Pinterest. Oh, pinterest: the guilty pleasure of all females out there who know what it is. Pinterest is the place that I can go to waste more time looking at things I want to cook, make, read, wear, etc. than I will actually spend doing these things. I know this, but it's not going to stop me from continuing the behaviour.
Kathy Lee and Hoda. By no means do I want to degrade the experience and knowledge that these two woman possess, but their segment on the Today Show is, at times, laden with nonsense and ridiculousity and sometimes includes wine as early as 10am. Yes, "ridiculousity" is a real word. Being under the weather the last couple of days has allowed me to indulge in enough of their segment to dream of getting paid to sample PB2 and advise a British teenager where to go for NYC's best eats before cutting to commercial break by breaking into a duet rendition of Miley Cyrus's Party in the USA. I'm also pretty sure that even if there is a script written for them, 75% of that plan goes to hell on a daily basis. I could do that kind of broadcasting.
Being under the weather has also guaranteed that I will be missing my 5k opener at Kent State this Saturday, which has also lead to a small amount of self pity and wallowing. Under any kind of undue stress, I tend to appease myself by baking or cooking, so yesterday when it finally hit me that I wouldn't be lacing up my spikes on Saturday morning, I went to work on some pre-race breakfast and post-race recovery fuel for my fellow CRC kids who will.
I don't trust anyone who doesn't love a PB&J sandwich. I don't advise making a habit of it, but if you want to really take the standard PB&J and skyrocket it from fabulous to change-your-pants awesome, throw some chocolate chips between your PB and jelly layer. Chocolate automatically makes anything better, and I'll argue that crunch also does the same. I've been aching to make a quinoa-based energy bar, so I made a few tweaks and changes to this recipe in conjuring up these bad boys, inspired by the change-your-pants awesome PBC&J sandwich:
Chocolate PB&J Quinoa Protein Bars
Ingredients
3/4 dry or 2 cups cooked quinoa
1/2 cup pitted dates
3 tbsp coconut sugar
2 tbsp coconut oil
2 tbsp ground flaxseed
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 cup protein powder
1/2 cup peanut flour
1/2 cup combination of raisins and dried cherries
1 tsp ground ginger
Preheat oven to 350 and line 9 x 5in loaf pan with parchment.
Rinse the quinoa and soak in water for 10 minutes or so, then drain. Bring one cup of water to a boil and add the pre-soaked quinoa. Cover and simmer for about 12 minutes or until all of the water has been absorbed.
When the quinoa is cool enough to handle, combine all the ingredients except the peanut flour and dried fruit in a food processor. Process until fairly smooth; the mixture will never be quite silky-smooth because the quinoa grain is so small. Add in the flour; pulse to combine. Stir in dried fruit. The dough should look like thick cookie dough. Press into loaf pan and bake 20-22 minutes, or until you can put a fork through the center of the loaf and it comes out clean. Store in the refrigerator for up to a week; the bars will keep in the freezer for up to 3 months.
Per my entry Wednesday, you saw that I am currently a little fixated on pumpkin. I love all things pumpkin, including Clif Bar's seasonal pumpkin pie flavor. I have no idea why we've chosen to elect pumpkin as something only eaten between mid-October and late December, but I think it's ludicrous. Obviously when I was deciding which copycat Clif Bar flavor to make, it was a no-brainer. However, I decided to put a slight little savoury twist on it. Don't turn your nose up; just trust me.
Black Pepper Pumpkin Spice 'Cliff' Bars
Ingredients
1 1/4 cups GF crisp rice cereal
1 cup GF steel cut oats
1/2 cup pumpkin puree
1/3 cup brown rice syrup
2 tbsp coconut oil
1 tbsp ground cinnamon
1 tbsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground cardamom
1/2 tsp sea salt
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
2 tbsp ground flaxseed
1/4 cup finely chopped cashews (or nuts of choice)
1/4 cup finely chopped raisins and dried cranberries
Preheat oven to 350 and line a 9x5in loaf pan with parchment paper.
Pulse the oats in a food processor until finely chopped, but before the oats turn to flour. Pour into a large bowl. Pulse the dried fruit until finely chopped and add to the oats. Do the same with the nuts. Add the nuts, dried fruit, flaxseed, salt and pepper to the bowl. Stir to combine.
In a medium saucepan, heat the oil, pumpkin, and brown rice syrup on medium heat until the syrup is no longer viscous. Whisk to combine. Pour over the dry ingredients and stir until coated. You may need to get a little dirty and use your hands. The batter will be very sticky, so with slightly damp hands, press into prepared pan and bake for 15-17 minutes, or until a fork can be removed cleanly from the middle.
Peanut flour.... do you just pulse peanuts in a food processor until they are broken up but before the peanut butter stage!?!
ReplyDeleteBell Plantations actually makes a product called PB2 (http://store.bellplantation.com/), which is simply their fancy name for peanut flour. It is exactly what you think, except they go an extra step and after the peanuts have been ground, they press a lot of the oil out of the meal, removing a lot of the fat and calories. There are varying degrees to which you can extract the oil-PB2 comes in only one variety, but other companies will remove various percentages of the oil, making some varieties richer than others. Peanut meal would work equally as well, but I decided to use the PB2 to make these more pre-workout friendly, since I don't digest fat very quickly and my belly doesn't like running with a gut full of nut butter.
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