A delicious and easy way to start the day. Perfect for Pancake Day, or make a stash for on the go. Naturally sweet from the banana, these have no added sugar. You could further flavour the pancakes with fruits such as blueberries, or use dark chocolate chips for an extra sweet kick.
Use gluten-free oats to make this gluten-free, or dairy-free by using a milk alternative and yoghurt alternative (I have used soya products in this recipe).
Porridge Pancakes
Serves 2
Ingredients
1 large banana
1 egg
100g rolled oats
50ml milk of choice
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon (optional)
Oil for frying
To serve
150g strawberries
80g raspberries
160g yoghurt (I have used soya yoghurt)
A few mint leaves
Method
Mash the banana in a bowl with a fork till you have very small lumps.
Add the remaining ingredients, except for the oil, and mix well.
Heat a frying pan over a low heat.
Wipe 1/4 tsp of oil around the pan before adding spoonfuls of the mixture, spaced out. You should be able to make 6-8 pancakes from the batter.
Cook for 2 minutes, before flipping and cooking for a further 2 minutes.
Serve in stacks with yoghurt, berries and mint.
Delicious served with fruit and yoghurt
Per serving*: 430kcal/ 11g fat/ 1.9g saturated fat/ 60g carbohydrates/ 12g fibre/ 15g protein
*Analysis based on unsweetened soya milk and unsweetened soya yoghurt
Get a head start on the week by whipping up a batch of my Bakewell Breakfast Bars. Naturally sweetened using dates and cherries, these bars contain no added sugar. They also pack some wholesome goodness in the form of oats and wholemeal flour meaning they contain 5.5g of fibre per bar as well as some healthy fats from the seeds and nuts.
If you don’t have cherries you can substitute in other dried fruits such as apricots, raisins, sultanas or even blueberries – just watch out that the dried fruits don’t contain added sweeteners such as glucose or apple juice. You can also swap the almonds and almond butter for other nuts or nut butter, or top with coconut chips.
These are great for on-the-go in the morning or as an afternoon snack. Keep in an airtight Tupperware container for 4-5 days or alternatively freeze them for longer-term storage.
Makes 9 squares
Ingredients
100g pitted dates
25g linseeds
60g dried unsweetened cherries
50g skin-on almonds
75g butter or vegan butter
25g almond butter
100g wholemeal flour
100g oats
15g sliced almonds
Method
Preheat the oven to 180°C and line a 25x25cm baking tin with baking parchment.
Soak the pitted dates in 50ml boiling water and the linseeds in 50ml tap water for 5 minutes.
Meanwhile, roughly chop the almonds and cherries by hand or using a food processor. If using a food processor remove once chopped.
After the dates have soaked for 5 minutes transfer them to the food processor and blitz to a paste*
Add the butter, almond butter and soaked linseeds with the water and blend together.
Add the flour to form a sticky dough.
Add the oats and chopped almonds and cherries and pulse until it just comes together. If you want a smoother consistency pulse for longer.
Press into the lined tin and top with flaked almonds before baking for 20 minutes.
Remove from the oven and allow to cool before slicing.
These cookies taste like a cross between a Hobnob and a spiced Ginger Nuts biscuit. Super easy to make, the hardest part is waiting between each of the different stages!
These are also perfect for little hands which will want to get involved. They can help with pouring the ingredients into the food processors, rolling, cutting and decorating. The use of oats and wholemeal flour means that although they are still a biscuit, they will still be contributing towards fibre intake.
These make the perfect little gift, or can be hung on the Christmas tree as decorations. To do this, poke a hole at the top before baking to allow you to use string to hang from the tree.
Makes around 30 small cookies
Ingredients
75g oats
100g wholemeal flour
1 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp ground sweet cinnamon
1/2 tsp mixed spice
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
50g butter
70g soft light brown sugar
30g golden syrup
1/2 a beaten egg
Plain flour for dusting
Method
In a food processor, blitz the oats till they resemble flour. Add the wholemeal flour, spices, bicarbonate of soda and butter. Blitz together till the mixture resembles breadcrumbs.
Add the sugar and briefly mix together before adding the golden syrup and egg. Mix till the dough forms large clumps before turning out onto the work surface. The mixture should feel a little sticky. If it is dry add a little more egg.
Lightly knead the dough till it just comes together.
Wrap in clingfilm and place in the fridge to chill for 15 minutes.
Preheat the over to 160°C fan/ 180°C convection.
Line 2 large baking trays with baking parchment.
Roll the dough out to a thickness of 5mm using a little plain flour to stop it from sticking, and cut out your desired shapes using a lightly dusted cookie cutter.
Place the cookies on the lined baking sheet, leaving a 1cm gap between the cookies to allow them to expand slightly.
Bake for 12 minutes for smaller shapes (or those with several holes in them like my snowflakes) and up to 15 minutes for larger shapes till just turning slightly darker on the edges.
Cool on the tray for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.
Per 10g cookie: 48kcal/ 1.7 fat/ 0.9g saturated fat/ 7.0g carbohydrates/ 0.6g fibre/ 0.9g protein
Granola is king in our house. We eat loads of it for breakfast, as a quick snack and sometimes even as a substitute for pudding! But shop bought granola sometimes isn’t the healthiest breakfast cereal to turn to. Often it is high in sugar, loaded with fats and has a few basic ingredients in it such as oats and sweetened dried fruits. Additionally, so many brands put 0.5% hazelnuts into the mix (why?!?!) which renders me out of the equation due to a nut allergy.
Homemade granola means I can add what I want
So I endeavoured to make my own range, which is either reduced or no added sugar, uses healthy fats, has a diverse range of fibre sources, uses unsweetened fruit wherever possible, and only has ingredients in there that I can eat, so feel free to swap anything out to fit in with your dietary requirements.
I developed this particular recipe for my chocoholic sister-in-law who loves sweet treats. Although not a sugar free granola, it’s definitely not as sweet as the generic shop bought granola, and packs in much more nutritious value, and as a bonus is also vegan!
I hope you enjoy making this recipe. Feel free to alter the fruits used, add alternative nuts if you aren’t allergic, or even change the chocolate if you’re not looking to make a vegan granola (I’m thinking white chocolate and raspberry!!!).
Making this granola is really easy, but takes a little time. Adding water and maple syrup allows some of the starch in the oats to come out and helps make clusters traditionally achieved by using high sugar and harder fats such as palm oil. Sometimes I even let the wet oats sit before adding in further ingredients so that the clusters really form. Then I add the fat: extra virgin olive oil! Packed full of polyphenols and phytochemicals which have been shown to be beneficial for heart, brain and even gut health.
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
You can use whatever seeds you have to hand, but try to get a good variety in there. This recipe will help you achieve 10 of your 30 different plant foods for the week, which we know is beneficial to overall health. I also hand chop whole almonds so that you get really large chunks of the nuts. This gives a really nice crunch, but we also know from research on almond consumption, eating roasted chopped almonds can increase some strains of butyrate-producing gut bacteria, which is thought to be beneficial for health. Additionally, in a recent review of studies investigating almond consumption, there were beneficial outcomes on cardiometabolic markers such as lowering total cholesterol and LDL-cholesterol levels in comparison to non-almond consuming groups.
Roughly chop the almonds to keep them in large chunks
Finally, a slow bake means you get lovely crunchy granola, I tried to speed things up in one of my recipe testing sessions. Sadly you get a slightly burnt toasted flavour which wasn’t to my liking, but some of my testers did actually enjoy they taste!
I love this granola with either dairy free milk, or a dairy free yoghurt such as a coconut yoghurt – just make sure you check the nutritional information to make sure it isn’t loaded with hidden sugar! Check out my previous post for a recent UK publication looking at the sugar reduction in yoghurts over the past few years.
Delicious served with creamy coconut yoghurt and fresh cherries
Recipe
150g rolled oats
150g jumbo oats
30g cocoa powder
50g desiccated coconut
25g chia seeds
25g pumpkin seeds
25g sunflower seeds
25g linseeds (flax)
50g maple syrup
80g almonds, roughly chopped
60g extra virgin olive oil
50g coconut flakes
90g dried cherries
100g dark chocolate chips of choice
Granola ingredients
Method
Preheat the oven to 130°C/125°C Fan/ 1⁄2 GM
Add the oats, cocoa powder, desiccated coconut, almonds, seeds, maple syrup and water to a large bowl and mix together. Let large clumps form.
Add the olive oil and mix
Spread out onto a tray, pushing the mixture down to help form more clumps
Bake in the oven for 90 minutes, gently turning the mixture at 30, 50, and 70 minutes
Add the coconut flakes to the tray at 70 minutes to gently toast for the last 20 minutes
After 90 minutes of cooking, remove from the oven and allow to cool completely
Add the cherries and chocolate to the granola and store in an airtight container for up to 2 weeks
Cherry, chocolate and coconut granola
Per 50g serving 226kcal/ 10g fat/ 5.4g saturated fat/ 21.3g carbohydrates/ 4.7g fibre/ 5.8g protein
Dr Pippa 