After months of trial and error I have finally found my favorite veggie burger and all it took was a little quinoa. If you haven’t discovered quinoa yet, it is a grain like crop grown for it’s seeds. It’s actually not a grain at all but closely related to beets and spinach believe it or not. Packed with protein, magnesium and iron this nutty flavored seed is perfect for toddlers, kids, and insane marathon/ultra runners like my husband. These burgers have now become a favorite in this house but I warn you it took awhile for Mia to get used to it. I had mixed results with kids when I handed this recipe out to a couple of friends. 3 out of 6 kids loved it and the other 3 were habitual fast food hamburger eaters and couldn’t get over the “different” burger. As for the adults, it’s a hit. A delicious and healthy way to eat your veggies and quinoa.

Quinoa Sweet Potato Burgers with Snow Pea Slaw serves 4
for the slaw

• 2 cups snow peas
• 3 carrots
• 1/4 cup orange juice, fresh squeezed (1 orange)
• 1 Tbs + 1tsp white wine vinegar
• 1 Tbs sesame oil
• 1 tsp honey
• 1 tsp fresh ginger, grated
• pinch salt and pepper

for the burgers

• 1 cup water
• 1/2 cup quinoa
• 1 sweet potato (to equal 1 1/2 cups shredded)
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1/2 cup bread crumbs
• 1/4 tsp kosher salt
• pinch pepper
• 1 tsp extra virgin olive oil or cooking spray

Rinse the quinoa. This is very important as quinoa is coated with saponin, a resin-like substance that is extremely bitter. It’s NOT toxic just bitter. I like to use 1/4 cup black quinoa and 1/4 cup white just to make it interesting. You can use whatever color you wish.

Bring water to boil in a pot. Once the water is at a boil, add rinsed quinoa and cover. Lower heat and simmer for 8 to 10 minutes until all the water gone and quinoa is cooked. Allow to cool.

While the quinoa is cooking, chiffonade (thinly slice) the snow peas. Set aside.

Peel and shred the carrots and set aside with the snow peas.

In a large bowl, combine the orange juice, vinegar, sesame oil, honey, ginger, and salt and pepper. Whisk until combined. Set aside  until the burgers are finished and you are ready to serve.

Now on to the “burger.” Peel and shred the sweet potato. You should have about 1 1/2 cups shredded.

Place the shredded sweet potatoes on a towel, paper or fabric, and squeeze out the excess water that the sweet potato holds.

In a large bowl, combine the cooked quinoa and sweet potato.

To the quinoa/sweet potato, add the beaten egg and stir.

Add bread crumbs, salt, and pepper and mix well.

With your hands, form “burger patties.” These will be about 1/2 cup of the quinoa mixture each.

In a griddle or large skillet, heat the olive oil over medium heat. Place the burgers on and cook for about 5 minutes. Flip and continue to cook for another 5 minutes or until the burgers are golden brown on both sides.

Place the snow peas and carrots into the dressing and toss to coat.

Serve the quinoa sweet potato burger on a bun or alone topped with the snow pea slaw.

Like I said, some kids love it and some kids aren’t to sure about it but all I know is that in this family we have to cook it often! So often in fact I’m already starting to crave the slightly sweet and nutty burgers again. Hope you enjoy.

Warning: there is nothing low-cal about these delicious and insanely addictive sweet potato cinnamon pull-apart buns! So, you might have to do another 20 minutes on the elliptical but your soul will thank you! Check out the story behind these sinful breakfast treats and how to make them for your family today on Babble.com’s 50 New Recipes From The 100 Best Food Blogs

recipe: sweet potato cinnamon buns

This recipe was made exclusively for Babble.com

A couple of days ago my phone rings. It’s Kim, my next door neighbor and sometimes a product reviewer on In Sock Monkey Slippers. This is what happens when you live next to me; I talk about you to hundreds of people and make you work for me without real pay but it’s all good because I feed you constantly. Kind of like Oprah and Gale. She’s in a hurry (has some REAL work to actually get to) and begins to tell me that someone is looking for me, contacted her and wants my phone number. At first I’m like, “uh…do they want money, cause if so tell them you don’t know me!” She then proceeds to tell me that it’s a newspaper reporter and gives me a number to contact, which of course is the wrong number (sorry to whomever I left a lengthy message to). After we finally get it right and I’m having a conversation with this reporter I suddenly realize it’s not a newspaper reporter but a television reporter. My brain stops with fear as he’s telling me he wants to come over as soon as possible to do a story on me an the blog. Ok, as long as it was a newspaper reporter I was totally cool but now that I have to

#1 have cameras in my OH SO MESSY HOUSE (picture a week of being out of town coupled by two weeks of the flu) and
#2 I’m a complete ball of crazy lady anxiety in front of a camera

…needless to say, I was a little stressed. I’m not gonna lie I seriously considered popping open a bottle of wine in the middle of the afternoon.

So, in a rush I cleaned the house and came up with a quick recipe to do on camera that tried to show the real food/nutritious side of the blog with what was left of a very barren pantry. This is that recipe… Sweet Potato and Oatmeal Raisin Cookies. A quick so very simple cookie that is still sweet and delicious with gasp… a vegetable.

All in all I pulled it together without any sort of medication or psychotherapy and Mia and I had a great time.

Sweet Potato Oatmeal Raisin Cookies makes 45 small cookies

• 1 large sweet potato or 1 cup mashed cooked sweet potato
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) and 6 Tbs of butter
• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 2 Tbs honey
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 1/2 cup flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon sea salt
• 3 cups old fashioned oats, uncooked
• 1 cup raisins, organic if possible

Preheat oven to 350° F.

If you don’t have sweet potato puree or a cooked sweet potato on hand, here’s a fast way to cook a sweet potato using a microwave. This is how I ate in college.

1. Pierce a large washed potato numerous times with a fork.
2. Wrap the potato in a wet paper towel and then wrap that in plastic wrap.
3. Place in the microwave and cook on high for 6 minutes, flipping the potato over halfway through cooking.

Cut the potato in half and scoop out the flesh, placing it in a bowl. Set aside.

Using a stand mixer or hand mixer, beat butter, sugars, and honey in a large bowl until creamy.

Next, add the sweet potato, vanilla and eggs and mix until thoroughly combined.

In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking soda, salt and cinnamon. Stir and add to the sugar and egg mixture. Mix until combined.

Add oats and raisins and stir.

With an ice cream scoop or large spoon, drop dough onto an ungreased or parchment paper lined baking sheet. Place in the oven and cook for 10 to 12 minutes or until golden. Allow to cool on a wire rack. And then eat as many as you can before they disappear by your kids, husband, or news crew if you have one hanging around the house.

I love how the sweet potato gives these cookies a slightly different taste and a round shape. These are seriously good and packed with Vitamin A, Vitamin E, calcium and beta carotene!

For months now, I have been constantly reminded that I promised to figure out a recipe for veggie burgers by one Mr. Atlas, the one and only hubby of our own Ashley Bass. After a couple of failed attempts involving his two adorable kids running out of the dinning room in terror, they both have been pushing me to create a veggie burger that is easy to make and edible.

All of this thinking about veggie burgers had me falling back in a time warp when yours truly decided it was a smart idea to become a vegetarian fifteen years ago. Needless to say it did not take and after a three year trial I broke down shamelessly after a night out with my friends. It was a sad scene where I literally begged a local hamburger institution, Jack’s Burger House on Hillcrest Avenue in Dallas, Texas to stay open past hours to make me a triple hamburger, side of fries and a coke. From then on I vowed never to turn my back on a Jacks burger again and my life has been great ever since. But I will tell you still to this day I crave a good veggie burger. For this recipe I dug back into my brain and tried to remember my old recipe with a little inspiration form the best spinach and bean burger I have ever had at Twin Sisters in San Antonio, Texas.

Jason, this one’s for you…

Black Bean Burgers makes 4

• 1 medium sweet potato
• 2 garlic cloves
• 1 cup baby spinach, organic
• 1 15oz can black beans
• 1 tsp extra virgin olive oil
• 1/2 tsp Kosher salt
• 1/2 tsp cumin
• 1/4 tsp fresh ground pepper
• 1/4 tsp ground oregano
• 1 1/2 Tbs flour
• 2 Tbs cornmeal
• 4 burger buns or dinner rolls, optional

Mango Relish

• 1 mango
• 1 red bell pepper, organic
• 1 Tbs fresh lime juice (1/2 lime)
• 1 Tbs cilantro, chopped
• 1 serrano pepper, optional

Let’s start off with cooking a sweet potato. Pierce the potato with a fork several times.

Wrap the sweet potato in a very damp paper towel and place on a plate. Place in a microwave oven for 5 to 6 minutes, flipping the potato once halfway through cooking.

Once cooked, scoop the flesh of the potato out with a spoon, discarding the skins, and set aside.

Peel the garlic cloves and roughly chop. Place in a food processor or blender.

Along with the garlic, place the spinach in the food processor and pulse until both garlic and spinach are finely chopped.

Rinse beans and place half of them in the food processor with the spinach and garlic. Set aside the other half.

Add the sweet potato and olive oil to the food processor. Puree for 1 minute until smooth.

Add salt, pepper, oregano, and cumin and pulse a couple of more times until all the spices are incorporated.

Remove mixture to a bowl and add the flour and cornmeal. Stir.

Add the beans that were set aside earlier and fold in.

Heat a greased (I use Pam cooking spray) skillet or griddle on medium. Form patties out of the mixture with your hands. {Using an ice cream scoop makes this very easy.}

Place the patties on the griddle and cook 4 minutes per side. Let rest for a minute before serving. Now you can serve it just like this, on a bun with your favorite burger toppings (Mia likes hers on a bun with cheese and lettuce) or you could…

Dice a mango into cubes and place in a bowl.

Cut the bell pepper into strips then dice. Add to the mango.

De-seed and dice the serrano and place in the bowl.

Chop the cilantro and add to the bowl with the mango.

Add lime juice and stir. Simple, fresh and amazingly good on pretty much anything.

Black Bean Burgers with Mango Relish… seriously good even if you eat meat.

Curried Sweet Potato Fries serves 4

• 2 sweet potatoes
• 1 Tbs vegetable oil
• 1 Tbs curry powder
• 1  Tbs brown sugar
• 1 tsp kosher salt

1. Preheat oven to 450°.
2. Cut sweet potatoes in 1/2 inch thick strips and place in a large bowl.
3. Pour oil over the sweet potato sticks and coat evenly.
4. Lay sweet potatoes on a baking sheet and be careful not to overcrowd.
5. Place in the oven for 20 to 30 minutes.
6. While those are cooking up, place the curry powder, brown sugar and salt in a small bowl and mix.
7. Once the fries are cooked return to the same large bowl.
8. Immediately sprinkle spice mixture over the fries and toss to coat.
9. Serve.

Drool!

Hope you enjoy this mouthwatering Colorado influenced meal. I now have to run and get back into the very messy kitchen remodel. Wish me luck and that I never have to see the plumber’s…well you know what they say, again.

My girl LOOOOVES chips. Ninety percent of the time potato chips are not allowed in the house because the big kids, aka the husband and I, eat them like ravishing piranhas. When I recently found my 22 month old breaking into a kitchen at her second cousin’s birthday party for the salty addictive treats I realized I should probably find a good substitute. Hence, the creation of sweet potato and beet chips. You can find recipes all over the internet for these but for something so simple there are many different ways to do so. After plenty of testing I found that low and slow is the key and parchment paper is a must! Healthy, nutritious and amazingly tasty, she fell for the switch and ate them like there was no tomorrow! Also a great paring for this.

sweet potato and beet chips

• 1 large sweet potato
• 2 medium beets
• sea salt optional

Let’s start with the sweet potatoes. Preheat the oven to 300°.

This is the one time where a mandolin is absolutely necessary. I found a cheep one at Target of all places. It might not last me forever but $14 sounded a lot better than $200. Leaving the skin on, slice the potato as thinly as possible. Watch those fingers!

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. I was out on this round and found it to be my biggest mistake. The parchment paper creates a barrier between the heat of the baking sheet and the chip. If you do not have parchment paper watch the chips carefully during baking or they will burn fast! Place the baking sheet in the oven and bake for 20 to 30 minutes, flipping the chips once during baking. Note: keep an eye on the chips after 15 minutes. They tend to burn at varying times. It’s like they have a mind of their own.

Immediately remove from baking sheet and place on a drying rack to cool. Sprinkle a pinch of salt over the chips if desired. At this time the chips will be slightly damp and pliable. Allow them to dry and soon you will have a crisp chip.

Repeat the same steps with the beets. The beets did have a tendency to bake faster so watch them.

After drying you will have a crispy fun treat! Store in an airtight container.

I think we will be taking some of these on our vacation next week! Would you like to join us? The husband, Mia and I are taking our first family vacation to the mountains of Colorado to escape this blistering Texas heat. As always I expect it to be full of adventure, fun and humorous mishaps. That’s just how we roll. Please join us next week while we invade Colorado!

To save myself some time in the morning from cooking everyone’s breakfast I spent about thirty minutes and cooked up a batch of theses, spinach and sweet potato quiche. Mia has mixed emotions about these. You have to catch her in the right mood for her to really enjoy these. She would rather have scrambled eggs but I think it’s a texture thing. This is more of a toddler food and she’s at that in-between stage. So I needed a second opinion and who did I go to? The neighbors baby and she liked them so it’s a go.

Spinach and Sweet Potato Quiche · stage 3 +

2 Tbs butter

1 medium peeled and grated sweet potato

10 oz of shredded organic fresh baby spinach or frozen organic spinach (if you use frozen make sure to drain the spinach well)

2 whole eggs

2 egg yolks

3/4 cup ricotta cheese

1/4 cup of grated parmesan cheese

Preheat oven to 375°.

In a medium skillet, melt butter.

Add grated sweet potato and saute over medium heat until done. About seven minutes. Next, add the spinach and saute an additional 3 minutes. If you ’re using frozen do not add the spinach just yet.

Transfer sweet potato and spinach to a medium bowl and allow to cool a bit. Next, add the eggs, ricotta, parmesan cheese and if you are using frozen spinach add it at this time. Mix well.

Fill a greased mini muffin sheet with mixture and place in oven. Bake for 15 minutes or until golden. Makes 26 and freezes well. Can be frozen for up to 3 months. Defrost in microwave for 15 to 20 seconds. Yummmmmm.

Holy crap these are good! With a inspiring suggestion from Momadom, I made these sweet potato pancakes this past weekend and everyone loves them. Pancakes are nothing new of course, but this recipe is a good twist on the everyday American pancake. Plus, it’s a sneaky way to add vegetables to everyday food for your baby, toddler, teenager, husband and so forth. Of course, now my husband wants me to make them every weekend. Good thing I made extra and froze the rest but honey, when you run out here’s the recipe. You know your way around the kitchen.

By the way, I made small “silver dollar” size pancakes for Mia and she loves them. I guess they turned out a lot better than the banana bread fiasco.

Sweet Tater Cakes

• 1 1/2 cups flour (I mix half whole wheat flour and half all-purpose)
• 3 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp salt (optional, I leave the salt out when giving it to my baby)
• 1/2 tsp freshly grated nutmeg
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1 1/4 cup of cooked and peeled sweet potatoes, about 2 (I roast mine the night before with dinner)
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 1/2 Tbs vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups of whole milk
• 1/4 cup of butter, melted

In large bowl stir together all dry ingredients.

In a smaller bowl add wet ingredients and stir.

Add wet ingredients to dry and stir until just moistened.

Drop 1/2 tablespoons, for “silver dollar”size, and large tablespoons, for regular size, of batter onto a hot greased griddle or skillet.

Flip when bubbles form on the outer edges of pancake. Cook until done.

Serve with peaches in syrup and toasted pecans.

Peaches with Syrup:

• 3 cups of frozen peaches
• 3/4 cup of water
• 2 Tbs brown sugar
• Place everything in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to a simmer. Simmer until water has reduced into a syrup, about 5 or 10 minutes.

Eat all you can until you are stuffed and then if you are my husband go run 26.2 miles. Isn’t that lovely.

For Miss Mia

Freeze remaining, if any, in a freezer bag and store up to 3 months. To serve, pop in toaster oven or microwave. Mia likes hers toasted.

I roasted a pork tenderloin last night and had enough left over to make Mia some too. Since I knew I was going to do this today I did not do anything fancy to the pork. I just seasoned a  pork tenderloin with a small amount of extra virgin olive oil and a small amount of rosemary and garlic and placed it in a 425° oven for 25 to 30 minutes or until it reached 155°.

Pork Tenderloin with Sweet Potatoes and Peaches {stage 3baby food}

1 cup of cubed cooked, cold pork tenderloin

1 cooked sweet potato

1 cup of organic peaches, fresh or frozen

3/4 cup (or more) of water or low-sodium chicken broth (I use equal amounts of both)

Since peaches are not in season I used frozen organic peaches. To make them extra soft and sweet start by putting them in a saucepan with 1/4 cup of water.

Bring to a boil and simmer for 5 to 10 minutes or until water is at least halfway evaporated.

Scoop the flesh out of the sweet potato. Discard skin.

Place pork (cold meats puree best) and sweet potato in food processor or blender along with 1/4 cup of broth or water and puree until mixed.

Add peaches and puree, adding water or broth as needed to reach desired consistency (i usually use a total of 3/4 cup).

Place in an ice cube tray for easy storage and portion control. Makes one tray and each cube is an ounce. Cover with plastic wrap and freeze. Once frozen remove cubes from tray and store in a freezer bag. Keeps for 3 months. Preferably use in one month. Defrost to serve and if desired add milk, formula or a small amount of olive oil or butter. Mia loves this recipe!