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Cherry Vanilla Bread

Update from last night: I finally got my 6 mile run in at 7pm. That’s later than I ever really run, but I got it done and get 1000x better afterwards, and that’s what matters. I’m one of those people who cannot function without exercise. I get drowsy and dopey, and I think I am sort of tightly wound, and exercise normally takes that edge off me.

Despite the late start, we had quite the delicious dinner, trying 2 new recipes of Cooking Light.

The first were cheesy cauliflower biscuits, which were filled with garlic and cheddar flavor. They almost reminded me of soufflés, because they were light and fluffy. The second recipe was the Roasted Carrot, Quinoa, and Grape bowl. I really liked this one-we cooked quinoa in chicken broth, and that was mixed with chicken, sliced grapes, and roasted carrots, all topped with a greek yogurt based dressing and served over a field of greens.

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The dressing had an interesting and delicious cumin flavor. The only thing is that I think we used more quinoa than the recipe called for, so there wasn’t much dressing for the greens.

This morning, I had a dentist appointment so I made sure to not have something that would stick in my teeth for breakfast! I had a Siggi’s pomegranate passionfruit yogurt, topped with sunflower seed butter, and a side of nectarine from the Farmer’s Market. I love that Siggi’s flavored yogurts are not very sweet!

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After the dentist, I went straight out to do my medium length run of the week-5 miles. My legs were dragged a tiny bit from running the night before, and my foot was a little stiff, but I knew I’d feel better if I just knocked it out early in the week because it works better with scheduling.

After my run, I headed home to get to work on some baking projects. I’m trying to avoid eating too many bars because they tend to be higher in sugar, and because I’m trying to eat fewer foods that may contain traces of nuts because my skin has been awful lately due to allergic reactions.

In the process, I threw together a quick lunch of leftovers, this time skipping the bed of lettuce.

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Project 1 was just basic pumpkin banana bread.

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Project 2 was sort of spur of the moment. I wanted to try something different. I’ve made cherry bread before on accident (when I realized halfway through assembling ingredients that we were out of pumpkin-whoops), so I thought making cherry vanilla bread might be fun to do for something different. It turned out great!

Interestingly, the bread doesn’t have a strong fruity flavor, but the cherry masks the banana flavor. If you want a warm, homey bread that is still wholesome, I would recommend giving this a try! It has a pretty basic flavor, and I think it could be the base for a lot of different things-I have big plans for this come winter! Feel free to jazz it up by added dried cherries or chocolate chips.

Cherry Vanilla Bread

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Ingredients:

2 well ripened bananas

1.5 cups of frozen cherries, thawed and ground in a blender or food processor

1 large egg or 2 egg whites

2 tablespoons oil (I used avocado)

1/3 c milk

1/8 c honey (or more to taste, recipe actually calls for 1/3 to 1/2 c sugar)

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon cinnamon (can omit-this gives it a warm flavor)

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

1.5 c whole wheat pastry flour

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350

Mash bananas.

Add all ingredients except flour and mix well

Blend in flour, stir until moistened

Pour into 4×8 loaf pan, I recommend lining it in tinfoil

Bake for 50 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center is clean.

Enjoy!

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And because I have to share this picture:

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Chocolate Muffins with Ricotta Filling

Guys. I have a recipe. I know, it’s been a while, right?

But first, a couple of things.

1. I’m trying to do some work on the blog. Does a right sidebar appear when you view my blog? It should be there but I can’t get it to come

up on my computer and I can’t figure out why…

2. I have some food pics first.

I had the best morning yesterday-I went to Crossfit and had my baking in the oven by 9am. I love jet lag. My before Crossfit breakfast was

random but functional.  A biscuit+roasted carrots+watermelon.

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Lunch was a hummus veggie wrap-whole grain wrap, red pepper hummus, lettuce, tomato, cucumber. Delicious. Plus more watermelon. And

muffins.

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And then dinner was take out-terikayi chicken tacos.

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And homemade guac and salsa.

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Also-I haven’t unpacked yet. You want to know WHY I haven’t unpacked yet?

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They were on it ALL day.

Ok-recipe time! This recipe can be used in parts or all together.

Chocolate Muffins with Ricotta Orange Filling

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The ricotta filling is from a recipe we used when I went to a culinary bootcamp for school lunch cafeteria workers for work. It originally was

used as a fruit dip. The recipe makes a bit more than necessary for the muffins so I recommend dipping some watermelon or oranges!

Ricotta Orange Filling

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Ingredients:

15 oz reduced fat ricotta

1/4 c orange juice

3 T honey

1 1/2 t orange zest

1 1/2 t vanilla

1/4 t cinnamon

Instructions: Beat all ingredients together in a medium sized bowl until smooth.

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For the chocolate muffin:

I used the recipe for my double chocolate banana bread (I swear you won’t taste the banana here so it won’t

clash, I promise!), although I only used 3 bananas.

Ingredients:

3 ripe bananas

1 egg (or 2 whites)

2 T oil (I used canola)

1/3 c milk

1 t salt

1 t baking soda

1/2 t baking powder

1/2 c cocoa powder (I used dark chocolate, hence the color)

1 c flour-I used whole wheat pastry

1 T honey

1/3 c bittersweet chocolate chips

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 350.

2. Mash bananas and mix all ingredients besides the chips.

3. Stir in chips

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4. Line a muffin tin with 12 muffin cups. I also highly recommend greasing the tin so that the oversized muffins come out more easily.

5. Divide the batter into the 12 cups.

6. Place a heaping table spoon (more or less if desired) of the ricotta orange filling on top of each muffin.

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7. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the muffin comes out clean.

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Enjoy!