Every summer we buy melons- watermelons, honeydews, cantaloupes, and so forth. However, as a family of four, we often have trouble finishing the whole melon. Last summer I made a muffin with a cake mix and watermelon. This summer I decided to work on that recipe. These muffins turned out delicious! They were light, fluffy and very healthy. They are also dairy free and egg free. If you would like to use eggs instead of the flax seed, replace the water and flax seed with 2 eggs. Enjoy the recipe!
Melon Muffins with Lime Caramel Sauce
Ingredients
1 Cup Blended Melon
1 Cake Mix (White, Yellow, or French Vanilla)
1/2 Cup Multi Grain Hot Cereal (I used Hodgkins Mills)
1/2 Cup Applesauce
1/4 Cup Juice (I used mango/tangerine, but any juice would work)
1/8 Cup Flax Seed
3/8 Cup Water
Lime Caramel Sauce (Optional)
1/4 Cup Honey
Juice of 1 Lime
Lime zest
Melon Muffins
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Microwave water for 45 seconds. Mix flax seed into water and stir. Set aside to cool.
2. In your magic bullet or blender, blend about 2 cups fresh melon (I used cantaloupe and watermelon). Your goal is 1 cup of blended melon. You want a thick juice. Small chunks of melon are okay, they actually taste delicious in the muffin!
3. In a large bowl, mix together melon, muffin, multi-grain cereal, applesauce, and juice. After mixing, mix in flax seed. Thoroughly spray muffin tins with non-stick spray. Fill each muffin tin almost to the top. It will make 12 muffins. Bake for 23 to 25 minutes. Muffins will start to crack and pop up when gently pushed. They will also start to brown around the edges. Let cool before adding sauce. (I let ours sit covered overnight)
Lime Caramel Sauce
Poor honey in a small pan. Juice 1 lime into pan (make sure to remove seeds). Mix together. Cook on high, stirring constantly. It will take 2 to 3 minutes to make the caramel. I let mine boil for almost 5 minutes and that was too long. The caramel and lime will start to boil and then froth up. Keep stirring, it burns easily. After it has reached a rapid boil, let boil for a minute. Pull off the heat and let continue boiling for a minute, stirring while it cools. Drizzle over muffins. Grate lime zest over top of the muffins.
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I love the Superbowl- not necessarily for the football but because of all the wonderful leftovers you can use in recipes afterwards! Here's one for your leftover bits of dip. I used a ranch dip in our Crescent Cups but you can use dill, french onion, bacon cheddar or what every kind of dip you have leftover and your family loves. Enjoy!
Ham and Broccoli Crescent Cups
Ingredients:
1 Cup Chopped Ham
1 Cup Chopped Broccoli, cooked
3 TBSP Dip (ranch, dill, french onion, bacon cheddar, etc.)
1 Egg
1/2 Cup Shredded Cheddar Cheese
1 Tube Crescent Rolls
1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Mix together ham, broccoli, dip, egg, and cheddar cheese in a large mixing bowl.
2. Spray a 12 muffin, regular size muffin pan with Pam. Unroll crescent rolls. Take each triangle, and make it into a triangular cup (see picture, use long perforated side to join together). Place into muffin pan. Fill with ham and broccoli mix.
3. Bake at 375 for 14 to 15 minutes. Let sit for 5 minutes to set before serving. Makes 8 Cups.
Summer is finally here!!!! As a teacher, summer is a precious time for me. It means weeks of teaching and spending time with my own babies. I love it! For us, an important part of summer is grilling with friends. I tend to buy huge watermelons and then after the bbq, my children get to see the watermelon at every meal for the rest of the week. This week I decided enough was enough, I was going to figure out something to do with the rest of the watermelon. Celia, Charlie and I created this recipe for watermelon muffins. Can you believe it only has 2 ingredients! They had a lot of fun helping me. Charlie loved them so much he ate 7 in 2 days!
Watermelon Muffins
Ingredients:
3 Cups of Cubed Watermelon
1 Cake Mix (white, yellow, or be creative, maybe strawberry)
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Puree watermelon cubes in the food processor until it resembles chunky applesauce. Don't over puree, 5-7 pushes of the button should do the trick.
3. Mix watermelon puree with cake mix. Pour into cupcake pan.
4. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes. Makes 24 muffins.
This is a coffee cake I made for our Easter Breakfast at church. I have been working on "healthifying" my recipes, so this one is made with skim milk, pineapple and apple sauce. There's not any oil or eggs in it! It turned out incredibly light and delicious. It was so easy to prepare, I will definitely make it again. If you cut the cake in 10, there's about 5 weight watchers points per slice. Enjoy!
Pineapple Coffee Cake
Ingredients:
1 cup applesauce
1 cup bisquick
1/2 yellow cake mix
1/2 cup skim milk
1 can pineapple chunks and juice
1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees
2. Mix together applesauce, bisquick, cake mix, skim milk and the juice from the pineapple in a bowl.
3. Spray 9" pie pan and pour pineapple on bottom. Pour batter on top. Sprinkle ground cinnamon on top. Bake in the oven for 30 minutes until toothpick comes out clean.
4. Let cool and serve, or flip coffee cake over onto a serving platter and have Upside Down Pinapple Coffee Cake.
Last weekend we had friends over for a fantastic, end of the summer bbq. (It's only the end of the summer because our school is back in session.) As always, we had way too much food. When I was little, we used to eat a dish called pizza burgers at school. I remember I loved them. This gave me the idea to turn our hamburgers into breakfast burgers. These were easy to make and only need a couple ingredients. Enjoy!
Breakfast Burgers:
Ingredients:
2- 1/4 Hamburgers, crumbled
2 Eggs
1/3 Cup Dip (I used spinach artichoke, but any will work.)
3 Hamburger or Hotdog Buns
Shredded Cheese
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Mix together hamburger meat, eggs, and dip. Spread out over hamburger or hotdog buns. Top with shredded cheese.
3. Bake for 10 minutes. Makes 6 Breakfast Burgers.
We had a bbq last night and amazingly enough, we ended up with more food leftover than when we started. It was totally loaves and fishes :) We have such great friends! This morning when I was figuring out breakfast, I realized that I should probably use some of the myriad of hamburger buns sitting on my counter, but I was tired of making the same old breakfast regulars. Here's a twist on French toast and peanut butter and jelly that was a huge hit! We ate them as a finger food. They are great for kids and husbands with very little clean up!
PB Jammerwiches
Ingredients:
4 to 6 Hamburger Buns
2 Eggs
1/4 Cup Milk
1 Tsp Cinnamon Sugar
Peanut Butter
Jelly or Jam
Powdered Sugar
1. In a shallow bowl, mix together milk, cinnamon sugar, and eggs.
2. Spray your griddle with non-stick spray and heat it up.
3. Spread a thin layer of peanut butter and jellly on the "wrong" sides of the bun. Put together like a sandwich and smash flat. Dip both sides of sandwich in egg mixture. Place on griddle and cook until both sides are golden brown. Sprinkle powdered sugar on top. Makes 4 to 6 PB Jammerwiches.
It's funny how weekends are supposed to be filled with relaxing downtime, but they often end up being busier, but more fun, than the work week! We've had an exciting weekend hanging out with friends and family! In fact, some of them are still hanging out in our kitchen. We also got to eat out at some really great restaurants. But don't worry What's for Leftovers readers, I still managed to squeeze in a couple of new recipes. This one is a variation of a recipe I read in a Guideposts a while back. It's called a Finnish Pancake. I told Celia and Charlie it was a 'GIANT' pancake. No matter what you call it, it's delicious. After you finish baking it, make sure you let it completely cool. This gives the inside time to settle. Top with fried apples and powdered sugar for a breakfast treat or a great dessert!
Fried Apples
Ingredients:
8 Medium Apples
1/4 Cup Honey
2 TBSP Butter
1/2 Cup Water
Pinch of Salt
1. Spray a large frying pan.
2. Peel Apples. Cut into large slices and put into frying pan.
3. Add honey, butter, water and salt.
4. Cook on high heat until water has evaporated. While cooking, stir frequently so apples don't burn. Lower heat and continue cooking until apples are soft and smell like apple pie filling.
Finnish Pancakes
Ingredients:
1 Cup Pancake Mix
2 1/2 Cups Milk
4 Eggs
1/4 Cup Honey
4 TBSP Butter
Powdered Sugar
1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
2. Spray a 10"-11" round baking pan or skillet with PAM.
3. Pour pancake mix, milk, eggs, honey and butter into a blender. Blend until smooth. Pour into baking pan.
4. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes. Top should be golden brown when 'Finnished'.
5. Let cool completely. After slicing, top with powdered sugar and fried apples.
Good Morning What's for Leftovers Readers! We have had a very busy weekend. Our children went out of town because Andy had to play the piano in our friends' wedding. So needless to say, there was not a lot of time for leftover cooking. Because of this, I made sure to make a dish last Thursday to post this Sunday. It was a breakfast quiche for the guys at Andy's shop for lunch. It was a big hit judging by the empty pie dish that came home with Andy that night. Quiche filling is one of the easiest food items to prepare, but the crust, unless you use a store-bought one, is a little more time consuming. Since I was in hurry, and I didn't have any ready-made pie crusts, I used baking potatoes as my crust. This was so simple, plus it made the dish a little healthier. I love to sneak vegetables in my recipes whenever I can! Let me know if you have any questions.
Ham and Potato Quiche
Ingredients:
2 Medium Baking Potatoes
1 Cup Chopped Broccoli
1 Cup Diced Ham
1/4 Cup Diced Red Bell Pepper
1/3 Cup Mayonnaise
6 Eggs
1/3 Cup Milk
1 1/2 Cups Shredded Colby Cheese
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray a glass bottom pie pan.
2. Peel baking potatoes. Cut in half and thinly slice. Layer potato slices on bottom of pie pan.
3. Layer chopped broccoli, ham, and bell peppers on top of potato slices.
4. In a blender or Magic Bullet, whip together mayo, eggs and milk until creamy and frothy. When finished, gently pour over vegetables.
5. Bake in the oven for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes add cheese to the top of the quiche and bake for another 15 minutes. When finished, the bottom of the quiche should be light brown and the cheese should be completely melted and bubbly.
