Minus Thirty Three : Healthy Baking Night

Happy Monday, friends and greeting from Starbucks!

O happy days today :) I can't remember the last time I had a Monday off so I made sure to plan a productive 'go-getter-done' kinda day.

I wanted to stop in and give you a recap of healthy baking night with Shaneen, Val and Emily seeing how we made a lot of treats and were baking for like 3-hours. When I moved into the new house, I marked it on the list 'have healthy baking night'. I messaged Val a few nights a go as we have touched topic on it a few times and I asked if she wanted to have it sooner than later. She agreed, so I sent the group text.

The Scope: each person has to bring all of the ingredients for a healthy (ish) baking treat (their choice). After all of the treats are baked, we divide them amongst whoever is involved.

Last night was a bit of a challenge because Emily has an allergy to nuts. I am a HUGE fan of nuts so this wasn't working in my favour. Val had planned on coming down a little earlier so she and I whipped up a few recipes containing pecans, almonds, hazelnuts, peanuts etc.

The Menu

Healthy Honey Almond Pecan Granola Bars

My Favourite Granola (containing nuts)

My Favourite Granola (without nuts)

Coconut Power Cookies

My Version of the Adventure Cookie

No-Bake Protein Bars

Banana Bran Muffins

Healthy Honey Almond Pecan Granola Bars

So this recipe was inspired by the one above (Compliments of Julie @ www.pbfingers.com) with some minor changes.

Ingredients

3/4C whole wheat old fashion oats

1/4C of ground flax

1T pumpkin spice

1/4C of slivered almonds

2T of chopped pecans

1/4C of honey

1T of melted coconut oil

1 egg

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350-degrees

2. Combine and mix dry ingredients then add wet ingredients

3. Add egg when both types of ingredients are mixed

4. Grease pan with melted coconut oil

5. Press mixture into pan and evenly distribute

6. Bake for 15-minutes and then let cool completely

7. Cut into squares

8. Taste test & be merry! (Like Val)

My Favourite Granola

Ingredients

1/2C of coconut oil

1C of honey

3C of whole wheat rolled oats

3/4C of almonds

3/4C of mixed nuts

1/3C of sunflower seeds

1/3C of pumpkin seeds

1/3C of ground flax

1T of chia seeds

1C of dried cranberries

1T of Epicure pumpkin spice

Directions
1. Pre-Heat oven to 350-degrees

2. Mix all dry ingredients in a large bowl

3. Add wet ingredients and mix thoroughly

4. Spread entire mixture on a cooking sheet

5. Cook for 15-minutes, remove from oven then stir around

6. Place granola back in oven for 10-minutes

7. Remove, let cool & serve

Instead of using the mixed nuts, we just increased the amount of pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, dried cranberries and added raisins so Emily could have her own batch of granola. Her batch actually turned out better than the other due an excess amount of coconut oil (which makes it delish x 10)

Coconut Power Cookies

Dry Ingredients

1.5C of coconut flour (could sub almond meal)

1/2C of pecans

1/3C of shredded coconut

1/4C of dried cranberries (optional)

1/2C of dark chocolate chips

1T chia seeds

1T of ground flax

Wet Ingredients

1/4C of coconut oil

1/4C of agave

1 egg

Directions

1. Pre-heat oven to 350-degrees

2. Mix wet and dry ingredients in a bowl

3. Roll into balls, then flatten into cookies (add a splash of almond milk to moisten the mixture if need be)

4. Bake for 20-minutes

5. Remove, let cool & serve

My Version of the Adventure Cookie

Recipe can be found here

No Bake Protein Bars

Recipe can be found here

Banana Bran Muffins

Emily was in charge of the banana bran muffins and I completely forgot to get the recipe off of her. (Em, perhaps you could throw it in the comments section?).

So healthy baking night was a definite success and we will definitely do it again!! I have so many healthy snacks for the next week and a half (knowin' me, it won't last that long) and I even have enough to share with some gym friends (you know who you are).