Pina Colada Bites

I served these bad boys at a party recently, and my friend popped one in her mouth, expecting a normal macaroon (which she's had before and loves). But tasting that this was not your ordinary macaroon, her eyes got big, she turned to me and exclaimed, "What did you DO?"

Not much really. It is seriously so easy to make these awesome cookies. Just take 1/2 cup THRIVE FD Pineapple powder/small pieces. Any dry foods tend to have some breakage (think potato chips, cereal, etc. You always have crumbs at the bottom of the bag) and FD fruits and veggies are no exception. But you don't have to throw away those crumbs with THRIVE. Throw them into soups, smoothies, oatmeal, or in this case, cookies.

So with your 1/2 cup of powder and crumbs, drizzle just enough cold water onto it to make a paste like you see below.  (Do 1 tsp at a time)

 Once you have your paste, add 2 cups of THRIVE Macaroon mix. Just be careful who you stand next to when you open the can. I swear that stuff is an olfactory aphrodisiac. Then add 1/4 cup hot water. Stir, and drop onto cookie sheet lined with parchment paper.  This recipe will make about 2 dozen bite sized cookies.

Bake at 350 for 8-12 minutes, (longer if you do larger cookies). When the edges just barely start to caramelize and turn brown, that's when you know they're down. Let cool, eat and enjoy!

Tropical Morning Muffins

So first of all, I have to do a special shout out to fellow consultant Lindsey Mote. She has an AMAZING blog with tons of great recipes I've been trying lately. One such recipe is her Tropical Morning Muffin Recipe. I've tweaked it a little to my personal tastes, but to see her original recipe, pictures, suggestions, visit her blog. 

This recipe is great because it is moist and healthy with lots of fruits, not a lot of sugar, and NO OIL OR BUTTER! I have tried it with all white flour, and again with all whole wheat flour. I must admit, this was my first time making anything with all whole wheat flour, and it was a bit much for me. There wasn't enough sweetness to balance out the grain for my taste. That said,  the people who usually eat whole wheat everything said they loved them, and my toddler still loved them and they were a life saver of a breakfast before our 8 am church on Sunday morning. I will personally only use all white, or half wheat/half white flour from now on, but let your health and taste preferences be your guide.

The best part of this recipe, aside from the taste, is that you can put everything in a jar and give it as a gift! I raffled one away at a party I did recently, and it was a hit. I have been using the pre-portioned individually sealed apple sauce containers that you can buy for your kid's lunch, because it's the right amount of sauce, and it rests at the top of the jar perfectly, still allowing me to fit on the lid and band to close the jar up. But since Shelf Reliance has just come out with applesauce powder, as soon as I get mine, I plan to use that in this recipe instead. I'll post an update once that happens.

If you want to make this recipe for yourself, just dump everything in a bowl, add 1 cup water, mix and let it rest while you preheat your oven to 350. Grease your muffin tins (1 batch yields 12 regular or 36 mini muffins). Spoon  the batter into the tins, and bake at 350 for 15-22 minutes, depending on the size of your muffin.

If you want to give it as a gift, use a wide mouth quart jar (the taller ones), and start layering items in the order listed below, with flour first and apple sauce last. Add a cute bow, e-mail me for a copy of the label to include, stick it on, and voila! Your thanksgiving hostess will love it, and your gift will ensure you are invited back for many a turkey in years to come.

So without further ado, here's the recipe for my version of Lindsey's Tropical Morning Muffins:

1c Thrive White Flour (or Whole Wheat Flour)
1/4c Thrive Brown Sugar
1T Thrive Whole Egg Powder
1t Thrive Baking Powder
1/4t Thrive Baking Soda
1/4t Thrive Salt
1/4c Thrive Maroon Cookie Mix
1/2c Thrive Pineapple Chunks
1/4c Thrive Mangoes
1/4c Thrive Banana Slices

1/2 cup of applesauce (in sealed container).

Just add 1 cup of water, mix it all together, bake in greased tins at 350 for 15-22 minutes, and enjoy!

Ham and Pineapple Pizza

We had the chance to have dinner with some old friends last night, and decided to do pizza. My friend provided the crust and cheese, and told her I'd bring all the sauce and toppings using my THRIVE ingredients. I know I've already done a review on pizza before, but being on vacation, I don't have too much time for lots of new recipes. And we did a different combination this time: Ham and Pineapple!

So the Ham TVP was easily rehydrated - pour some hot water on (not too much, to prevent losing flavor in drain off water) put on a lid, let it sit for for 3-5 minutes, add a little more hot water if its too chewy, and when all the water is absorbed, it's done. 

Hydrating the pineapple is a little more tricky. I used cold water, but after 5-10 minutes, the big chunks of pineapple were still far from being hydrated. 15 minutes - still not enough. Thankfully, in a can on FD pineapple, there are large chunks, and small crumb type bits. Those small bits rehydrated beautifully, and this was the perfect way to use up the smaller pieces, saving the bigger pieces for snacking on (FD Pineapple is the yummiest snack straight from the can!) So I used the smaller bits on the pizza and left the larger pieces in their rehydrating container and stuck them in the fridge. This morning, they were rehydrated wonderfully.

So with pineapple, small pieces will rehydrate in cold water in 5-10 minutes. The large chunks are best left in cold water to rehydrate in the fridge overnight.

As for the pizza, my friends said the sauce was great (tomato powder reconstituted with water to desired consistency, then seasoned with garlic salt and italian seasoning). The toppings were pretty good. As an every day replacement of ham and pineapple pizza, they gave it a 5. But as an emergency food, they said it was easily an 8 or 9.