This is our 301^st post, and I can’t believe it myself! Neither Sunitha or I realized we had covered 300 posts with the last one. We feel a great sense of achievement, and are thankful to all our readers for your love and support through the last one and a half years. One exciting day after the other is making me quite delighted as I write this post. I mean exciting Father’s day yesterday.



How was it for you? I spoke to my Dad, who was clueless about Father’s day, but I spoke to him and enjoyed our visit. It was definitely more exciting for my daughter. She has been planning the day for weeks and wanted to do something special for her dad. It all worked out well through the course of the day. We went hiking in the foot hills of Rocky Mountain which is a great pass time of this family. On the walk, my daughter got to do something different for her dad from the usual self painted Father’s day card she has been giving him for years. She carefully picked up wild flowers through her walk and gave it to her Dad. She was very pleased and so was he. These moments of simple pride and happiness are so priceless.

Not so much fun for my lil imp because he got excited and grabbed the bouquet from his Dad spoiling the bouquet and upsetting his sister. But on our walk back, the whole family picked flowers and brought home a fantastic wildflower bouquet. It’s sitting pretty on the windowsill. I wish I could take a close up picture to show you but it's a dreary day and hardly any light.

Notes:

1.If you want it super thick, leave the ice cubes and blend.
2.You could use any nut milk(for eg: almond milk) instead of milk, which will be great,since that makes this smoothie protein rich.
3,.This serves 2.

  After a roll this week with sinful desserts and pork, let's talk healthy today.  These muffins with oats and whole wheat flour is super soft and delicious.   Great in your tummy and yet gentle on your love handles.

   Don't mistake healthy to be dry flakes falling off the muffin.  No, far from it.  My little guy enjoyed it so much he finished a big huge muffin (huge- used relative to my 2 year olds size). And on a lighter note here is a snippet of dialogue we shared while I was making this recipe:

LM:     Muffin menam ( I want muffin) The words are distorted like when babies first start talking.  Like 'twain' for train etc.

I (Playing along in his child talk): eppo tharame..(Wait a second)

LM(Pouting his lips and giving me a wide eyed doll look): Veleelu vachittu matiye (Only after you have kept it outside)

I: Open jawed, hands on hips making a face at him.

  Did you get it?  He is teasing me! Yeah, the little one is growing up quickly in the teasing department.

  He says 'only after keeping it outside' because I cook and then run outside with it to the patio to photograph.  I do this little hip hop between stove - dish - patio - table thingy.   Therefore now, I am the butt of the joke even for my 2 year old!   Gosh! What do a being do when they have to blog and photograph and feed kids and not have them tease you!!%@%$#



Ingredients:

Brown Sugar- 1/2 cup to 2/3 cup
Oats- 1 cup
Whole wheat flour- 3/4 cup
Baking Powder- 2 tsp
Baking soda- 1/2 tsp
Salt- 1/4 tsp
Eggs- 2
Mashed bananas- 1 cup (3 med)
Vegetable oil/Any oil of your preference- 1/4 cup
Cinnamon powder(optional)- 1/2 tsp
Walnuts chopped- 1/2 cup
Low fat milk/Buttermilk- 1/4 cup



Method:

1.Preheat the oven at 350 degree F.Prepare a muffin pan by either greasing or lining with paper liners.
2.Crush the oats in a blender and mix it with the whole wheat flour,salt,baking powder and baking soda.
3.Beat the eggs and sugar to mix them well.Add oil and mix once more.
4.Spoon in the mashed bananas and cinnamon if you are adding into this and mix well.
5.Finally add the milk/buttermilk and mix again.
6.Pour this wet mixture into the dry mixture and fold in using a wooden/plastic spatula.Also mix in the walnuts in this.
7.Spoon into the prepared muffin pans and bake at 350 degrees for 18-20 minutes or until they are done.



Notes:

1.This recipe gives you 12 standard size muffins.
2.You could add 1 tsp of pure vanilla extract if you prefer.
3.You could add more nuts if you wish.

Sending this to Champa's Bake off event

Recipe courtesy: Various Internet sites
Contributor: Namitha