Maegan Janelle & Co

Motherhood Life & Style Blog

Chocolate Zucchini Banana Muffins ( vegan & no refined sugar! )

You know when you make a recipe and it’s so delicious you can’t believe it’s even remotely healthy?  Well friends, this is one of those times.  I started trying to find the perfect zucchini bread recipe a few years ago, I found myself with more zucchini than I knew what to do with…..courtesy of an overly abundant garden. After trying countless recipes and finally taking what I loved from some and omitting other ingredients to make it vegan, I feel like I’ve finally got it down to a science.

 My husband loves anything to do with chocolate.  I remember the first time I made him a chocolate vegan cupcake with avocado frosting, I almost didn’t have the heart to tell him it was healthy and burst his bubble…LOL.  I would love to try other flours, spelt or even buckwheat in these! If you do try an alternative please let me know in the comments, I’d love to know how they turned out 🙂 .

These scrumptious little morsels don’t last long in our house, and the few times they’ve lasted longer than 2 days, I couldn’t believe how moist they still were!!  Nothing worse than having to choke down a dry muffin with coffee, just so you can get it down the hatch…..these babies don’t disappoint!!  As you can tell, Liberty is a HUGE fan.

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Chocolate Zucchini Banana Muffins ( vegan & no refined sugar )

The perfect healthy chocolatey snack, your kids will love and helps unload all that zucchini in your garden! 🙂

Course Breakfast, Dessert, Snack
Cuisine VEGAN
Keyword dairy free, healthy, vegan
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 25 minutes
Total Time 40 minutes
Servings 12 muffins

Ingredients

  • 1 1/4 cups whole wheat pastry flour
  • 1/3 cup cocoa powder I use organic raw
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1/4 tsp salt
  • 1/3 cup agave nectar or pure maple syrup
  • 2 tbsp coconut oil, melted and cooled
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1 chia egg (1 tbsp chia seed, 3 tbsp water. Mix and let sit for 5 minutes to thicken)
  • 1 cup shredded zucchini
  • 1 medium ripe mashed banana
  • 1/2 cup almond milk any nut milk will work
  • 1/2 cup regular or mini dark chocolate chips dairy free for vegan

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Generously grease the inside of a muffin tin with oil, I like to use coconut or grapeseed.

  2. Place zucchini in a few pieces of paper towel, and squeeze out excess moisture. Set aside.
  3. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt.
  4. In the bowl of an electric mixer, add coconut oil, agave/maple syrup, vanilla, chia egg, and mix on medium until smooth and well combined. Add in zucchini, banana and almond milk, mix again. Slowly add in dry ingredients and mix until just combined. Gently fold in chocolate chips.
  5. Evenly divide batter into prepared muffin tin. Bake 22-25 minutes or until toothpick inserted into middle comes out clean. After 5 minutes, remove muffins and transfer to wire rack to finish cooling. Enjoy.......bet you can't have just one!!

Cocunut Milk Yogurt

Who doesn’t love yogurt?? It’s easily one of my favourite dairy products…..prior to becoming plant based, and I have to admit, giving it up when we first made the switch made me a tad nervous.  One of the hardest things for me when transitioning to a completely plant based diet was giving up dairy cold turkey.  Not only because of the taste, but it’s in everything!!!  I’ve had oatmeal every morning for years, and one of my favourite parts was the yogurt I put on top.  Not fruit filled or vanilla yogurt, but the plain variety…..the one that makes you pucker when you have a bite.  Saying goodbye to my beloved yogurt was bittersweet (no pun intended), cheese, butter, ice cream were easy to say good riddance to, but that yogurt I still dreamt about.  So when I discovered you could make a vegan friendly version I HAD to try it.

Took a few times to get the perfect combination, and with every batch it gets better and creamier.  I actually prefer it to any dairy yogurt I’ve ever had, and that says a lot!  Filled with rich creamy flavour and still full of probiotics for healthy gut was a definite winner.  Using full fat coconut milk makes it a little more of a splurge in the diet department, than my regular fat free diary yogurt….but I just have less in my oats, usually a couple tablespoons does the trick.

 Hope you enjoy this recipe and please let me know if you have any questions or feedback in the comments below!

 

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Coconut Milk Yogurt

Rich, creamy, full of probiotics AND vegan friendly!!! 

Course Breakfast, Dessert
Cuisine VEGAN

Ingredients

  • 1 400 ml can Organic Coconut Milk - full fat
  • 4 capsules 50 Billion Probiotic - make sure they're vegetable capsules if you're wanting your yogurt vegan
  • Cheese cloth & rubber band

Instructions

  1. Empty can of coconut milk into a mixing bowl, if the contents have separated and the coconut cream is hard I usually give it a good whisk before adding the probiotics.  

  2. Take powder out of probiotic capsules and add to bowl with coconut milk.  I had to cut mine open because they don't come apart easily and I didn't want probiotic powder all over my kitchen (which happened the first time lol).  

  3. Whisk the two ingredients together until combined.  Poor into a jar and cover with cheese cloth, secure with a rubber band around mouth of the jar.

  4. Now is when you have to wait, and why I generally have 2 jars going at once....more on that in a minute.  The jar can sit at room temperature on your counter, after 24 hours give it a stir and let it sit another 24 hours.  Once the whole 48 hours has passed, give it another stir and put jar lid on, put in fridge where it will set.

  5. For your second batch of yogurt, you don't have to do this whole process again....well the waiting you have to do, darn hey? But you don't need to use probiotics the next time you make your yogurt.  Simply add about 1/4 cup of your already made yogurt (I usually wait till I'm halfway through a jar) to a can of coconut milk, whisk and set on counter to make your second batch!!  Yes it's THAT easy, crazy right? 

Recipe Notes

**You can use papertowel if you don't have any cheesecloth, I used it for months before I finally went out and finally bought cheesecloth....which I found at the dollar store!!

I use this yogurt every day on our oatmeal, it's also a great treat with some granola sprinkled on top 🙂

Cauliflower Sauce

 

          One of the best mom hacks out there is sneaking veggies into our little ones diets, am I right?!  Smoothies, muffins, and my favourite puffs recipe are all great options…..but what about dinner ?  I don’t know about your little ones, but Liberty is a pro at flinging her veggies across the room. My baby that once loved all food now snubs her nose at broccoli and won’t even look at a pepper, so what’s a mom to do but sneak the veggies in without being detected……self proclaimed mom ninja over here.

This has been my favourite recipe for the past few months, so simple to make, with only a few ingredients and under 20 mins!  Oh and did I mention Liberty LOVES it!!  I started off using it as baby food and then realized how delicious it was as a pasta sauce

Cauliflower is one of those veggies you wouldn’t think is full of nutrients, I only recently discovered how amazing this vegetable really is.  Being plant based a good creamy sauce was one thing I was having a hard time finding, but using cauliflower has been a life changer.  Combined with the nutritional yeast and hemp hearts this is the perfect dinner for a vegan or non vegan baby, FULL of protein, healthy fats, vitamins and minerals.  Did you know a single serving of cauliflower has all your recommended daily intake of Vitamin C?? Also nutritional yeast is an excellent source of B vitamins, which is one of the harder vitamins to get as a vegan, plus a whopping 8 grams of protein for only 2 tbsp! Wowza.

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Cauliflower Sauce

This is one of my favourite recipes for Liberty! It's quick and easy to make while also being packed full of fibre, vegetables, and vitamins. One of those meals you feel good about giving your little one

Course Main Course, Side Dish, Snack
Cuisine VEGAN
Prep Time 10 minutes
Cook Time 10 minutes
Total Time 20 minutes

Ingredients

  • 3 cups cauliflower chopped into 1" pieces
  • 1/2 cup almond milk
  • 3 tbsp nutritional yeast
  • 3 tbsp hemp hearts

Instructions

  1. In a pot, with a steam basket in the bottom, steam cauliflower until it falls apart easily when pierced with a fork.

  2. Drain cauliflower and add to blender (or Babycook if using).

  3. Add the rest of the ingredients and blend until smooth

  4. I don't season the sauce if I'm feeding it to Liberty. For the rest of the family I will use a little salt and pepper and serve over pasta, spelt or buckwheat are some of our favourites with this sauce.

Recipe Notes

* I have only used almond milk for this recipe but I'm sure any plant based milk would work

** I love our Babycook and use it for this recipe 90% of the time.  It's all cooked and pureed in one so saves on dishes and time, that's a definite mom win!  Only time I will use a blender is when I'm making larger batches or feeding more than two of us.

*** I will often make a double recipe and freeze in ice cube trays, then transfer them to freezer bags.  Easy to grab out of the freezer, defrost and serve baby alone or over pasta!

One of the things that makes this recipe so easy is my Babycook, it steams the cauliflower and purees it all in one.  I hate doing dishes and this makes my life much easier, when I’m in the kitchen too much already.  I reached out to Beaba to see about getting a coupon code for those of you that don’t have a Babycook, and they were more than happy to give me one!  I will have the code at the bottom of the page for anyone interested 🙂

I can whip this recipe up so quickly it’s become a lunch staple around our house.  I make large batches of the sauce and freeze it in ice cube trays then transfer them to freezer bags.  Perfect for when you need something fast, just pull out a couple cubes, defrost them and mix with pasta!  It’s like Kraft Dinner for vegans lol.

 

 

 Beaba code, good for 10% off anything on their site! MAEGAN10

( please note, this post is not endorsed by or affiliated with Beaba USA, these are my true and honest opinions of their product )

 

Homemade Puffs Recipe

The granola mom in me loves a healthy and tasty snack and this is both! It is Liberty’s FAVORITE treat, well actually everyone in the house loves them including my husband. They’re so popular, I’m lucky if I can keep a batch for more than a couple of days……*looks for a new hiding spot.

 

 As a mom, I find one of my biggest worries is if my kids are getting proper nutrition.  They get to an age where they refuse to eat certain fruits and veggies, and tend to gravitate towards prepackaged food as snacks. My teenagers would live off of prepacked store-bought food if I let them……even they need guidance in the nutrition department….(they’ll thank me one day).

 

Snacks that baby can feed themselves, from about 7 months old on, is a great way to encourage fine motor skill development.

 

Preparing homemade food for meals is hard enough, but snacks too? Really?? With my older kids I remember  Gerber puffs and cereals like cheerios being a big hit among babies and kids at snack time, so why not make it yourself?  I’ve tried many variations of this recipe before finally finding one that worked.  I love that you can customize them to your babies palate, whether sweet or savory or a mix of both! One brand we do trust and use when in a pinch is Love Child Organics I will often use their purees or cereals when I’m running low or don’t have time to make my own.  They’re organic, all natural and delicious!

 

 

Some examples of fruits and veggies I use:

 Peaches, Apples, Pear, Mango, Banana, Plums

Carrots, Peas, Beet Greens, Kale, Spinach, Sweet Potato

 

   I usually do a mix of veggies and fruit, with a little extra banana for sweetness 🙂

 

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Home-made Puffs Recipe

This is the perfect baby finger food.  Delicious and nutritious!




Course Snack
Cuisine VEGAN
Prep Time 10 minutes
Cook Time 35 minutes
Total Time 45 minutes
Servings 12

Ingredients

  • 1 cup organic oat flour, or brown rice flour* (you can also use baby cereal)
  • 1 tbsp coconut oil
  • 1/2 cup pureed fruits or veggies
  • 1 flax or chia egg (1 tbsp flax (ground raw flaxseed) or chia mixed with 2 1/2 tbsp water - let sit for 5 minutes)
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • 1/4 cup breastmilk, juice, or water
  • 1 tbsp molasses, unsulphured (optional, great source of iron)

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees, prepare cookie sheet with parchment paper.

  2. Mix all ingredients together, making sure there are no lumps (but don't overmix)

  3. Pipe onto parchment paper and bake for 15 minutes. Turn oven down to 200 degrees and continue to bake for another 5-7 minutes, depending on how crunchie you want them.

Recipe Notes

Tip: If you don't have a piping bag, you can use a ziploc bag and cut a corner to squeeze through.   *To make your own Oat Flour or Brown Rice Flour, simply pulse in food processor or high-speed blender until the consistency of flour!

 

I can’t wait to hear if your little ones enjoy this snack!  Please let me know in the comments if you found any new variations or have any tips also!

 

xo