Zucchini Banana Bread Muffins

 

Do you have picky eaters?  Oh boy! I do.  I struggle to get my boys to eat vegetables.  My oldest will eat raw carrots and spinach with out much fuss.  I use to be able to get him to eat some broccoli but it has been more than a year since I have been able to get him to eat any.  He will eat mild baby lettuce like romaine but I most just give him raw spinach instead because it has more good stuff in it.  My youngest will eat raw spinach and broccoli and some times cauliflower.  For a short time he was really into Baby Bella Mushrooms until he ate one that he didn’t like and that was it. 

 

So you can see how I have to get creative in getting them their vegetables.  Oh did I mention that they won’t eat mixed foods like stir fry or fried rice or casseroles?  My oldest will eat lasagna and that is only because Garfield likes it.  Other than that they don’t like sauces so I can’t hide vegetables in there.  That leaves me with baked goods. 

 

We make banana muffins usually for Saturday or Sunday morning breakfasts.  They are easy to make.  I make them small so that they can be eaten in 2-3 bits for the kids….this is less wasteful.   Regular muffins usually get put aside after they eat the tops.  They also leave crumbs all over the place, unlike mini muffins.  Right now I have a lovely garden going and I am growing my own zucchini, among other things.  Zucchini has a nice mild flavor and even a touch of sweetness to it.  Have you ever grilled it?  You really should try it.

 

I made these this weekend with my modification and the boys loved them.  They didn’t even seem to notice the change.  Which is surprising for my boys cause they notice most slight changes in taste and texture.  They don’t like to try new foods very often.

 

Ok on with the recipe.

Ingredients:
2 ripe bananas

1 medium zucchini
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter, margarine or (shortening)
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
2 1/2 cups Gluten Free Flour Mix
1/2 cup chopped pecans (optional)
a dash of lemon or lime juice if freezing (optional just keeps the bananas from browning)

To prepare the zucchini you will need to grate it.  I peeled mine to get rid of the tell tale green that screams “THERE’S VEGETABLE IN THERE!  DON’T EAT THEM! SHE IS TRICKING YOU!”  Then I used my trusty micro grater to basically make a fine pulp.  If you have a food processor (which I don't), you can just put the zucchini in with the bananas and process them till it is smooth.  Since I have  a stand mixer  I blend the bananas, grated zucchini, sugar, butter,eggs and vanilla.  Add remaining ingredients and process/mix till smooth.  Note: depending on the water content of the zucchini you may need to add a touch more flour.  It should turn out about the consistency of  brownie batter.

Pour into desired baking pans and bake at 350 degrees until firm. Mini muffins: 6 minutes, regular tins: 10-15 minutes, mini loaves: 15 minutes, bread loaf: about 60 minutes (I have a mini muffin maker (kind of like a waffle iron for muffins) and I usually leave them in for 5 minutes)

You can add an extra banana and omit the eggs, you can omit the sugar and add 1/4 cup honey, you can omit the nuts. You can also find egg replacer at a health food store. Love having it around for times when I am low on eggs and want to bake something.

 

These muffins are also good to travel with but I recommend putting them in a container rather than a plastic bag (so they don’t get crushed).  I like to make these when we are going on a trip or camping.  The mini muffins are handy for on the go because they don’t make much mess.  When I make them I put them on a plate on the table and they slowly disappear.  There is no fussing over my kids to make them eat something when I do this. 

 

My feeding responsibility lies in making sure they have opportunity to eat something healthy.  Their responsibility is to eat it when they are hungry and stop when they are satisfied.  I think we put way to much emphasis that they need to eat everything on their plate.  However, I do get after them for eating everything but their vegetables.  I think if more people worried more about if they eat their vegetables and less about “cleaning their plate” then we wouldn’t have over weight kids.  They wouldn’t learn to over eat.  Kids naturally want to stop eating when they are satisfied.  Aren’t they promoting these days that it is better to eat more smaller meals than 3 large meals?  Just food for thought. 

Yummy Parsnip Muffins-Gluten and Dairy Free

I know what you are thinking……”Parsnips? Yummy?” Yes they can be yummy. I can’t say that I eat parsnips all the time. What I can say is that I have prepared them before and not cared for their flavor. So when I say this is yummy, I am not kidding around. If I didn’t like them you would not be reading this. If my husband and one of my two boys didn’t like them, you wouldn’t be reading this.

Last weekend I was watching Good Eats on Food Network. Alton Brown had an entire show on preparing parsnips so that children would not only eat them but ask for seconds. The first thing he made was parsnip muffins. They looked pretty tasty. His version had roasted almond slivers on top and looked much like muffins you would buy in a bakery.

I decided I would try to make a gluten free version of these muffins since my son can’t have gluten. What is the point of making these the normal way if my child (whom I am trying to get to eat more vegetables) can’t eat them? So I can’t tell you if these taste “just like” his but I can say that we liked them. My oldest son is avoiding them because they are a new food (even though they look much like the banana muffins he loves). My younger son who is in many ways even more picky than his brother said “Mmmm these are super yum!”

My version has the texture of banana or pumpkin bread but a slight lemony flavor. Even though there is no lemon in them.

Thanks Alton for the inspiration!!! Here is Alton's original recipe.

Ingredients

1-ounce sliced almonds (optional)

nonstick spray

8-1/2 ounces Gluten Free Flour Mix

1 teaspoon Xanthan Gum

1 teaspoon baking powder

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg (Alton recommends freshly grated, I say use what you got ;)

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

3 whole eggs

3/4 cup soy yogurt (I used 1/4 cup soy sour cream + 1/4 cup soy cream cheese + 1/4 rice milk because it is what I had on hand) Plain soy yogurt is harder for me to find with out driving all over the place.

1/4 cup vegetable oil (I used canola)

8 ounces sugar

10 ounces grated parsnips (I processed the gratings into a pulp to hide them better)

Directions

Place the almonds in a single layer in a pie pan and place in the oven. heat the oven to 375 degrees F. Bake the nuts until lightly toasted, approximately 20 minutes while the oven heats. Meanwhile, spray a standard 12 cup muffin tin with the nonstick spray and set aside.

I skipped that first part because I used my mini muffin maker (kind of like a waffle maker that sits on the counter). I did spray my mini muffin maker with nonstick spray.

Combine the flour, Xanthan Gum, baking powder, baking soda, nutmeg and salt in a bowl. Mix well.

Whisk the eggs, yogurt (or my substitutions listed above), vegetable oil, and sugar in a large mixing bowl until combined. Add the flour and parsnips, and fold with a spatula until all the flour is moistened.

Prepare the parsnips by peeling off the outer skin. Cut off the top end and grate all but the inner core. In Alton’s show he explains that the core is a little bitter. You want only the sweet flesh for this. I then put my grated parsnip into a food processor to make it into a finer pulp. This gives the muffins a similar texture to banana muffins. The parsnip will not break down when baking. Your children will be able to see the shredded parsnip inside the muffin when they eat it if you don’t process it down further. Just saying….. For us it is a texture thing.

Divide the mixture evenly among the muffin cups. If you are adding almonds, sprinkle the top of each muffin with the toasted almonds. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until the muffins reach and internal temperature of 210 degrees F and are golden brown. Rotate your pan half way through while baking. If needed, use a small knife to loosen the muffins and immediately remove them from the tin to a cooling rack. Alton says to cool them for 15 minutes and serve warm. We ate our mini muffins as soon as they were cool enough to bite into with out burning ourselves (which was more like a minute but remember we made mini muffins, they cool faster).

I have found that gluten free baked goods are best eaten fresh. These are best when eaten with in a day or two. I froze half of my batter for another time. I have done this for years with cookie dough, cake batter and banana muffin mixes. We bake up what we want to eat right away. When I want use use my frozen batter, I simply defrost it and bake it. This is great when you have produce that needs to be used right away before it goes bad. We like to use the frozen batters on weekends for no fuss breakfasts on Saturdays.

P.S. If you are freezing banana muffin mix add a touch of lemon juice to it and the batter won't turn brown.

With cookie dough you can partially defrost it and use what you want right then and put the rest back in the freezer. It will keep for 3-6 months.

Enjoy,

Katrina

Technorati Tags: recipe,parsnip,muffins,gluten free,dairy free

Betty Crocker Gluten Free Brownie mix

I have finally tracked it down. Betty Crocker's new Gluten Free Brownie mix. What I really wanted to know is what was in it. I wanted to know if it was dairy free as well as gluten free.

Here is the ingredient list: Sugar, Semi-sweet chocolate chips (sugar, chocoalte liquor, cocoa butter,soy lecithin, vanilla), cocoa processed with alkali, rice flour, potato starch, xanthan gum, salt. Contains Soy Ingredients.

My son has been asking me to make them since we put them into the shopping basket in the store. All that you add to this mix is margarine (butter if you can have it) and 2 eggs.

Upon getting home my son asked me to make then right away. He LOVES brownies. xoxoxoxox The mix is pretty straight forwar and you can make then in anything from an 8x8 to an 11x7 inch pan. Obviously the bigger then pan the thinner the brownies will be. I choose to put them in an 11x7 inch pan. You know to stretch them out a bit farther. The mix has mini chocolate chips in it so you have that extra bit of chocolaty goodness when you take a bite. Honestly I have had many good gluten free brownies. In some ways brownies are a bit more forgiving that some other baked goods are. I have to say that my son and I really liked these brownies. They hit our chocolate cravings right on the money! What I like about them is that this is a name brand and is fairly easy to get a hold of at a regular supermarket. The price was also resonable as well. I have purchased some gluten free mixes were more expensive and not neccessarily above an beyond in flavor. If you haven't tried it you should.

We also purchased the devil's food cake mix. I will be sure to let you know how that one is. Although you may have to wait a week or two. I am not one to have desserts around all the time. Plus with the boys going off to school next week, I will be left all alone with chocolate and that is never a good thing. Well, yes it is a good thing for my taste buds but not for my hips. ;)

They also make a yellow cake mix and chocolate chip cookie mix. One by one I will be trying all of them. I have not yet seen the yellow cake mix.

Smoreables

I found these recently and decided to try them out for my cheesecake. My 4 year old sampled a couple of the cookies and said they were good. He is so use to gluten free foods (even though he can eat anything but dairy) that he really does not notice the difference. It is just another food to him. These are about half the size of traditional graham crackers. The smore in the picture is made with one cracker split in two. We have not used them for smores. I will have to get another box some day to try them that way.

The box has a recipe for cheesecake on it. I used their recipe for the crust. At first it seemed odd. Normally when making a graham cracker crust the mixture isn't very wet. Just enough to stick together. Theirs on the other hand, was very wet. It was like taking cookie dough and pressing it into the bottom and sides of the pan (though it didn't stick to your hands because of all the margarine). However, it made for a very nice finished product. I will be looking for these again when I make cheesecake.

Yummy Donut Holes

Recently I decided to try these. I believe I got them before but it has been a really long time. These are a nice cake donut. They look like they are chocolate flavored but they are plain. We ate them as is and I put some in a bag with powdered sugar to coat them. They were good that way too. Again my more adventurous son tried them and liked them a lot. These are a great treat to have.

Crackers

For years I have been getting the plain crackers from Ener-g foods. The boys love to eat them with their cheese. When in the mood the two of them will eat most of a package in a sitting. I like the flavor. They are a good substitute for saltines or oyster crackers in your soup. Recently our local had the onion crackers. I really liked them. One of my boys has tried them and seemed to like them. This is saying something because they are both really picky and don't often like to try new things.

Oreo type cookies

We use to get the ones made by Midel. They were a good substitute. However, the middle was not creamy like the real thing and the cookies were a little more crispy. These on the other hand have a nice creamy filling and the cookies are a little more moist. In my opinion these are more like Oreo's than Midel's. This brand also make vanilla sandwich cookies.

Our Favorite pretzels

These are very nice pretzels. I catch myself eating them if they are out. My kids ask for them all the time. They are always on hand around here. They are lightly salted. What is also nice is that they are circles so my boys can easily tell if they are their pretzels or regular ones made with wheat. There is no mistaking them even for young children. For young children they also make fun edible rings.