Like what you read? Try these!:

1. Spicy Macaroni Casserole Recipe
2. Tyson’s Grilled and Ready Chicken & Dressing Casserole Helps Show Teachers a Little Appreciation
3. Menu Plan Monday

Serve with salad or your favorite steam veggies to complete the meal.

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The French kind…

no…not kisses, this is all G rated.

Today we’re making over French toast. Mmmm…YUM, as my nephew would say.  But OH how bad it is for you!  I don’t even want to think about it!  Thankfully with a few small adjustments you can make delicious French toast the whole family will enjoy without knowing it’s good for them!

For more of my Healthier Back to School breakfasts check out how to make Lucky Charms & yogurt, a bagel & cream cheese, and healthier instant oatmeal.

Like what you read? Try these!:

1. Mango French Toast
2. Healthier Back to School Breakfasts – Bagel with Cream Cheese Alternatives
3. Healthier Back-to-School Breakfast Alternatives – Lucky Charms and Yogurt

Instant oatmeal makeover

instant oatmeal substitutes: Quaker Quick Oats {or if you have even more time, try their Old Fashioned Oats} provide a sodium-free, 100% natural, whole grain breakfast that will fill your kids up with 3 grams of protein and the whole grain will keep them feeling full and fueled up until lunch time. And it takes about 1 minute to warm up!

give your oatmeal some personality: add wheat germ, honey, cinnamon, brown sugar, toasted almonds, fresh or dried fruit, pecans, you get the idea.  As long as you keep it healthy and proportionate, you’ll only add to the appeal of this tasty meal.

use milk instead of water for a more creamy texture and taste, plus you’ll up your child’s calcium intake a bit.

{I don’t have a picture up yet, since we had this yesterday but I couldn’t find my camera before it was all eaten.  I’ll make some more today and post a pic soon.}

In our house I always supplement with a bit or wheat germ{since the taste blends right in} and then add whatever toppings we have in the house or that one of the girls has requested.  We regularly end up with a mixture of quick oats, wheat germ, brown sugar or honey, and dried fruit. By taking just a bit more time {barely!}, you can provide a healthier, lower in sugar, and tastier breakfast for your child as they head off back to school with this filling breakfast.  What’s your child’s favorite breakfast?

 Image Credit: time_anchor

Like what you read? Try these!:

1. Healthier Back-to-School Breakfast Alternatives – Lucky Charms and Yogurt
2. Healthier Back to School Breakfasts – Bagel with Cream Cheese Alternatives

As a kind of real-life test.

Here are a few of the alternatives I found to bagels, cream cheese, and chocolate milk to make things a bit healthier.

Plain Bagel (avg. 289 calories) Alternatives: Whole Grain bagels (just check and make sure high fructose corn syrup is not an ingredient): 170 calories or Whole Grain English Muffins (this was the choice I went with for our family): 120 calories. These choices also provide a great supply of healthy whole grains (hence the name ‘whole grain’), which provides plenty of fiber and protein.

Regular Cream Cheese (80 calories & 1 g of protein) Alternatives: Fat free cream cheese (30 calories & 4 g of protein) (one of the options my family chose), almond butter (101 calories & 2.4 g of protein), all natural peanut butter (80 calories & 8g of protein) (one of the options my family chose), Neufchatel Cheese (80 calories & 2.8 g of protein).

-You could also try adding smoked turkey slices for protein, which is how I eat it. (90 calories & 9 g of protein).

Chocolate Milk Alternatives: Milk chocolate Ovaltine (what my kids are drinking right now), chocolate almond milk, chocolate silk ‘milk’.

As always I recommend adding some organic yogurt with fruit to get calcium & well all the awesome that fresh fruit provides.

We really enjoyed this breakfast this week and it will be one we revisit often.  I’m still open for what breakfast to make healthier for next week so leave your suggestions here!   By making some small and probably unnoticeable changes to your family’s favorite breakfasts you can make them healthier without sacrificing your family’s happiness.

Like what you read? Try these!:

1. Healthier Back-to-School Breakfast Alternatives – Lucky Charms and Yogurt

Apricot Glazed Turkey Breast Recipe

Ingredients

• 40 oz. skinless, boneless turkey breast
• 1 Knorr Homestyle Chicken Stock container (any chicken stock will do)
• 3 heaping TBS Smuckers Simply Fruit-Apricot
• 2 TBS spicy brown mustard
• hot water to cover the turkey
• cooking spray

Recipe Directions

• Combine chicken stock with two cups hot water until thoroughly mixed & pour into crock-pot.
• Add thawed & rinsed turkey breast.
• Cover turkey breast with hot water & set crock pot to high.
• Allow turkey to cook in crock pot for 6 hours on high or until cooked through.
• After 6 hours, preheat over to 400 degrees and spray your roast pan with cooking spray.
• Removed turkey from the crock pot and place in roasting pan and allow to sit.
• Meanwhile, mix fruit spread and spicy mustard together until completely mixed.
• Spread fruit/mustard mixture all over turkey.
• Roast for 30 minutes or until glaze has set and begun to brown slightly.

Serve with a salad and baked potatoes for a complete, healthy, and delicious meal!

This glazed turkey recipe has become one of our family’s favorite meals and a great variation for those who are not pork fans. The apricot fruit spread can also be substituted with orange marmalade, berry fruit spread, or your favorite fruit spread.

Do you ever try variation on a family favorite? Share your experience with us!

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It’s back-to-school time here in rural Kentucky and with it comes much earlier mornings and the need for healthy back-to-school breakfast choices.  If your kids are anything like mine they like Poptarts, Lucky Charms, and just about anything else loaded with sugar…but these don’t really make smart everyday breakfast choices (they’re what KJ has learned to call “sometimes” foods).  Everyone knows that breakfast is the most important meal of the day and this is especially true for children who’s brains are still developing, so in an effort to get those brains going with the best start possible while still appealing to the child’s taste buds, I’m going to be sharing with you a few of our favorite healthier back-to-school breakfasts.

This week we’ll start out keeping it simple by making some simple changes to my kiddos favorite breakfast: Lucky Charms, vanilla yogurt with sprinkles, and milk.

Lucky Charms: For starters I mix half a bowl of Lucky Charms with half a bowl of Rice Krispies cereal, add fresh cut up organic strawberries and blueberries.  The girls can’t tell the difference in the mixed cereal and love the addition of the fruit, in fact KG said today “When you run out of marshmallows, you still have the fruit!! I love it!”

Vanilla yogurt with sprinkles: Here again I’m taking parts of the breakfast that my girls love and tweaking it slightly by choosing organic plain yogurt, sprinkling a generous amount of cinnamon (not cinnamon sugar) on top, followed by a tiny amount of their favorite sprinkles, and letting them make faces with their blueberries and strawberries.

I plan to wean them completely off the candy sprinkles in the yogurt in the coming weeks, but for now this is a much better option than what we started with.  What I love about this is I can substitute any fruit that is on sale in these small healthier changes and can (read: have been) even enjoy them for breakfast myself!  We were able to make these small changes without any complaints and in fact I think they like this even better, I’m excited to share what we’ve come up with for next week as well! You don’t have to change everything about your child’s favorite breakfast to make it healthier, making small changes can really add up…and trust me, the teachers will thank you for losing some of the added sugar!

How do you make small changes in the foods your kids love to make them healthier?

Like what you read? Try these!:

1. Semi-homemade Monkey Bread Rolls

Glazed Pork Tenderloin Ingredients

1 3lb boneless pork loin

2-3 TBS of apricot preserves (to your tastes)

2 TBS of Dijon mustard (again: to your tastes)

{you could add a pinch of horseradish [a very small pinch] if you weren’t serving this to children}

Glazed Pork Tenderloin Directions

Spray your crock-pot with no-stick spray and add just enough water to cover the bottom on the pot.  Add your tenderloin and cook on high for 6 hours.

After 6 hours, set your over to broil and transfer the pork tenderloin to a large roasting pan.

Mix the apricot preserves, Dijon mustard, and optional horseradish well until they form a smooth glaze.

Spread the glaze all over the tops and sides of your tenderloin and place uncovered in the over to broil.

Let broil for 5-10 minutes or until the glaze has formed a chewy crust.

To complete the meal: Just add cheesy mashed potatoes, your favorite veggie and some home-made bread to round out this non-traditional Easter meal.  Treat your family to a Easter dinner of apricot glazed pork tenderloin that will satisfy and keep them coming back for more!

Do you have a recipe to share this Manic Monday?  Make sure to link up here!

Like what you read? Try these!:

1. Pink Salad Recipe – Perfect for any Holiday
2. Easter Menu
3. Spicy Macaroni Casserole Recipe

With Valentine’s Day less than a month away, you may already be thinking about what to get your honey…but I challenge you to save your money and try out the age-old adage: “The way to a man’s heart is through is stomach.” with this month’s recipe: Homemade Chocolate Fudge Pudding. Sure you can go out an buy the cheap box version or you can show him you care by going to all the “trouble” of making the most delicious fudge pudding he’ll ever put in his mouth. And your kids will thank you too!

Homemade Chocolate Fudge Pudding

Ingredients

• 1 cup sifted flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2/3 cup granulated sugar
• 6 tablespoons cocoa
• 1/2 cup milk
• 2 tablespoons melted margarine
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1 1/2 cups boiling water

Directions

Preheat your oven to 350.  Sift together flour, baking powder, salt, granulated sugar, and two table spoons cocoa.  Add milk, margarine, and vanilla and mix until smooth.  Pour into greased 1/2 quart casserole dish.  Mix the brown sugar with the remaining four tablespoons cocoa.  Sprinkle over mixture in casserole dish.  Pour the boiling water evenly on top.  Bake at 350 for 40 minutes.  Cool until desired temperature.

This is a favorite in our house for special occasions and while it does take a bit (ok a lot) longer than the boxed variety, I can promise you it also tastes A LOT better than it as well.  So I vote if you really want to show your family some love this Valentine’s Day, whip up a batch of this pudding and serve it on your best china with their favorite meal.  What is your favorite way to say “I love you”?

If you’ve also got a great recipe to share, be sure and link up with Mr. Linky!

Like what you read? Try these!:

1. Semi-homemade Monkey Bread Rolls
2. Spicy Macaroni Casserole Recipe
3. Tyson’s Grilled And Ready Chicken Noodle Soup

Winter’s Best Chili

Ingredients

• 1 lb. Very Lean Ground Beef
• 1 Small Onion
• 1 Can Brooks Chili
• 24 oz Tomato Sauce
• 2 Cups Water
• 1/2 Box of angel hair pasta

Directions

Ok. Are you ready for these? Here we go:

Combine all ingredients. Bring to a boil and let simmer until pasta is tender.

Whew. If you try this recipe, let me know what you thought of it!

If you’ve got a recipe you’d like to share, make sure to link up here! I’ll be doing this monthly and I’d love for you to join.

If you don’t blog, but have a favorite recipe to share leave it in the comments, I’d love to start trying to make some of your family favorites too!!

Like what you read? Try these!:

1. Travel’n Trail Mix
2. BlueBerry Muffin Recipe
3. Chocolate Chip Cookies