Oatmeal Coffee Cake

This breakfast recipe is so tasty, and it doesn't even require milk. My dad can't do milk, so I was interested in a recipe that looks like a regular coffee cake except that in the place of milk, you basically make a big bowl of oatmeal in the microwave. Isn't that a fun replacement?

Oatmeal Bites

Just like my Oatmeal Pancakes, I have been looking for more ways to eat lots of oatmeal, even when it's so hot! These are great for breakfast, dessert, or a 3 a.m. snack. They don't need refrigeration, but I think they're extra delicious that way. These are a good example of something that you can make to suit your mood: When I really want something healthy, I use oatmeal in the place of the coconut flakes and substitute all raisins instead of half raisins and half chocolate chips. On other days, I use these to indulge my sweet tooth and eat the recipe as written.

These are so easy -- just stir, scoop, and refrigerate for 20 minutes. Notice they require no cooking or baking, so I have made them countless times over the summer.

BLT with Mushrooms and Jalapeno

BLT Pasta

I hope everyone had a great summer. In Tucson where I grew up, the kids are already in school for the fall semester. What did you do over the summer?

Sweet Strawberry Carrot Muffins

When I bought a lot of strawberries, I started dreaming of the things I could make with them, including strawberry muffins. One of my goals is to eat more vegetables so I decided to make some strawberry carrot muffins. Unfortunately for the world, searching "Strawberry Carrot Muffins Recipe" does not yield lot of results that just feature the strawberry and carrots. Fortunately for me, I had some ideas about how to put them together.

Salisbury Steak

Before I tell you about a dinner recipe that my husband would never refuse, I do want to make an announcement about my commenting system. It's been updated, and I'm afraid I lost past comments, but thank you so much for them. I love hearing from you!
Now onto dinner.

Perfect Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

My mother always made huge batches of oatmeal chocolate chip cookies when I was little. She'd make quadruple this recipe. Now you're wondering why this post is on oatmeal raisin cookies when I am remembering oatmeal chocolate chip cookies: my husband likes regular cookies to have chocolate chips and his oatmeal cookies to have raisins in them. He has an explanation about textures: oatmeal cookies are chewy just like raisins, while chocolate chip cookies are smooth just like cookies without oatmeal.
Personally, I love these cookies with either chocolate chips or raisins. It's an old family recipe.

Orange Chicken

One of my favorite meals is orange chicken, whether made at home for a light version or going out to eat. This version is flavorful without being overly sweet.

Wheat Pita Bread

Restaurants make great pitas, and now I can make delicious, healthy ones at home too.

Fresh pitas are actually a very easy yeast bread to make: You mix it, knead it, let it rise once for an hour, then cook it in a frying pan on the stove. I make the dough in the bread maker so it's even easier.

Lentil Soup

Last Thanksgiving my husband, Jay and I took a great 10 hour drive to visit family and friends back in Utah. It was great, but does anyone else feel kind of icky when you get back after eating so many rich foods? Maybe it's just Jay and me, but we're always ready for real food after a long car ride of travel snacks.
So I made sure I had this soup and some sausage in our freezer for when we got back on a Sunday evening. It microwaved while we unpacked the car and took a walk. My body was so happy with me for feeding it hot, healthy lentils.

Hermits--Molasses Cookies with Raisins

This exact recipe originated over 100 years ago.

I didn't know what a hermit was until I found this recipe in a very old cook book, which had been put online as a part of Project Gutenberg. I downloaded Things Mother Used to Make by Lydia Maria Gurney here.

Hermits are molasses cookies with chopped raisins in them. I have a favorite molasses cookie recipe, but never thought to add raisins. What a great idea!

It was also so fun to look at a cookbook from someone who lived in a very different world than I did.

Healthy Chili--Tips and Tricks

Beans are known as a Super-food, with antioxidants, fiber, a high water content, and protein. According to WebMD, they may even help fight cancer and diabetes!

Chili not only has the Super-food beans in it, but is well loved by so many people, especially my husband. But did you know there are other ways to make your chili even healthier than just including beans?

Coconut Fudge No Bake Cookies

My mom always made no bake cookies growing up. In fact, they're one of my dad's favorites to this day. Sometimes when my siblings and I were teens and needed our dad to help us fix something or give us a ride, we'd use no bake cookies to sweeten the deal.
Last Father's Day I even combined his love of no bake cookies with coconut, which is this recipe.
This recipe is also friendly to those with milk allergies! The chocolate taste is so strong, I've never known anyone to notice when I sub milk free ingredients.

Golden Rolls

Three years after this recipe post my husband still asks for these. And my 7-year-old Craigslist bread machine that leaped off the counter 6 months ago is still great at making bread dough. (I was shopping and it was making me pizza dough. I think it somehow rocked itself off the counter. Either that or it came alive while I wasn't looking like something out of The Brave Little Toaster.)

*Updated 8-8-17*

I have simplified the recipe a little -- previously I used wheat flour, bread flour, and oat flour. Now I just have white and wheat flours because it's easier. Do you have favorite recipes you have adapted?