Fruit Cobbler Without The Fat

Photo: Flavor Walk

Fruit cobblers are scrumptious and scream summer is near! But, usually, these tasty cobblers are made with a stick of butter. Nowadays, I try to eat healthy about 90% of the time, so I make a cobbler recipe that only requires buttering the baking pan. You can use any fruit, such as a peeled and diced apple, or peach, or my favorite, blueberries. A combination of blueberries, seedless raspberries, and blackberries will also do. My recipe yields one or two servings, so you don't have to wait for visitors to make it. Without the usual butter in a cobbler, it's not too decadent to devour all of it by yourself. You are still eating dessert (i.e., sugar), though, so you may not want to bake the cobbler every day. But gee whiz, sometimes we just crave a little treat:😋

Fruit Cobbler Without the Fat

Ingredients: 

Fruit Filling --

1/2 cup of berries (or 1 peach or 1 apple)

1 tablespoon dark brown sugar

1 tablespoon all-purpose unbleached flour

a sprinkle of cinnamon and nutmeg

a squirt of lemon

Cobbler Streusel Topping --

2 tablespoons unbleached flour

1 tablespoon of finely crushed walnuts.

2 tablespoons dark brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

2 - 3 tablespoons of buttermilk (or milk if it's all you have)

If you like cinnamon, you can sprinkle some in the topping.

Optional: 1 tablespoon of Quaker oats if you feel like tossing it in.

Directions:

1) In a mixing bowl, use a fork to combine all the ingredients for the fruit filling.

2) In a 2nd mixing bowl, whisk together the streusel topping ingredients.

3) Butter a baking pan or dish (an 8-inch, 9-inch, or 10-inch square baking pan, a pie pan, or a loaf pan all work). Pour in the fruit filling.

3) Spread the streusel topping evenly over the fruit filling.

4) Bake in a preheated 350°F oven for 20 - 25 minutes. Watch for the cobbler to bubble and the topping starting to turn brown. After removing it from the oven, let it cool for about 10 minutes before eating.

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What I'm Feeding My Senior Mom

Photo: Canadian Digestive Health Foundation

My Mom relies on me to make her food choices, but honestly, I liked it better when she had an appetite and all her faculties, and if she didn't eat, or eat healthily, it was her choice as an adult and not my problem. I should add that younger, she prepared and ate healthy meals. Now it's my job to plan and cook for her.

I support eating a healthy diet, and I also pity her because it's sad to grow old and lose your independence and appetite. She must follow my rules, and I can be an enforcer if necessary.:)

The following are my caregiver rules:

1) She must eat at least 2 meals a day! In her adult life, she never ate lunch, so I have to work with her lifelong habit and pack her nutritional requirements into 2 meals a day. But after I've done so ...

2) She must eat her dinner. Breakfast is never a problem. Too often she claims she's not hungry for dinner, but I tell her she must eat one. She's lucky to have someone in her life who is mean. Me! It is something a nursing home aide cannot do ... tell a senior she must eat food. In a nursing home, the meals roll in and out, eaten or not, often by separate aides.

3) She must eat the amount of protein her body requires daily and a variety of fruit, vegetables, and whole grains, as much as I can get her to eat with her reduced desire for food. I use skim milk and 4 ounces of fruit juice (no sugar added) to help meet her dietary needs. According to the National Library of Medicine, older adults may benefit from consuming 1.2 to 2.0 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight (or 0.54 to 0.9 grams per pound). This is in line with what other medical sources recommend. Three glasses of skim milk a day help get the job done! Eggs, too, are an easy-to-eat light meal.

3) No overloading on sugar. Everybody should eat a healthy diet, young, old, or in-between. Sugar is a treat, not a staple. In fact, sugar is bad for all of us and addictive. Many of us like sweets, but if a senior has arthritis, sugar causes inflammation, resulting in more painful joints. We cut down on sugar, eating it in moderation only: A row of dark chocolate, 2 cookies here and there, birthday cake, Christmas cookies, one portion of Halloween or Easter candy. So we don't feel deprived. I'm also a believer in the less sugar you consume, the less you crave it. Finally, it's as easy to like healthy food as unhealthy food. Cherries, strawberries, blueberries, peaches, and apples are all delicious snacks! Ditto for vegetables and a healthy dip such as spicy humus!!

A fortune in eggs.😳

It's payback time for both my mom and me. Once upon a time, she was the enforcer ensuring I didn't overload on sugar and ate a balanced diet, and now our roles are reversed. The egg has become the head chicken and enforcer. Be careful of the values you instill in your children. Chickens come home to roost!🐣😁

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Chocolate Cakes Without Flour or Sugar

Photo & recipe: Notycheese

Call me a skeptic. But, when you crave a slice of cake, I think you'll only satisfy your craving by eating the decadent cake. Why? The texture resulting from the flour, sugar, chocolate, and butter is why we like the dessert. Without the right texture, we have something else we are calling cake.:)

That said, all the flourless, sugarless, and butter or oil-less cakes floating around the internet are intriguing, and I'm willing to try the easy ones.

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An advantage is they often require less work with fewer ingredients than baking a 2-layer cake. Also, the amount of dessert made is usually less, so I can see using the tastier recipes as a quick snack when we lack the time or people to help us eat a whole cake. I don't see any benefit to foregoing gluten without a gluten sensitivity, but maybe it's a practical way of using the apples or bananas in our refrigerators.

Today I'll select 2 recipes for Chocolate Cake, one made with apples and the other with bananas to replace the flour, sugar, and oil or butter in the batter of traditional cakes:

Flourless Chocolate Cake Using Apples (top image👆)

Ingredients: (Half the ingredients to make less cake.)

4 medium apples, peeled and chopped into chunks
4 large eggs
5 tablespoons cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking powder

Butter or cooking oil spray to grease the baking pan

Directions: 

1) Blend the apples and eggs in a blender until smooth.

2) Add the coca powder and baking powder.

3) Pour the batter into a greased loaf pan.

4) Bake for 45 minutes or until done in the middle. Cool before slicing and eating.

🎂🥮🎂🥮🎂🥮🎂🥮🎂🥮🎂🥮🎂🥮

Flourless Chocolate Cake Using Bananas (bottom image👇)

Photo & recipe: yummyy

Ingredients for the Cake 

2 ripe bananas, sliced

2 eggs

8 tablespoons cocoa powder (I used only 1 banana, 1 egg, 1 tablespoon of cocoa powder, but tossed in a small handful of dark chocolate chips, crushed walnuts, a chopped Pure Protein bar, and a sprinkle of baking soda. After baking it, I also blended in a little vanilla Greek yogurt to get a senior to eat a banana. She liked it.)

1 teaspoon baking powder

Cooking oil spray for the dish.

Directions for the Cake:

1) Toss the bananas and eggs into a blender and mix until smooth. Transfer to a bowl and whisk in the cocoa powder and baking soda.

2) Pour into a nonstick or cooking oil-sprayed microwave-safe dish. Smooth the top with a spatula.

3) Bake in the microwave for 5 minutes. Let cool.

Ingredients for a Topping: 

1/2 cup of chocolate chips

3 - 4 tablespoons of milk

Directions:

Melt the chocolate and milk in the microwave, incorporate, and pour over the cake.

A similar recipe on my Facebook feed using oatmeal:

Feel free to try this Grand Culinary Experiment along with me. I'm also skeptical that eating flourless, sugarless, butterless cakes will help us lose weight. Still, these "cakes" could be worthy chocolate desserts in and of themselves!

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A Milk Cake

A recipe on Facebook that found me is from the page, N'oven Foods. Called a Milk Cake, it's very similar to a Buttermilk Cake. Both are sponge cakes. I'm posting the recipe because I think it solves the problem of too much cake without enough visitors to eat it!

The only cakes worth the calories are either homemade from scratch, or made by a good bakery, not from a box of cake mix, but sometimes a 2-layer cake is too much of a good thing. The following recipe is for a 6-inch single-layer homemade cake ... and you can either bake it in an oven or on a stovetop!

Milk Cake by N'oven

Ingredients:

2 tablespoons butter

1/2 cup milk (Bump it up to condensed, half and half, or cream if you wish.)

2 large eggs

1/2 cup sugar (I use 1/4 cup sugar.)

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon of baking powder

I add a tiny pinch of salt

Directions:

1) Mix the butter and milk in a saucepan. Bring it to a boil and set aside.

2) In a mixing bowl, crack 2 eggs and using an electric mixer blend for one minute.

3) Add 1/2 cup of sugar and continue mixing until foamy.

4) Next use a strainer to shift in the flour, baking powder, and salt. Pour in the vanilla extract. Continue mixing either with an electric mixer, a whisk, or even a spatula. 

5) Into the bowl, incorporate the hot milk and butter with the dry ingredients and continue mixing.

6) Pour the batter into a well-greased 6" baking pan, The video places the pan on top of a metal trivet inside a bigger pot with a lid to cook on a stovetop for 30 minutes. I'll bake mine inside the oven at 350 degrees F for 30 minutes. But if we're ever somewhere (camping?) without a stove, there's an alternate way of "baking" it!

A-ha, the original cooking method on a stovetop explains why this cake is 6" and one layer. I bet you could make the cake without using 2 pans and a metal trivet by simply pouring the batter into a buttered cast iron skillet covered with a lid. Cast iron skillets get very hot and cook evenly on a stovetop or inside an oven. I think since cornbread can either be baked in an oven or cooked in a skillet on a stovetop, the same would work with a Milk Cake. Like pancakes, only slower and higher.

The recipe ended here on Facebook, but not in Debra's kitchen where dark chocolate and a little bit of milk get melted in a microwave and then poured over the finished and cooled Milk Cake. A  ganache topping is France's contribution to the desert world.:)

Clearly, a Milk Cake is editable plain; sprinkled with powdered sugar; or frosted. Icing with shredded nuts, or chocolate sprinkles would work too. You do you!

I've made cakes when a friend was coming over for coffee. My friend eats a slice and I eat a slice and then I have the rest of the cake I no longer want that ends up in the freezer.

This delicious recipe is a coffee hour or tea time keeper! It solves 2 problems: no oven (but you can bake it in the oven) and unwanted leftover cake. Sometimes all we crave is a single day of cake.

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Oatmeal, An Apple & A Carrot For Breakfast

Recipe and photos courtesy of Simple Food

The following is a recipe from Simple Food on Facebook. An appetizing and healthy breakfast is what I see! As Aristotle knew, "The whole is greater than the sum of its parts."

Oatmeal, An Apple, & A Carrot For Breakfast

Ingredients:

2 cups flaked oatmeal, ground in a food processor

1 teaspoon of baking powder

1 cup of milk

1 carrot, grated

4 tablespoons raisins soaked in hot water

a medium apple, unpeeled but diced

1/4 cup walnuts, chopped

3 eggs

Optional: 1 package of vanilla sugar (or substitute 1 teaspoon of sugar and 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract)

Directions:

1) Toss each ingredient one by one into a mixing bowl and
incorporate.

2) Grease a 7" cake pan. I use butter. Pour the mixture into it and distribute evenly.

3) Bake at 360 degrees F for 50 - 60 minutes.

4) After it bakes but is still warm, remove from the baking pan and cut into pieces.

Packed with protein and fiber, vitamin A, some vitamin C, and minerals, eat a serving for breakfast or a snack. Delish!

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White Poke Cake Made Two Ways

Photo: Tasteful Recipes from Facebook

I haven't made a White Poke Cake -- once upon a time called an Angel Food Cake -- in years but this one is perfectly festive as a Christmas dessert, plus with an alternate custard topping it's suitable for the rest of the year. Perhaps I like the poke cake because I love custard pudding!

The recipe for the Christmas version, which is circulating on Facebook, uses cake mix, however, I never, ever buy cake mix. In my home, the rule is if you eat cake, either buy a good bakery cake or make one yourself. Every cake that enters your piehole must be worth its calories!!

For sure making a cake from scratch is as easy as opening a box of cake mix:

Ingredients for the White Cake Batter

½ cup butter softened
1 cup granulated sugar
4 large egg whites, room temperature
½ cup milk, room temperature
1½ cups all-purple flour (I never buy cake flour, but you can.)
2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon almond extract

Directions:

1) With an electric mixer, cream together the butter and sugar.

2) Add the egg whites.

3) Pour in the milk and continue mixing.

4) Follow with the all-purple flour and baking soda.

5) Next pour in the vanilla and almond extract.

6) Bake in a prepared buttered 9-inch square baking pan in a preheated 350-degree F oven for 25 - 30 minutes or until the center is firm.

7) Remove the white cake from the oven. Let cool and remove from the pan while still warm. Next, sit aside to cool completely.

You could make a topping for this White Poke Cake any number of ways, but I'll give you two options. The first cranberry topping is festive for Christmas:

I. Cranberry Poke Cake Topping🎄🎁🔔

ingredients:

14 oz of cranberry sauce - either homemade or canned

1/2 cup water

1/4 cup sugar if it isn't already sweet (taste it and judge.)

Directions:

Simmer the ingredients in a stockpot on the stovetop until smooth and uniform in consistency. You'll pour the cranberry topping over your white poke cake (see #4 below).

The 2nd topping is for the rest of the year:

II. Vanilla-Almond Custard Poke Cake Topping🥛🥚🥛

Ingredients:

4 cups of milk

Photo: iStock

4 egg yolks

4 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1/2 cup sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon almond extract

Directions:

1) Toss the milk, eggs, sugar, and flour into a stockpot on the stovetop and whisk together. [FYI: I get a smoother custard by blending these ingredients cold.] Stir occasionally while the mixture is heating up.

2) Bring to a boil and on medium heat continue whisking while simmering until the mixture thickens into a custard.

3) Near the end, add the vanilla and almond extracts and stir. Turn off the heat.

4) With a fork poke holes in the top of the cake. Pour your topping of choice on top of the cake. [I've never combined the cranberry and pudding toppings, but if I did I'd use straight cranberry sauce without thinning it with water on top of the custard which I'd pour into the holes of the cake first.🐪🐑]  

At Christmastime, you can use your 4 leftover egg yolks to make my pecan cookies, which I linked, or save them for a breakfast omelet. Waste not, want not.

5) Finish the cake with a dab of real whipped topping if you wish. The sweet creamy goodness only improves the cake.

Bon appètite!

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Christmas Fruitcake

November is the perfect time to prepare for Christmas.🎄 This week, I've ordered nuts and dark chocolate chips to have on hand to bake cookies. Buying a few items at a time is the way to do it. Planning and making lists equal calm.

The following recipe is a David Parke share. David Parke is a Facebook friend of mine from the United Kingdom, who retired after years of serving on Queen Elizabeth II's staff. I have no idea what position he held and haven't had the pleasure of meeting him in person, but he uploads very tempting recipes. My classmate, a romance author, makes the best fruitcake ever found here, but it requires lots of Kentucky bourbon and weeks of time. My in-person friend has so many requests for her fruitcakes, she began selling them.

If you don't order or make hers, try this one uploaded on Facebook by David Park:

Christmas Fruitcake

Ingredients:

For the Cake:

1 1/2 cups mixed dried fruits (raisins, cherries, apricots, and cranberries)

1/2 cup candied orange peel

1/2 cup chopped pecans or walnuts

1/2 cup dark rum (or orange juice for a non-alcoholic version)

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1/4 tsp allspice

1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened

3/4 cup brown sugar

2 large eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 cup buttermilk

Optional Glaze:

1/4 cup apricot or peach jam, warmed

1/4 cup powdered sugar

1-2 tsp milk (adjust as needed for consistency)

David's directions as quoted verbatim ...

"Instructions:

1. Prepare the Fruit Mixture --

In a bowl, combine the mixed dried fruits, candied orange peel, and nuts. Pour the rum (or orange juice) over the mixture, cover, and let it soak for at least 2 hours or overnight for the best flavor.

2. Preheat the Oven and Prepare the Pan --

Preheat your oven to 325°F (160°C). Grease and line a 9-inch loaf pan or round cake pan with parchment paper.

3. Mix the Dry Ingredients --

Whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, and allspice in a medium bowl. Set aside.

4. Make the Batter --

• In a large bowl, cream the butter and brown sugar until light and fluffy.
• Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Stir in the vanilla extract.
• Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, alternating with the buttermilk. Stir until just combined.
• Fold in the soaked fruit and nuts and any remaining liquid.

5. Bake the Cake --

Pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top. Bake for 60-75 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Let the cake cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

6. Optional Glaze:

For a festive glaze, mix the powdered sugar with milk until smooth. Brush the warm jam over the cake, then drizzle with the powdered sugar glaze.

Details:

Prep Time: 20 minutes (plus soaking time)

Bake Time: 60-75 minutes

Total Time: 3 hours (including soaking)

Servings: 8-10 slices

Tips:

a) Storage: Wrap the cooled cake in plastic wrap, then foil, and store in an airtight container. This cake tastes even better after a few days!

b) Flavor Boost: Brush the cake with additional rum or fruit juice every few days for extra moisture and depth of flavor.

This Christmas Fruitcake Delight will bring a taste of the holiday spirit to your table. Each slice is packed with festive flavors and warm holiday memories—perfect for a cozy winter celebration!"

I aim to make this fruitcake (for Thanksgiving?). It looks sensational! Hmm, I must grab some dried fruit while shopping for my weekly groceries. Nowadays for Christmas, I prefer confections that aren't super sweet yet have other flavors and textures creating a party in your mouth! Like European cakes and pastries, call them adult sophisticated sweets if you will!

Thanks, David Park, for the share!

Update, December 1: I substituted Marker's Mark Kentucky Bourbon for dark rum because my rum wasn't dark rum. I used pitted frozen cherries instead of dried cherries (much cheaper!), a tablespoon of grated orange rind with a squeeze of orange juice instead of candied orange rinds. To make up for the skipped 1/2 cup of candied rinds, I added 1/4 cup of fresh blueberries and 1/4 cup of dried pineapple, which I cut into small pieces. Walmarts and pecans went in (about 1 1/4 cups together). I also soaked the nuts and fruit for hours in the bourbon before making the cake. Tweaking the recipe works as long as you keep the ratio of the dry-to-liquid ingredients. I added 5 more tablespoons of all-purpose flour since my cherries and blueberries were wet, not dried.

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Applesauce Breakfast Cake

Photo: iStock

As a child, I loved a great aunt's applesauce cake. It was so moist and sweet! I want to eat applesauce cake for breakfast so I tried my hand at making a healthier recipe. You can easily turn the cake batter into cupcakes to eat breakfast on the go if you wish.

Applesauce Breakfast Cake

Ingredients:

1 cup of applesauce

1/4 cup mashed ripe banana (= 4 tablespoons)

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

2 teaspoons cider vinegar (I think organic tastes best.)

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

1 1/2 cups of oatmeal turned into flour in a food processer

(You can substitute unbleached all-purpose or whole wheat flour. I use oatmeal for a breakfast cake, and flour for a dessert.)

1/3 cup dark brown sugar (White sugar works too.)

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda (The cider vinegar activates it)

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup of chopped walnuts

1/2 cup of raisins (Omit if you wish. Raisins will keep your cake moist for extra days.)

Optional substitution: A pumpkin spice mix powder has cinnamon and nutmeg in it so if you have it, feel free to use it.

Directions:

1) Get out 2 mixing bowls. Mix all your wet ingredients in one bowl and all your dry ingredients in the other bowl.

2) Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and incorporate with a mixer or whisk.

3) Pour the batter into a greased square 8-inch by 8-inch baking pan. Sometimes I use a loaf pan, which you can also cut into squares) If you decide to make cupcakes instead, pour the batter into each cupcake holder 2/3 full.

4) Bake the cake or cupcakes in a 350 F degree preheated oven for about 22 minutes. Check the cupcakes at about 16 minutes as they may bake faster.

5) After the center is done, remove from the over. Remove from the pan, not when hot, but while still warm.

Light Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients 

8 oz Neufchatel (light) cream cheese

Drops of milk

As much powdered sugar as you need

1 teaspoon of vanilla extra

Directions:

Whisk all ingredients until creamy. I start with a cup of powdered sugar and add a little more at a time.

Alternatively, you can sprinkle your applesauce cake with powdered sugar instead of frosting. It will have even less calories.

Ahhh, the perfect autumn breakfast with coffee, tea, or milk. Enjoy a light treat that also has a few nutrients in it!🍎🍏

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