20

Mar

Sam’s Birthday Treats

Sam, our dog, is pretty awesome.

I know, you might have a dog or cat or mouse whom you think is the most awesome, and that’s all well and fine. I’m certainly not PETA pet owner of the year, but I love our little spotted dog. He is half playful and half snoring lap dog. Sam is a bundle of fun that loves his treats, too. OF COURSE, don’t we all love treats?

For Sam’s 5th bday this year, I thought it would be fun to make him some little natural treats. Turns out, I had all of the ingredients at home to make peanut butter banana swirl treats. Actually, the recipe is similar to a banana bread recipe that I like to make. Sorry, I digress. I found a site that had quite a few dog food recipes, and this one looked like fun. It took a little time, but it was fun to roll these little jewels for Sam. And, since our dog is small (16 pounds), I STILL have treats for him, a month later. When I rolled the swirls together, I made 4 sections and froze three of them. When he’s running low on treats, I just take out a roll, let it thaw a bit, slice it up and bake it. Really easy. I sliced these treats pretty thin, so there was actually enough dough to make about 80 treats for little Sam. WAY cheaper than treats from the store–bonus!

Pooch Peanut Butter Swirls
 

Adapted from here

Dough #1: 2 cups whole wheat flour
1/3 cup cornmeal
2/3 cup water
1/3 cup peanut butter
1 egg
Combine all #1 ingredients and mix thoroughly. Knead on a lightly floured surface. Set aside.

Dough #2:
 2 cups whole wheat flour
1/3 cup cornmeal
1/2 cup mashed banana
1 egg white
2/3 cup water
2 Tbsp. vegetable oil
 1 Tbsp. honey
 1 Tbsp. cinnamon

Combine all #2 ingredients and mix thoroughly. Knead on a lightly floured surface.


Roll each dough separately to a 1/8 inch thickness, into rectangles. Place the dark dough on top, then roll up like a jelly roll. Wrap the roll in plastic and chill in the freezer for one hour. (You can make 4 smaller rolls and freeze the other three for later.) Cut the roll into 1/4 inch slices. Place them on a cookie sheet sprayed with non-stick spray. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.

Yield: 56 pieces 

Happy treating!
Laurel

~Laurel~

14 years ago Short URL

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26

Apr

Puffy Scones

Have you ever walked in a kitchen with no plan? I just did. The result?


puffy scones (vegan)

these scones bring a little surprise by adding the toppings in the middle of this sweet, healthy dough. they’re low fat, low calorie and the small size allows you to snack on them any time of the day.

*makes 12-15 scones*
 
 1 cup all-purpose flour, plus more for rolling out dough
1 cup wheat pastry flour
1/2 t. baking soda
1/2 t. baking powder
1/4 t. salt
1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
1/2 cup light vanilla soymilk
3 TB agave syrup 

toppings: (choose what you like)
1/2 cup sweetened coconut
1/2 cup chocolate chips/shavings
1-2 t. cinnamon sugar
 
step 1: preheat oven to 350. mix dry ingredients in medium bowl.
step 2: mix wet ingredients in a different medium bowl.
step 3: stir wet into dry ingredients. form into dough, which will be a little sticky.

step 4: flouring surface of a sheet of wax paper or counter surface, roll out dough into an egg shape (about 12″ lengthwise and 7-8″ width).


step 5: add toppings to one half of the “egg.” roll the plain half of dough over to the topping half of dough, making it a 2-layer dough with the topping in the middle. using 2″ cookie cutters, cut out your mini scones. place them on a non-stick baking mat.














step 6: bake for 8-10 minutes, until slightly firm but soft as well.

 e a t…lots.


 easy, simple ingredients, healthy!


~Laurel~

15 years ago Short URL

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11

Apr

Pizza and Scones

Tonight involved a couple of fun recipes. Matt & I made a homemade pizza (how have I never made a crust from scratch before?)…the crust wasn’t super pretty, but the pizza was DELICIOUS! I give Matt the credit. We made it up as we went (including the crust), and it turned out well. Who needs a cookbook, anyway? (Haha, I DO!!!! And I inherited the love of cookbooks from my mom and grandmother, so it only comes naturally, right?)

Here are the ingredients:

Mattycake, mattycake, baker’s man…whole wheat crust,

Gigantor pepperoni, shredded mozz/asiago/parm, and Red/Green/Yellow bell peppers…Ole!,

Black olives,

FRESH rosemary,

Some garlic,

A little more mozz,

and BAM! Pizza! (425 in the oven for 15 min.)

If we left off that second layer of cheese, this would’ve been low fat. But with the whole wheat crust (made only with water, yeast, salt and olive oil–no butter), the fresh veggies and herbs, it turned out to be a pretty healthy meal.
(Of course, I forgot to make the salad…maybe tomorrow night.)

NOW ON TO THE SCONES…

I am a self-proclaimed lover of all things baked and sweet. I can’t help it, my sweet tooth has progressed to my head, limbs, and is quickly reaching my pinky toes. I try to contain it, but sometimes the only way to express my love for buttery, sugary confections is to bake it out.

These One-Eyed Blackberry Scones were based on Tyler Florence’s Orange Glazed Blueberry Scones, but I completely changed it up! So, while I give Tyler thanks for the inspiration, I received a grade of an “F” for following his recipe and an “A” for creativity and making my own up. (Ha, well, I tried at least.)

1 1/2 cups of wheat flour
1/2 cup of all-purpose white flour
1/2 t. salt
1 T baking powder
1/3 c sugar
1 t cinnamon
1 t almond extract
1/2 t nutmeg
1/4 c unsalted butter (1 stick, cut with pastry blender)
3/4 cup half and half (or coffee creamer)
1 egg
1 carton blackberries

Combine dry ingredients and extract in bowl, while combining butter and egg in 2nd bowl. Combine wet ingredients into dry ingredients, but not overmixing the dough.
Roll the blackberries in additional 2 T of flour; this keeps them from sinking to the bottom of the scone when baking. Roll into 2 T-increments and bake for 20 minutes at 425 degrees.
Enjoy!



~Laurel~

16 years ago Short URL

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