When I was growing up my Mum would make these moist, sweet, cinnamon flavored, banana fritters, which are very similar to pancakes but the consistency inside is much softer.  They were fried in oil and coated with sugar and cinnamon so there really was no need for syrup and they were delicious hot or cold.  The main ingredient in banana fritters is the banana, the batter requires no oil and no milk, just eggs and flour to form a thick batter.   Over the years, as I have become more conscious about what I am eating, I have adapted this traditional Jamaican recipe to a more healthier version.  Now, I know the word ‘Pancake’ and ‘Healthy’ are usually two words that don’t go together in the same sentence, but this healthy pancake recipe has a rich flavor of banana, moist and naturally sweet from the ripened bananas and with only 41 calories for each one, you can take that extra serving.    I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

The healthy banana pancake recipe starts with the following ingredients.  3 Very Ripe Bananas, 3 Tbsps of Whole Wheat Flour, 2 tsp baking powder, 1 Egg, t tsp of vanilla, a pinch of nutmeg and a pinch of cinnamon (ignore the tsp measurement, I didn’t use that much).

Mash the ripe bananas in a bowl and add your egg, vanilla, nutmeg and cinnamon, whisk all the ingredients together.  In a separate bowl, whisk the flour and baking powder until combined.  Whisk the flour into the banana mixture until evenly mixed.  Using a 1/4 cup measuring cup scoop out the batter and place on a warmed griddle set to 250F.

Unlike most pancakes, you have to keep the temperature very low as the banana will burn quickly if the heat is too high.  When the bottom is browned, take a spatula and gently flip the pancake over.  These pancakes can break easily if not handled gently.

Now stack em up and Serve plain.

Or with powdered sugar.

Or if you like, some maple syrup or honey.

Like peanut butter and jelly, eggs and spinach are a perfect couple, the two flavors melding to form an incredible taste.  The addition of shallots in this dish really brings additional flavor.  If you like the taste of eggs and spinach together you should really enjoy this healthy breakfast recipe.

Start by preheating your oven to 400F, then finely chop 1/3 cup of shallots (about 1 medium sized shallot or two small ones).  Add two tablespoons of water to a skillet and warm on a medium heat.  Add your shallots, 2 sprigs of thyme and a pinch of nutmeg to the skillet.  Stirring, until shallots begin to soften, about 3 to 4 minutes.

Add 12oz of spinach in batches, turning and mixing and as it softens add more spinach.  Whilst turning, look for and remove the 2 sprigs of thyme.

Continue turning until all the spinach has been added and is softened, about 3 to 4 minutes.  Season with salt and cracked black pepper.  I recommend tasting a little to ensure you have added enough salt.  Add a tablespoon of Gruyere or Parmesan cheese and mix in.  Divide spinach into two oven safe bowls and make a well in the center and crack an egg in each bowl, into the center well. Bake for 15 minutes until egg whites are firm and the yolks are beginning to set.  Cook longer if you like firmer eggs.

Who doesn’t love Breakfast in Bed, kicking back, relaxing in a comfy bed whilst someone brings you delicious treats.  Oh divine.  Well breakfast in bed  cannot be complete without a tray, the right tray is so important as you want the breakfast that you made with love to be presented on a beautiful tray.  With Mother’s Day fast approaching (see here, for an explanation), I am in search of the right tray as my small collection is desperately in need of some additional pieces.

I have been scouring the internet and found some really great choices.  Here are my favorites, which ones do you like?

This tray is practical, it has a box underneath that can hold additional treats, a tray and a container all rolled into one, fabulous for when you’re having more than one or two breakfast options.  You can find it here.

Isn’t this tray adorable?  The kids can help to make this by picking out the frame and painting the chalkboard paint.  Sam of Elephant Shoe made this great tray. Look her up and check out how to make it.

This one is really perfect for Mother’s Day, Father’s Day or any personal event.  The great thing is, it’s customizable so you can put whatever you want on it.  Monique over at Hangsthemoon (on etsy) allows you to pick your own words, phrases and color scheme.  Love, love, love it as the kids can get involved and have their names included as well as special things they love about their Mom.

Next is a gorgeous tray, with a rich, deep red color and hidden legs, perfect for breakfast in bed.  White plates against this red tray will make food look amazing.  Unfortunately it is not currently available online but if you have a World Market nearby go check it out and at only $29.99 it’s a steal.

Here are some practical trays, not much pizazz but sturdy trays that are perfect for breakfast in bed, prices are great too, the wooden tray is $45.00 and can be purchased here and the plastic trays are only $7.99 each and can be purchased here.  Can you guess which one is from IKEA?

Lastly I found a couple of DIY trays that I loved and just had to include.  The first one was a school project, posted by The Simple Wife and although instructions were not included you could buy an unfinished tray at Joanns and then get the kids to paint and decorate it.  Super cool project.

and finally this amazing tray is perfect for the Mother who likes recycled, rustic and funky things.  Made by Donna from Funky Junk Interiors.  Just beautiful.

Pot pies are the ultimate in comfort food on a cold day, it instantly warms you as you break that flaky pastry shell and find the steaming hot, tasty goodness waiting for you, it’s heaven.  I haven’t had a pot pie in years now, and the freezing temperatures in Atlanta have me craving warm, comfort foods so I thought this would be a good time to try something different for breakfast.  So here’s my breakfast version of a pot pie, and if I say so myself, “it was rather delicious”, next time I’m going to add a little cream to the filling.

Start by preheating your oven to 350F .  You’re going to need some pastry, puff pastry works best but I didn’t have any, so I used some left over pie crust (see recipe here).  Roll out your pastry and using an oven safe bowl, turn it upside down onto your pastry and cut your pastry about 1/2 to 1 inch wider than your bowl.

Turn your bowl over and add your fillings.  You need about 1 cup of fillings per bowl.  I made 5 bowls and varied what I added to each.  In the kid’s bowls I added 1/2 cup of chopped kale, 1/4 cup of diced turkey and a 1/4 cup of cup of chopped tomatoes.

Now it’s time to add the seasonings, add 1 tablespoon of diced onions to each bowl and 2 leaves of chopped basil per bowl.  Season each bowl with a pinch of black pepper and salt.  Mix the ingredients in each bowl until properly incorporated.

Make a small well in the middle of the ingredients in each bowl and crack an egg into the well.  Add a 1/4 cup of your favorite cheese, I used Swiss cheese on mine.

Cover each bowl with your pastry and press down the sides.  Put two small slits in the pastry and brush with milk.

Bake for 30 to 35 minutes.

Bagels for breakfast are amazing and there are so many different varieties, I love cinnamon raisin topped with some bananas and don’t get me started with a sesame seed bagel as they are delicious with eggs.  My kids like plain bagels, smothered with cream cheese, if you love cream cheese on your bagels as much as my kids then this recipe is for you and to make it more tempting, it is super fast and tastes delicious, as my kids say, “it’s mmmm…..”

Start with your fave cream cheese, I used a low fat, light brand of cream cheese.  Pop that into your food processor, wash and remove the stems of 5 strawberries and cut each in half and add that to the cream cheese.  Now you just have to add 1 teaspoon of vanilla and if you like your cream cheese sweet you can add 1/2 tablespoon of powdered sugar or a sugar substitute.

Switch on your food processor, if you want to have chunks of strawberries in your cream cheese, stop it within a few seconds, if not, then let it process until fully blended.

Serve on your favorite bagel and say mmmmm……….

Breakfast couldn’t be easier.

We (meaning my family) are testing out new pancake recipes, I let the kids search for something they like and then we whisk it up, cook and test it out.  They would like to do this testing daily but alas, one cannot live on pancakes alone.  Naturally, I had to set some guidelines and rules with this plan as we would be testing chocolate pancakes, chocolate chip pancakes, double chocolate chip pancakes, can you see the pattern?  So here are the rules;

RULE 1
For every sweet pancake batter there must be a healthier batch the following week.

RULE 2
Mummy gets to pick the healthy pancakes (there were lots of long faces starring back at me).

RULE 3
Everyone has to try the healthy pancakes (more long faces starring back at me).

So with the rules in place the selection began, they searched my many cookbooks which, sadly don’t have any pancake recipes so they progressed to the internet.  WOW, tons of choices, surprisingly their choice did not include chocolate, they unanimously agreed on a blueberry, lemon pancake.  So we got to work.

We put 1-1/2 cups of Evaporated Milk into a bowl along with 2 tablespoons of melted butter, the zest of 1 lemon, the juice of 1 lemon, 1 large egg and 1-1/2 teaspoons of vanilla.

The dry ingredients were put in a separate bowl and included 1-1/2 cups of cake flour, plus an additional tablespoon of cake flour, 1/4 teaspoon of salt, 1 heaping tablespoon of baking powder and 3 tablespoons of sugar. The dry mixture was whisked until fully combine.  We added the wet ingredients to the dry and whisked until just incorporated, then 1 heaping cup of blueberries were stirred in.

We heated the griddle to a medium heat and lightly oiled with butter.  A 1/4 cup of pancake batter was added to the griddle and evenly spaced.  Pancakes were flipped when ready.

So the verdict.

ADULTS
We could taste the evaporated milk in the pancake, and although I like the creaminess of evaporated milk it seemed out of place in the pancake.  The sweetness of the blueberries against the sour lemon was well balanced and pleasant.  The pancake was a little too dense and not as fluffy as I would have wished.

KIDS
Not too keen on these pancakes.

The original recipe is from the Pioneer Woman.

Mother’s Day Card. Check it out, here.

Lucky for me, I get to celebrate Mother’s day twice this year.  My Mother is coming to visit me in March and I am so excited because she hasn’t been to visit in absolutely ages.  I’ve already started planning all the wonderful things we’ll do together and of course we have to celebrate Mother’s day since she wont be here in May.  So I’m adopting March as Mother’s day this year and I’m starting my planning from now, which will definitely include breakfast and a brunch.

You may think it’s too early to be talking about Mother’s Day but that depends on what country you live in.  The idea of Mother’s day was started in America, in 1908, by a young lady named Anna Jarvis, she campaigned until 1914 when it became recognized as a National holiday.  Other countries followed but instead of using the second Sunday in May they chose different days for their celebrations.  So in Norway, Mother’s day is actually in February, in the U.K. it falls in March and in Thailand it falls in August.  You can read more about it here.

I will test out some Mother’s Day breakfast ideas and post them here, so check back regularly to see what’s cooking.

I really like quiche, it’s one of those versatile recipes that can work for breakfast, lunch or dinner and you literally have so many different options as to how to fill it, by using different meats, veggies and cheese, it tastes different each time.  Quiche originated in France from a region called Lorraine, lucky for me, my husband went to Grad school there and on one of my visits I got to taste a French made Quiche, it was absolutely divine, I fell madly in love, thick creamy eggs with a salty bacon and flaky pastry, who wanted fall for this.  I have tried time and time again to duplicate that taste and the closest I have come is by using the recipe from Le Cordon Bleu which you can find in their book Quiches & Savories.

So here is my adapted version of this recipe, the only changes I made were to the filling.

Start with some good pie crust you can find recipes here or here.  Roll out your dough and cut to the size of your pan or oven proof dish.  Grease your pan and then line with your dough.  Using a fork, prick your dough in several places so steam can escape when it’s baking.  Add some waxed paper and some pie weights or beans and bake in the oven at 350F for 30 minutes.

Whilst the pie crust is baking crack 3 eggs in a bowl and add 1/2 a cup of whipping cream.  Season with a pinch of nutmeg and whip until well blended, set bowl aside.  Now you can grater your gruyere cheese, you’ll need 2/3 cups.   Now, measure out two cups of small broccoli florets and thinly slice a quarter of an onion.  Heat a frying pan on medium heat with 1/2 tablespoon of olive oil.  Add your broccoli and onion and saute for 5 minutes until broccoli and onions are slightly softened.  Season with salt and black pepper, I like to add pepper flakes and some general all purpose seasoning as well.

When the pie crust is ready add the broccoli and cheese to the bottom and then pour the egg mixture in.

Bake for 25 to 30 minutes until the filling is set and slightly browned.

Bon Appetit

One of the things I have searched for is an easy pie crust recipe, but not just an easy or simple pie crust recipe but a pie crust recipe that is quick, easy AND tastes good.  I stopped searching when a friend bought me a great cookbook, Butter, Sugar, Flour, Eggs  by Gale Gand.  Literally every recipe I have tried from this book has come out superb, including her Simple Pie Crust Recipe.  As you can see this book has been well used, the pages are falling out and my daughter has even drawn on several pages, but it is still one of my pride and joys.   (Thank you Renee for getting this for me, I don’t think I have ever mentioned how much I love it).

So for those of you who are asking “How to make pie crust?” here it is, a perfect pie crust recipe that wont fail you, easy and delicious, that can be used for sweet or savory pies.

Start by sifting 4 cups of flour into a bowl.  Then re measure that sifted flour to ensure you have 4 ½ cups, of sifted flour, if you have too little, sift in the remaining and place in your mixer.  Add 2 teaspoons salt and 2 teaspoons of white sugar.

Mix the flour mixture with your paddle attachment for 1 minute.  Then cut 3 sticks of cold butter into pieces and add to your mixer.

Switch your mixer back on and mix until flour mixture is crumbly but you can still see clumps of butter.

Mix together 1/2 cup of ice cold water and 2 teaspoons of red wine vinegar.   (I know, I thought this was weird too and was going to quit but here’s where you have to trust Gale or rather her Mother Myrna whose recipe this belongs to.  The vinegar leaves no taste behind and helps the dough become flaky.).  Switch your mixer to medium speed and drizzle the vinegar water mixture into your mixer.  When a dough forms stop the mixer and divide dough into two round balls and wrap each ball in plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator for 30 minutes before using.  Roll out and use for savory or sweet pies.

I hope you guys are hungry because, Oh My Goodness, do I have something delicious, to share. I had some excess tomatoes in my refrigerator and decided to try and grill them for breakfast.  I am so glad I did because they were absolutely scrumptious, plus to top it all, it was quick and easy. from start to finish it took 15 minutes.

I used a variety of tomatoes, roma, vine ripened and Kumato.

I decided to use 3 tomatoes and washed and cut them in half.

I finely chopped 3 garlic cloves and 6 basil leaves and then spread them evenly over the tomatoes.

I sprinkled 1 teaspoon of salt and 1 teaspoon of black pepper over the cut tomatoes.

Lastly I drizzled 1 tablespoon of olive oil over the tomatoes.

I placed the tomatoes in a baking tray and broiled them for 10 minutes.  Oh the smell was just divine.

I served mine with a toasted English Muffin, it was so good I had it again the next day but this time I had it with some crispy breakfast potatoes.  Just delicious. Give it a try and let me know what you think.