Healthy Choc Oat Pancakes

these delicious pancakes are filling and totally feel as though your eating dessert for breakfast! My kids love these and unlike regular sugary pancakes where they ask for more and more. They are full after 2 or 3 mini Pikelets  sized ones!



what you will need:

Foodprocessor , 2 bowls, frying pan

I blend my own oats – but you could buy quick oats. This is why I used the foodprocessor. It makes the oats more floury, really fine. Where as quick oast from a packet are course and not so fine.

Ingredients:

3eggs

1 1/2 cup milk

1 1/2 cup oats (blended in foodprocessor)

4 tablespoons cacao

Small amount of Butter for frying pan



Method:

In a separate bowl place your egg whites and in the opposite add your yolks. In your bowl of yolks add the oats,milk,and cacao. Mix well!

Whisk your egg whites in the other bowl until stiff.

Slowly fold your egg whites into the bowl of oat batter.

Heat your frying pan, and grease your pan with a nob of butter. 



Place a small amount into frying pan. Waiting for little bubbles to appear on the surface. When you have roughly a dozen bubbles on the surface, flip your pancake. Cook the other side for approx 1min .

Now you should have a pancake stack





You can top these with what ever you like.

But above I have topped mine with whipped cream, chopped fresh strawberries, dark chocolate drops, toasted hazel nuts and some maple syrup.

Bon appetit 

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Hot cross bun fudge bites – recipe!

now common, who doesn’t like makin a special treat for friends and family at easter time? And who doesn’t mind licking the spoon when you make something super sweet and delicious? Well I don’t make fudge often, as it is soooooo full of nasty ingredients that will make my thighs even bigger than what they already are… But I’ll make it for my friends, so that I can feel skinny, while they stuff their faces full of it!!! Hahahaha



Delicious Easter Hot Cross Bun Fudge is super easy to make and here’s how.

Ingredients:

1 can condensed milk

100g butter

1 1/4 cup brown sugar

2 tablespoons golden syrup

1/4 teaspoon chinese 5 spice

1 teaspoon ground cloves

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon 

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1/4 cup sultana

1/4 cup currents

Method:

Mix your butter, sugar, condensed milk and golden syrup in a large glass bowl. Mix it well and place in the microwave for 10minutes on high. Every 2 minutes take it out and stirr it! If you miss this step it will burn and have gritty dried bits when you mix it together.

Mixing below



after your 10 minutes in the microwave add your spices, sultanas and currents. Mix through well.



Finally grease proof a square baking tin, or line it with baking paper if you like. Smooth it as best you can, like below.



Refrigerate it for at least 1 hour and cut into bite sized pieces. 

Delicious! 

Asian chicken salad with crispy dried shallots



This was one of the salads we were making and selling, that I had for lunch today in writers week at the adelaide fringe festival. It was the BOMB! Delicious fresh flavours, that had great texture throughout. Delicate soft rice noodles with gingery poached chicken, thinly crisp slaw topped with crunchy fried shallots.

This is a recipe where you make as much or as little as you need, so I have put the ingredients below but you add more of the flavours that you like the most.

Recipe:

Cooked rice noodles

Poached chicken

Thinly sliced cucumber (minus the seeds)

Thinly cut carrot

Shredded cabbage

Mint leaves

All tossed together

Dressing:

1/2 cup Lemon juice

1/2 cup fish sauce

1 tsp sugar

A few coriander leaves chopped

1 hot chili

1 crushed/diced garlic

A pinch of ginger 

Mango & Pretzel Bliss Balls? Say what!

okkkkk so you should know by now if your following on my Instagram account – the_middle_ingredient_leia   That I LOVE creating and inventing new crazy flavours and combinations! It’s all about texture and trying new ingredients, and exposing our 3 kids to nutrition and flavour!



So here we have used Premium Choice branded, dried mango and linseed meal! They have been great supporters in seeing me try new products and creating goodies for them to share with others who like using their health foods – and well, because they are a south Australian Buisness I want to show my support for small local businesses.

Okkkkk so your all saying HURRY UP Leia give us the recipe.

Well it’s simple, all you need is:

1 bag of dried mango

3/4 cup linseed meal

1/2 cup coconut (either shredded or decicated)

Blend or food process or thermomix or even stick blender!! If you have one of these gadgets you can make these balls. BLITZ — BLITZ — BLITZ & BLITZ some more.

Crush some pretzels, I did mine in a zip lock bag and crushed them with a heavy rolling pin. But seriously this should be easy, so do what ever you can think of to get them a bit crumbly and on tiny pieces! Trust me it will work 👍

Using a spoon scoop a bit smaller than a golf ball into the palm of your hand and roll as best shape into a ball as you can.

Roll into the pretzels. I had trouble getting a LOT to stick, but I tried my best and some was better than none. And to be honest any more and they would just be a big giant pretzel! Let them set in the fridge and go slightly hard before eating. 

They should store well and for a long time in the fridge (if they last that long)

Lime crisp cookies

who doesn’t like a crunchy cookie!?

Combine that with Lime, and you have a “WOWZER” of a combination

There is something about limes and coconut in our house – the kids love it, and mum and dad love it! Seriously can’t get enough. Now I’m kicking my self, knowing I should have made them coconut and lime. Oh well, next time!!!



Now this batch/recipe will make LOTS! Depending on stage size your after. So you may want to halve it and try them first and see if you love them as much as we do. But seriously, you know you will love ’em so just make the whole lot hahaha…

Recipe

1 1/2 lime zest

1 1/2 lime juice

250g butter

1 3/4 cup caster sugar

1 tspn vanilla

1 egg

(Mix the above ingredients well)

2  3/4 cups SR. Flour

METHOD:

Roll into small balls and press onto a tray. These are a very buttery crisp cookie, so will spread far on your tray. Give them space between each other. Bake in a fan forced 180 degree oven for 15 minutes. they will look soft when they come out, but will harden and go crunchy after cooled. Totally the type of cookie you are going to want to dunk in your cuppa!!! Or to accompany your green tea 👌

I’ve got great BALLS!

Who doesn’t like experimenting??
Who doesn’t love a good healthy snack that actually fills you up??

these coconut lime and mint bliss balls
Are to die for! Here is the recipe

1 cup of dates
1/2 lime juice
1 teaspoon lime rind
6 mint leaves
1/2 cup dedicated coconut

Blitz your dates until fine, add the juice and rind. Blitz for another minute. Break the mint leaves up with your fingers and add them to the blender and blitz for approx 30 seconds. Add your coconut and blitz until all combined well. Scoop small amounts into the palms of your hand and roll into bite sized balls.

Yum!

Did you say smoothie? Or shake? Here’s 4 your sure to LOV

Totally “HOT” in our house right now!
Hubby is in on it, kids love it – I just want to try more combinations and scream yum yum bubblegum everytime.

berry banana BOMB

This one above was made with
1 peeled and halved white flesh nectarine
1/2 frozen banana
1/4 cup frozen blueberries
5 medium sized strawberries
2 tablespoons greek yoghurt
1 tsp honey
6 ice cubes
And as much water you need to make it slurpable through a straw. Usually NOT quite 1/2cup.
Blitz it all up in the blender/foodprocessor/stab mixer – what ever youve got!! It will work, trust me

veggie mixer

Using these ingredients add some water.

1/2 carrot
1 Lebanese cucumber
1/4 cup of strawberries
Small handful of grapes
1/2 avocado
Icecubes and water
–miss 5 LOVES it, and doesn’t like avocado at all!

strawberry blitz

1/2 frozen banana
3/4 cup strawberries
1/4 cup grapes
1 heaped tablespoon vanilla yoghurt
Ice cubes and water

– amazingly my favourite!!

Pineapple lover

1/2 half pineapple
1 frozen banana
1/2 cup coconut milk
Ice cubes and (water if needed)

— Miss 8’s favourite

Vanilla milkshake protein balls

Seriously could you snack on anything healthier??!!

These babies have been a favourite in our house this past week! Even the kids have wanted them for lunchbox treats.
Recipe: (equal amounts of dry ingredients*nuts*grains – dried fruit/liquid)
Using a food processor or thermomix
Grind your cashews and peppitas and place in a bowl to the side.
Place medjoole dates in the food processor and approx 1 tsp of honey. Until all blended well and smooth.
Add 3/4 of your cashew and peppita mix back to the blender, along with a sprinkle of desicated coconut and chia seeds. Mix well.
Add vanilla bean seeds. Mix well.
Add the rest of your cashew and peppita mix and mix well.

In a bowl have some sesame seeds, scoop small balls out of the blender and roll in the palm of your hands then roll in the sesame seeds.

Seriously if you can get these to last more than a week – HALF YOUR LUCK!
I made a large batch and they all went like hot cakes in a few days

The birthday boy wants CAKE!

My son turned 10!
That in its self was HUGE – let alone the MASSIVE cake I made him.

So with his excitement on becoming a double digit human meant there needed to be a monsterous cake, and his exact instructions were – ginormous, must have chocolate, banana, caramel and KitKats. And all that- it did have!
YEP you read that right, it was a cake with everything desirable by my 10year old. And let me tell you, the crowed of people it fed did not walk away empty handed nor with empty stomachs HA!

It’s all about the layers:

So here I have used a basic cake batter and substituted some flour for cocoa powder with milk instead of water.
I had watched a you tube video on how to make caramel out of condensed milk. Now I was skeptical because every time I’ve mDe caramel it’s been with sugar on the saucepan and add your butter etc.
However I desperately wanted to trial this condensed milk method. And it worked well to a consistency I was happy with. The flavour not so much. But hey, I tried it and if you didn’t want to make your own or didn’t know how to then this condensed milk would be perfect for you.

Here’s how-
1 tin of condensed milk
Saucepan of water, to the boil.
Peel the label off of your condensed milk and leave the tin(unopened) sit in a saucepan on medium heat for 3 hours. Remember to top up any water evaporated. Once the 3 hours is up, you must let the can cool in the water for up to 6hours or in my case I left it over night. If you open the tin after being in the saucepan it will explode from being under pressure.
Open your tin of condensed milk and Whoopie! It’s turned to caramel. I added a sprinkle of salt to my caramel.

Once the cakes were cooled I cut them to size. Whipped some cream, and sliced some bananas. Everything was ready to roll!
Taking the plunge I, managed to have my base layer ready and smothered it in a generous amount of whipped cream and a thick drizzle of the salted caramel all over. Then placed another layer of cake and repeated the same process. On the middle layer I used cream and the sliced bananas. Then continues to layer more cake and cream and salted caramel until I reached the top.

Time to cover the cake in delicious chocolate ganache and surround it by four flavours of KitKats – peppermint swirl, white & milk swirl, cookies and cream & milk chocolate.

Finish by freezing halved bananas and dip them in melted chocolate and sprinkles. Once ready to serve place them on top of your cake.

My son loved this cake – and I guess it’s the main thing!!

Meat FREE Monday’s – ANY ONE?

does any one else enjoy Meat FREE MONDAYS as much as we do?

it is seriously a family tradition in our house now. We don’t eat any where near as much meat as we used to, and have easily been able to incorporate plenty of vegan and vegetarian dishes into the rest of our week.

these little babies were super easy to make and so awesome for the summer weather.
If your anything like me, the last thing you want to do is turn on the oven in the heat – and heat the house up even more.
So when you see a window of cooler weather, switch on that oven and get creative.

Frittatas are awesome and can include any thing! they are all about the eggs, and the veggies are what ever is left over in the fridge or in some cases – whats on special or in season at the market!

in the picture above i’ve made zucchini and corn, but remember the eggs are the star of the dish!
ingredients – method :
2 small zucchini’s grated
1 can of corn kernals drained
1/2 a large onion diced
10 eggs
3/4 cup of grated cheese
pinch of salt and pepper
2 tsp curry powder
mix all ingredients together well (if you have any herbs add them!

I love using my pyrex dishes, and in this instance i used a square one.
baked in the oven on 180 degrees fan forced for 40minutes
Once cooled i cut it into large slices and placed in a container in the fridge.
I sliced them into bite size pieces because they were appealing for the kids. But you could do this for a dinner party dish! top it with a half cherry tomato. you could also place a piece of smoked salmon, capers and dill on top. everything works with a frittata!

Good luck – Leia