Low Fat Banana Muffins

Remember those delicious Healthy Pumpkin Pie muffins that I made a few weeks back, and how excited I was about having a super healthy muffin recipe? Well here's another! I love banana bread, and have perfected that recipe of mine down to an art, so here's a banana muffin recipe that is a sure keeper! PLUS, it's (virtually) fat free!

Ingredients...

...2 eggs
...4 bananas
...2 cups flour
...1 tsp. salt
...1/2 c. sugar
...1 tsp. baking soda
...1/4 c. milk (not pictured)
...1 tsp. cinnamon (not pictured)
...1 tsp. vanilla extract (not pictured)

Directions...

In a small bowl, mash and stir together bananas, eggs, milk and vanilla. In a large bowl, combine remaining ingredients. Stir in wet ingredients until well combined. Spoon batter into a greased muffin tin and bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes.

Mom's Lasagna

Lasagna is one of America's favorite Italian dishes! Families all over enjoy a hearty supper together at night over this dish. So it's no surprise that one of my favorite dishes growing up was my mom's lasagna recipe! I've tried various other recipes, but I always come back to this one. I think it's just a comfort food type thing. Not only did my mom make this, but so did my grandma. So when I found the yellowed and well worn recipe card with my grandma's scrolly cursive handwriting recording this recipe, I added it to my "family favorites" recipe box so I can make this very recipe for my own family, and carry on this lasagna through the family.

Ingredients...

no picture, sorry!

...12 oz. container cottage cheese

...2 c. shredded cheese

...2 eggs (beaten)

...1 jar (32 oz.) pasta sauce

...1 lb. ground meat, browned

...lasagna noodles

Directions...

In a medium bowl, mix together cheeses and eggs. In another medium bowl, stir together browned meat and pasta sauce. In a 9x13 pan, spread a small amount of the sauce/meat mixture on the bottom. Cover sauce with a layer of lasagna noodles. Top noodles with 1/2 of the cheese mixture and more sauce. Add another layer of noodles and top that with remaining cheese and sauce mixtures. Cover and bake at 350 for 45 minutes. Uncover and top with shredded cheese. Continue baking an additional 15 minutes (uncovered).

To see more great reipes, check out Tempt my Tummy Tuesday over at Blessed with Grace and Tasty Tuesday over at Balancing Beauty and Bedlam!

S'mores Brownies

How about a fun recipe for today? If you are a true summer person who loves camping, and of course the S'mores and roasted marshmallows that comes with, then you will love this recipe! This is also a super easy recipe to make! I decided seeing that I have been getting gobs of super cheap marshmallows at Target lately, and have gobs of Halloween candy leftover from a CVS deal, that this would be an appropriate recipe to try right now!

Ingredients...

...graham crackers
...marshmallows (about a half bag of mini marshmallows)
...chocolate (you can use chips, chocolate bars, whatever you have on hand. I used about 4 fun sized Hershey's Bars with Almonds)
...Brownie Mix (I used a box because I wanted to get it used up, you can use homemade or whatever you please!)

Directions...

Grease a 9x13 pan and line the bottom with graham crackers. You will have to do some cracker breaking and cutting to get it all to fit well. Prepare brownies according to box/recipe instructions. Spread brownie batter over graham crackers (this proves to be a trick as the crackers move around quite a bit. Don't say I didn't warn you!). Bake at 350 for 25-30 minutes. Remove from oven and layer marshmallows on top of brownies, and then sprinkle with crushed chocolate bars or chocolate chips. Place back in oven for an additional 3-5 minutes. Let cool before cutting/serving.

To see more great recipes, check out Mouthwatering Monday over at A Southern Fairytale!

Crockpot Creamy Potato Soup

It's a common known fact that with pregnancy comes cravings. And my cravings have been all things potatoes. Mashed potatoes, potato salad...mmmmmm!!! So I decided to brave a potato soup in the crockpot. I've made it before, you can find that attempt here. And while it was good then, it was watery. And appeared to have "grease" pockets floating around. I prefer my potato soup to be more creamy.

And this recipe is just the ticket! YUUUMMMM!!!

Ingredients...

...1 lb. potatoes
...1/4 of a medium onion, chopped
...3 T. cream cheeese, cubed
...1 can (14 oz.) chicken broth
...1/4 c. milk
...1 tsp. parsley
...1/8 tsp. white pepper

Directions...

Throw all ingredients in crockpot and cook on low for 6-8 hours (or high for 3-4). Give a good stir to the soup before serving to completely combine the ingredients, which may appear resistent to combining until you stir. Once you stir it gets creamy and delicious! You may also want to add in salt and pepper to suit your tastes when you are serving this. It needed something, so I added a little of each and that TOTALLY completed this soup! Enjoy!

Uncle Dan's Tuna Noodle Casserole

I got this recipe from my husband's uncle Dan. Like two years ago. We were all sitting at a family gathering and I was copying down recipes from hubs' grandma's cookbooks when Uncle Dan saw what I was doing and recited this recipe for his Tuna Noodle Casserole to me. I wrote it down and it has sat in my recipe folder ever since. When I decided that I wanted to make Tuna and Noodles last week, I figured I would give Uncle Dan's recipe a shot. Except, when I re-read the ingredients, I about passed out from the fat content! The original recipe called for a stick of butter, bag of cheese and potato chips. I just couldn't bring myself to do it. Especially since now that I am pregnant, I'm watching my fat content super closely. I strive to make only meals that are low fat or super healthy. So I put off making it for a few more days until I decided to just tackle it. So I tweaked this recipe. A lot. And guess what! It was delish! So delish that hubs ate it for breakfast the next morning. I did good :)

Ingredients...

...1/2 package rotini or egg noodles
...1 can peas
...1 can cream of mushroom soup
...2 cans tuna

Directions...

Cook noodles according to package directions. Combine cooked noodles with all other ingredients in an oven safe casserole dish. Bake at 350 for 15-20 minutes.

To see other recipes for special diets, check out Ultimate Recipe Swap over at Life as Mom!

French Toast Casserole

We love breakfast food in this house! We have breakfast for supper night at least once per week. I decided that this week instead of the usual waffles or pancakes and eggs/bacon I would switch things up a bit and we would give french toast casserole a shot at glory. I'm super glad I did, this is amazing! Plus, it left my kitchen smelling like french toast for days!

Ingredients...

...5 cups bread cubes (I used my french bread recipe for the bread. you can use whatever you want!)
...4 eggs
...1/4 cup white sugar, divided
...1 1/2 cups milk
...1/4 tsp. salt
...1 tsp. vanilla extract
...1 T. margarine, softened
...1 tsp. ground cinnamon

Directions...

Grease an oven safe casserole dish and place bread cubes in dish. In a small bowl, wisk together eggs, milk, 2 T. sugar, salt and vanilla. Pour mixture over bread cubes. Stir until bread cubes are all well coated. Dot with butter and let sit for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, in a small bowl, combine remaining sugar and cinnamon together. At the end of the 10 minutes, pour the cinnamon/sugar mixture over the bread cube mixture and stir to coat well. Bake at 350 for 40-50 minutes.

Bean Bake

If anyone were to ever ask what my favorite food is, this would hands down have to be it. This is another one of those dishes that I grew up eating and I have loved it all my life. It is such a simple recipe and many don't understand why it is my favorite...until they taste it. Basically, this is doctored up baked beans...but oh my it is wonderful! This was a recipe that my grandma always made, it reminds me of growing up, being in her warm and inviting kitchen where cookies were always in the cookie jar and something delish was always in the oven. I've noticed I've been making a lot of my grandma's recipes lately, but I think it's because it's fall and they are all such a warm, comfort food to me. I hope you love this as much as I do!

Ingredients...

...1 lb. ground meat

...2 (15 oz.) cans pork and beans

...1/4 cup ketchup

...1/4 cup brown sugar

...2 tsp. ground mustard

Directions...

Brown ground meat. In an oven safe casserole dish, stir together all ingredients until well combined. Bake at 350 for 35-40 minutes. See...I told ya...simple.

To see other great recipes, check out Tasty Tuesday over at Balancing Beauty and Bedlam!