Bikini Baking

Why "Bikini Baking"?

Bikini Baking is a concept and an idea. This has been a (thankfully) warmer than normal winter and springtime in New England. I have had the opportunity to get into my bikini a few times. While I was in my bikini I realized I did not want or crave unhealthy food choices. Now when I am hungry and want to eat my favorite high calorie foods with little nutritional value I picture myself in my bikini, wear workout clothes or wear my bikini and I am forced to think about food in a new light. Food is fuel for our bodies. It is only because we live in American and food is readily available (knock on wood) that we are able to eat often and pretty much any quantity we want.

My children come home from school VERY hungry and I like to feed them very nutritious foods at this time since I know they will eat pretty much anything in sight or in reach between the hours of 2 and 3pm. That being said I just created some healthy, high fiber, low fat, high protein mini muffins from ingredients I have at my home. I am a HUGE fan of Bob's Red Mill products. They can be found at Stop and Shop (or any grocery in the healthy section), target, health food store. Christmas Tree Shops has a wonderful supply of Bob's Red Mill products and they are about half the cost of other stores!

Here are the ingredients I quickly pulled out of my cabinets:

From left to right back row the ingredients are: Bob's Red Mill Ground flaxseeds, Bob's Red Mill baking powder, Skim milk, Wheat Chex, egg substitutes (like egg beaters), Quaker quick oats, Bob's Red Mill whole wheat pastry flour. Front row products are: Watkins Vanilla Double Strength, Watkins Purest Ground Cinnamon (Watkins products are wonderful! Sue Rhealt sells them if you live in Quincy!), Sweet Leaf (brand) liquid stevia cinnamon (found in health food store), and Greek Gods Non fat plain Greek yogurt (UGH, I am NOT a fan of this brand of Greek yogurt! That is why I would only bake with it and not eat it from the container. I like Chobani or Stop and Shop brand plain Greek yogurt only).

The mini muffins needed a teeny tiny bit of kick so I added just 1/4 C of cinnamon chips and 1/4 C mini chocolate chips. Mixed ingredients and baked in my Pampered Chef non-stick mini muffin tin for 9 min at 350*.