Happiness is Sunday morning baking two dozen triple wheat muffins

 OK I ate two.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Triple Wheat Muffins

1.5 cups wheat germ

1.5 cups all purpose wheat flour

3.0 cups wheat bran

1 T baking powder

1 t baking soda

1 t ground cinnamon

 

2.5 cups milk

2/3 cup brown sugar

2 eggs beaten

1 cup apple sauce

 

Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees F.

Mix dry ingredients in one bowl, wet in another.

Whisk dry into wet gradually.

Add 24 baking papers to tins.

Use a 1/3 cup measure to scoop batter into the liners.

Bake about 20-22 minutes.

Cool in the pans on the counter for 20 minutes.

Serve with butter and jam. And coffee. 

Happiness is a recipe which helps you cut back on toilet paper!

 For a butt-hole which is clean as a whistle, eat one of these oat flour and wheat bran muffins every morning instead of toast! You'll find yourself using far less toilet paper as a result!

Foil the kitty!

Oat Flour & Wheat Bran Muffins

1 cup oat flour (just grind up one cup whole oats in the coffee grinder)

2 cups wheat bran (I pay $1.29/lb at the health food store for a refrigerated bag of organic; super cheap!)

1.5 t baking powder

0.5 t baking soda

0.5 t ground cinnamon

 

1.25 cups milk

0.33 cup brown sugar

1 egg beaten

0.5 cup apple sauce

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1/ preheat oven to 400 F

2/ combine dry ingredients in one bowl, wet in another

3/ add the dry to the wet, whisking together

4/ line two 8-bay muffin tins with parchment baking cups

5/ spoon in the completed mixture, about 1/4 cup each

6/ bake 15-20 minutes

7/ let cool thoroughly before storing in the frig or freezer

8/ parchment peels right off once cooled

9/ rewarm in microwave and serve with butter and jam

10/ one a day will do ya

 

 

Salty things I ate at Christmas

A waffle (409 mg sodium) on Christmas Day. ... And that's after substituting the salt and baking soda of the Betty Crocker recipe with more baking powder instead. Otherwise Betty's version would have packed 522 mg sodium per waffle. Eat just two of those (without butter) and you're more than half way to the daily limit of 2000 mg. Add bacon at 220 mg per slice and . . . ouch, because no one can eat just one waffle or one slice of bacon. 

A slice of spinach pesto Sockeye pie (308 mg sodium) on Christmas Eve. ... The canned salmon is the killer here, as is the pesto. One can't do much to reduce the sodium in canned fish except to use fresh instead, which is kind of a waste. But the salt in the pesto recipe can be cut in half and still taste like pesto, especially if you use salty Romano cheese instead of parmesan. Thus prepared I ended up with nearly 700 mg sodium in 1/2 cup for the recipe.

Two slices of this savory fish pie are normal for a serving, so the ketchup condiment had to go (190 mg sodium in one tablespoon). I used San Marzano tomato sauce instead and that was fine (16 mg sodium in one half cup). A teaspoon of the pesto is also good on the morning egg (about 30 mg sodium), as it is on the Saturday pizza.  

A gingersnap cookie (66 mg sodium), from frozen dough bought for a fundraiser. ... I ate only two, because at fewer than 4 mg sodium per square I'd rather eat Lindt 85% cocoa chocolate instead.

Oat muffins with dried Montmorency cherries

Oat Muffins with dried Montmorency cherries

This recipe is adapted from the POST 100% Bran Muffin recipe of old. The only substitution is the oats for the bran cereal. The only addition is the cherries. The yield is about 15 muffins. Calories per muffin are about 194. Total fat is 2g, total carbs 38g (dietary fiber 3.2g), and total protein is 6g. 

Ingredients:

1 cup unbleached flour

1.5 teaspoons baking powder

.5 teaspoon baking soda

.5 teaspoon ground cinnamon

2 cups whole rolled oats

1.25 cups 2% milk

1 egg 

.5 cup unsweetened apple sauce

.33 cup brown sugar

.66 cup dried cherries

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

2. Whisk dry ingredients together in one bowl.

3. In another bowl whisk together the wet ingredients, and the sugar and cherries.

4. Add the dry to the wet, mixing well with a wooden spoon.

5. Lightly grease 2 8-bay muffin pans with Crisco.

6. Add .25 cup of the mixture to each bay.

7. Add water to the last unfilled bay.

8. Bake 15-20 minutes on the center rack of the oven.

Double Corn Bread in a cast iron skillet

Same as Betty Crocker, just use corn flour instead of the all-purpose flour, and double the milk to two cups.

DOUBLE CORN BREAD

1 c yellow cornmeal

1 c corn flour

2 T sugar

4 t baking powder

.5 t salt

2 c milk

.25 c vegetable shortening

1 egg

Grease the skillet.

Combine all ingredients in a blender bowl and blend until thoroughly mixed.

Pour and scrape into the skillet.

Bake at 425 degrees F about 20 to 25 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean.

Serve with breakfast sausage and maple syrup, or with lots of butter and honey on top.

Buckwheat Yogurt Oatcakes

For about two months, I've been avoiding wheat on most days. Saturday night pizza has been the only exception. Otherwise I'm relying on less grain in the diet overall, using oat bran and oats as before but in smaller quantities, substituting brown rice pasta and corn tostadas for wheat pastas and wheat flour tortillas.

There's reason to believe that wheat is a major contributor to small LDL, which in its turn is suspected as a prime culprit in cardiovascular disease. The usual cholesterol panel you get at your annual physical tells you absolutely nothing about particle size, and doesn't even really measure LDL. It's a calculation, not a measurement.

So when I got the results of a special blood panel back in 2008 and found out my supposedly pretty good cholesterol numbers revealed many small LDL, I started to look into the subject more deeply. Most interesting has been the clinical work of a Milwaukee, Wisconsin, cardiologist named William Davis. His book, Track Your Plaque, has interesting dietary recommendations which frequently dovetail with the super foods menu. And his blog keeps us up to date on all the latest developments. I'm looking forward to my next blood test when we'll see if my small LDL particle count has gone down.

Eliminating wheat isn't easy, especially if toast, sandwiches and wraps, tortillas and pasta play a large role in your diet. And Saturday morning pancakes! So here's a recipe I love, in moderation, which the lady of the house adapted from "Whole Wheat Buttermilk Pancakes" by Marcia Beachy in the More-With-Less Cookbook by Doris Janzen Longacre.

Buckwheat Yogurt Oatcakes

.5 cup plain fat-free yogurt

.5 cup 2% milk

2 T canola oil

1 egg

.5 cup buckwheat flour

.5 cup oat flour

1 t baking powder

.5 t baking soda

.5 t salt

1 T ground flaxseed

1. Combine the yogurt, milk, oil and egg in a bowl and whisk together.

2. Combine the dry ingredients in another bowl and whisk in the wet ingredients for about a minute.

3. Fry on a lightly oiled griddle.

Makes about eight pancakes.

'Nita's Cakes on the Griddle

It's Saturday. We sleep in, and 'Nita makes us a lazy breakfast. Sometimes it's Dutch Babies, but usually it's griddle cakes. She likes a recipe she adapted from "Wheat Germ Griddle Cakes" by Selma Johnson in Doris Janzen Longacre's More-with-Less Cookbook. The recipe makes 16 cakes. Serve them with butter and pure maple syrup. Then go out and cut the grass to work it off. Or not.

'Nita's Cakes on the Griddle

1 cup raw wheat germ

.5 cup oat bran

2.25 cups reduced fat milk

3 eggs

3 T canola oil

3 T ground flaxseed meal

1.25 cups unbleached bread flour

4 t baking powder (we prefer Hain brand "Featherweight Baking Powder" without aluminum)

1 T sugar

1.5 t salt

.5 t ground cinnamon

.25 t ground ginger

Mix the dry ingredients in one bowl with a whisk. Beat the eggs in another and add the milk and oil and mix. Then gradually add the wet to the dry, stirring as you go.

Preheat a cast iron griddle over medium heat for a few minutes. Coat it with a thin slip of canola oil. Drop a bead of batter on the griddle to test for readiness. Use a 1/4 cup ladle to pour out the batter. Reduce the heat to medium low and proceed. Keep the cakes warm in the oven as you go.

It's summer, so serve with some sliced water melon or other fresh fruit on the side.