Muffins and Coffee

    I've never been much a breakfast person because I’ve never needed to get up early and therefore it’s just an easy meal to ignore as lunch is usually only a couple hours away. But now that I have to get up at 5:30 every morning I’ve gotten into the practice of eating breakfast. I am now a huge breakfast fan! I mean I always loved breakfast foods, so breakfast for dinner was always one of the greatest ideas ever, but now I eat breakfast for breakfast (crazy right?)!

    Last week we had raw flax pancakes with natural peanut butter for breakfast everyday and they were AMAZING! Seriously, I would sit down for breakfast and get excited for breakfast the next day. You can get the recipe here.

 This week I made some date and nut muffins that are so very very yummy. Here is their recipe and here are my modifications:

• 2 cups quick oats

* 1 cup unbleached white flour * 1 cup oat flour (just blend 1 1/2 cup of oats)

• 1/2 cup whole wheat or spelt flour
• 1 Tbsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/3 cup unbleached cane sugar or brown sugar
• 3/4 cup chopped nuts - walnuts and/or pecans*3/4 cup mixed nuts (it's much cheaper and just as good)
• 1 cup chopped dates
• 1 1/4 cup warm water
• 1/3 cup vegetable oil  1/3 cup coconut oil

    Since the weather has gotten colder these past couple weeks I have been walking to the nearest Starbucks with Adam (the boy I nanny) for a nice hot treat. It’s a nice way to pass away a few of the morning hours. The Starbucks we go to has a little “kids corner” with a bookshelf full of kids books (which Adam loves) so it’s a win situation for both of us! He gets to look at books and I get to drink a soy peppermint latte-yum! So now I find myself craving this creamy-minty-coffee treat ALL the time. But unfortunately it really isn’t good for me, so I decided to try to make my own. I am proud to say that I have succeeded! It really didn’t take too much creativity-its way easy.

Peppermint Latte

½ cup Almond Milk

1 ½ drops Peppermint extract

1 tsp Stevia

Espresso

oops-somehow I ended up with
the "Mr." cup?

    Unfortunately for those of you who don’t have espresso machines-it won’t actually be a latte, but you can totally just make this with your regular coffee. Brew your espresso or coffee, mix the stevia and peppermint into the espresso, steam your milk (or just pour in your regular milk) and pour it into the coffee while stirring. You’re finished! Enjoy! I went from a small Starbucks peppermint latte with 150ish calories (if not more) to 30 calories with my homemade version.