May Recipe Part II: Chocolate Avocado Pancakes

I guess I've been on a pancake kick lately, so my second recipe for the month of May is another pancake recipe! This time around, I stumbled across a recipe substituting avocados for butter in pancakes, and as I had exactly one avocado left, I thought why not? I followed the recipe I found on Motherthyme to a tee (link). 

Now before I post pics of the process, I did have a couple of comments. First, the batter was incredibly fluffy and thick, which was super exciting despite its very unappetizing muddy color. Second, the pancakes turned out to have a bitter aftertaste. I saw one commenter on the original recipe say the same, and I think that in my case, it was because the avocado was probably a little underripe. Third, as another commenter mentioned, it was difficult to get the middle of the pancake fully cooked. Not sure if that's user error on my part or a flaw with the recipe. Anyway, on to the pictures (they're not very good pictures, but pictures nonetheless).

Lining up the dry ingredients: 

The batter did not have such an appetizing color, but it was so fluffy & thick! Oh, and I added some chocolate chips to satisfy that pesky sweet tooth of mine.

 Due to the batter being so thick, I had to help spread it out a bit after pouring it onto the pan.

 Aaaand, flip!

 And a very blurry, hasty picture of the final product:

In conclusion? Not the best pancake experience I've had. I think that when I am back in California for the summer with an abundance of ripe avocados, I may try it again. Until then, I'll stick to regular pancakes or other breakfast foods.

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May Recipe: Protein Pancakes!

As I mentioned in my previous post, I'm participating in a DietBet this month, so I've been searching through a bunch of fitness-related blogs/Youtube channels/etc for inspiration. One of the ones I found was Blogilates (both Youtube & website). I love Cassey's energy and love the fact that she posts workout vids, recipes, calendars, and so much other stuff for free on her website and Youtube channel! People pay hundreds to get this kind of stuff from other fitness gurus. Anyway, enough promotion about Blogilates. 

Cheap & easy recipes are my favorite kind of recipes, and the protein pancakes from Blogilates fit the bill (video). It's just 2 eggs and a banana! Plus, I've been craving chocolate chip pancakes recently, so I thought this would be a nicer alternative.

First, I peeled, sliced up, & mashed one banana:

Next, I added two eggs and whisked away! My batter was still pretty lumpy, though.

Finally, I just cooked it like regular pancake batter! Sprayed some Pam on there, flipped when bubbly, and voila! Two medium(ish) protein pancakes ready to eat!

As much as I loved how easy, cheap, and healthy this was, I did have a couple of gripes. I don't like maple syrup, so I ate these plain, which was maybe not the best idea. They were a bit bland and not convincingly pancake-y enough to satisfy my craving for pancakes. Perhaps whisking out the lumps would help, but some parts just tasted extra egg-y, which didn't help with the pancake illusion. All complaints aside, I think this was tasty for what it was, but I wouldn't classify is as a pancake per se. I'll definitely be making these again when I need a quick & easy fix!

-jennkay

Edit 5/12/14: I made these pancakes again for a power snack of sorts while studying, and I have a few things to add. This time, my banana was much more ripe, almost overripe, and I think that it helped a lot. There were less lumps in the batter because the banana was squishier, and there was more flavor because the banana was sweeter. I definitely prefer it this way!

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Healthy Snacking: My First NatureBox!

Hello all! I recently started watching a lot of Youtube vloggers including the Shaytards family (link). Shay's journey of eating healthy, exercising, and losing weight has been pretty inspirational. So of course, I got sucked into it as I do with everything else. First off, I joined the Shay's DietBet (link) where you "bet" $30 that you can lose 4% of your body weight in one month. All those who achieve their goal weight split the pot (and there's over $64k in there right now!). Ok, I'm getting a little off tangent.

This post is more of a review of NatureBox (link), a subscription service that sends monthly boxes full of healthy snacks. I had a half off discount through Shaytards, or else these would have been too expensive to justify. Anyway, I went through and picked out from their plethora of snacks, which five I wanted to try in my box. I chose: Guacamole Bites, Baked Sweet Potato Fries, Seaweed Rice Pops, Fuji Apples (dried), & Sweet Blueberry Almonds. Unfortunately, I think there was some kind of mix-up with my order because I did not receive the Guacamole Bites, but I got Santa Fe Corn Stix instead. Here is a picture of what I received in the mail:

Ok, so on to each of the snacks. First up, I was most excited for the baked sweet potato fries. Unfortunately, this was also the most disappointing snack. The sticks were really hard and there seemed to be some kind of spice added to it that was unexpected. Not my favorite, but at least I tried it out!

Next up, seaweed rice pops! In general, I prefer Asian snacks over American ones because they aren't nearly as overly sweet. So when I saw these seaweed rice pops, I thought that it was perfect! They are a little Americanized to me in the sense that they seemed to have made these sweeter than I expected. I thought it would be more of a salty snack. When I got over my initial disappointment, I actually did enjoy this one.

I love dried fruits because I just love fruits in any shape and form. I especially love Fuji apples, so I was excited to see that they had dried Fuji apples! They were pretty much what you would expect from dried apples with that signature sweetness from Fuji apples.

My gosh, I'm getting peckish looking at these pictures, but it's late at night, so I'll try to resist.. Anyway, the next snack was surprisingly better than I imagined. I never had "flavored" nuts other than honey roasted, so I decided to try out the blueberry almonds. The blueberry flavor comes in the form of some kind of powder on the almonds. It reminds me a bit of the blueberry flavor in blueberry muffins (my favorite kind of muffins). Delicious!

Lastly, I had a bit of a mix-up with the last snack. I originally ordered the Guacamole Bites as I mentioned before, but instead received Santa Fe Corn Stix. I guess it was a happy mistake because these turned out to be my favorite snack from the box! They taste exactly like some kind of cheesy Fritos. I had to stop myself from consuming the whole bag in one sitting. Also, when I emailed NatureBox about this mix-up, they apologized that the Guacamole Bites were out of stock and gave me credit toward my next box so that I could add an extra snack to make up for it! Kudos for friendly, fast customer service!

Overall, I had a pretty good experience with NatureBox. I think that $20 is a little too hefty of a price to get five snacks on a regular basis, though. I only ordered mine because I had 50% off through Shaytards. There is also a $10 referral credit, though, so maybe I'll convince my friends one month at a time to get a box with me and we can both get $10 boxes for 5 snacks, which isn't as bad price-wise. If you want $10 off, hit me up with your email and I'll be glad to refer you! ;)

Another side note, I just got a new camera, so it was fun testing it out on this box. Can't wait to improve my food photography skills!

-jennkay

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