Pumpkin pancakes

I love the flavors of fall. Last week, I craved the flavors of fall. And brinner. So what did I make? Pumpkin pancakes. Indulge your tastebuds and make your own fall-inspired brinner. Your tummy will thank you.

Pumpkin pancakes

Prep & cook time: 40 mins
Servings: 6

• 1 1/2 C milk
• 1 C pumpkin puree
• 1 egg
• 2 T vegetable oil
• 2 C all-purpose flour
• 2 T vinegar
• 3 T brown sugar
• 2 t baking powder
• 1 t baking soda
• 1 t ground allspice
• 1 t cinnamon
• 1/2 t ginger
• 1/2 t salt

Mix wet ingredients together in a bowl. Combine dry ingredients in a separate bowl. Stir the pumpkin mixture into the dry ingredients just enough to combine. 

Heat a lightly oiled griddle or frying pan over medium-high heat. Pour or scoop the batter onto the griddle, using approximately 1/4 C for each pancake. Brown on both sides and serve hot with real maple syrup and fresh whipped cream. They're great plain, too! Nutrition info is for plain pancakes. 

Nutrition Facts

Serving Size 169 g

Amount Per Serving

Calories  269 Calories from Fat  63

% Daily Value*

Total Fat  7.0g 11%

Saturated Fat  2.0g 10%

Trans Fat  0.0g

Cholesterol  32mg 11%

Sodium  446mg 19%

Total Carbohydrates  43.9g 15%

Dietary Fiber  2.6g 11%

Sugars  9.0g

Protein  7.8g

Vitamin A 128% • Vitamin C 4% Calcium 11% • Iron 16%

Nutrition Grade A-

* Based on a 2000 calorie diet

Nutritional Analysis

Good points

• High in selenium
• Very high in vitamin A
• Very high in vitamin B6
• Very high in vitamin B12

Deconstructables

I love my boys. My boys love food (and me, of course). But they don't love ALL food (actually, pretty sure one of them does love ALL food. Can you guess which?).

Honestly, cooking for kiddos is a bit of a rollercoaster ride (anyone out there who can relate?!). One day, they love everything they can get in their little mouths. The next, they won't touch anything you offer them.

Here's how I try to avoid mealtime mayhem and/or monotony: Deconstructables.

(Don't mind my super cheesy Paint rendition)

What are deconstructables? Exactly what it sounds like -- things that are able to be deconstructed.

When I was a freshman in college I took a nutrition class. It had nothing to do with my [undecided] major, I just thought it would be fun. And it was. One thing about children's nutrition that stuck out to me most was this concept:

Don't force your kid to eat foods he or she doesn't want to eat. Encourage them to try everything, but don't get mad if they don't. Provide several options at each meal, but make sure you include at least one thing you know they'll eat. If they don't like something, don't force it on them -- but reintroduce the food after a few days. Eventually, they'll try it and/or like it. 

Makes sense, right? But it also sounds like a lot of work. How am I supposed to provide several options when I'm only making one meal?

The answer? Deconstructables.

Here's a simple example: I want a Greek-inspired cucumber salad for lunch. My salad includes cucumber, cherry tomatoes, sliced red onion, feta cheese and balsamic vinaigrette. I assemble my salad and deconstruct the kids'. I get a scrumptious and beautiful cucumber salad, the kids get a little stack of diced cucumbers, a few cherry tomato halves, a sliver of sliced red onion (in case they're in a palate-expanding-mood [and I don't mean braces]), a pile of crumbled feta, and some dressing on the side. Throw in a piece of fruit and you have a meal. I get my salad, and the kids get a variety of foods to pick and choose from.

If it's something the kids haven't tried before, I start with a small amount of everything and encourage the kids to try the new foods, using the additional "liked" foods as bribery. I can almost always get them to taste everything this way. If they don't like it, they're allowed to spit it out and they still get the other "liked" foods for trying. Most of the time, they don't spit it out.

On a larger, dinner scale: I'm making Vegetarian Chili with a side of cornbread. I know the kids will eat the cornbread, but the chili might have too much kick for the little guy (actually, the bigger little guy. Little guy is a Texan and can handle the heat. Bigger little guy spent his formative first four months in Utah and hasn't finished acclimating to spicy foods). If I'm worried about the spice, I'll (a) set aside a couple pieces of each vegetable as I'm chopping and nuke it with a little water in a bowl with a vented lid, or (b) spoon some chili into the colander and rinse it with cool water, effectively cooling the food in more ways than one.

And that's that: Chili deconstructed. Kiddos get to try beans, squash, zucchini, corn, onion, red and green peppers, and tomatoes -- all in one go. I usually give them a little bit of the cooked meal, too, so they can try it and eventually be okay with just eating the cooked chili.

There you have it. Deconstructables. Just about any meal can be deconstructed to give your kid plenty of options and broaden his or her palate.

What I love about Sundays: Family dinners & resilience

A few years ago, I took a PR class called, "Communications 416: Media Advocacy and Social Change." Part of the class required us to complete a social advocacy project. My group chose to focus on the benefits of family mealtime and it's accompanying movement, and as part of the project I wrote several blog entries on the subject:

Cooking with the Condies : Resources Everywhere
Cooking with the Condies : Why I Love Family Meals
Cooking with the Condies : Family Day
Cooking with the Condies : The Benefits of Family Dinners

When I started this project I had been married for about 8 months. I was very-soon-to-be pregnant with Peyton. And I had no idea how impactful this project would be on my life.

One of many benefits family dinners offer is a greater sense of resilience (The Family Dinner Project).

Resilience: an ability to recover from or adjust easily to misfortune or change.

Resilience is something I've thought a lot about recently. It's also something I've had to work hard at, even as an adult.

In the Ensign article entitled, "Raising Resilient Children" (which I encourage EVERYONE to read. It's amazing), Lyle J. Burrup writes:

We know two things about adversity and resilience: First, there is “an opposition in all things” (2 Nephi 2:11). Second, obtaining anything of great worth often requires great sacrifice. 

As children become resilient, they understand and accept these two facts. They see life as challenging and ever changing, but they believe they can cope with those challenges and changes. They view mistakes and weaknesses as opportunities to learn, and they accept that losing may precede winning. 

As children develop resilience, they believe they can influence and even control outcomes in their lives through effort, imagination, knowledge, and skill. With this attitude, they focus on what they can do rather than on what is outside their control.

Couldn't we all use a little (or a lot) of resilience? Can you imagine having the ability to look at every mistake and weakness and say, "I can really learn from this! I might misstep a few times, but sometimes you have to lose before you can win."

Sometimes I focus on the things I can't change, when I should be focusing and working toward changing the things that I CAN control.

One thing that hinders the development of resilience is a misunderstanding of the commandment to be perfect (see Matthew 5:48) ...

This misunderstanding may also stem from what society teaches our youth: that their worth depends on talent and performance. In schools and communities, sometimes even at church or at home, youth see their peers get acceptance, admiration, approval, and praise for being talented at something. So they try to measure up. As they do so, they start to fear failure and mistakes. They choose what to do based on how successful they think they will be. They procrastinate when they do not feel confident. They worry about what others will think if they make mistakes. They fear loss of approval. They view their performance as the measure of their worth. Their perfectionism becomes a mean taskmaster, and it wears down their resilience.

I'm not a child or even a youth, but I still feel this way. I still feel like my worth depends on my talent and performance. Just this week I was filling out my mormon.org profile, and I started to feel down.

"What can I possibly put that would make people want to read about me? I'm ordinary. I'm stereotypical. I haven't accomplished anything outstanding or incredible. I'm average."

This is NOT resilient thinking. This IS a misunderstanding of the commandment to be perfect. This is not how God views us, and it's certainly not how I should view myself.

I'm extraordinary. I'm a child of God. Daughter of a King.

Burrup provides several suggestions for teaching our children resilience. I read the suggestions twice -- once for my kids and once for myself.

• Pray to understand your children’s strengths and how to help them with their weaknesses.
• Be patient and realize that children need time to develop resilience.
• Strive to understand that mistakes and failures are opportunities to learn.
• Allow natural, logical consequences to serve as the disciplinarian.
• Respect children’s decisions, even if their poor choices lead to lost privileges.
• Refrain from berating children for breaking the rules.
• Do not discourage effort by criticizing harshly.
• Rather than praising accomplishment, encourage and praise effort.
• “Praise your children more than you correct them. Praise them for even their smallest achievement” (President Ezra Taft Benson [1899–1994], “The Honored Place of Woman,” Ensign, Nov. 1981, 107).

• Pray to understand your strengths and for help with your weaknesses.
• Be patient and realize that you need time to develop resilience.
• Strive to understand that mistakes and failures are opportunities to learn.
• Allow natural, logical consequences to serve as the disciplinarian.
• Don't dwell on your decisions, even if you make poor choices. Learn from them and don't make them again.
• Refrain from berating yourself or your worth when you make mistakes.
• Do not criticize yourself harshly.
• Rather than praising your accomplishments, encourage and praise your efforts.
• “Praise more than you correct yourself. Praise yourself for even your smallest achievement” (President Ezra Taft Benson [1899–1994], “The Honored Place of Woman,” Ensign, Nov. 1981, 107).

Now we can add, "eat dinner together as a family" to our building-resilience list. And we can use that mealtime as an opportunity to practice many of the above suggestions. 

A walk down memory [time-line] lane

Please join me for a walk down memory lane. And please don't mind my somewhat annoying timelines. I'm a nerd.

Let's rewind the clock a bit -- approximately 6.5 years -- and start there. Don't worry, I'll be brief. And I do have a point, which I'll get to eventually. 

I had several conversations with my mother that sounded a lot like this:

Mom: Whitney, you're about to leave home and live on your own. You should practice cooking. 
Me: I'm going to have a meal plan. I don't need to learn how to cook. 
Mom: Well, you won't live in the dorms after freshman year.
Me: I'll learn then. 
Mom: Nobody wants to marry a girl who can't cook. 
Me: Good. I don't plan on dating any RMs freshman year anyway. Besides, I'm going to marry a guy who will cook for ME. 
Mom: Whatever. Good luck with that. 
Me: Watch me. 

So here's the point (told you I'd get there eventually): I am not an expert cook. I'm not an expert mom. Really, I'm not an expert at anything. But I believe everyone has something he or she can bring to the table (pun intended). Learning to cook has been a years-in-the-making process for me. Once I finally felt like I had cooking pretty well mastered, my baby became a toddler and now I'm learning how to cook with and for kids -- which is a whole different ball game, let me tell ya. 

I'd like to share my culinary experiences, experiments, and extravagant fails from my past, present and future with ya'll. From cooking for two to cooking for kids to cooking for time to cooking for health. Hopefully some of my successes and failures will help you succeed more and fail less in the kitchen. Or at least provide a laugh for you "seasoned" chefs out there. 

Greek Pasta Salad

For some reason I've really been loving Mediterranean flavors lately. I guess it shouldn't come as a surprise, I mean, what's not to love, right? This recipe is perfect for a hot summer day (or any day for that matter) when you don't want to heat the house up too much. Best part? Store the leftovers in the fridge and enjoy for tomorrow's lunch or dinner.

Greek Pasta Salad (original from HERE)



Servings: 4, about 2 C each
Prep time: 30 minutes

• 2 medium tomatoes, coarsely chopped
• 2 small cloves garlic, minced
• 1/2 small red onion, finely chopped
• 3 T extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 T red-wine vinegar
• 1 T balsamic vinegar
• 8 oz whole-wheat farfalle or similar-size pasta
• 1 15-oz can chickpeas, rinsed
• 1 medium cucumber, seeded and chopped into 1/2-inch pieces
• 1/2 C crumbled feta cheese
• 2 T chopped fresh oregano or 2 teaspoons dried
• 1/2 T chopped fresh basil

Bring a large pot or water to boil. Combine tomatoes, garlic, oil and vinegar in a large bowl and let stand while pasta cooks. Cook pasta in the boiling water until just tender, according to package directions. Drain and rinse with cold water. Drain again. Add the pasta, chickpeas, cucumber, feta and herbs to the tomato mixture. Gently toss to combine.

Nutrition Facts

Serving Size 350 g

Amount Per Serving

Calories  726 Calories from Fat  204

% Daily Value*

Total Fat  22.6g 35%

Saturated Fat  5.2g 26%

Trans Fat  0.0g

Cholesterol  58mg 19%

Sodium  255mg 11%

Total Carbohydrates  104.2g 35%

Dietary Fiber  20.8g 83%

Sugars  14.2g

Protein  31.1g

Vitamin A 9% • Vitamin C 37% Calcium 26% • Iron 61%

Nutrition Grade A

* Based on a 2000 calorie diet

Nutritional Analysis

Good points

• Low in sodium
• High in dietary fiber
• High in manganese
• Very high in vitamin B6

Banana Coconut Crunch Muffins

There they are. Those old, brown bananas. They seem to be breeding fruit flies as you read. No, as you blink. But is plain ol' banana bread worth the effort? Should you toss those yellow beauties of yester-week and cut your losses?

No. 

Because now you have the recipe old, brown bananas were made for. Intended for. Over-ripened for. Allow me to give you the life-giving elixir [aka recipe] for those banished bananas:

The Muffins:

• 3 C all-purpose flour
• 2 C sugar
• 2 t baking powder
• 1 t baking soda (Oops! -- I left this out on accident. Still turned out great)
• 1/2 t salt
• 1/2 pound unsalted butter, melted and cooled
• 2 eggs
• 3/4 C whole milk (I had cream and 1%. After a little research, I learned you can combine 3 T cream with 1 C skim/1% to approximate whole milk)
• 2 t pure vanilla extract
• 1 C mashed ripe bananas (2 bananas)
• 1 C medium-diced ripe bananas (1 banana)
• 1 C small-diced pecans
• 1 C old-fashioned oats
• 1 C sweetened shredded coconut
• Streusel (recipe follows)

Preheat the oven to 350° F.

Grease or line muffin pans (makes 18-20). Sift flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt in bowl using a whisk. Add the melted butter and stir well. Combine eggs, milk, vanilla and mashed bananas. Add them to the flour-and-butter mixture. Scrape the bowl and stir well to combine. Don't overmix.

Fold the diced bananas, pecans, oats and coconut into the batter. Spoon the batter into the prepared muffin tins, filling each to the top. Top each muffin with streusel. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, or until the tops are brown and a toothpick comes out clean. Cool slightly, remove from the pan, and serve.

The Streusel: 

• 1/4 C butter, softened
• 1/4 C all-purpose flour
• 1/2 C old-fashioned oats
• 1/4 C light brown sugar
• cinnamon (optional)

Combine all ingredients in a small mixing bowl. Using two knives, cut the butter into the mixture [basically you're coarsely "chopping" the butter] as you would if making a pie crust (if that makes no sense to you, it's probably because of my bad explanation. Watch the video below). 

Read more at: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/banana-crunch-muffins-recipe/index.html?oc=linkback

WARNING: If you proceed any further down the page, you may not want to consume. I'm still including the nutrition information. You have been warned. But you should still make them. And eat one today. Save one for tomorrow. And take the rest to your neighbors. =)

Yeah, it's definitely not a hearty, healthy breakfast muffin. It's more of a dessert muffin. Those nutrition facts down there ... that's approximately per muffin.

Nutrition Facts

Serving Size 104 g

Amount Per Serving

Calories 364 Calories from Fat 163

% Daily Value*

Total Fat 18.1g 28%

Saturated Fat 9.2g 46%

Trans Fat 0.0g

Cholesterol 48mg 16%

Sodium 215mg 9%

Total Carbohydrates 47.6g 16%

Dietary Fiber 2.5g 10%

Sugars 25.0g

Protein 4.7g

Vitamin A 8% • Vitamin C 3% Calcium 5% • Iron 12%

Nutrition Grade D+

* Based on a 2000 calorie diet

Nutritional Analysis

Bad points

• High in saturated fat
• High in sugar

Vegetarian Sloppy Joes

After reading the title of this entry, you might be thinking to yourself: That's impossible. Vegetarian Sloppy Joes? Psshhh. Yeah right. Sloppy Joes are the antithesis of vegetarian. This girl's el pollo loco. 

I assure you, I am no crazy chick(en).

Wanna know the most amazing part? It. Tastes. Legit. I mean, it literally tastes like a Sloppy Joe. And you look at it and you almost see meat. It's really the craziest thing ever.

Scared of mushrooms? (Side note: I've been terrified of mushrooms ever since I accidentally saw an episode of Oprah when I was about 4 years old ... long story.) I used to be too. Guess what? You have nothing to fear with this recipe.

Vegetarian Sloppy Joes: 
Serves: 8
Prep: 30 minutes
Cook: 30 minutes
Total: 1 hour

Ingredients:

• 1 lb mushrooms, finely chopped in food processor
• 1/3 C pecans, pulsed in food processor
• 2 T extra virgin olive oil
• 1 onion, diced
• 1 green bell pepper
• 1 red bell pepper
• 1/2 t chipotle chili powder
• 1/4 C barbecue sauce
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 t yellow mustard
• 1 T Worcestershire sauce
• 2 T tomato paste
• 8 whole wheat hamburger buns

Directions:

Heat olive oil in a large sauce pan over medium heat. Saute onion, peppers and garlic until the peppers begin to soften (about 6 minutes). Stir in chipotle chili powder, barbecue sauce, mustard, Worcestershire sauce, tomato paste, mushrooms and pecans. Simmer for 15 minutes, or until your Joes reach your desired consistency. 

Serve on whole wheat hamburger buns topped with pepperoncinis or sliced jalapenos. 

Nutrition Facts

Serving Size 160 g

Amount Per Serving

Calories 203 Calories from Fat 79

% Daily Value*

Total Fat 8.8g 13%

Saturated Fat 1.1g 5%

Trans Fat 0.0g

Cholesterol 0mg 0%

Sodium 254mg 11%

Total Carbohydrates 28.3g 9%

Dietary Fiber 4.9g 20%

Sugars 8.9g

Protein 6.0g

Vitamin A 21% • Vitamin C 71% Calcium 5% • Iron 16%

Nutrition Grade A

* Based on a 2000 calorie diet

Nutritional Analysis

Good points

• No cholesterol
• High in manganese
• High in selenium
• High in vitamin A
• Very high in vitamin B6
• Very high in vitamin C

Bad points

• High in sugar