Chocolate Meringues. Success!

Man, I am the worst blogger ever lately! Sorry folks, I have been VERY busy with wedding shenanigans and unfortunately my baking frequency has suffered the consequences. HOWEVER, I did finally make a successful batch of meringues which Joe and I handily devoured shortly thereafter. Third time is a charm.

Since I wasn't thrilled with the flavor of the cardamom meringues, I decided I would try good old fashioned chocolate for a flavor. Here's the recipe I used:

Ingredients:

3 egg whites, room temp and carefully divided
1/8 teaspoon cream of tartar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2/3 cup white sugar
1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder


First I beat together the egg whites, vanilla and cream of tartar. I think the cream of tartar was the key, because of the leavening action. It allowed me to slowly add my sugar and then, at last, the elusive..... Stiff Peaks! Yes!

Then it was time to gently fold in the cocoa powder, which I totally should have sifted before hand but I was too lazy. It was Saturday afternoon and I was a few beers in already.....

Instead of using a pastry bag, I simply filled a big freezer bag with the batter, and snipped off one of the corners. Then I piped the meringue into pretty little kisses on my baking sheet.

Ta-da They look a lot better that the flat-as-a-pancake attempts of old.

Then into the oven at 300 degrees for 25 minutes.

And we have light, fluffy, sweet little treats.

I'm a big fan of these and I'll definitely be making them again. next up on the baking agenda is a trial-run of my wedding cookie project (you didn't think I'd get married without baking for my own wedding did you?) I'll have to figure out how to share the trial run with ya without giving away the final project. It's gonna be the bomb.

Happy July!

Healthy Banana-Oat muffins

Happy almost-Friday everyone! I was home early today and was greeted by some very-ripe bananas when I walked in the door. My first thought was banana bread, but Joe and I have been trying to eat better so I thought I'd try out a healthy muffin recipe.


Ingredients:
3 ripe bananas, mashed
2 eggs
1 tsp almond extract
3/4 cups sugar
1 cup all purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1/8 cup coconut
1/8 cup brown sugar
1/8 cup oats

Time to bust out the new hand blender! This thing was from my cousin Jenn at our shower, it's great for quick recipes that don't quite need the kitchen aid.

Beat the eggs until fluffy, the mix them with the mashed banana. Add in your almond extract. In a separate bowl, mix together all of your dry ingredients....

And mix it all around.....

Spoon the batter into lined muffin cups....

I topped these with a mixture of coconut, brown sugar, and quick cooking oats. Largely because that's what I had in the pantry....

Yum.

Bake at 350 for 20 minutes. These smelled awesome. They taste ok, ya know, "healthy" food. Not up to my usual delicious standards but good for a guilt-free breakfast.

Mini Strawberry Crisps

This week at the grocery store I bought this enormous box of strawberries. After putting them in my cereal every morning for five days, this was all the progress I'd made. Hmmmm. Obviously I had to come up with some tasty dessert to use them up. Since Joe always complains that I never bake anything for just him, I thought I'd whip up a couple of strawberry crisps for our Friday night dinner.

First I chopped up the strawberries and added about 1/4 cup of sugar and a tsp of vanilla extract.

Then for the topping, I mixed 3 tablespoons of melted butter, 1/4 cup of whole wheat flour (wedding diet), 1/4 cup of oats, and 2 tablespoons of brown sugar.

I used a couple of our new Crate and Barrel ramekins from our Wedding Shower. These things are so cute, and perfect for single serving desserts.

I topped off the strawberries with the crunchy topping.... And then baked them at 350 for about 20 minutes. With berries the bake times are pretty low. If these were apples, I'd probably have extended it another 10 minutes.

Yum! For dinner, I made a veggie and bacon quiche. I'll share some picture, because it was pretty. Although it looked better than it tasted. All in all it was just okay (wedding diet, strikes again). It was super low-calorie though :)

Have a great weekend everyone!!!!