Cornbread Topping for Crockpot Meals

1 cup flour
1 cup cornmeal
3 T sugar (opt.)
2 t baking powder
1 cup milk
1 egg
1 cup cheese
1/4 cup oil

Mix together and put on top of chili (or whatever). It will be done well within an hour on high. This amount works best in my large crockpot - half it when using a smaller one.

Whole Wheat Egg Noodles

These are great for chicken noodle soup...add chicken, the water you cooked it in, carrots, celery, onion, garlic, salt and pepper. I haven't tried these in anything else.

Mix 2 cups flour and 2 t salt. Add one egg and three egg yolks. Mix until crumbly. Add enough water to get a good consistency before rolling out and cutting. Boil fresh or dry for later.

Pear Bread

Adapted from "Buster Bucks" at http://busterbucks.hubpages.com/hub/Worlds-Best-Pear-Bread

1/2 cup oil
1/2 cup applesauce (or pear sauce = mash up pear in its own juice)
3 eggs
2 cups sugar
3 cups flour
1 t baking soda
2 t baking powder
1 t cinnamon
1 t nutmeg
1/2 t ginger
1.5 t salt
1.5 cups peeled chopped pears

Mix wet ingredients. Mix dry ingredients. Fold dry ingredients into wet ingredients. Add pears and mix. (Add nuts if you want.) Bake in two greased loaf pans at 325 for about an hour (check after 45 minutes), or until a toothpick comes out clean. You can sprinkle the tops of the loaves with sugar before baking, which will make a delicious crust. Let cool for ten minutes, then remove from pans.

Next time I make this I will try to decrease the sugar. As it is tastes like delicious dessert bread, but I would like to make it into a more healthy snack.

Whole Wheat Banana Bread and Muffins

1 3/4 cups whole wheat flour (I use freshly ground flour from hard white wheat)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1 cup mashed over-ripe bananas (about 2-3 bananas)
1/3 cup honey
1/4 cup melted butter
2 eggs

Stir together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. In a separate bowl, mash bananas, or puree them in a blender. Mix mashed bananas, honey, melted butter and eggs into flour mixture.

For Bread: Spread batter into a well buttered bread pan. Bake in a 350° oven for 50-60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out clean.

For Muffins: Spoon batter into 12 buttered or paper lined muffin tins. Bake in a 400° oven for 20 minutes.

For Mini-Muffins bake them in a 400 oven for about 12 minutes.

Banana Crumb Muffins

Adapted from stephaniecooks.blogspot.com

Ingredients:
For the muffins:
1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 bananas, mashed
4 tbsp unsweetened applesauce
3/4 cup white sugar
1 egg, lightly beaten
1/3 cup butter, melted

For the crumb topping:
1/4 cup packed brown sugar
1.5 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 tsp butter

Mix flour, soda, powder and salt. Beat bananas, applesauce, sugar, egg and butter. Mix wet into dry until moistened. Fill 12 muffin cups. Make topping by mixing dry ingredients and cutting in butter. Sprinkle over muffins and bake at 375 for 18 to 20 minutes.

Granola Bars

Adapted from StephanieCooks.blogspot.com
Makes 8" x 8" pan

1 2/3 cup quick rolled oats
1/3 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup sugar (I keep decreasing this amount - next time I will skip it completely.)
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp cinnamon
2 to 3 cups dried fruit and/or nuts
1/3 cup peanut (or other nut) butter
6 Tbl butter
1 tsp vanilla
1/4 cup honey, cane syrup or corn syrup
2 Tbl light corn syrup
1 Tbl water

Heat oven to 350. Grease 8" x 8" pan. Melt butter over low heat. Add peanut butter into butter and stir until smooth. In another bowl mix together oats, sugar, flour, salt, cinnamon, fruit and nuts. Whisk into the butter/peanut butter vanilla, water and liquid sweeteners. Mix all ingredients together and press into pan. Bake for 30 to 40 minutes until it looks browned around the edges. The bars will set once completely cool. After completely cool, cut bars out of pan.

Fruit/Nut suggestions: peanuts, almonds, cashews, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, coconut, raisins, cranberries, apricots, chocolate chips.

Note: I have read that the corn syrup cannot be substituted with honey because its properties are what holds the bars together. I don't know personally but I wouldn't try to skip it unless you want to experiment.

Pumpkin Banana Muffins

Pumpkin Banana Muffins
Makes 24-28

Adapted from a recipe called "Healthy Pumpkin Banana Muffins" from www.food.com by: Vseward (Chef~V) .

4 cups whole wheat flour
almost 1 1/3 cups rolled oats (can use oat bran for 1/2 cup of that)
4 tsp baking powder
2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
4 tsp cinnamon
2 tsp ginger
1 tsp nutmeg
3 mashed bananas
1 cup applesauce
15 oz. pumpkin
4 eggs
1 cup sugar (brown or white)

Oven at 350. Grease or line muffin tins. Mix flour to spice (all dry ingredients) in medium bowl. Mix bananas to sugar (all wet ingredients) in larger bowl. Add dry ingredients. Stir until combined. Fill muffin tins until almost full (they don't rise too much). Bake for 25-30 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean. Cool on wire rack.