21 Day Fixed Approved: Chocolate, Peanut Butter OATS

Today's recipe is a special one, folks. This tasty treat is straight out of Autumn Calabrese's new cookbook called Fixate; for those of you who don't know who Autumn is, she's the creator of the 21 Day Fix that gave me these results in 3 weeks. Yeah, she's one of my heroes. Ha!

ANYWAYS, this recipe is an awesome breakfast option for the days I save my shake for a quick lunch or on the weekends when Nate and I want to eat a yummy, guilt free breakfast together! 

So let's start with the main ingredient: Steel Cut Oats.

For those of you who aren't familiar with anything other than instant, old fashioned or rolled oats:

"Whole grain oats provide a healthy start to your day. Steel-cut oats, also known as Irish oats, are a type of whole grain oat cut from the center portion, or kernel of the oat, called the groat. Although steel-cut oats undergo less processing than rolled oats or instant oatmeal, all whole-grain oats have essentially the same nutritional value, as long as the finished product contains no added sugars. Steel-cut oats do take longer to cook than rolled or instant oats and have a chewier consistency."

Personally, I prefer steel cut oats because I'm a texture gal! Take the extra time to try them, I bet you'll like them! Go ahead and make these bad boys start to finish before you move onto the other ingredients.

Next, you're going to need some shakeology. This is going to give your oats a CREAMY sauce to bathe in & that desert-like chocolatey taste! PS, the shakeology is also adding a protein element to this meal.

If you aren't sure what Shakeology is, check out my blog post about it here; it's a nutrient dense shake that costs about $4 a day to drink and replaces a meal, vitamins and supplements. It's a game changer in healthy eating and the pursuit of fitness goal, I highly recommend you try it risk free for 30 days.

Now you need to stir in some all-natural peanut butter! My household is 100% crunchy, but you could of course go the creamy route.

SO this is where my rendition of this recipe gets comical. My hubby and I moved on Friday.. who cares, you just want the recipe.. WELL, most of my food items were either packed, discarded or misplaced. A few lucky ingredients made it over here to my two burner, no oven kitchen. SO, when the cook book says himalayan sea salt, caramel extract and cinnamon- I say no biggie!

All I had here was vanilla extract, so I used that and went without the cinnamon and sea salt. You know what? This stuff still turned out to be AMAZING! I can only imagine how much richer the other ingredients would make it.

Okay, so here's the recipe!

4 Cups Water

1 Cup Steel Cut Oats

1.5 Scoops of Chocolate Shakeology

4 TBSP All Natural Peanut Butter

Dash of Cinnamon (omitted above)

Dash of Pink Himalayan Sea Salt (omitted above)

1/2 TSP Caramel Extract (substituted pure vanilla!)

Optional: Mixed Berries for Topping (or in my case- I had like 2 strawberries left in my mini fridge) 

Top this treat with some mixed berries & you're SET!

Bon Appetit, My Friends!

xo, Lindsey

{healthy} peanut butter cups

If you're anything like me, the demands of the sweet tooth can strike at any time. My weaknesses, to name a few, include chocolate and salt. I can pretty much forget about self-discipline if either of those are sitting in front of me. If I'm not following an abnormally stick meal plan for my current workout program, I try to keep a couple kinds of healthy treats around the house to avoid a grocery run of desperation for the candy, pop chip or frozen yogurt sections.

I saw online via gosh-darn pinterest that people had been making candies using chocolate shakeology. 

shut the front door!?

If you know me well at all, you are fully aware of how much I LOVE my chocolate shakeology! I saw the recipe and decided to kick it up a notch and add some peanut butter; I'd say this spark of creativity was purely to add protein to this little snack, but who doesn't love a good reeses cup?

Without further ado..

Ingredients:

1/4 c. Coconut Oil

1 scoop chocolate shakeology

2 tblsp. PB2 OR crunchy peanut butter

cooking spray (olive, vegetable or coconut)

*optional: sea salt to sprinkle on top*

Directions:

1. melt coconut oil in microwave

2. stir in chocolate shakeology

3. if using PB2, add now and stir. if using crunchy peanut butter, leave to the side.

4. spray muffin tin with cooking spray of choice

5. spoon mixture evenly into 6 muffin cups

6. if using crunchy peanut butter, you may spoon a small drop into the center of the chocolate mixture

7. finally, if using sea salt, sprinkle LIGHTLY on top

8. place muffin tin in freezer to allow candies to harden.

(notice here, I doubled my recipe to make candies with PB2 and peanut butter)

9. after about 30 minutes, use a knife to loosen the candies. Mine came out VERY easily and in one perfect little piece. 

Give these a try and let me know what you think!

For a tasty snack that contains legit nutrients from the shakeology & a little protein from the peanut butter, I could look past the texture for the "reeses-like" taste!

Enjoy,

Lindsey

My famous "Tannyn Balls"

When Nate and I started eating healthier in September of last year (like, lifestyle healthy), we decided that we needed a tasty little energy ball  that could be made once a week so we could grab & go. I found approximately a zillion recipes on pinterest and ended up creating my own version! This little nugget of goodness will appeal to your sweet tooth while packing a punch of energy and protein!

We named these little energy balls "Tannyn Balls" after our ever so active german short haired pointer named Tannyn. I'm pretty sure that if Nate and I had to choose two words to describe her that they would be: energetic and sweet. Naming these bites after her just seemed fitting.

Here's the recipe!

1 c. Oats

1/3 c. Agave (or honey, if you'd like)

2/3 c. Coconut Flakes

1/2 c. Peanut Butter

1/2 c. Dark Chocolate Chips

1/3 c. Flax Seed

2 tbsp. Black Chia Seed

1 tsp. Vanilla Extract

1/3 c. Dried Cranberries

1 scoop of Vanilla Protein Powder mixed with water to a "paste (optional)

My secret to keeping it easy and no-mess when making these bad boys is to use an ice-cream scoop and let them set on wax paper. Easy Peasy!!!

Enjoy!

xo, linz