Banana Nut Granola

Ingredients:


2 large ripe bananas
2 Tbsp melted coconut oil (or vegetable oil)
1 Tbsp molasses
1 Tbsp vanilla
3 cups oats
1 tsp salt
1 Tbsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp nutmeg
1 cup unsweetened coconut flakes (or shelled sunflower seeds)
1 cup chopped walnuts


Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Mash the bananas in a large bowl. I use a bent fork, but you could use a potato masher. Stir in the coconut oil, molasses, and vanilla. Add the rest of the ingredients on top of the mashed bananas and stir them all together until thoroughly coated and clumping together. Use your hands to squeeze into clumps if you want.

Spread the granola evenly onto two trays. Bake at 350 for 10 minutes, then take the sheets out and stir the granola up a bit to make sure it browns evenly. Turn the oven down to 300 and put the sheets back in to bake for another 10 - 15 minutes, or until toasted to your liking. I like mine a little underbaked. The granola will crisp up as it cools.

It should make about 6 cups, which equates to a dozen half cup servings. Each serving has 215 calories, 12 grams of fat, 5 grams protein, 4 grams fiber, 4 grams sugar, and 22 grams total carbs.

It costs about $4 to make the entire batch, using bob's red mill coconut, with the coconut oil, oats, and walnuts coming from Aldi.

Schokoladen-Pfannkuchen (German Chocolate Pancake)

My mom's signature dish, from the cookbook that came with her Oster Kitchen Center some 30+ years ago, is Apple Pfannkuchen.

I don't claim to make mom's original recipe. I've never been able to pull it off anyway. However, I am notorious for adjusting and "messing with" original recipes, so I made a chocolate version instead.

Ingredients:

For Pfannkuchen
3/4 cup milk (almond milk works too)
3 eggs
1/3 cup oat flour (or all purpose flour)
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
2 tbsp sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla/almond extract (or 1 splash of amaretto, which is what I used)

2 tbsp butter (for pie plate)

For Topping

2 cups fresh or frozen raspberries
shot of amaretto

Whipped cream


Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Put milk, eggs, flour, cocoa, sugar, salt, and extract into a bowl. I use my immersion blender to blend it into a smooth batter. Or you can skip the bowl and put it all in a regular blender and use the highest speed to get a smooth batter.

Place the butter in a pie plate, then put that in the oven for a minute until it melts. Watch it closely so that it doesn't burn. Once the butter has melted, using oven mitts, take the pie plate out and carefully pour in the batter. Place the pie plate back in the oven and bake 20 - 30 minutes or until the pfannkuchen puffs up and is set in the middle.

While the pancake is baking, place berries and liquor (or you can use a shot of water, 1/2 tsp vanilla and sugar to taste) in a pot on the stove and heat on medium until the berries break down a bit and thicken into a sauce.

Once out of the oven, pfannkuchen will collapse as it cools. Serve warm, with the topping, and whipped cream.

Or wait until it cools and slice it like a pie into eighths. Spread the slices with peanut butter, and cinnamon or chocolate chips, then roll each one up like a crescent roll.

You could also replace the vanilla with orange liquor/juice and zest. Then spread it with marmalade, or Cannoli dip, instead of raspberry sauce.

Guten Appetit!