In an effort to try and make some changes around here I’m trying to get Drew to eat healthier. He loves oatmeal for breakfast on cold mornings but I know those little packets of instant oatmeal just aren’t healthy. Are those little pieces of fruit even fruit? I’m not so sure. I found this recipe for homemade instant oatmeal in my Little House Living book and thought I’d give it a try. It took some trial and error. He didn’t like it plain even though there’s brown sugar in it. So next we tried dried fruit. That was a no go. So onto frozen fruit because that’s what I had in the house. Blueberries first – he decided he doesn’t like blueberries. Then strawberries – he didn’t like those because I warmed them up in the microwave along with the oatmeal. He refused to try them again without warming them up. So, then I tried a little bit of sugar and cinnamon. Bingo! Now I need to mix up larger batches of this stuff at a time because he loves it. He even wanted oatmeal for supper last night! He’s been eating two bowls every morning before school. This is a huge plus for me – a nice warm filling bowl of oatmeal makes me feel like he’s starting his day off on the right foot! And I’m loving the oatmeal too – might have to start buying it in bulk! So baby steps – we’re starting slow – one little step at a time!
Category: Diet
Breakfast Is Served
What perfect timing. I got my new Trim Healthy Mama cookbook last week. I was searching for a tasty, healthy breakfast item I could have made up ahead of time. Something I could grab and eat on the way into town if need be before dropping Drew off at school and then walking. And this is what I found – oatmeal on the go cups – delicious! And a bonus – it can sometimes be a battle to get Drew to eat breakfast but he loves these and asked if he can have them in the morning! How perfect is that??!!
What’s For Breakfast?
I haven’t always been good at eating breakfast. Or if I did eat breakfast, it probably wasn’t going to be healthy. For the past few months I’ve been following the Trim Healthy Mama way of eating. I haven’t stayed on plan 100% but I’m working on it! One thing I have done is start eating a healhty breakfast on a daily basis. Some days it’s Greek yogurt with berries and little sweetener. Once in awhile I’ve tried a muffin in a mug recipe but haven’t found a recipe I really like. But one thing I’ve found that I really like is this Cran-Apple Oat Cake. Minus the cran simply because they don’t carry fresh cranberries right now at my little local grocery store.
It’s so easy to make. The night before I soak the oats and mix the rest of the dry ingredients together. Then all I have to do in the morning is dump the dry ingredients in the oats, add the wet ingredients and the apple, stir it up and bake. One thing I did discover the other day though was not to forget to add the dry ingredients. I mixed everything up, baked it, sat down to eat and what a surprise! It was edible but just barely. I didn’t even realize what I had done wrong until I went back to the kitchen with my empty plate and discovered my little bowl containing the baking powder, sweetener and cinnamon. I doubt I make that mistake again! Another tip – when I warm up the leftovers in the microwave I only warm for about thirty seconds otherwise it gets rubbery. A great filling breakfast and it will perfect in the winter – a nice warm filling breakfast! You can find the recipe at www.briana-thomas.com/cran-apple-oat-cake/. I have found lots of great recipes on her site and she also has a great cookbook full of recipes I can’t wait to try.
What’s For Supper?
It’s raining! Yeah! We were in a draught. Great big cracks in the ground, brown grass, the farmers were starting to worry about crops, gardens were suffering. I had stopped watering everything but the cucumbers and tomatoes. We aren’t hooked up to rural water. We have a well. In the 26+ years we’ve lived here our well has never run dry but there’s always a first time so we were starting to be extra careful with our water usage. So this rain is greatly welcomed by all!
Supper tonight – I’m trying to watch what I eat for health reasons and because I really need to lose some weight. Tonight’s supper was so good thanks to my mom’s garden! Baked fish with homemade tartar sauce, fresh green beans, cucumbers and onions and cherries for dessert. Eric was home for supper which hasn’t happened much lately so no leftovers but that’s okay. I didn’t know he was going to be home and yet I served lots of his favorites. Score! I love this time of year and eating fresh garden veggies!