Orange Cranberry Pancakes with Orange Sauce (Vegan)

I made this recipe and changed a few things to make it vegan. Try them, they are vegan, taste like fall and are so good.

Sauce

1 teaspoon finely shredded orange peel
1 cup orange juice
1/3 cup water
2 tablespoons sugar (I prefer less sweet)
2 tablespoons dried cranberries (optional)
1 tablespoon cornstarch

Pancakes

1 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup dried cranberries
1/8 teaspoon cinnamon
1 dash ground ginger
1 1/2-2 cups plain or vanilla silk
1/4 cup applesauce
4 teaspoons vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 tablespoon finely shredded orange peel

For orange sauce, combine the water and corn starch in a small bowl until it forms a slurry. Combine slurry in a small saucepan with 1 teaspoon orange peel, the orange juice, 2 tablespoons sugar, and 2 tablespoons snipped dried cranberries (if desired), and cornstarch. Cook and stir over medium heat until thickened and bubbly. Cook and stir for 2 minutes more. Remove from heat and set aside.

For pancakes, in a large bowl combine the whole wheat flour, all-purpose flour, brown sugar sugar, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, ginger and finely chopped cranberries.

In another bowl combine 1 1/2 soy milk, applesauce, vegetable oil, vanilla, and orange zest. Add more soy milk if batter is too thick.

Add all at once, add the wet ingredients to flour mixture. Stir just until moistened (batter should be slightly lumpy). Preheat griddle to 300-325 degrees, until water "dances" on surface. For each pancake, pour about 2 tablespoons batter onto hot griddle or skillet. Use more batter for bigger pancakes. Spread batter into a circle about 2 - 2 1/2 inches in diameter. Cook over medium heat about 1-2 minutes on each side or until pancakes are golden brown, turning to cook second sides when pancakes have bubbly surfaces and edges are slightly dry. Serve with sauce.

Nutella Rum-Rums

Yo, ho, ho a pirate's life for me. Why is the rum always gone? Oh that's why, they are in these cookies and I drank it LOL. Oh my gosh these are one of the best cookies ever. I based these cookies off of this recipe

1/3 cup Nutella
1/4 cup oil (mild olive oil or vegetable oil)
1/2 cup soy milk
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 tbsp plus 1 tsp. ground flax seeds
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract (I actually forgot to put this in mine)
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 cup whole wheat pastry flour or whole wheat flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon allspice
1/2 cup dried cranberries
1/4 cup nuts of choice, I used walnuts
1/4 cup white chocolate chips
3 tablespoons rum

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Soak the cranberries in the rum while you are making the rest of the recipe.Place Nutella, oil, milk, brown and white sugar and vanilla extract in a large bowl. Mix well. In a small bowl, combine flours, baking soda, salt and allspice. Add in small additions to the wet mixture. Add cranberries and rum, white chocolate chips and nuts of choice. You may need to add a bit more soy milk if mixture is crumbly. Spray your hands with cooking spray and form into balls. Leave plenty of room for these, they spread. Cook about 6-8 minutes or until set and crispy. Remove from pan and let cool.

Maple Nut Cookies (Vegan)

When I saw a recipe for Maple Nut Cookies on cat tea corner's website I had to try it! I cut it in half and ended up with 8 cookies. These are pretty good, kinda like a pecan sandy or other shortbread type cookie. I made mine with walnuts, but I think that they would be best with pecans to make them more like pecan sandies, and I used Grade A maple syrup because that is what I had but I will look for some grade B before making these again for more maple taste. Sorry no pics but I will be making them again for a Christmas gift package so I will have pics up by then!

Spiced Whole Wheat Walnut Pancakes

Wow, out of all of the pancakes I have made, this recipe by far is my favorite. I have changed the recipe a bit and it could be made completely vegan if you use something in place of the honey, like maple syrup, agave nectar, corn syrup, golden syrup, etc but I have never tried it that way......

Spiced Whole Wheat Walnut Pancakes

1 cup whole wheat flour
1.5 tsp baking powder
1.5 tsp ground cinnamon
1/8 tsp ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 cup applesauce
1 cup soy milk
1 tbsp regular olive oil not EVOO
1.5 tbsp honey
1/8 cup chopped walnuts or pecans or to taste....I never measure them

Honey-Cinnamon Topping

1/4 cup honey
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tbsp margarine (LOL, never measure this one either)



1. To make Honey-Cinnamon Topping: Place a small saucepan on low heat; add honey and cinnamon; stir for 1 minute.
2. Add in butter and stir until melted; keep warm.
3. To make pancakes: In a big mixing bowl, combine flour, baking powder, spices, and salt; set aside.
4. In another bowl, whisk the applesauce, milk, oil, and honey together; add to the dry ingredients and mix well.
5. Fold in nuts.
6. Heat a nonstick griddle or skillet over medium-high heat.
7. Lightly brush with vegetable oil ( I find this to be unnessary)
8. Pour 1/4 cup batter onto griddle for each pancake.
9. Cook until bubbles form on the surface; flip pancake over and cook until the other side is golden.
10. Serve warm pancakes with Honey-Cinnamon Topping.

Vegan Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies

I made these cookies today, and if you haven't tried them yet you need to !!!! So rich and chocolately, and almost brownie like, I will make these cookies again and again! They are so easy to make too, so decadent. I halfed the recipe and it made 11 cookies for me and I used regular cocoa as I didn't have dutched cocoa on hand. Rock on Isa!!!

Chewy Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies


Ingredients:
3/4 cup canola oil
2 cups sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla

1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon whole flax seeds
1/2 cup soymilk

2 cups all purp flour
3/4 cup dutch processed cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup chocolate chips


Directions
Preheat oven to 350 F.

Grind the flax seeds on high in a blender until they become a powder. Add soymilk and blend for another 30 seconds or so. Set aside.

In a large bowl sift together flour, cocoa, baking soda and salt.

In a seperate large bowl cream together oil and sugar. Add the flax seed/soy milk mixture and mix well. Add the vanilla.

Fold in the dry ingredients in batches. When it starts to get too stiff to mix with a spatula, use your hands until a nice stiff dough forms. Add the chocolate chips and mix with your hands again.

Roll dough into 1 inch balls and flatten into a disc that's about 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Place on an ungreased cookie sheet about an inch apart.

Bake for 10 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool for about 5 minutes, then set them on a wire rack to cool completely.

Variations:
For chocolate chocolate chip cherry cookies, replace 1 teaspoon of the vanilla with almond extract, and replace 1/2 the chocolate chips with dried cherries.

For chocolate nut cookies, replace 1 teaspoon of the vanilla with a nut extract (almond, walnut, what have you) and replace the chocolate chips with 1 1/2 cups chopped nuts (hazelnuts, almonds or walnuts all are good).

Ginger Schezwan Stir Fry

You know when you are outrageously hungry, and you don't know what to eat, haven't planned a meal and are not sure what you have in the kitchen and you throw together a meal with the things that you have and it turns out wonderful? This is one of those times :) I looked in the freezer and a few weeks ago, I had visited the Asian grocer and they had VeriSoy Vegetarian Ginger Chicken, and looked and saw some broccoli, onions, a half container of mushrooms, onion and carrots and decided to make a stir fry. I cheated on this one, all I really did was cook up the veggies and brown rice ( made from the boil on the stove, but hey it was brown rice!) and I used a package of Schezwan Hot and Spicy stir fry sauce from Kroger, just follow the instructions on the sauce packet. Wow this is the most amazing stir fry I have ever made or had.

Banana Nut Bread and WW Oatmeal Bread

This banana bread is very moist and very, very low in fat. It makes one big loaf and 6 "short" texas sized muffins. I shared with my coworkers and they loved it, wonderful way to get rid of 4 bananas that are overripe.

I also made Celine's WW Oatmeal bread and I had a PB and Jelly made out of some of the bread, not just any PB and J, it had White Chocolate Wonderful PB and Orange Marmalade, definately a grown up PB and J. Sorry, no pics of the actual sammich!