Chewiest Granola Bars

After finding this recipe on Pinterest (follow me!), I will never buy the bars in the store again. These were far too easy to make, and taste better and fresher than anything in the store. Plus, I know what's in these, and it's not glycerin, artificial flavors and preservatives. It's all stuff I happily store in my pantry. Hubby, kiddo and I all love them! I'll be making these weekly.

Chewiest Granola Bars

1/4 cup butter
3 Tbsp honey
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
2 cups quick cooking oats
1 cup crispy rice cereal
1 teaspoon vanilla
Mini chocolate chips

Melt butter, honey and brown sugar together over medium heat until it boiling. Reduce heat and cook 2 minutes. Add vanilla and stir.

While melting, stir oats and rice cereal together in a large bowl.

Add liquid to dry ingredients and mix well to moisten.

Pour into small non-stick jelly roll pan (about 12x8x1) and press out to be about 3/4 inch in thickness. If you don't have a small enough pan, mold the mixture to one side, pressing at all angles to ensure compaction.

Press in mini chocolate chips.

Cool on a countertop at room temperature for two hours or until the chocolate chips are set before cutting into bars.

Wrap in plastic wrap and store at room temperature.

Adapted from this recipe.

Cranberry Jalapeno Cream Cheese Dip

I have long lost the original source for this ah-mazing Cranberry Jalapeno Cream Cheese Dip, and there are a bunch of sites that host it or something similar. And it is fabulous. When a friend passed the now-lost link on to me, I was hesitant when I saw the jalepeno. I'm Minnesotan! I don't do spice! But she assured me that when seeded, it's not very spicy at all. And she's right, it's the perfect amount of zip, adding very little heat.

I brought this to a potluck at work and it was an absolute hit! It's very festive around the holidays, especially when the cranberries are fresh, but if you freeze your cranberries, you could bring this year-round. I bet it would be delicious at a summer picnic! Can you tell I'm thinking of warm weather?

1 12-ounce bag cranberries
1 jalapeño, stemmed, seeded and coarsely chopped
1 cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons lime juice
1/2 teaspoon cumin
pinch salt
2 8-ounce packages cream cheese, softened

Dice cranberries and jalapenos to your preference. I like to run it in a food processor or bullet-type appliance. This gets it really thin and juicy. If you do this, you'll want to strain some of the liquid out right before you spread onto the cream cheese. If you like it a bit thicker, you can do this by hand. 

Add sugar, lime juice, cumin and salt and stir to combine. Cover and let sit either for 4 hours, or overnight. I recommend overnight, it's really lets everything soak up the sugar.

Spread softened cream cheese onto a large platter or dish and spread the cranberry mixture over. 

I served with Wheat Thins, but any yummy party cracker would be great. Shoot, cardboard would be great, this stuff is fab. 

Sweet Potato and Aduki Bean Borritos

These burritos are not only delicious, but they are filling and packed with nutrients. Sweet potatoes are source of potassium, fiber, beta carotene, calcium, protein and vitamin A. The beans are a good source of minerals such as folic acid, magnesium, zinc and iron. Good belly filler, indeed!

Ingredients:

Filling:

• 1 can (15 oz.) aduki beans (I used no salt added variety. You could use black beans instead)
• 2 large (orange fleshed)sweet potatoes, diced in 1 inch cubes
• 1/4 cup vegetable stock or canned vegetable broth
• 2 T fresh squeezed lime juice
• 1 tsp. ground cumin
• 1/2 tsp. ground coriander
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 1/2 c shredded Monterrey jack cheese, queso fresco or whatever you have in the house (I had sharp cheddar so that is what I used today)

Tortillas (Based on Deborah Madison's recipe)

• 2 c flour (can use white or whole wheat)
• 2 tbsp canola oil
• ¾ milk (water can be used also)
• 1 tsp baking powder
• ¼ tsp salt or other seasoning like garlic powder or cumin or both
• I sometimes through in a tbsp or two of flaxseed meal

To make the tortillas: Whisk together the dry ingredients in a bowl. Drizzle the oil throughout the dry ingredients and work it into the mixture with a fork or your fingers. Pour in the milk and combined until you have a shaggy dough. Turn this out onto a floured surface and kneed until combined. Be careful not to over-knead.  Place a damp towel over the dough and let rest for 20 minutes. Heat a cast iron pan on th stove on med-high. Cut the dough into eighths. Roll out an eighth onto a floured surface. Place the tortilla in the hot pan. When air pockets start to appear (40 seconds or so), flip your tortilla.

To make the filling: Heat olive oil in a dutch oven or large pot on medium. Add sweet potatoes. Cook for a half hour or until they start to get pretty soft. Add vegetable stock and deglaze. Add the beans and spices. Simmer for 15-20 minutes. Add lime. Simmer for another couple minutes. Spoon the filling onto a tortilla. Top with cheese and enjoy!

Roasted Chickpeas

I love these as a salad topper and also as a snack on their own. They’re super easy and you can vary the seasoning to your liking.

Ingredients:

• 1 15 oz can of chickpeas/garbanzo beans 
• 1 tsbp olive oil 
• garlic powder (about 1 tsp)
• Mrs. Dash all purpose seasoning (about 1 tsp)

Preheat your oven to 400. Rinse the chickpeas. Throw them in a small baking pan. I drizzle about a tablespoon or two of olive oil over them, sprinkle some seasoning on top and use my hands or a spoon to mix everything together. I actually don’t measure the seasoning. I just eyeball it. The beans should be well coated with seasoning. Roast these for about 35 minutes and enjoy!

Roasted Root Vegetables

One of my absolute favorite things to enjoy during the cold Minnesota fall and winter are roasted root vegetables.  Roasting brings out an incredible sweetness and the warmth is comforting when you are chilled to the core.

I find that most root vegetables marry well together. I adjust my varieties but there are some vegetables I use consistently which are onion, garlic, and fennel. If you aren't familiar with fennel give it a try.  It is very aromatic and tastes similar to anise, which is used to flavor black licorice, but don't let that scare you! I hate black licorice (which is saying something because I am the Candy Queen), but I adore fennel.

Ingredients:

• 1/2 large red onion, chopped
• 1 orange fleshed sweet potato, cubed
• 1/2 to 1 fennel bulb (1/2 if it's a really big one)
• 3-5 garlic cloves
• 2 turnips, cubed
• 2-3 parsnips, sliced into coins
• about 2 tsp dried rosemary leaves
• about 1 tsp ground thyme
• 2 tsbp olive oil

Add more or less of whatever you want. If you aren't enamored with onion, use less. To be quite frank, I don't measure any of this. I eyeball it to my liking. The size of my cubes are pretty small, less than 1 inch.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

Try your best to cut the sweet potato, turnips and parsnips into similar sizes.  Put these in a bowl and drizzle most of the olive oil on top. Toss to combine. Spread on a baking sheet (I line mine with a silpat liner) and sprinkle on the rosemary and thyme. Put this in the oven and set a timer for 15 minutes.

In the meantime, roughly chop the garlic, fennel and onion. Toss in remaining olive oil. After the timer goes off, combined this with the vegetables in the oven. Distribute them well. Roast for another 15-20 minutes. Remove from the oven and serve!

These are great alongside quinoa with pesto.

Spinach Lasagna Roll Ups

While I may not be culinarily-creative enough to make my own recipes, I do like to adapt where I can. Especially for freezer options and health reasons. Pinterest has no end to the fabulous recipes just begging to be reworked to my taste. 

For example, this Lasagna Roll Up recipe from Cooking Classy just looks divine, but I've never been a fan of chicken with red sauce. Plus, I like to substitute for meatless when I can, since I can sneak in my greens. So I played with this recipe a little, subbing frozen spinach for chicken, and stretching to make two more meals out of it. Check it out!

Lasagna Roll Ups

Ingredients:

• 1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• ¼ cup finely chopped onions (optional)
• 1 can crushed tomatoes (I like Fire-Roasted)
• 1 jar of spaghetti sauce (I like Prego HeartSmart)
• 2 Tbsp minced garlic
• 1 box frozen spinach, squeezed of excess liquid
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

• 1 (15 oz) container Ricotta Cheese
• 1 large egg
• 2 1/4 cups grated Mozzarella Cheese, divided
• 3/4 cup finely grated Parmesan Cheese, divided
• 1/3 cup freshly, finely grated Romano Cheese
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper
• 12 uncooked lasagna noodles

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Start that water boiling! And cook noodles according to directions. I like to cook those things while I do everything else so I'm not waiting for them. They can wait for me, darnit!

Heat 1 Tbsp olive oil in a non-stick frying pan and sauté onions. I'll be honest: I didn't have an onion, and they're really not my favorite. So I skipped this part. It's ok!

If you sauteed onions, transfer them to a medium-large saucepan. Add crushed tomatoes, minced garlic,  oregano and jar of spaghetti sauce.  Season sauce with salt and pepper and cover with a lid to simmer over low heat.


When lasagna noodles are cooked, drain and immediately line in a single layer on waxed paper or cookie sheets.

In a large bowl, combine Ricotta cheese, egg, 1/4 tsp salt and 1/4 tsp pepper.  Add in 1 3/4 cups grated Mozzarella Cheese, 1/2 cup Parmesan Cheese and 1/3 cup Romano Cheese, stir mixture until well combined. Add spinach to cheese mixture until combined.

Confession: I had no romano cheese. So I threw in extra mozzarella. I love mozzarella.

Stir sauce and spread in the bottom of your pan. You have options here. If you're making the whole batch, or almost whole, use a 13x9 inch baking dish. I opted for a 9x9 inch baking dish, and two 9 inch round aluminum foil pans for the freezer. It's just the two of us and a baby, and even with leftovers, we wouldn't eat a whole batch. But by freezing the other two pans, that's two more nights coming up that I don't have to cook, but still get a tasty, hearty meal. Heckuva deal.


Spread two heaping spoonfuls of cheese mixture onto each cooked lasagna noodle, then spoon sauce over.  Roll noodles up and arrange seam side down in your dish.  Cover rolled noodles with remaining meat sauce and sprinkle with mozzarella cheese and a little more oregano.  For the dish you're baking, tent with foil (don't allow foil to rest on cheese or it will stick you just want to loosely tent to prevent the cheese from browning) and bake for 35 minutes, removing foil for last 5 minutes.

For freezing, cover and freeze flat with nothing resting on top. Once frozen, they can be stacked. On eating day, move the dish to your fridge for 12-24 hours, just to soften. Remove lid and tent with new foil, bake at 375 for an hour or until hot.



Adapted from: Cooking Classy