watch Finley while we were hitting the pavement. My parents jumped at the opportunity to watch their little granddaughter and said they had been wanting to watch us run a race for a while now. Do they know how not-exciting it is to stand around in the cold rain waiting 50 minutes for me to run by? Oh well, they learned....

Anyway, this race also happened to fall on my mom's birthday. My mom is always trying to stay healthy and avoid sweets so I didn't want to make her a traditional birthday cake. Then I found this recipe for Peaches and Cream Cake on Mel's Kitchen Cafe. I don't know about you but since it had fruit in it, I automatically thought this must be healthy ;)

I made a few minor adjustments to the cake. First, I used whole wheat flour instead of all purpose flour. This actually give it a nutty taste that was quite delicious. Next, I used reduced fat instead of full fat cream cheese and made sure to use skim milk in the recipe. I also only used about 3 Tbsp of melted butter instead of six. I also sprinkled the top with straight cinnamon instead of cinnamon sugar. The original recipe also states that it serves 12. I easily cut this into 24 GENEROUS dessert portions.

The original recipe provides per 1/12 serving:

415 calories
20.6 g fat
53.1 g carbohydrate
1.2 g fiber
6.6 g protein

It was delicious! Of course the 4 of us couldn't polish off the whole pan so I plated up the leftovers to bring to our small group Bible study the next night.... shhhhh..... don't tell.

Peaches and Cream Cake - BETTER

Cake:
1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1 Tbsp cornstarch
1 tsp vanilla
2 eggs
1 cup skim milk
3 Tbsp butter, melted

Peaches and Topping:
29-oz can sliced peaches in own juice or 1 quart home-bottled peaches
16 oz (2 pkg) reduced fat cream cheese, softened to room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
6 Tbsp reserved peach juice
1 tsp cinnamon for sprinkling

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease a 9x13 inch baking pan with cooking spray and set aside.

In a medium or large bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, salt, sugar and cornstarch. Blend. Make a well in the center and add the vanilla, eggs, milk and melted butter. Whisk together until well combined. Spread the better evenly in the prepared pan.

Slice the peaches into bite size pieces, scattering them over the top of the batter evenly. In a medium bowl, beat the cream cheese, sugar and reserved peach juice together until light and creamy. Dollop the cream cheese mixture in tablespoon-sized spoonfuls over the top of the batter and peaches and then use a spatula to evenly spread together to form a creamy layer. It won't spread perfectly, don't worry. Sprinkle the top of the cream cheese layer generously with cinnamon.

Bake 45-60 minutes until the edges are puffed and golden and the cream cheese layer has bubbled slightly on top. If the middle is still jiggly, bake it until it no longer jiggles.

Makes 24 servings. Per serving:

168 calories 6.5 g fat 25 g carbohydrate 1.2 g fiber 3.9 g protein

Almond Butter Cookies

I'm not quite sure how long the almond butter from yesterday's post would stay fresh in the fridge so I felt I needed to find a few recipes to use it up. Why not make some cookies?

Apparently finding an almond butter cookie recipe was harder than I anticipated but I finally struck gold at the Almond Board of California's website. The recipe already used whole wheat flour and minimal butter as most of the fat comes from the healthy fat source of almond butter! If you used my recipe for almond butter, then your cookies would additionally have flax seed in them.

When I made these I was first a little taken aback by the amount of oil that was on my hands as I was rolling them out. I'm not quite sure why but they are very greasy when you roll them. The recipe also makes 36 cookies. At first, I didn't think I'd have enough dough to make that many as the dough balls were very small. But they spread out a bunch when you cook them so make sure your dough balls are about the size of ping pong balls, not bigger.

These were pretty good! They had a more subtle flavor than peanut butter cookies but tasted a bit butterier (if that's a word...). For the most part they were tender and soft although I did overcook one batch and those got a little crispy.

Almond Butter Cookies

3/4 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
3/4 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
3/4 cup smooth, unsalted almond butter. (recipe here)
1/3 cup packed light brown sugar
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 egg
36 raw whole almonds

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Spray two baking sheets with cooking spray (or just use parchment paper or Silpats like me).

In a large bowl, whisk together the flours, salt, and baking soda. In another large bowl, beat together the butter, almond butter and sugars until fluffy (about 2 minutes) Add the vanilla and egg and beat until well combined. Gradually stir in the flour mixture, blending well.

Shape the dough into 3/4 inch balls (about the size of ping pong balls or a little smaller) and place on the baking sheets. Place an almond in the center of each cookie and press down lightly. Bake for 10-12 minutes until lightly browned. Cool on a wire rack.

Makes 36 cookies. Per cookie:
80 calories
5 g fat
9 g carbohydrate
1 g fiber
2 g protein

Sugar Cookie Bars (and a ROYAL fail)

I am not really all that interested in the royal wedding. My neighbor/friend/day care provider, however, is obsessed. She did us a HUGE favor today and watched Finley on an off day starting at 6:15am - such a trooper! At first I felt really bad about asking her to get up so early but when I found out she would be up to watch the wedding anyway I guessed it wasn't that much of an inconvenience.

Out of appreciation, I wanted to make her a special thank you treat. I had been looking for the occasion to make these sugar cookie bars from Annie's Eats and I thought this would be perfect. I had these grand plans of piping royal crowns and "Will+Kate" on the cookie bars. Until I realized my piping skills mimic a 2 year old's....



Needless to say I just ended up putting sprinkles on the rest and calling it a day!

I did not intentionally health-i-fy these cookies. I did, however use unsweetened applesauce in place of the eggs since I somehow ran out of eggs. I also cut the recipe in half so I could use a 9x13 pan instead of a 13x18 pan.

These were super tasty! The frosting is especially delicious. Good for you - no. Good for your taste buds - yes.

Sugar Cookie Bars

For the cookie bars:
1 stick unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce (or 2 large eggs)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise
zest from 1/2 a lemon
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp baking soda

For the frosting:
1 stick unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
pinch salt
2 cups confectioners' sugar, sifted
2 1/2 Tbsp milk
food coloring (optional)

To make the cookies, preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9x13" pan with butter. Combine the butter and sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer. Beat on medium-high speed until light and smooth, about 2 minutes. Mix in the applesauce (or eggs). Blend in the vanilla, seeds from the vanilla bean, and lemon zest. In a medium bowl, combine the flour, salt and baking soda. Stir together with a fork to blend. Add the dry ingredients to the mixer bowl and beat on low speed just until incorporated.

Transfer the cookie dough to the prepared baking sheet and press into an even layer. Bake 10-15 minutes, until light brown. Transfer the pan to a wire rack and let cool completely before frosting.

To make the frosting, place the butter in the bowl of an electric mixer. Beat on medium-high speed until smooth, about 1 minute. Blend in the vanilla, salt, and confectioners' sugar until smooth, 1-2 minutes. Mix in the milk. Tint with desired food coloring. Spread over cookie in the pan, cut into bars and serve.

Makes 24 bars. Per bar:

188 calories 7.8 g fat 28.6 g carbohydrate 0.4 g fiber 1.5 g protein

Baked Tortilla Chips - 2 ways

So Megan at Muncher Cruncher pretty much has the same affinity (dependence) on La Tortilla Factory Tortillas as I do. I mean, seriously, how can you not love a little tortilla that is only 50 calories, 10 carbs, 7 g fiber and 5 g protein? But Megan kicked it up a notch by making an awesome snack with them.



Check out Megan's post here to see how she created baked tortilla chips out of La Tortilla Factory Tortillas.

Want a sweet treat instead? I sprinkled some with cinnamon sugar before baking and served it with vanilla low fat yogurt. Pretty much awesome...



Enjoy your snacking :)

P.B. Banana Dream

Apparently I'm on a banana dessert kick because that's what I have for you again today! Actually, at work we are doing a fruit and veggie challenge. We are challenging all of our clients to get at least five servings of fruits and/or veggies each day. Afterall, that's the minimum recommended amount of fruits and veggies you should eat a day. But do most people get that? No. Do you???

So I've been a little more aware of my fruit and vegetable intake each day. I do a pretty good job of getting at least 5 servings in each day but THE MORE THE BETTER! So lately when I've been craving something sweet, I'm reaching for a piece of fruit instead of thinking about making cookies.

This recipe is a variation of a recipe that is in one of the weight loss programs I administer in groups with my clients. It's always raved about by the clients so I thought I should give it a try. It is pretty tasty! I don't typically like vanilla yogurt but I found that I prefer Dannon brand over Yoplait. You could also try Greek yogurt for a little extra protein.

P.B. Banana Dream

2 small bananas, sliced in half lengthwise
2 Tbsp creamy peanut butter
1/2 tsp cinnamon
6 oz container fat free light vanilla yogurt

On a microwave safe plate, spread banana slices thinly with peanut butter and sprinkle with cinnamon. Cover with a paper towel. Microwave for 15 to 45 seconds, until banana is cooked and peanut butter is melted.

Top with vanilla yogurt and serve immediately.

Makes 2 servings. Per serving:

240.8 calories
8.7 g fat
37.2 g carbohydrate
4.0 g fiber
7.6 g protein

Chocolate Banana Soft Serve

It was a hot summer when I was pregnant last year. I swear it was in the 90's every day - at least it felt like it to me. One way that I found effective to cool off was to eat ice cream (every night). Needless to say, this did not help with my pregnancy weight gain. Even though I have all the nutrition training I could possibly need, I still over-indulged a little while pregnant.

Thankfully, after I had Finley I dropped the daily ice cream habit. I saw a post on Muncher Cruncher a few weeks ago on making Banana Soft Serve. I admit, I was a little skeptical. Really??? Its going to be like soft serve ice cream just by sticking a frozen banana in the blender? Right....

Well I tried it. And it worked! I did find that trying to make a single serving with just one banana didn't blend up too well. So I added a second banana and shared with my husband. It was the perfect evening sweet treat. DELICIOUS :) I also added a tsp of unsweetened cocoa powder to almost make it like chocolate soft serve.

I decided to compare it to another Chocolate/Banana ice cream. Ben & Jerry's Chunky Monkey ice cream provides the following per serving:

300 calories
18 g fat
30 g carbohydrate
1 g fiber
5 g protein

This provides

110 kcal
0.7 g fat
28.2 g carbohydrate
3.1 g fiber
1.3 g protein

Not a bad trade....

So what do you do?

Stick two frozen peeled bananas in your blender. Begin blending. Add 1 tsp unsweetened cocoa powder (if desired). Blend until smooth and creamy. Divide into two servings and ENJOY!

Snickerdoodles

Last week I ran my first 5k since my surgery/pregnancy. It was good to get out and race. I met my "logical goal" but in my head it was still disappointing that I ran it two whole minutes slower than I did two years ago. I'll get over it.... by getting faster.

Well I used the husband as a pacer since keeping a consistent pace is my biggest weakness (KINDA a big fan of going out too fast). Although he's apparently not good at pacing at my slow pace because we started out WAY TOO SLOW and ended up going super fast for the last 1.5 miles. Oh well. ANYWAY since we were both running in the race we needed somewhere for this precious child to go.



So I put on facebook that I needed someone to watch Finley on Saturday morning and would pay in cookies. Within 5 minutes I had a suitable taker! I'm not sure if its because Finley is so cute or because cookies are so tasty ;)

Anyway, I made snickerdoodles which I did not healthify in any way, shape or form. Sigh.... but they were good! I got the recipe from Martha Stewart's website.


Snickerdoodles

2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp cream of tartar
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
1/2 cup vegetable shortening
1 3/4 cups sugar, plus more if needed
2 Tbsp ground cinnamon, plus more if needed
2 large eggs.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees with one rack in the top third and one rack in the bottom third of the oven. Line baking sheets with silpats or parchment paper; set aside.

Mix together flour, cream of tartar, baking soda and salt; set aside. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, combine butter, shortening and 1 1/2 cups sugar. Beat on medium speed until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Scrape down sides of bowl. Add eggs and beat to combine. Add dry ingredients and beat to combine.

In a small bowl, combine remaining 1/4 cup sugar and the ground cinnamon. Use a small ice cream scoop to form balls of the dough. Roll in cinnamon sugar. Place about 2 inches apart on the prepared baking sheets. Bake until the cookies are set in the center and begin to crack (they should not brown), about 10 minutes, rotating the baking sheets after 5 minutes. DO NOT OVERBAKE. Transfer the sheets to a wire rack to cool about 5 minutes before transferring the cookies to the rack. Store in an airtight container up 1 week.

Makes 4 dozen.

Nutrition facts per cookie:
94 calories
4.3 g fat
13.1 g carbohydrate
0.3 g fiber
1.0 g protein

Pistachio Chocolate Chip Cookies

My grandfather was a very active man. In the last few years of his life after my grandma had passed away, he lived with my parents. Even though he was 89 years old, he still enjoyed hiking at the local state parks and walking around the indoor track at the local high school as part of the town senior center. Every day he would drive to the track and walk at least a mile with one of the ladies from the senior center (after all, once you're 89 its mostly ladies at the center as all the men have died off). One day in December, my grandfather drove to the track, began to walk around it and had to sit down to catch his breath. It was there that he passed away quickly and painlessly from a heart attack.

I don't mean to tell this story as a sad one, but rather to show the commitment to physical activity that my grandfather had. When he passed away my parents hosted visiting hours at their house the day before the funeral. (That is a WHOLE other story - he narrated his own life video and had us show it at his funeral, talk about creepy!). At the visiting hours my brothers and I chuckled at all the ladies from the senior center who knew exactly how to work the situation. They came in, signed the guest book, walked straight to the food, filled up a plate and claimed seats around the dining room table. I suppose at a certain age going to visiting hours for a deceased friend is pretty common.

The biggest hit at the visiting hours was a batch of cookies brought over by a neighbor. They were so good that no only did myself and my sister-in-law ask for the recipe from my mom's neighbor. BUT, one of the cute little ladies from the senior center even wrote a thank you note to my mom for hosting the visiting hours and asked her to pass along the recipe if possible.

Now these cookies aren't necessarily healthy but they are a tasty treat! They are small cookies so I suppose if you can stop yourself from eating 5 of them they could be calorie controlled. The key ingredient in these is pistachio pudding mix. I've tried the same recipe with other flavor of pudding mixes and never have liked it as much as the cute green originals. Give it a try!

Pistachio Chocolate Chip Cookies

2 sticks (1 cup) margarine
2 boxes instant pistachio pudding mix
1 egg
2 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
12 oz. bag chocolate chips

Mix together until well blended margarine and pudding mix. Once well blended, add in egg. Stir in flour and baking soda. Once well combined stir in chocolate chips with wooden spoon.

Spoon by level tablespoon (they are small cookies) onto baking sheet. They don't spread out much but give them about an inch between cookies. Bake at 350 degrees for 11-13 minutes. They should not turn brown.

Makes 60 cookies.

Per cookie (good luck eating just one!)
74 calories
4.8 g fat
7.1 g carbohydrate
0.3 g fiber
1 g protein

What's the most unusual way you acquired a new recipe?

Butternut Cake

Whoops! Meant to take a picture before I sliced it up to give away. Too late - here it is all sliced.

We've been trying to introduce solid foods to Finley. I'm not sure what her deal is but its not going so well. She pretty much screams, shakes and gags like we're trying to poison her. At this rate I'm going to have to go to her kindergarten class every day to feed her since she'll likely still only be taking in milk. We've tried rice cereal, oats cereal, bananas, sweet potatoes and now butternut squash.

I've been making my own baby food with this fancy contraption and its super easy and actually tasty. But since she eats approximately 1 Tbsp a day (and by "eats" I mean spits back out) I obviously end up with left over produce. So I decided I needed to find a recipe to use up the extra butternut squash this weekend.

I found this recipe for butternut squash cake on Fine Cooking. It looked delicious! AND I knew I could make a couple healthy changes. As listed, this recipe provides per serving:

368 calories
13.6 g fat
58.9 g carbohydrate
1.5 g fiber
4.0 g protein

I simply substituted applesauce for the oil and just omitted the frosting recipe completely. I'm sure its really good with the frosting but to be honest, I didn't know what I was missing so I thought it was delicious even without it! In addition to those healthy changes, there are many healthy benefits to eating butternut squash. It is high in potassium which helps with bone and heart health. It is also a good source of vitamin B6 which can improve both the nervous system and immune system. Like most orange fruits/vegetables, it is high in beta-carotene which can help with eye health. AND a 1 cup serving of butternut squash provides almost half a day's vitamin C. (Although I'm pretty sure there's not a whole cup in each slice of cake... but its got to have some, right???)

So, if you're going to have cake, you might as well make it benefit you somehow ;)

Butternut Cake - BETTER

1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
3 cups all purpose flour
1 1/2 cups granulate sugar
1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
2 large eggs
1 Tbsp distilled white vinegar
2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp table salt
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp grated nutmeg
3/4 cup lowfat buttermilk
2 1/4 cups peeled and grated butternut squash

Position a rack in the center of the oven and heat the oven to 325 degrees. Butter and flour a 10-cup Bundt pan; tap out excess flour.

In a large bowl with a hand mixer or in a stand mixxer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter and sugar on medium speed until well combined, about 1 minute. Add the applesauce and beat until combine, about 15 seconds. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well on low speed. Add the vinegar and vanilla and mix again until just combined. Add half of the flour and the baking soda, salt, ginger and nutmeg, mixing on low speed until just combined. Add half of the buttermilk and mix until just combined. Repeat with the remaining flour and buttermilk.

Stir the squash into the batter and transfer the batter to the prepared pan; smooth the top with a rubber spatula. Bake until a cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean, about 1 hour. Cool on a wire rack for 30 minutes; then carefully invert the cake onto the rack and remove the pan. When cake is completely cool, transfer it to a serving plate.

Makes 16 generous portions. Per serving:
237 calories
6.7 g fat
41.1 g carbohydrate
1.6 g fiber
3.9 g protein

Carrot Cake

Last weekend I had both Paul and my families over for lunch after church for Finley's dedication. We had a pasta bar with bolognese, marinara, bowtie pasta, cheese ravioli, garlic bread, salad, etc. For dessert I wanted something other than a traditional cake. After wracking my brain all week long, I finally came up with it - CARROT CAKE.

I don't care that we're in the dead of winter and its more of a spring food, who cares. It sounded good and that's what I made. Needless to say - IT. WAS. AWESOME. I may or may not have had a piece (or two) when I came home from my run the next day. Ahh.... I wish there was more left over.... oh well.

Original recipe provides:
525 calories
29.7 g fat
62.1 g carbohydrate
1.2 g fiber
4.5 g protein

Now I realize that dessert is dessert and I should try to make it the best thing ever for me, but I did make a few alterations. I got the original recipe from food.com . The recipe does call for this to be made as a three layer cake. That is WAY too much work for me, so I did it in a 9x13 pan - WAY EASIER. The only substitutions that I made was that I substituted the oil with unsweetened applesauce (surprise! I always do that...) and for the frosting I used fat free cream cheese instead of it's full fat counterpart. You would have never known the difference!

Carrot Cake - BETTER

1 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
2 cups flour (you could probably use whole wheat flour although I did not)
2 tsp baking soda
1 pinch salt
3 cups grated carrots
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla

Icing
1/4 cup butter
8 oz fat free cream cheese
3 1/2 cups powdered sugar

Beat applesauce and sugar, then add eggs. Mix in the rest of the cake ingredients in the order given. Beat for 1 minute.

Pour into 9x13 pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 35 minutes (This may take a little longer since its in a 9x13, not three 9-inch cake pans).

Once cake has completely cooled, mix the butter and fat free cream cheese together until smooth, then add sugar a little at a time. Beat until smooth. Frost cooled cake.

Makes 18 servings.
318 calories
4.6 g fat
65.1 g carbohydrate
1.4 g fiber
5.5 g protein

Pumpkin Blondies

A few nights ago I hosted my husband's track team at our house for dinner. I made a baked potato, chili and salad bar for the 30+ athletes that could make it out to the middle of no where to our house one snowy night. Even though those athletes brought with them a big appetite, I still had a TON of food leftover (some of it not even prepared). But with all these chopped veggies for salad toppings, I knew they wouldn't stay fresh forever and I needed a way to use them up quickly. So I sent an email out to a bunch of our friends and invited about 10 more people over for lunch after church on Sunday. Everyone was up for a tasty free meal!

Well Sunday morning rolled around and I had a mini-panic when I realized I did not have any dessert to serve with my leftover chili/potato/salad bar. So I did a little brainstorming and decided that a bar cookie would be the fastest to prepare since I wouldn't have to form each cookie. I could whip up the ingredients and put it in the oven while I finished getting ready for church. I found this recipe for Pumpkin Blondies on The Girl Who Ate Everything and I had all the ingredients (except white chocolate chips, so I substituted semi-sweet...). It was perfect!

As originally posted, each bar provides:
229 calories
12.3 g fat
32.6 g carbohydrate
1.1 g fiber
2.5 g protein

It turned out awesome, I got lots of complements on how tasty they were. I made a couple changes. I swapped out half of the flour for whole wheat flour. I also substituted half of the butter with unsweetened applesauce. In a traditional cookie I wouldn't normally do this as the butter provides structure to the cookie. But since it was a bar, I figure it didn't need to hold its shape as much in the oven. I also like that this recipe calls for 24 servings which is a decent size bar once they are all cut. If you wished to slash your calories or fat even more, cut them into smaller pieces.

Pumpkin Blondies - BETTER

1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 Tbsp pumpkin pie spice
3/4 tsp salt
1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
1 1/4 cup brown sugar
1 large egg
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup pumpkin puree
1 cup white chocolate chips (or semi-sweet in my case)
1 cup butterscotch chips
1/2 cup pecans, chopped (optional and not included in the nutrition facts)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line a 9x13-inch baking dish with foil. In a medium bowl, combine the flours, pumpkin pie spice, baking soda and salt. Stir together and set aside.

In a separate bowl, beat butter, applesauce and sugar on medium-high speed of a hand mixer or stand mixer until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Beat in the egg and vanilla until well combined. Mix in the pumpkin puree. With the mixer on low speed, add the dry ingredients and mix just until incorporated. Fold in the chocolate chips and butterscotch chips (and pecans, if using) with a rubber spatula.

Spread the batter evenly into the prepared pan. Bake until the edges begin to pull away from the sides of the pan and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with just a few crumbs, about 35-40 minutes. Transfer the pan to a wire rack and let cool completely before cutting.

To serve, lift the cake from the pan using the foil and transfer to a cutting board. Peel off the foil and using a sharp knife, cut into 24 squares.

Makes 24 pieces. Each pieces:
195 calories
8.5 g fat
32.8 g carbohydrate
1.6 g fiber
2.6 g protein

Cinnamon Sugar Pretzels

I love pretzels. My whole family loves pretzels (especially my little brother and I). My mom loves pretzels in spite of the fact that they give her hiccups (seriously). If given the choice between pretzels, chips, tortilla chips, or cheetos. I'd go with pretzels every time. In fact, I'm not a HUGE potato chip eater. Maybe an occasional BBQ, but not that much. My husband, however, LOVES potato chips. When I was pregnant I had a pretty easy pregnancy, no morning sickness, not a whole lot of aches and pains. But the one thing that made me completely nauseous was the sight and sound of my husband eating potato chips. I would make him stay in the kitchen if he was going to eat them.

ANYWAY... the whole point of all of this is to tell you I love pretzels. And when I saw this post on Real Mom Kitchen for Cinnamon Sugar Pretzels, I thought - What a perfect snack to bring to my pretzel lovin family's Christmas.

I'll be honest, the only small change that I made was to reduce the amount of oil to 1/2 cup. BUT here are some other ideas for healthifying these pretzels:

Preportion them in little snack size bags.
Use a baking sugar substitute like Splenda-for-baking instead of sugar.
Use whole wheat pretzels to increase the fiber

Cinnamon Sugar Pretzels- Slightly BETTER

16 oz bag pretzel twists
1/2 cup canola oil
1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp cinnamon

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Place pretzels in a roasting pan. In a small bowl, combine oil, sugar and cinnamon. Pour over pretzels and stir to coat.

Bake for 10 minutes. Remove from oven and stir. Return to oven and bake for 1o more minutes. Remove from oven and stir again. Return to oven one last time and bake for 10 more minutes.

Remove from oven and allow to cool. Store in an air-tight container.

Makes 16 servings. Per serving:
193.2 calories
7.8 g fat
28.9 g carbohydrate
1.1 g fiber
2.6 g protein

Pumpkin Whoopie Pies

Christmas cookies have always been a great tradition in my family. I remember my mom making a handful of varieties of cookies and making dozens of each variety. We would get to snack on them through out the Christmas season as well as make up trays for our teachers, take them to cookie exchanges and walk a few over to our neighbors. In past years I have also kept up the tradition of making a bazillion kinds of cookies over the holidays. In fact, at my own wedding I had a homemade cookie buffet in which I served over 100 DOZEN homemade cookies made by myself and the women in my family.

But the last two years have been a little bit of a dry spell for me in the cookie making department. Last year, I had just had foot surgery 1 month prior to Christmas and had a hard time hobbling along in the kitchen on one foot and crutches. We also lived in a TINY apartment with a poor excuse for a kitchen for the small amount of time between when our old house sold and we were building our new house. So, Christmas of 2009 was cookie-less. Christmas 2010 rolled around and I never seemed to have the time make cookies. I'm not sure if having a new child threw my cookie making schedule a curve ball but it just seemed it wasn't going to happen this year.

Finally, on December 23rd, I got the Christmas treat bug and jumped to action. I decided I would make one batch of cookies and would try to make them healthier. I had saved a link to the Swanky Pear's Pumpkin Whoopie Pies a few months back and thought I could still bake with pumpkin in December. So that was the start (and end) of my Christmas cookie baking this year.

Each cookie in the original recipe provides:

161.5 calories

7.8 g fat

24.3 g carbohydrate

0.8 g fiber

1.5 g protein

These cookies have almost a cake like consistency and therefore, could handle a few changes in them. First, I substituted unsweetened applesauce for the oil. (Obviously I canned a lot of applesauce this fall!). Next for the filling I used fat-free cream cheese instead of full fat cream cheese. I also used 1/4 cup butter, instead of 1/2 cup butter (actually by accident as I read it as half a stick but really it was supposed to be a full stick). But, either way, it turned out delicious!

Pumpkin Whoopie Pies - BETTER

3 cups flour
2 Tbsp cinnamon
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/8 tsp allspice
1/2 cup sugar
1 1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1 cup unsweetened applesauce
3 cups chilled pure pumpkin puree
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla

Filling:
3 cups powdered sugar
8 oz. fat free cream cheese
4 Tbsp (1/2 stick) butter
1 tsp vanilla

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat.

2. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda, salt, ginger, all-spice and nutmeg. Set aside.

3. In a separate bowl, whisk the granulated sugar, the dark brown sugar, and the unsweetened applesauce together. Add the CHILLED pumpkin puree and whisk to combine thoroughly. Add the eggs and vanilla and whisk until combined.

4. Gradually add the flour mixture to the pumpkin mixture and whisk until completely combined.

5. Use a small cookie scoop or a large spoon to drop a rounded, heaping tablespoon of the dough onto the prepared baking sheets, about 1 inch apart. I also kept the bowl of batter in the freezer between batches to keep it chilled. The batter is quite thin and works better a little chilled.

6. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes, making sure that the cookies are just starting to crack on top and a toothpick inserted into the center of a cookie comes out clean. The cookies should be firm when touched. Remove from the oven and let the cookies cool completely on a cooling rack.

7. To make the filling, beat the butter on medium speed until smooth with no visible lumps, about 3 minutes. Add the cream cheese and beat until smooth and combined, about 2 minutes. Add the powdered sugar a little at a time, then add the vanilla and beat until smooth.

8. To assemble the whoopie pies: Turn half of the cooled cookies upside down. Pipe the filling (about a tablespoon) onto that half (I used a ziplock bag with the corner clipped, made quick work!). Place another cookie, flat side down, on top of the filling. Press down slightly so that the filling spread to the edges of the cookie. Repeat until all the cookies are used. Put the whoopie pies in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes to firm before serving. These also freeze well for later.

I made 52 sandwiches in my batch.

Each cookie provides:

107.5 calories

1.3 g fat

25.0 g carbohydrate

0.8 g fiber

1.8 g protein

Puppy Chow

There are certain foods that with just the mere mention of their name causes my husband to drool. Hot dogs, wings, baked French toast, German chocolate cake, etc. Puppy Chow is definitely one of the top 5 drool-worthy snacks in my husband's book. When Crispix was on sale a few weeks ago, I decided to buy a couple boxes so I could make a large batch of Puppy Chow to give out with some Christmas gifts and to also take to our parents' houses for munchies.

Puppy Chow, the sweet, distant cousin of Chex Mix, is typically some combination of Crispix, chocolate, peanut butter, butter and powdered sugar. I used this recipe from allrecipes. Now I made the full fat, not good for your hips version. But as I was making it, I was thinking to myself. If I were going to make this healthier, what could I do? I came up with a few options for you to try.

• Use solely wheat Chex, instead of Crispix, for higher fiber content.

• Use half as much butter, or try none at all. It might take a little experimentation as you still want it to be able to coat the cereal.

• Try natural peanut butter or almond butter instead of regular old creamy Jif.

• Add in dried cherries or raisins for fiber, vitamins and minerals.

• Use half as much chocolate or try with dark chocolate chips for antioxidants.

• If worse comes to worse - portion out small portions of this delicious treat into snack size ziplock bags to prevent possibly inevitable over-eating.

Merry Christmas!

Caramel Apple Cheesecake Bars

First of all, everything about this recipe sounds awesome. And I can only imagine that as the recipe as posted by The Girl Who Ate Everything, it is amazing. But also sounds incredibly indulgent:

Per serving (makes 24 servings)

377.5 calories

22.4 g fat

46.7 g carbohydrate

1.3 g fiber

5.0 g protein

I decided to make this recipe way before I tried to make it healthier. I was going to an event at church and knew this would be the perfect fall dessert. But I just couldn’t bring myself to put three packages of cream cheese into. I read the original blog post more thoroughly and noticed that the original recipe was from Paula Deen and the filling only had TWO packages of cream cheese – voila! I could make that!

When making desserts healthier, you have to tread carefully. Certain ingredients (often butter and eggs) have structural roles in the recipe and really can’t be substituted. So you have to come up with other ways to improve the nutritional value. Whole wheat flour – although calorically similar to all purpose flour – can provide added fiber to a recipe, which was one way I tried to improve the recipe. In this recipe I like the whole wheat flour, it provides a nutty taste to the crust.

Caramel Apple Cheesecake Bars – BETTER

Crust:

2 cups whole wheat flour

½ cup firmly packed brown sugar

1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened

Cheesecake Filling:

2 (8-ounce) packages of reduced fat cream cheese

½ cup sugar, plus 2 tablespoons, divided

2 large eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

Apples:

3 Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored and chopped

½ teaspoon ground cinnamon

¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg

Streusel topping, recipe follows

½ cup sugar free caramel topping

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a medium bowl, combine flour and brown sugar. Cut in butter with a pastry blender (or 2 forks) until mixture is crumbly. Press evenly into a 9x13 baking pan lined with heavy-duty foil. Bake 15 minutes or until lightly browned.

In a large bowl, beat cream cheese with ½ cup sugar with an electric mixer at medium speed until smooth. Then add eggs, 1 at a time and vanilla. Stir to combine. Pour over warm crust.

In a small bow, stir together chopped apples, remaining 2 tablespoons sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Spoon evenly over cream cheese mixture. Sprinkle evenly with Streusel topping. Bake 30 minutes or until filling is set. Drizzle with sugar free caramel topping and let cool. Serve cold and enjoy!

Streusel Topping:

1 cup firmly packed brown sugar

1 cup whole wheat flour

½ cup quick cooking oats

½ cup (1 stick) butter, softened

In a small bowl, combine all ingredients until crumbly.

Nutrition Facts (24 servings)

294.1 calories

15.9 g fat

40.9 g carbohydrate

2.7 g fiber

5.0 g protein