Smoothie Recipe For June’s National Fresh Fruits & Vegetable Month

May 31, 2015 by Danielle 3 Comments

Trying to get your kids to eat more veggies and fruits? Here is a fabulous, healthy, tasty smoothie recipe from Vicki Marquez, author of Rootlets: Super Rootabilities. June is National Fresh Fruits & Vegetable Month.

About Rootlets:

The Rootlets: Super Rootabilities was created and written by Vicki Marquez and illustrated by Jeremy Russnak, introduces readers to the Rootlets – Brocc, Carrotina, Cornelius and Kaley – who live on Planet Planted in the town of VeggieVille with their dog, Basil, and their guardian and caretaker Yammy Grammy, who plucked them from the ground when they were just sprouts. Hilariously fun with bright, bold, colorful illustrations. The Rootlets: Super Rootabilities is a thrilling journey that showcases the super powers of plant-based foods and explores the magic of friendship and imagination.

This book is recommended for children ages 4 to 9.

This is the first product that is launched by The Rootlets brand, whose mission is to familiarize kids with fruits, veggies, and healthy eating. Future Rootlets products include apps, more books, games, toys, and an animated TV show. The Rootlets will be launching their website, which will be an interactive experience filled with games, activities, learning resources and exclusive content about the characters and their magical world.

Smoothie Recipe:

Grandma’s “Cleaned Up” Greened up Milkshake

1 Banana
2 heaping handfuls of spinach
2 to 3 pitted dates
1 1/4 cup of almond milk (or coconut milk)
1 scoop of maca powder
1 scoop of cacao powder
1 TB of raw crunchy almond butter
3 ice cubes
A Sprinkle of love (optional but highly recommended)

Add all ingredients to a blender, blend until smooth and enjoy.

My daughters and I truly love smoothies and love to try new recipes. I try to sneak new ingredients into smoothies all the time for hope that they don’t know how good for them it is. I am looking forward to adding this great smoothie recipe to our list and I know that the girls will like it as much as I did.

Tip: Checkout kitchen ultimate website to compare best kitchen products and utensil required to prepare this milkshake recipe in your kitchen for buying at discounted rates.

Filed Under: recipes Tagged With: check in, Green Smoothies, healthy Smoothie, Healthy Snacks, National Fresh Fruits and Vegetables Month, recipe, Smoothie, Smoothie Recipe, Snacks for Kids

Goya Foods – Yucca

May 19, 2015 by Samantha 5 Comments

We are adventurous eaters in this house. We love to experiment with new foods, cooking techniques, and flavors. But most of all, we love new ingredients. You never know what will spice up those chicken cutlets or even a roasted chicken without trying new things. One such new ingredient we recently experimented with was Yucca. For those who do not know, yucca is a fibrous tuber, think 90% potato, 10% celery. It is like a fibrous potato, but when cooked the texture is unique, not stringy, and can complement many main dishes.

03 02 2015 cannon 065 We tried a few recipes with our frozen yucca from Goya. Of them the two stand outs were oven fried yucca fries and mashed garlic yucca, both of which are easy to make. When preping the yucca, be sure to boil it until it is soft as your first step, then take out the tough inner core. On some pieces, the core was already removed, but most had a bit of it left. You may not understand what this core is, but when you see it you will know. It is a shade darker then the rest of the flesh and is easy to distinguish as visibly more fibrous as well. Below is our recipe for oven fried yucca fries followed by mashed yucca with garlic sauce, enjoy.

03 02 2015 cannon 066

Oven Fried Yucca Fries:

1 bag (24 oz.) frozen GOYA® Yuca

½ cup GOYA® Extra Virgin Olive Oil

3 tbsp. GOYA® Minced Garlic, or 8 cloves garlic, finely chopped

3 tbsp. GOYA® lite Adobo spice Mix

First boil the yucca as described above, then remove the core of the yucca. As the yucca is boiling, grab a plastic zipper bag and put in the Adobo, garlic, and olive oil. Shake up gently mixing the oil and spices. After this, slice the yucca into french fry shapes- long stripes. After cutting up approximately 3 yucca toss them into the oil and spice mixture, zip, and shake. Once properly coated, transfer the yucca to a cookie sheet for baking. Set the oven to 350 degrees and start baking. The yucca are done when they are slightly brown. These are not the same brown as french fries, so be sure to keep an eye on them.
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Filed Under: food, recipes

The Best Sugar Cookie Recipe Ever

February 19, 2015 by Danielle 4 Comments

Who doesn’t love a wonderful sugar cookie? I am truthfully not really a sugar cookie person, but let me tell you….this sugar cookie recipe is amazing. I always make them fairly thick and they seem to stay soft and good at all times! I made these last week for Valentine’s Day (about 70+ hearts) and not a single one was wasted.

Sugar Cookie Recipe:

1 Cup Oleo or Butter
1 Cup Shortening
1 Cup Powdered Sugar
1 Cup White Sugar
2 Eggs
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
4 1/2 Cups Flour

Of course, there is always the stand mixer kept in your kitchen!

1. Cream together the Butter and the Shortening.
2. Add the Powdered Sugar and the White Sugar
3. Add the remaining ingredients; eggs, vanilla, salt, baking soda, and flour.
4. After the cookie dough is all mixed together you can refrigerate if you feel necessary. (I typically don’t refrigerate)

Chicken Enchilada Soup

January 10, 2015 by Danielle 9 Comments

As cold as it is outside here, let me tell you that there isn’t anything better than some good soup! Or is there? Actually having that soup cook in the crock-pot all day long with no extra work from you makes it even better. I am very excited to share my Quick and Easy Chicken Enchilada Soup Recipe with you.

What You Need:

3 Medium/Large Size Cans of Chicken (depending on how meaty you want it).
1 Can of Green Chillies
1 Can Petite Diced Tomatoes
1 Bag Frozen Corn
Black Beans Rinsed (I left these out)
1 Packet Taco Seasoning
Chicken Broth (We’ll talk about the amount in a little bit)
Cream of Chicken Soup (Talk about how many cans in a bit)

Kitchen Roll-Ups- Fruit Leather from your Juicer

January 8, 2015 by Samantha 7 Comments

For most owners of a powerful Breville juicer, the job description of their machine begins and ends with extracting juices from fruits and vegetables. However, a juicer can be one of the most versatile tools in the kitchen for an adventurous cook, and one of its hidden powers is the ability to make fruit leather in your own home.

These delicious fruit snacks can be made using a wide range of fruit blends and are guaranteed to remind you of a packed lunch from your school days. They also retain all the nutritional value of the chosen fruits, so kids will find it much easier to get more fruit into their diet one roll at a time.

Preparation

Creating a homemade fruit roll up starts with choosing the fruit flavors that will go into the mixture. Practically any fruit will work, even dried fruit can be rehydrated with water and honey for use in this recipe. Honey, maple syrup or agave nectar can also be added to the mixture before juicing for enhanced sweetness. Add the fruit blend into the juicer and process into a thick, pudding-like consistency using the homogenization setting.

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Filed Under: evergreen, food, recipes Tagged With: juicer, recipe

Turkey Soup

December 5, 2014 by Admin 5 Comments

This recipe is really easy, and it’s great to use left over meat with it. I always make this after a family dinner or, Thanksgiving, Christmas even. You take those left overs and the carved up turkey ( bones and fat and all) boil it for a few hours with vegetables till all the meat falls off. Toss some beans in there, you have left over soup with whatever meat you had on hand. It makes a great hearty soup, my kids like to eat it in mugs after a rainy day .

Ingredients

The remains of your turkey or chicken ( even Ham works) with bones, skins, fat, everything. No need to pick off the itty bites of extra meat, it’ll come off later. This is going to make the broth for the soup

2 cups of left over Turkey or Chicken or Ham

3 stalks celery chopped

1 large onions chopped

2 cloves garlic minced

2 large tomatoes chopped

1 cup mushrooms

1 cup both red and green peppers

1 1/2 cups chopped carrots.

1 bag of dried beans which have been soaked over night or 3 cans white northern beans ( rinse them)
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Filed Under: food, recipes Tagged With: cooking, food, Soup

Amazing Chocolate Cocktails

December 3, 2014 by Samantha 2 Comments

Got a chocolate lover in your life? Maybe you are looking for an amazing “signature drink” for an upcoming party. You will love the flavored vodkas by Van Gogh – they do all the work for you, just mix and serve! So delicious, and there is nothing overly “girly” about them, so the guys will enjoy it as well.
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Filed Under: evergreen, food, recipes Tagged With: cocktails, recipe

Banana Bread Recipe

November 30, 2014 by Samantha 3 Comments

You can’t go past a good homemade banana bread. One slice after another – and before you know it you have eaten a whole loaf. Make sure you use really ripe bananas, as they bring about a deep, sweet banana flavor. Often I spread a cream cheese icing on top, finished with toasted chopped walnuts – but it wouldn’t be a bread then, would it? Tip: you can also make this delicious banana bread recipe in bread maker appliance easily.

Makes 1 x 23cm LOAF

220g self-raising flour

¼ tsp baking soda

¼ tsp ground cinnamon

¼ tsp salt

80g sugar

45g brown sugar

2 eggs

60ml milk

1 tsp vanilla extract

75g melted butter or vegetable oil

200g mashed ripe banana
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