sweet potatoes

Yum yum! A side dish even a carnivore will love. plus you get something sweet before dessert. Substitute applesauce for brown sugar to make it healthy. Also add in some pecans and raisin (or craisins) to pack in even more healthy goodness. Can you say vitamins A, C, E, antioxidants...the list goes on! Your carnivore will never know what hit them.

To make these fast peel five small to medium potatoes and place them in the microwave for ten minutes. (You can also boil them until fork tender, drain and cool.) Let them cool. Then chop them up into small chunks and place in a sauce pan with -

2tbl. of butter
one pack of applesauce
cinnamon and cloves to taste
1/4 cup of pecans
1/4 cup or raisins
and a splash of cranberry or orange juice.

Mash the mixture together and simmer until ready to eat. Make sure bottom doesn't burn by stirring often. Easily reheats too!

menu idea:
I suggest serving this side with sauteed green beans, fresh french bread, and orange-ginger chicken for the meat eater / morningstar farms chick patties with homemade honey-mustard dressing for the vegetarian. Get the meat eater to marinate the meat and grill it while you prepare the rest. Dinner will be done in no time!

lemon cake

Here is a slice of the lemon cake I made today. Yummy! The icing is a very sweet. Nothing about this dessert is hard to make. Not to mention I was able to pack lots of vitamin C into something my carnivore can't get enough of!










Preheat oven to 350 degrees and spray a loaf pan.
Combine and mix together:
1 1/2 cups of sugar
1 1/2 cups of flour
1 1/2 tsp of baking powder
4 eggs
6 tblsp. melted butter
the juice of two lemons
the zest of three lemons
1/2 cup half and half

Put ingredients in pan and bake for about 1 hour. Let it rest in the pan for 5 minutes before turning it onto a cooling rack. To make the icing combine the juice of one lemon and half cup of powdered sugar. Drizzle the glaze over the cake while still warm. Enjoy!

mini silicone cups

I love these mini silicone cups. I made some cranberry orange muffins with them today. No stick, no mess. They made perfect mini-muffs. Also, they don't need to be in a muffin pan. They can stand on their own! How cool is that? I have a similar product for my regular sized muffins and they work just as well. But, I couldn't resist using these tiny guys today. It made baking from a martha white mix seem more special somehow. Check out my amazon link to get your hands on these ity-bity miracle workers.

menu idea:
Pop a couple of these mini-muffins out of their silicone cups and place them along side a fried egg and some orange slices. A petite but special breakfast for any day of the week.