Beautiful Desserts: Eye Candy and Healthy

Tired of baking desserts? Or do you simply want to try something fresh? These ones you only have to carve.

Beautiful, body-nourishing, and biodegradable, no-wash dishes. 

What more can you ask for?

Mouth-watering. Photo not mine though :)

Thanks to Coconut Mama for sharing this (including the photo).

And another one. Berry appetizing.

Any fresh ideas for desserts you'd like to share? 

No-Bake Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies

I never knew it was possible to make cookies without baking them. 

I just remembered seeing a recipe for no-bake goodies before because of the past Halloween season, and I thought, I needed something quick, healthy, and delicious for my daughter's school snacks tomorrow.

So browsing the web I went.

Thanks to Betty Crocker's inspiration, I now have my own no-bake chocolate oatmeal cookie recipe with less sugar and more coconut oil goodness.

I don't like my cookies too sweet so I made changes in her recipe. I used only a cup of brown sugar, instead of two. 

I also used coconut oil because it tastes good with chocolate and I love it for its health benefits. It also replaces the need for butter. But I know there's a grass-fed butter revolution going on, so you can use butter as you wish.

I also know that 1/4 cup of butter (in usual no-bake oatmeal recipes) means 8 tablespoons of butter or oil, but 4 tablespoons of coconut oil worked fine for me. You can make it 8 tablespoons of oil if you want. 

Ingredients

• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa
• 4 tablespoons virgin coconut oil
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/2 cup fresh milk
• 3 cups quick-cooking oatmeal

Instructions

1) Combine sugar, cocoa, oil and milk in a saucepan. Boil for a minute in medium heat or until everything is fully dissolved.

2) Remove from heat and add oatmeal and vanilla. Stir well.

3) Put spoonfuls on a plate and let it cool. 

No-Bake Deliciousness

Easy, practical, delicious no-bake cookies! Healthy too!

They're not just as solid as other baked cookies though. 

They're more like soft, chewy cookie goodness.

My kids and husband love these No-Bake Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies and I make them regularly nowadays. I can't wait to try other no-bake goodies. 

Practicality is simplicity after all, and no-bake is pretty and sweetly simple enough for me.

What's your idea of a healthy no-bake cookie? 

Healthy Homemade Energy Drink

If you want a healthier and more natural energy drink, you can always depend on the best manufacturer in the world for the best ingredients- Nature. 

And you can also rely on the best owner and maker of that amazing sports drink- Yourself.

You don't need to buy commercial energy sports drink anymore for your kids or yourself that has too many ingredients that you don't want (i.e. artificial sweeteners, colors, and preservatives). 

You don't need to because you can make one, and turn it into any flavor you desire. 

Excited much? I sure am! Just hearing (actually reading) about natural homemade energy drinks pumped up my energy!

One of the Best Natural Sports Drinks--- Coconut Water! 

Coconut water has fewer calories, less sodium, and more potassium than a sports drink.

I did some research on natural sports drinks and several websites confirmed the effectiveness of plain coconut water plus a tablespoon of lime or lemon juice. 

Coconut water is considered better than commercial sports drinks because it has "fewer calories, less sodium, and more potassium than a sports drink."  

The best coconut water would be one that just came right out of the coconut, not commercially-packaged coconut water.

Also, coconut water is different from coconut milk which is squeezed from the inside pulp and used as a common ingredient in coconut-milk based recipes. 

Coconut water is from young, green coconuts. Coconut water is "low in calories and a natural source of electrolytes including sodium and potassium." The electrolyte content of coconut water is more than double that of traditional sports drinks with only half of the carbohydrates. 

Jennifer Koslo, a full-time faculty member with Kaplan University’s School of Health Sciences and a teacher of courses on Vitamins, Herbs, and Nutritional Supplements, Sports Nutrition, and Contemporary Diet and Nutrition, reviewed two studies on the use of coconut water as a fluid replacement drink. 

One study compared rehydration after exercise using young coconut water, a carbohydrate electrolyte beverage, and plain water. Results showed that drinking coconut water post-workout resulted to the same recovery level as the carbohydrate electrolyte beverage. 

The second study confirmed the results with some variation: "the sodium enriched coconut water was as effective as the sports drink in whole body rehydration."

Clearly, fresh coconut water with added sodium is a great energy drink, and I've tested it as an effective pre-, during, and post-workout drink.

In my country, the Philippines, coconut water is affordable and it is fairly accessible too. If coconut water is not available or too expensive in your area, you can whip up an alternative healthy sports energy substitute with the extra sodium needed for intense workout sessions.

Nutritious Homemade Natural Energy Drink

Here's an example of a nutritious, natural sports drink recipe without artificial flavors or ingredients from Wellness Mama.

Ingredients

• 1 quart of liquid (options: green tea, herbal teas, or plain water)
• ⅛-1/4 tsp Himalayan Sea Salt (regular table salt will be alright, but it will not have the same trace minerals as Himalayan Sea Salt)
• ¼ to ½ tsp crushed Calcium magnesium tablets or powder (optional)
• ¼ cup or more of juice (optional. Some examples are: grape, apple, lemon, lime, pineapple, etc)
• 1-2 tablespoon sweetener (optional, such as honey and stevia)

Instructions

1. Brew tea if you chose that option or prepare a slightly warm base liquid (aka water).
2. Add sea salt and calcium magnesium (if you want that in your drink).
3. Add juice and mix well.
4. Cool in the fridge until ready to use.

Example

My recipe is 1 quart of green tea, 1 fourth teaspoon of sea salt, 1 tablespoon of honey, and one fourth cup of apple juice. A practical combination for practical exercisers!

Homemade Honey Lemon Energy Drink

Another Thrifty Energy Drink 

For the most frugal energy drink, you can do away with the fruit juices. I made it with just salt, honey and water and it tasted fine. Not sweet like commercial energy drinks, but healthy-goodness fine for me. 

Simple, Healthy Energy Drinks 
It's that simple because healthy options should be simple! 

Plus, you'll love the taste of your natural sports drink too. Why? Because you'll be choosing the right mix for your specific taste! 

Sweat it out and drink natural goodness afterwards with your healthy homemade energy drink! 

What homemade energy drinks have you tried? Any natural homemade energy drink recipes you can share?

Three Super-Easy Steps to Healthy Oven-Roasted Sweet-Potato Wedges

Sweet potatoes, you gotta love 'em for being a rich source of antioxidants, vitamins, minerals, and dietary fiber. Unless you're completely a newbie to the wonders of sweet potatoes, now that's another matter. You have a lot of enlightening to go through just yet. 

In the Philippines, we call sweet potatoes, "kamote." It's a super food for me because it's cheap, filling, and amazingly nutritious. Assuredly, practical parents won't fret on the price of this super food.

Usually, in cooking sweet potato, I just boil it in water without adding anything. I got tired of the taste, so I wanted to try a new recipe. 

I got the Oven-Roasted Sweet-Potato Wedges from Health's website, but I did not follow everything because I don't have all of the ingredients. 

Below is the one I tried and to make it more interesting, I asked my 5-year-old daughter to help me. She's not much of an eating person. I always have to force her to eat, almost always (quite her mother's opposite!). I decided to have her help me with the preparations to increase her interest in food. Maybe if she helped me cook it, she will be more interested in eating it!

I woke my daughter up earlier than usual, and she woke pretty fast when she learned she'd be cooking. That's one of her fastest waking-up rates, second to the times when her military father is around.

Let's get to work. It's baking time!

Oven-Roasted Sweet-Potato Wedges Recipe

Ingredients

• 2 small sweet potatoes (Note: I would have wanted it unpeeled and brushed well to clean the skin, but the skin was not so nice, so I had to peel it.)
• 1 tablespoon garlic-flavored olive oil (Note: I don't have garlic-flavored olive oil so I just added some minced garlic on the olive oil.)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt 

Preparations

1. Preheat oven to 450°. (I don't have an oven yet, so I used my roaster).
2. Peel sweet potatoes; cut each potato lengthwise into 8 wedges. In a large bowl, combine sweet potatoes and remaining ingredients; toss well to coat.
3. Arrange potatoes in a single layer on a baking sheet or the grill. Bake potatoes at 450° for 30 minutes or until soft and lightly browned, turning wedges after the first 15 minutes. Serve immediately.

My daughter patiently waits for her breakfast.

Testing, Testing

Okay, so the sweet potatoes cooked in only 13 minutes, maybe because the preheating took too long, Or so I thought. I put the temperature incorrectly, actually. Toinks! 

Anyway, probably becaus of the hurried cooking, it's a bit dry and not enough saltiness for me. I would add a little more than a dash. Zoe loved it though. I mean, chef Zoe loved it. We dipped it in tomato ketchup. 

Yummy mother-child bonding. Hurrah to healthy living!

Ready to eat! Healthy sweet potatoes! (Sorry for the poor lighting. I'm still getting used to taking photos of food in our seemingly-underground kitchen hehe)

How did this recipe go for you? What sweet potato recipes have you tried already?