Week 6.1: Crockpot (whole, multi-grain) Cereal with Applesauce

Before:
I got this recipe from my cooking pal Angela. She found it here, at Monkeys on the Bed. A lot more things on my list that have never been in my kitchen before: pearl barley, steel cut oats, wheat bran, and ginger spice. Boy keeps flaxseed around, so that I had on hand, but we’ve never used it for cooking. We opted against putting any dried fruit in it (raisons completely disgust me and the other kinds of dried fruit just didn’t seem like it would fit in the recipe – mostly because I am a texture gal and think chunks would create a roadblock for me).

I think perhaps because of the lack of fruit, or maybe my overly-heaping heaping teaspoons of cinnamon, or maybe just my crave for sugar, I did find it tastier when I sprinkled a bit of sugar over it. I know, I know, that defeats the whole aspect of it being so super good for you, but Boy and I both liked it and we would eat it again! (Tofer missed out this week since he is in another state.)

I would love to mix the dry ingredients together to make little packets – just add vanilla, applesauce, and water! Super easy. Thank you Monkeys on the Bed commenter Amy for the superb idea!

After:

Week 6.2: French Toast Souffle

Before:
I’ve had this recipe torn out of a Ladies Home Journal magazine for years and never made it. Can you believe that? I totally can. But anyway, so I finally made it! It may seem odd that I would choose two breakfast recipes in a single setting, and I am still not quite sure what I was thinking, but it turned out okay. Not as fabulous as I was expecting (I really really really love French toast), but definitely good. If it wasn’t just me in this house who eats French toast, I would make it again. It has just the right amount of sweetness to it. Since the recipe is really old, I could not find it on the Ladies Home Journal website, but I did find it re-printed here. I used the original recipe, not the lower fat one printed at the bottom (the article itself made-over someone’s family recipe to be more healthy).

After: