Overnight oats and yogurt parfaits

Juicy frozen fruit turns healthy overnight oats into a sweet breakfast parfait -- like eating a sundae for breakfast!

I'm on a roll with new breakfast ideas. And I'm continuing with the easy / make-ahead / grab-and-go theme because ... well ... because I'm most decidedly not a morning person.

And I'm continuing the whole-grain thing from last week's fruit and grain energy bars with these super-easy overnight oat and yogurt parfaits.

Oats are just so darned convenient and versatile, aren't they? I mean, how many other ingredients can claim such yummy success whether they're whole, ground, wet, dry, stewed, baked, boiled or raw? Not to mention all the good-for-you protein they contain.

Now, if you read lots of food blogs or waste a lot of time on frequently browse Pinterest, you know that overnight refrigerator oats are pretty much all over the place. Confession time: I tried making them a couple of years ago and HATED them. I couldn't find the right combination of ingredients. Most were too thick or just too blah-tasting.

But then I got turned on to the secret of using frozen rather than fresh fruit!

You would think I would have figured this out earlier since frozen fruit is also key to my favorite and easiest breakfast smoothie. Duh.

Easy fruit and grain energy bars

Fruit and grain energy bars are protein-rich, delicious and easy to prepare -- a perfect portable breakfast or afternoon snack. 

These easy, homemade fruit and grain energy bars have successfully gotten us out of our current breakfast rut at Casa de Ninj.

Booyah.

They are just the right amount of chewy and not too sweet -- perfect for a grab-and-go breakfast. The danger is that they are so good that I'm tempted to keep making batch after batch.

But eating them constantly would likely get us into another breakfast rut, right? Gaaaaah, when will I learn?!

Changing up the kinds of dried fruit you use in these energy bars keeps them from getting boring. I use dried cranberries and cherries since we have them on hand most often, but I've been known to use dried apricots and plums, too. (Prunes and apricots are a particularly favorite flavor combination of mine, in case you hadn't noticed.)

And if you're not in a breakfast rut, these are still the bars for you. Their portability (and freezability!) make them great afternoon snacks.

Easy cabbage tabbouleh

Add some healthy whole grains to your summer meal salads with this easy, no-cook recipe for cabbage tabbouleh, a riff on the traditional Middle Eastern favorite.

With the onset of the summer heat, we all start looking for cool, no-cook dinner recipes, don't we? You bet we do: Just take a look at your favorite food boards on Pinterest and you'll see what I mean.

Yet "no-cook" often turns into shorthand for "salad." So we end up eating lots of salads, which, let's face it, can get pretty boring. I like to incorporate more filling meal salads like this cabbage tabbouleh into my summertime repertoire.

Tabbouleh is an traditional Middle Eastern dish, composed largely of tomatoes, parsley, mint and onion, often with a grain mixed in, and finished with a lemony oil dressing. To be honest, I don't really like traditional tabbouleh. Something about the amount of parsley in it is just a bit overwhelming for me.  A little too earthy, too tart ... oh, I don't know, a little too something.

But I do like the idea of tabbouleh -- a simple, easy grain and veg salad, cool and quick to prepare.

Since I've been expanding my whole grain horizons (I no longer immediately think of the rhyme "bulgur is vulgar" when I see a bag of it), I decided to give tabbouleh another chance when I came across this recipe that substitutes cabbage for all that too-something-something parsley. Heck yeah!

No-bake healthy oat bars

No-bake oat bars made with just six ingredients and sweetened only with dates and honey: a super-easy recipe for a delicious, healthy snack both kids and adults (and dogs!) will love.

We all crave sweets sometimes. I admit it. As much as I try to eat healthy, sometimes I just want to cram a handful of cookies in my face.

I can think of no one, not even the healthiest eater I know, who has ever told me that, when she has a craving, she crams a handful of asparagus into her face.

So I try to keep a bevy of healthy snacks in my arsenal. Not eating crap involves learning how to satisfy your cravings and desires in more healthful ways. I don't believe in complete denial -- I think that just encourages binge eating.

Therefore, when I have a craving for a sweet snack, I indulge it -- with healthier snacks and in moderation. Always in moderation.

These no-bake oat bars are the perfect solution for those cravings. A little sweet, a little salty, packed with protein and fiber, totally satisfying and made with real ingredients and no refined sugar. Plus, no baking!

ERMERGAHD: possibly the world's most perfect snack!

Brown rice pudding

Mr. Ninj is a huge fan of rice pudding.  Back in the days when we were dating and not eating as healthfully as we are today, he was known to buy a tub of Cozy Shack rice pudding from the grocery store and eat the whole thing.

Yeah, I'd say that makes him a huge fan.

Up until now, I hadn't really made rice pudding because it seemed like too much of a pain in the ass, frankly, and you know The Ninj is all about easy when it comes to recipes. (I know, that's not very loving of me, but hey, I'm honest.)

But brown rice pudding? That uses leftover or instant-cook rice and involves minimal prep? Now you're speaking my language!

I love this recipe because it's super easy and, because of the individual portions, you can pull one out of the fridge anytime you want a snack. Or, let's face it, breakfast -- this rice pudding makes a seriously delicious and filling quick breakfast. The custard is thick but smooth, and the rice adds just a hint of chewiness.

Pineapple rice with chicken

Easy weeknight recipe for pineapple rice bowl with chicken -- with plenty of leftovers for lunch.

I have a new favorite quick and easy weeknight dinner. OK, it's beyond mere favorite status: I am more than a little crushing on this pineapple rice with chicken.

Rice bowls are the best, aren't they? Easy to throw together for a weeknight dinner, generally full of fresh, seasonal veggies and most of the time there's a lot leftover for tomorrow's lunch. And if, like me, you tend to add some cooked chicken, you've got a pretty complete meal in that one bowl.

This pineapple rice bowl has a great blend of flavors: Thai-style spices complement the sweet tang of the pineapple, and carrots and peanuts add just the right amount of crunch.

Dried fruit and cereal snack bars

I really don't think you can have too many recipes for snack bars. I mean, really: What other food can stealthily morph from a grab-and-go breakfast to energy bar to sweet dessert, all in one day and without changing shoes?

(You know The Ninj loves stealthy food, especially snacks. And shoes.)

Mind you, this snack bar should not be confused with either a rice krispy treat (too sweet) or a granola bar (too, well, granola-y). It is neither, yet it is both.

I love that it is loaded with dried fruits, nuts and grains yet still offers enough sweetness to seem more like a treat. And the puffed cereal provides just enough chewy-crunchiness to round out the whole dealy.

Oh, hold the phone: DID I MENTION IT'S A NO-BAKE BAR?

Booyah.

Savory supper muffins

 
I have a confession: I fell off the whole-grains wagon this month.

For the past few months, I have been featuring recipes from Liana Krissoff's Whole Grains for a New Generation, from which I am cooking as part of the From Scratch Club's virtual book club. Every two weeks, the group is assigned a different grain or set of grains from which we can choose a recipe or two to make, then share our results with the rest of the group.

I've had a love-hate relationship with this book. Well, hate is too strong a word: more like a love-annoyance relationship. Love, because I have found many great new recipes (the roasted butternut squash with quinoa and greens is seriously amazing) and annoyance because some of the grains are just too obscure: I don't want to have to visit three natural foods stores to find one cup's worth of a grain I'll never use again. Which is why I wound up skipping one of our last assignments. Just plain skipped: didn't even ask for an extension or an incomplete.

Peanut butter banana oatmeal muffins (from your best girlfriend)

Clearly, I can't get over my breakfast obsession.

But before I even get to these yummy, Elvis-y muffins, I have to tell you about my weekend.

We had houseguests, which gave me a great opportunity to trot out some of my favorite recipes from this blog, some not often sampled by anyone other than Mr. Ninj and me:

• Baked oatmeal
• Crockpot oatmeal
• Pancake muffins
• Nicoise toasts
• Scourtins
• Avocado pasta salad
• Chocolate strawberry quick bread

While planning the weekend menu, it finally dawned on me what a great variety of recipes I have collected and tested. And they are all in one place, online, easily accessible in my kitchen without searching through folders full of scraps of paper.

In a nutshell, I'm using my own blog as a database.

I've been fretting for a while that my blog is not useful because it's not niche-y enough -- that is, it's not easy to label, elevator-pitch style. Some blogs are easy to label, as they focus solely on vegetarian recipes, vegan recipes, desserts, Indian food, gardening, canning, DIY crafts, knitting, "skinny" recipes, toddler-friendly food, Southern food ... you name the niche, there's a blog out there filling it.

It can make the generalist feel a little ... well ... too general. (Akin to my engineer husband not understanding why anyone, ahem, would choose a liberal arts education over a more specialized one.)

But my experience this weekend helped me to realize that it's OK to be a generalist because I'm filling my own niche, both for me and for you, my readers: the what's-for-dinner (or breakfast or lunch) niche, punctuated by the occasional foray into the world of DIY (gardening, pantry staples, crafts).

Oat and yogurt breakfast bars

Oat and yogurt breakfast bars

Regular readers know I'm all about make-ahead, grab-and-go breakfasts.

So imagine my delight when the recipe choice list for my virtual book club this week included a good-for-you, whole-grain cereal bar. I was all over that like white on rice.

When cooking from a book entitled Whole Grains for a New Generation, I didn't expect to find too many sweet recipes.  Frankly, I didn't expect to find any at all, because I'm that new to cooking with whole grains.

This bar is all about the oats (just like my salted oat crack cookies but with actual nutritional value). I'm hooked on making oat flour simply by grinding up oatmeal in the food processor: genius! I modified the original recipe, based on what ingredients I could find (I'm hard-pressed to find quinoa flakes locally and didn't want to have to mail-order them just for this recipe), but I'm super-pleased with the results.

Roasted butternut squash with quinoa, sausage and greens

Roasted butternut squash with quinoa, sausage and greens

Yes, the recipe is a mouthful -- both in name and in flavor.

Regular readers know that I'm continuing my participation in the From Scratch Club's virtual book club, in which a group of home cooks selects a cookbook and then makes and discusses some recipes from each chapter or section. We're currently cooking our way through Liana Krissoff's Whole Grains for a New Generation (we're lucky enough to have Liana participating in our online discussions, too!).

Our last grain topic was rice. This time, it's quinoa.

I've become a huge fan of quinoa over the past few years, in large part because it is easy to prepare while also being one of the few good-for-you grains that Mr. Ninj doesn't hate (See? No kids, yet I have my own picky eater to deal with).

I chose this recipe from Liana's book because I love butternut squash. Since I, too, often pair it with sausage, as is called for here, I knew I couldn't go wrong. Added bonus? Liana included a recipe for making your own quick sausage, which was easy and awesome.

Cherry-apricot quinoa breakfast cookies

Cherry-apricot quinoa breakfast cookies

First I gave you muffins and now cookies for Detox January.

See? I told you it wouldn't be that hard!

I find it fairly easy to find healthier, lower-fat entree ideas during Detox January (Eating Well and Cooking Light magazines are my go-to resources) but not as many breakfast recipes. Therefore, I was pleased to stumble upon this breakfast cookie recipe via Kiersten at Oh My Veggies, who adapted it from Bon Appetit.

As I stated in my value proposition for this blog, I try to emphasize both "stealthy and healthy" eating as much as I can (I do fall off the wagon and go bacon-crazy sometimes, but hey, I'm only human). The healthy recipes and ingredients are usually obvious; the stealthy ones, not always. These cookies definitely fall into the stealthy category.

Why? One word: quinoa.

Quinoa burgers

Quinoa burgers with tomato jam

Have you noticed how quinoa is freakin' everywhere lately?

It's the new new thing.

And apparently rightly so, given the recent bruhaha over arsenic levels in rice. Not to mention all the research that tells us a diet without a lot of white rice and pasta might help us all to be a little less ... well ... how shall we say ... fluffy?

So bring on the quinoa!

I like quinoa because it's not too grainy or health-food-storish, like bulgur (oy, I tried to like bulgur because Bittman says I should, but I just can't deal with it). I can almost pretend quinoa is pasta.

(Almost.)

I have to admit, I was pretty skeptical when I tried this recipe for quinoa "burgers." My experience has been that grain-based veggie patties tend to fall apart when you try to flip them in a frying pan. Which is why, frankly, I didn't even buy burger buns when I made these; I just figured I'd call them "fritters" or "hash" and be done with it.

But --- ha cha cha! -- wouldn't you know it? They stayed in one piece! A real patty!