Minnie Christmas Trees

Minnie Christmas Trees

The Minnie Chef
Snacks

Who says cookie cutters can only be used for making cookies?!?  Is anyone else over the dozens of cookie cutters that sit tucked away in a drawer and only come out to play once a year?  Break out your cookie cutters more often and break out of the box when you use them!  

Getting toddlers to try new foods is half the battle, right?  Once they try new things, they often find they like them.  But getting a toddler to step into uncharted territories and taste something new isn’t always a walk in the park.  Making food fun—cutting it into fun shapes, creatively decorating it or turning it into a game—is one way to help break down that barrier.  

Last week I had some friends over for a slightly belated “Friendsgiving” dinner.  I have quite a few friends with . . .

Curried Chickpea and Carrot Stew

Curried Chickpea and Carrot Stew

The Minnie Chef
Meals

Back when I was in second grade I had to do a school project on India.  I promise you this isn’t just a trip down memory lane, I’m taking you back to my second grade schoolwork for a reason… I don’t remember the details of the project so much, but what I do remember is that my parents took me all over Miami, searching high and low for all things Indian to report back to my class about.  We went to the Metro Zoo, what is now called Zoo Miami, to learn about Bengal tigers.  We went to a clothing store where my parents recorded me being wrapped in traditional garb.  And we also went to and Indian restaurant to learn about and sample the cuisine.  I don’t remember the restaurant, or the food, but what I do remember is . . . 

Gingerbread Smoothie Bowls

Gingerbread Smoothie Bowls

The Minnie Chef
Drinks

🌲☃Christmas has arrived early this year 🎉 because now you can make healthy gingerbread men for your little ones during the holidays!  Gingerbread cookies have always been one of my favorite, if not my very favorite, cookie.  They’re one of the things I most look forward to this time of year! 

I have a friend who, every year around this time, for as long as I can remember, makes gingerbread and sugar cookies with her mom.  They bake and decorate dozens and dozens of gorgeous and absolutely delicious cookies to give out to family and friends for the holidays.  Year after year, I have walked into their house . . . 

Banana Walnut Loaf

Banana Walnut Loaf

The Minnie Chef
Sweet Treats

We always have a lot of bananas around at our house, at all stages of ripeness.  I like to eat mine when they're still completely yellow with a little bit of green near the stem.  Zoey likes hers when they just start forming brown spots.  And we always like to have really ripe ones around for smoothies and banana nice cream.  But some always get to a certain point—that dark, mushy stage when they'll fall right off the stem when you pick them up—the point right when they're about to go from being overripe to rotten.  At that point we usually peel and freeze them.  But the other day we had . . . 

Minnie Eggplant Pizzas

Minnie Eggplant Pizzas

The Minnie Chef
Snacks

Hey everyone!  This week we’re very excited to share a new idea with you!  We decided to start switching up our current weekly “Midweek Inspirations” with “Midweek Minnies.”  So from now on every other week, we’ll switch back and forth between the two.  

The “Midweek Minnies” will come in the form of light bites, appetizers and kid-size meals.  Sometimes, there is too sharp a divide between “toddler friendly food” and sophisticated dishes.  I don’t really envision myself, or other parents of toddlers, serving Ants on a Long or PB and Js at a dinner party, but, hey, we also want our little ones to eat, right?  But who feels like adding the extra task of . . .

Roasted Kabocha and Avocado Salad with Pear Vinaigrette

Roasted Kabocha and Avocado Salad with Pear Vinaigrette

The Minnie Chef
Salad

I’m starting to notice a bit of a trend here… Vacations seem to spark ideas that get the creative juices flowing.  Whenever we’re getting ready to pack up and go on a road trip we know there’s a lot of food in our kitchen that we’ll be bringing with us, but there’s also a lot of food that just won’t travel well.  So in those days leading up to a road trip, that’s when you gotta decide to either use it or lose it.  

A couple nights before we were about to head out on our last trip, I wanted to cook some stuff to make sure things wouldn’t go to waste, but I was busy with packing and other things and didn’t want to make something with too much effort.  I had a kabocha squash that had been sitting on my counter for a while so I decided to just go ahead and roast it.  It was as simple as cutting, scooping, and tossing it in the oven, so why not? . . . 

Rustic Loaded Baked Sweet Potatoes

Rustic Loaded Baked Sweet Potatoes

The Minnie Chef
Sides

Unfortunately for sweet potatoes, they aren’t the most attractive looking spuds to begin with… and featuring them in this recipe doesn’t make them much more appealing to the eye, or so I’ve been told.  I sent a picture of this dish to one of my friends and he told me he thought he was looking at a hornet’s nest.  I’m not exactly sure what a hornet’s nest looks like, but I am pretty sure that he didn’t mean it as a compliment.  So let’s go ahead and refer to these loaded sweet potatoes as rustic, so as not to be insulting.  And in all fairness . . . 

Pumpkin Pie Chia Pudding

Pumpkin Pie Chia Pudding

The Minnie Chef
Sweet Treats

Just one more Thanksgiving-inspired dessert idea that can be made just in time for Thanksgiving (so get on it right now!)!  The last couple of days, I’ve been wanting to make some variation of pumpkin pie that was simple, cruelty-free and healthy (at least healthier than a traditional pumpkin pie).  I dabbled with some ideas and ultimately decided to stay away from a vegan version of a baked pie.  Instead I made something that was a little bit cleaner, made with simpler ingredients, that wasn’t too sweet and could double as a breakfast option and dessert.  

Okay, so I could have just made some of my Pumpkin Pie Green Smoothie Bowls and called it a day, but I wanted something that . . .

Apple Pecan Pie Balls

Apple Pecan Pie Balls

The Minnie Chef
Sweet Treats

Who doesn’t dive into a warm slice of apple pie on Thanksgiving?  Sorry, if that sounds like a raunchy reference to American Pie—that was totally not my intention. 😜  But seriously, isn’t apple pie a staple at Thanksgiving?  It is at ours anyway.  This Thanksgiving will actually be my first Thanksgiving since giving up meat and dairy, so this time around I’ll be saying“no thank you” to a slice of apple pie baked into a rich, buttery crust.  So instead of coming up with an alternative baked dessert for me to enjoy on the big day, I decided to try something a little bit healthier.  Since my Carrot Cake Balls . . .

Brown Rice Bowl with Avocado and Lentils

Brown Rice Bowl with Avocado and Lentils

The Minnie Chef
Meals

We just got back from a looooong road trip 🚙 and the moment we got home I was desperately craving some REAL FOOD.  I did my best to stay on track during our ten days on the road—I packed tons of fruits, veggies and even brought my blender along with some chia seeds and hemp seeds (yea, that really happened).  We picked up spinach, bananas, and cantaloupes at grocery stores along the way and I made as many green smoothies for breakfast, before checking out of our hotel rooms, as I could.  But we were gone for ten days, never stayed more than one night in any given place and we spent a lot of time in the car, driving all over the South, so in some situations . . . 

Pumpkin Curry Soup with Cranberry Chutney and Spiced Pecans

Pumpkin Curry Soup with Cranberry Chutney and Spiced Pecans

The Minnie Chef
Meals

Pumpkin, cranberries and pecans… Does anything scream November more than that trio?  Seriously, I’m pretty sure not a single one of those has ever been left off of our table at Thanksgiving.  On Halloween, my family and I had a little pre-trick-or-treating dinner at my house and I decided to make a pumpkin soup in the spirit of being festive.  I mean we had carved five pumpkins the day before for decorations, but what’s one more?  Being at the mercy of not just one, or two, but three little toddlers, ages: 2, almost 3, and 4, I knew there was the possibility that . . . 

Pumpkin Spice Latte Donuts

Pumpkin Spice Latte Donuts

The Minnie Chef
Sweet Treats

Ok, so I know I’m not the only one who has at some point marked the start of fall based on when Starbucks would release the PSL.  To be honest, I’ve never even been much of a Starbucks fan.  Sure when I was in high school I used to enjoy a frozen Frapuccino every now and then, but those poor excuses for coffee impersonators would hardly do the trick in satisfying my grown up coffee needs.  In college I started drinking my coffee black and there’s almost nothing worse to me than the taste of black Starbucks coffee on its own—I imagine gasoline mixed with mud would taste very similar.  No shade.  But because of my lifelong love for all things pumpkin and my earlier fondness of their frozen concoctions . . . 

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