Tag / Recipes

by tessbrennan

Healthier Fruit Pizza

In a world of quick options, we frequently “don’t have that option” so I make things from scratch.  Since I’m making it from scratch, I may as well kick the nutrition up a bit as I go… So here is my recipe for healthier Fruit Pizza.

Start with the crust:

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  • 1 cup softened butter
  • 3/4 cup natural sugar
  • 1 1/4 Tbsp vanilla
  • 2 1/2 cup flour
  • 1/2 cup instant protein
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 tsp salt

In a large bowl with your mixer:

  1. Beat butter for 1 minute
  2. Add sugar and beat another 3 minutes
  3. Beat in vanilla and eggs – mix 1 minute
  4. Scrape the sides of the bowl if needed
  5. Refrigerate for 15-20 minutes
  6. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F
  7. Spray down your stone baking dish with olive oil (very well)
  8. I divided dough between two pans (see photos below) and spread it out with my hands.
  9. Bake at 375 degrees F for 12-15 minutes or until lightly browned
  10. Remove from oven and allow to cool slightly.

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For cream topping:

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  • 8 ounces Neufchatel Cheese (WARM & SOFT)
  • 1/4 cup sugar
  • 1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
  • 8 ounces sour cream
  • 1 tsp orange zest
  1. Beat cream cheese with mixer 2 minutes
  2. Mix in sugar & vanilla for 1 more minute
  3. Beat in sour cream until mixture is smooth
  4. Mix in zest of the orange
  5. Spread 1/2 of mixture onto each baked cookie crust and smooth around
  6. Arrange fruit around on the pizza top as desired.
  7. Chill in refrigerator for 30 minutes and slice to serve

 

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Fruit pizza with a bit of protein to stabilize blood sugar, no preservatives or artificial anything! Great for a pot luck or just as a special treat for cleaning your plate of all the veggies and protein!!!

by tessbrennan

Chocolate Covered Protein Bites-With a Sense of Humor

My darling daughter turns 6 on Friday. Saturday is her birthday and I am opting for non-traditional birthday fare…of sorts.

  • Fruit Salad with homemade organic whipped cream
  • Chocolate covered protein bites
  • Brownie pops
  • Fruit smoothies from Fresh Planet.

Tonight it was time to make the protein bites. I haven’t made chocolate for dipping in a long time, so I got to learn a valuable lesson tonight… that I will share. SmileDON’T ADD LIQUID TO YOUR CHOCOLATE!

Adding liquid to your chocolate causes it to seize and become a granular solid mass of useless schtuff!  LOL

The_Good_and_the_Bad_Chocolate

Here’s the Good the Bad and the ugly of tonight’s cooking lesson.

Instead, use 1 TBSP of grape seed oil for each cup of chips that you are using.

I melted 1 cup of white chocolate chips to coat 40 protein bites, as seen below.  I use two tiny spoons to swish them in the melted chocolate, then move them to a piece of parchment paper on a cookie sheet.  I refrigerate them for 15-30 minutes, then move them to a container for storage.

These are a nice snack/treat because they pack a nice protein punch.  I only coat them in chocolate for special occasions, but love them!!!

Click the protein bites link for the basic recipe, then just roll them in your melted chocolate or white chocolate for a tasty, special treat!

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For more information on healthy treats, contact me. I’m happy to share ideas!

by tessbrennan

Banana-Peanut Butter Cup Smoothie!

On the weekends, I make old fashioned breakfast with eggs and meat, sometimes with toast, just like my great grandparents did, its part of our family tradition.

So for lunch I have my Fast Food – maintenance smoothie.

Today it’s Banana-Peanut Butter Cup:

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* 8-10 Oz of Soy milk
* 1 TBSP Natural Peanut Butter
* 1/2 Banana
* 2 Scoops of Chocolate Soy Protein mix with Leucine.

 

Blend in the bullet until mixed and smooth & enjoy.

I don’t even wait to pour it into another cup, I just inhale it, so to speak.  Bask in the deliciousness of a healthy meal!

ahhhhhhhh

(Trying to drink it mindfully, but it’s just so good and goes down so smmmoooooootttthhhh.)

Make it a GREAT DAY!

For more information on feeling good fast, or other tasty fast food recipes, feel free to contact me.

by tessbrennan

Healthy Pumpkin Bread

We purchased a big pumpkin from the store and I was really worried about how it was going to cook up, since many sites say not to use the large pumpkins.

Well, it worked GREAT! We got 3 quarts of pumpkin puree’ and it is delicious.  We froze 1 1/2 quarts, made the following recipe with 1 pint, saved a pint for smoothies, and are making pumpkin muffins tonight with the other pint.

How we puréed the pumpkin.

half pumpkinPumpkin puree

Cut the pumpkin in half, set it in a baking dish with a 1/4 inch of water in it.

Bake the pumpkin 1/2 for 45 minutes at 350 degrees F. Take it carefully out of the oven so as to NOT splash HOT water all over yourself, flip the now cooked and soft pumpkin over into a large bowl and then scoop out the inner flesh.

I scoop the flesh into my blender and blend until it is puréed then dump it into the bowl and repeat until I have it all done.  This pumpkin yielded 3 quarts of pumpkin puree.

Now for the Pumpkin Bread Recipe. (leave the oven set at 350 degrees F)

Ingredients

  • 2 cups of pumpkin puree
  • 4 eggs
  • 2 tsp baking soda
  • 1/2 cup coconut oil
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1/2 cup veg. oil
  • 1 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 2/3 cup of water
  • 1 tsp ground nutmeg
  • 1 cup organic raw sugar
  • 1/2 tsp ground cloves
  • 3/4 cup brown sugar
  • 1/4 tsp ground ginger
  • 3 cups of unbleached flour

 

  1. In a large bowl, I mix the pumpkin puree, eggs, oils, water, & sugar until it is very well blended.
  2. In another bowl, I whisk together all the dry ingredients.
  3. Mix the dry ingredients into the wet until JUST blended.
  4. Pour into oiled bread pans. (I used coconut oil to grease them)
  5. Bake for about 50 minutes in my preheated oven and they were perfect.
  6. Loaves are done when a toothpick stuck in the center comes out clean.
  7. Cool loaves on a wire rack, slice and serve!

I hope you enjoy this bread as much as my family and co-workers have!

Pumpkin bread

Here is what the puree looks like in my freezer.  I freeze it in ziplocks in 2 cup servings, so when I want to make a recipe that calls for a can of pumpkin, I have my own pure pumpkin to cook with. Smile

pumpkin in the freezer

by tessbrennan

Making Healthy Tomato Sauce From Scratch

With the recent knowledge of our daughter’s allergy to corn, our lives are rapidly changing and its not been easy, so we are now learning to read labels and discovering that most everything, processed at all, contains a corn product of some kind & it allows me to eliminate things I may not realize may even be in our foods.

Tonight, I took a bunch of tomatoes our neighbor gave us and am processing them into a homemade spaghetti sauce that I will freeze in quart bags for use in the future.  I began by processing the raw tomatoes.

After processing the tomatoes I threw everything into the crock pot to slow cook for around 8 hours.

Here’s my recipe: (sort of – I cook by handfuls like Grandma Ringer did)

Grandma Ringer

10-12 Fresh, ripe tomatoes (processed as above)

2 Tbsp Olive Oil

1 cup of chopped, fresh onions

1/2 cup of grated zucchini (I shred & freeze mine so I have it to use when I need it)

1/2 cup of shredded carrots

3-5 cloves of Garlic sliced thin

2 teaspoons of oregano

4 teaspoons of basil

2 bay leaves

1 teaspoon sugar

Instructions:

  1. Pour Olive oil in bottom of crock, spread out the onions.
  2. Spread zucchini over onions (or drop frozen cubes around)
  3. Spread out carrots
  4. dump in peeled tomatoes & garlic
  5. Sprinkle spices over the tomatoes and stick the bay leaves down in it.
  6. Cook on low for 8-10 hours
  7. Stir, break up tomatoes further if need be
  8. Cool & pour into quart ziplocks and freeze flat.

When ready to enjoy it, thaw a quart, add some cooked ground beef, ground turkey, or shredded chicken and serve over whole wheat pasta.   Yummers!!!

Thank you Grandma Ringer (95 yrs old) for taking the time to teach me to cook with handfuls, and a love of the art of cooking that many have never been taught.  I love you!

by tessbrennan

Hearty, Healthy Chili Recipe

School starts on Wednesday of next week and I am starting a new part time position at a friend’s Insurance Agency, so I decided today would be a good day to begin preparing “heat and eat” meals.  Enter, Hearty, Healthy Chili Recipe.

In my 6 quart slow cooker I layered. Continue reading →

by tessbrennan

Spice-Rubbed Flank Steak

(This recipe is modified from July/August 2002 Issue of Energy For Women Magazine.)
We are a health conscious family, and we still like and eat meat!  The trick is to find healthier ways to fix it!

 

1 12-16 oz Flank Steak, trimmed
1 tablespoon brown sugar
3/4 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2+ teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon black pepper Continue reading →

by tessbrennan

Chicken Soup for the Sniffles/Cold…

Grandma, and the Romans were right.  Chicken soup is good for your cold, just ask the Nebraska Medical Center who conducted the studies that proved just such a thing.

Into a Crock pot place

1 whole chicken (the nutrients need to be cooked out of those bones into the broth)
Water to cover the chicken
4-5 Large Cloves of Garlic (a natural antibiotic)
1 Chopped onion (we chop it small so the young one doesn’t realize she’s eating it)
2-3 Carrots Chopped
2-3 Stalks of ORGANIC Celery (the leaves of celery like to hold onto the pesticides – no need for those here)
Salt & Pepper to taste

Let it all cook on Low for 7-8 hours.  Serve with long grain or brown rice, or high fiber/protein pasta noodles if you choose.

A major thing to stay away from when fighting a cold:  is refined sugars because they inhibit your body’s immune system.  According to Jacob Teitelbaum, MD, an internal medicine specialist and author, "The sugar in a can of soda suppresses immune function by 30 percent for three hours."   (THEREFORE: stay away from sodas, candy, and processed flours and foods, please)

Also try:

Spicy foods or perhaps a good, homemade guacamole with local grown, organic ingredients.  Avocados, Tomatoes, Bell Peppers, & Garlic are good for the body and the spicy peppers can help to clear out that congestion!

Happy recoveries to you and yours, and may your husbands not spend more than a day at a time moaning on the couch because they are sick. Smile

by tessbrennan

Healthy Peanut Butter Cup Shake

This protein shake rocks my world!  I Love it! Tasty way to start my day, boost my blood sugar and keep it from dropping later in the morning. I consider this one of my Fun Foods. Its fast, easy and starts my day off right! Everything I need, nothing I don’t.

Chocolate-Peanut-Butter-Protein-Shake

You will need

8 ounces (1 cup) Lowfat milk/Soy Milk/Almond Milk (even water)
2 scoops of Chocolate Life Protein shake (with Leucine)
1 heaping teaspoon of natural, organic peanut butter
2 ice cubes

Blend in mixer, Pour in Cup, & ENJOY!

(Almost posted a photo of my Fast Food Mustache – then decided NOT)

Smile

by tessbrennan

Healthier Cookies–Works for most Recipes

I prefer to make the cookies my family eats.  As a part of our healthier choices, I make as much of our food as possible so that I know what is in the recipes and so I have some control of the nutrition going into my families bodies.

We’ve found that by simply adding a 1/4 cup of Protein Powder, the cookies have a touch of nutrition and protein to offset the sugars.

Here’s how we “fix” the cookies.

 

  1. Cut the sugar content in half.  This way you actually get the flavor of the cookies &/or chips.
  2. Try mixing flours.  We will substitute 1/2 the flour of the recipe with Oat Flour, Soy Flour, Rice Flour, or whole wheat flour. (no one even notices the difference)
  3. Substitute 1/4 cup of Instant Protein Powder for flour.  This adds protein to the cookie.  We should always be eating a protein with our carbs to help level out the blood sugar and keep it from spiking.

Give it a try and let us know how it goes! We do it with all our cookies, our cakes, & even our bread recipes.

If you’ve got the Drive, we’ve got the Vehicle!

The Healthy Grease Monkey is a project by Tess Brennan dedicated to writing useful blog posts for consumers who are smart about Nutrition & what they put in & surround their body with, passionate about protecting our environment, and are committed to supporting local entrepreneurs. Those who are about healthy weight loss & dynamic living. If you would like to find out what it is like to live a healthy life, we invite you to explore our product line or find out more about our services. 

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