Tag: snacks

Apple Pie Fruit Leathers

Melissa King 23 Comments

My kids love fruit leathers, but they are so expensive at the store.  So now I make my own.  It’s so easy and you can add in whatever fruits and spices you like.  I have peach fruit leathers on my blog already, and now I can add these to the list.

Apple Leather watermark

The house smells amazing when these are cooking, kind of like when I make my crock pot applesauce.  The best part is that you probably already have all the ingredients in your own cabinets!  I used applesauce to make mine, but you can most certainly use real apples and puree them first.  Think about it though.  When your store has a sale on applesauce, you can stock up and make these.  It would save a lot of money and make your kids happy too. I used a dehydrator to make mine, but you can certainly try this in the oven as well.  You just need to keep an eye one them.

Apple Pie Fruit Leathers

Apple Pie Fruit Leathers

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Prep Time 20 min Cook Time 7 hr Serves 20 fruit leathers     adjust servings

Ingredients

Instructions

  1. If using an oven, preheat to the lowest setting or 135. 
  2. Put all ingredients in a bowl and mix well. 
  3. Line your baking sheets with parchment and spread the mixture out evenly. 
  4. Bake for about 4-6 hours, depending on how low the temp your oven will go. 
  5. If you are using a dehydrator , line the trays with parchment as well.  You can use the dehydrator sheets as well, but I think parchment is much cheaper and works great. 
  6. I baked mine in the dehydrator at 135 for about 6-7 hours. 
  7. Once it feels tacky, it’s pretty much done.  I got about 20 fruit leathers out of my batch.  Enjoy!

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Gluten Free Herb Crackers and a Giveaway!

Melissa King 153 Comments

When I made my Homemade Wheat Thins the other day, a lot of you wanted a gluten free cracker as well.  This recipe is more for adults than kids, but it’s so good!  But first, let me tell you about the giveaway.

If you need help on your knife skills like I do, this giveaway is for you!  I used this mezzaluna from Joseph Joseph to cut the herbs in this recipe.  Let me tell you it worked so well!  Makes me wonder why it took me so long to get one!  Joesph Joseph is also going to give a mezzaluna to one lucky winner.

mezzaluna

All you need to do is:

Like My Whole Food Life on Facebook
Like Joseph Joesph on Facebook
Leave a comment under this blog post

Contest is open to US residents only. Winner will be chosen on  Tuesday, August 27, 2013.  Good luck!  Now onto the recipe.

This giveaway is now closed.

herb-crackers-watermark

Gluten Free Herb Crackers

Gluten Free Herb Crackers and a Giveaway!

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Prep Time 20 min Cook Time 30 min Serves 30 crackers     adjust servings

Ingredients

  • 2 cups cooked brown rice or quinoa
  • 1 /4 cup chia seeds
  • 6 basil leaves chopped
  • 2 T fresh parsley chopped
  • 1 tsp fresh rosemary
  • 1 tsp fresh chives
  • salt and pepper to taste
  • About 4 T water

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 350. 
  2. In a food processor , blend up the rice and the chia seeds. 
  3. Then add in the remaining ingredients and pulse until a dough starts to come together. 
  4. Tear two pieces of parchment paper the size of your baking sheets . 
  5. Place 1 piece of parchment on the counter top. 
  6. Put half the dough onto the parchment. 
  7. Tear some plastic wrap to put between the rolling pin and the dough.  This will prevent the dough from sticking to the rolling pin . 
  8. Roll the dough out pretty thin. 
  9. Transfer the dough and the parchment paper to a baking sheet.
  10. Repeat these steps with the other half of the dough. 
  11. Bake in the oven for 15 minutes. 
  12. Remove the pans and carefully cut the dough into squares with a pizza cutter . 
  13. Carefully flip each square over and bake for another 15-20 minutes, or until crispy. 

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Recipe Notes

You can probably do the whole thing in the dehydrator as well if you want to keep them raw. I got around 30 crackers in my batch. Store them in a container with dry rice scattered at the bottom. The rice will absorb the moisture and keep the crackers crispy. Enjoy!

Peach Fruit Leathers

Melissa King 66 Comments

We got a bunch of peaches in our co-op basket this week.  I though about doing some ice cream or cobbler, but at the last minute I decided to make peach fruit leathers.

Fruit leathers watermark

Fruit leathers are really easy to make.  Much cheaper too!  I used my dehydrator to make these peach fruit leathers, but you can make them in your oven as well.  I just love the dehydrator because it quietly runs and I can even leave the house with it on.  It also doesn’t heat up the kitchen.  This is so easy, it’s almost silly to call it a recipe.

Peach Fruit Leathers

Peach Fruit Leathers

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Prep Time 20 min Cook Time 7 hr Serves 10 fruit rolls     adjust servings

Ingredients

  • 5 peaches
  • 1 T honey or maple syrup (optional)

Instructions

  1. If using an oven, preheat it to 150. 
  2. Cut and pit all the peaches. I left the skins on, but you can also remove them if you want.
  3. In a food processor or blender , mix the peaches into a smooth puree.  Take a taste. 
  4. If the mixture is on the tart side, add a small amount of sweetener. 
  5. If you are using the oven, spread the mixture onto a parchment lined baking sheet.  Make sure it’s as even as it can get. 
  6. Bake for about 7 hours or until the mixture is a bit tacky.  I kept checking on mine to see how easily it could pull away from the parchment. 
  7. I also line my dehydrator trays with parchment. 
  8. Set the dehydrator on 150 and run for about 7 hours.

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Recipe Notes

I got about 10 fruit rolls out of my batch. I really wish I had made more. Feel free to double the batch! Enjoy!

Lemon Larabar Bites (Vegan and Gluten Free)

Melissa King 58 Comments

Lemon Larabar Bites that are vegan and gluten free.  If you have been following this blog for a long time, you know that I love larabars.

Especially if they are homemade larabars!  I have had several requests to do a lemon larabar recipe, so here it is.  I absolutely love lemons, so I was excited to create the larabar version.

 

Lemon Larabar Bites

 

They came out so good!  I am happy to tell you that these are grain and gluten free.  If you have a nut allergy, you can try making them with sunflower seeds.

These homemade lemon larabars make the perfect snack because it only takes minutes to make them and there is no sugar added!

Looking for more larabar recipes?

Lemon Larabar Bites

Lemon Larabar Bites

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Prep Time 10 min

Ingredients

Instructions

  1. In the food processor , grind up the almonds and cashews. 
  2. Once they are ground, add in the dates and the lemon juice.  You may need to add in a small amount of water if the mixture looks too dry. 
  3. Once the dough is formed, roll into balls and place them in the fridge to firm up.

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Recipe Notes

I got 14 balls out of my batch. Enjoy!

Almond Butter Protein Bars (Vegan)

Melissa King 117 Comments

Almond Butter Protein Bars.  Have I told you how much I love almond butter?  I eat it almost daily.  One of my favorite healthy sweet snacks is a date stuffed with almond butter.

If you haven’t tried it yet, you really should.  Totally curbs a sweet tooth!  So I created these almond butter protein bars with that snack in mind.

 

almond butter protein bars

 

These would be a great pre/post workout snack.  Most of the protein shakes on the market are full of unwanted ingredients or too much processed sugar.

Why not try these instead?  They are filled with wholesome ingredients.  They can be made in minutes and you could enjoy one with my Energizing Green Juice.

To watch a video of just how easy this is to make on your own, watch me below.  For more videos, you can subscribe to my You Tube Channel.

Almond Butter Protein Bars

Almond Butter Protein Bars

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Prep Time 20 min Serves 10 bars     adjust servings

Ingredients

Instructions

  1. In the food processor or Vitamix, grind the oats into a course consistency. 
  2. Add the remaining ingredients and mix until a sticky dough is formed. 
  3. From here, you can roll them into balls or make them into bars like I did.  I used an 8 x 8 pan, but I think a slightly smaller pan would work better.  If you use a pan, line it with parchment leaving enough room to come out the sides.  That way they will be easy to pull out and cut. 
  4. I used a pizza cutter to cut mine. 
  5. Let them chill in the fridge for about 30 minutes to an hour.  That’s it.  I cut mine into squares and got about 10 in my batch.  Enjoy!

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Homemade Nutri-Grain Bars

Melissa King 217 Comments

Who doesn’t like a Nutri-Grain bar? I made you Homemade Nutri-Grain Bars!  I used to eat them like crazy until I liked at all the ingredients in them.  If you read it as well, you probably know that they are laden with way too many chemicals and artificial dyes.

So naturally I had to create my own homemade nutri-grain bars.  My homemade nutrigrain bars tastes so much better and it’s made from wholesome ingredients.

Homemade Nutri-Grain Bars

Sadly, it took me two tries.

I did some tweaking the second time around and they still didn’t look that pretty, but I thought, what the heck, I will post them!  The second time I learned from my mistakes so hopefully, these will be easy for you to make.

I filled them with pureed dates and also with a fruit spread. I personally liked the dates better as a filling, but use what ever you like.  I know many people have said they filled them with homemade Nutella.  I bet that is amazing too! I’m not sure I trust myself with something like that haha.

Homemade Nutri-Grain Bars

Homemade Nutri-Grain Bars

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Prep Time 30 min Cook Time 13 min

Ingredients

    For the bars

    For the filling

    • Your favorite fruit spread or 12 medjool dates blended up into a caramel with a bit of water

    Instructions

    1. Preheat oven to 350.
    2. In a food processor, grind up the almonds and oats. Measure them before grinding. 
    3. Once they are ground into a slightly course consistency, add them to a bowl with the rest of the dry ingredients. 
    4. In another bowl, add the wet ingredients. 
    5. Add dry to wet and mix just until combined. 
    6. Gather the dough into a ball.  It will be a bit sticky. 
    7. Wrap it in plastic and place in the fridge for about 30-60 minutes to firm up. 
    8. Once firm, cut a piece of parchment paper the size of a baking sheet, and lay it on the counter.
    9. Cut the dough ball in half.  I used a bench scraper to cut mine. 
    10. Take one piece and roll it out onto the parchment, putting some plastic wrap between the rolling pin and dough. 
    11. Roll it until it is about 1/4-1/2 inch thick. 
    12. Spread jam onto the top. 
    13. Roll the second ball of dough the same way onto another piece of parchment. Place that onto the dough with the jam. I made sure all the sides were sealed up. Then slice into squares with a pizza cutter. Bake for about 13 minutes. These should last a week or two. You can freeze them as well.  Remember to save your parchment paper.  You can re-use the same piece over and over again.  Enjoy!

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