i am OBSESSED with breakfast tacos/burritos.. pretty much whenever i go to a restaurant for breakfast, you can always count on me ordering a breakfast burrito, but for some reason i just never think to make them at home.  then the other morning when i couldn't decide what i wanted to eat for breakfast, my little one suggested i make a burrito!  it was the best idea EVER!  it ended up turning into a breakfast taco because i made too much stuffing to fill the tortilla, but that's ok because it tasted just as delicious!! and i've been eating them non-stop since!

I've been seeing the Sweet Potato Toast craze blowing up the internet lately.  And I must say, Ive been intrigued.  Take a slice of sweet potato, toss it in the toaster a few times, and voila, straight-from-the-earth perfectly toasted toast.  Or maybe not?  Along with all the praise it's been getting, I've also read a number of horror stories about toasters damaged beyond recognition, fire alarms getting set off, and houses nearly burning down all in the name of the perfect piece of healthy sweet potato toast.  So I decided to stick to my gut . . .

Challahhhhhhhhh.  It seriously doesn't get much better than challah… Unless, of course, it’s challah french toast.
There aren’t really many things that I have missed since becoming vegan, but challah bread is definitely one of the few exceptions to that general rule.  That sweet, fluffy, pillowy goodness is the mother of all carbs and it just can’t be replaced.  Lucky for us . . .

These pancakes are EVERYTHING!  🙌  We’ve been eating them for breakfast all week because we just can’t get enough.  😋  I mean, is there even such a thing as enough pancakes?  I don’t think so, anyway.  😎  And when they’re free of oil or butter, refined sugar, and gluten-y, processed flour, I ain’t even worried about having pancakes for breakfast every day this week...  💁🏻

I have another gluten free pancake recipe that I usually make, that have about half the ingredients in them that these do.  We’ve always enjoyed those, but they don’t have the thick, fluffiness to them that I really love and crave in a good pancake.  I’ve tried upping the proportion of oats and adding some baking powder in that recipe, but in addition to thickening the batter, it also dries it out.  👎  So instead of just . . .

Why, oh why, did this idea not come to me sooner????  I should have taken notes from Dr. Seuss sooner, but I guess I had to be in a festive mood and get inspired to make all things green.  🐸 So thank you, St. Patrick’s Day, for giving me the idea to put spinach in my pancakes!  🍀 Ok, so maybe the idea of spinach pancakes doesn’t actually sound all that appetizing, but, really, you can’t taste the spinach.  Like at all.  Extra vitamins, extra nutrients, and extra downright goodness packed into a stack of yummy, wholesome pancakes! 😋

And the best part is (you know, aside from being vegan, gluten-free, refined sugar-free, etc.)... Drum Roll, please... These babies are . . .

I’ve been really into savory breakfasts lately and I’ve been on a HUGE English muffin kick ever since making those Tofu Benedicts and trying Ezekiel Sprouted Grain English Muffins for the first time.  I love them so much, I just can’t stop eating them!  😋😋😋  I just tried them for the first time a couple weeks ago and I’ve already enjoyed them in so many different ways with so many different toppings.  And this 👆 was one of my favorite ways, right up there with the Benedicts.  So good, that I just had to share…

It’s a great savory breakfast option that’s so quick and easy to put together… All you need is . . .

Am I going to seem like a creepy obsessed super fan 😁 if I start talking about 💀 The Walking Dead 💀 again??  Well, if I do, it’s because I am!  And I got no shame in my game.  So last Sunday night, when I was watching 📺 the mid-season 6 premiere of the show, I got a little emotional over the “W” man scene in the episode.  It was really the first time in the show where we got an emotional connection to a supporting role villain 👿 through a main character’s storyline.  And just when we wanted to hate this villain the most, he risked his own life to save the life of one of the good guys (who he had just minutes before taken captive).  And in case we thought there were selfish motivations behind his actions, moments later, after he is shot several times in the gut, instead of falling to his death, he selflessly makes one final heroic move to grab a walker 💀 and allow his prisoner to make a run to safety.  👼 Given the overall intensity of this episode, I got a little emotional during this scene (and pretty much every other one, to be honest 😩) and was beyond excited, maybe even relieved, when the actor who plays the “W” man, Benedict Samuels, appeared on The Talking Dead. 🙌

Ok, now I know what you’re thinking… And I promise you this isn’t just some creepy . . .

Sometimes we have those “that just happened” moments in our kitchen… Those moments when we take a bite of something so epic that we can’t believe we actually created it! This was one of those moments…

These Cookie Monster Pancakes embody all things cookie… There are cookies 👉👈 inside the pancakes and 👇 on top, 3 ways!  From the ginnybakes’ Dreamy Vegan Delight cookies in the batter itself to the heaping spoonful of cookie butter on top, we have no doubt that the Cookie Monster himself would go insane for these! 🍪 We sure did! 

The best part about these pancakes is that they’re actually pretty 🍌 healthy 🍌, way healthier than traditional pancakes.  And with the exception of the cookie butter we used, they’re gluten-free!  So go ahead and do yourself a favor. . .

If you follow me on Instagram, you already know by now that we really REALLY like our oatmeal around here.  But we also enjoy a nice stack of pancakes every now and then too.  And if they were healthier for us, we’d enjoy them a lot more often!  So I took our main go-to breakfast ingredient and tried to incorporate it into our other favorite breakfast meal and tried to achieve a healthier balance by combining the two.  Instead of using processed all-purpose flour like in my traditional pancake recipe, I used oats to make flour as the base in this recipe, so we can guiltlessly enjoy a hot stack of pancakes for breakfast more often.  With just a few other simple ingredients and a few . . . 

Most days I don't have time to cook a complete warm breakfast, so we usually opt for oatmeal, a smoothie, or a chia pudding parfait. But some weekends, especially lazy Sundays, just call for a long morning of cooking up something great in the kitchen.  

I absolutely love home fries!  Who doesn't, right??  I think I actually love potatoes in all forms.  I'm not sure I've ever had a potato that I haven't enjoyed, but home fries are especially delicious!  They're so crispy and crunchy on the outside, with just the right amount of pillowy tenderness on the inside.  And these are so simple, but so full of flavor and spice!  They are also so welcoming to ketchup and hot sauce and I just love hot sauce.. I put it on . . .

The smell of pancakes cooking on the griddle brings me right back to my childhood.  One of my favorite childhood memories is waking up to the smell of my dad’s homemade pancakes on the weekends.  Instead of packing lunches and rushing to get ready for work and school, weekend mornings were ours to spend some quality time together in the kitchen—a favorite place of both of ours.  

Pancakes are actually one of the first things I ever learned how to cook.  From whipping up the batter to pouring it straight onto the griddle from a spouted measuring cup, and flipping them over as soon as the bubbles and that perfect golden-brown color were achieved, my dad let me help out every step of the way.  Always made from scratch (and never one of those store-bought boxed mixes that my dad would never—and still won’t—let you find in his pantry), my dad taught me step-by-step how to make the perfect pancake.   When we’d sit down at the breakfast table to eat, every time—without fail, my dad would relish in his first bite and say . . .

Chia Pudding Fruit Parfaits are such a nutritious and healthy way to eat dessert for breakfast!  Who doesn’t love the sound of that?  There are so many different ways to flavor chia pudding itself, and so many different ways to incorporate fruit into the mix.  Since it’s Fall and I just received a new bag of delicious Salba chia seeds from Salba Smart, I was inspired to make a chia pudding with traditional fall flavors and seasonal fall produce.  The white Salba chia seeds that I used in this recipe . . .