Thursday, August 14, 2008

First week of 1st grade

My sons first week of school has been great! I have been able to spend a little time with the girl one-on-one and I have been cooking again... Why I didn't over the summer, I don't know... The first day of school my son had these great oat bars that I made for his snack (see recipe below). Day 2 he had the oat bar AND I made him "I Can't Believe I Ate the Bowl Dip" which is a refried beans and salsa dip (with shredded cheese and sliced black olives) in a yellow bell pepper "bowl". I gave him tomatoes, carrots and corn chips as the dippers. Yesterday, he got a wheat pita with turkey, raw spinach, sliced cucumbers and shredded carrot. He didn't eat that...*sigh* Today, I made him a sandwich wrap with a sundried tomato basil wrap, sundried tomato cream cheese that I made earlier yesterday, raw spinach, sliced cucumbers, grated cheddar jack cheese and shredded carrot. AND I made these GREAT chai muffins (see recipe below) that he got for a snack today! The girl helped me make those ;) Tomorrow... he will get another "I Can't Believe I Ate the Bowl Dip" and the yummy bagel chips I made from the 2 extra bagels we had from Sunday.

Wow... what to do for the weekend?!!?

Chai-can-believe-how-yummy-these-are Muffins
1 cup milk
1 heaping TBSP instant black tea
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 six ounce container of vanilla yogurt
3/4 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/3 cups wheat flour
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground cardamom
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp ground cloves
pinch of ground pepper
Preheat oven to 375F and line a muffin tin with paper liners.
Stir the instant tea in the milk and set aside.
In a large bowl whisk together oil, yogurt, sugar and vanilla.
In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and spices. Pour half into the yogurt mixture, stirring well, followed by the milk/tea mixture and the rest of the flour. Stir only until just combined, then evenly distribute into prepared muffin tin.
Bake for about 21-23 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean and the muffin springs back when lightly pressed.
Cool completely on a wire rack.
Makes 12 muffins.

Oat Bars
RECIPE INGREDIENTS:
1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 cups plain instant oats
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup softened butter
1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup chopped dried pineapple
1/2 cup coconut


1. Heat the oven to 350 degrees. In a large mixing bowl, combine the baking mix, oats, brown sugar, butter, applesauce, egg, and cinnamon.

2. Stir the mix with a wooden spoon until you have a crumbly dough. Next, fold in the coconut and the pineapple.

3. Press the dough into an ungreased 9- by 13-inch pan and bake for 17 minutes or until the center is set and the bars are slightly brown. Allow them to cool for 10 minutes before cutting. Makes 1-1/2 dozen 2- by 3-inch bars.

I made these interesting for my son my cutting out large, heart shaped "bars" with a cookie cutter. He was very impressed ;)

2 comments:

amy cohen-huffine said...

Do you think instant green or white tea would work in the muffins? What about regualr oatmeal in the bars? All I have is the 10 minute cook on the stove kind... What do they do to oatmeal to make it instant anyway? Intanteous immediosa spell or something?

PJ said...

LOL too funny... Honestly, I think you could totally leave the tea out of it... I will in my next batch just because the caffeine is unneeded. Besides flavor, I cannot imagine it would add or subtract from the baking aspect of the recipe. As for the oatmeal, I would use quick oats. No idea what spell they use ;) but the types of oatmeal are very different when baking. it MIGHT be fine... or it might be like you are eating horse food... IDK though... horses DO have pretty hair!