Hey guys, I just wanted to share some of my new found wisdom on fruits and veggies. I have always loved them, but never viewed them as a practical snack. Being the occasional snacker....okay the non-stop snacker that I am, I would always grab the chips, chocolate, ice cream, cookies, popcorn, or whatever sugar packed snack we had on hand. But recently I have been trying to be a little bit healthier, and that includes eating more fruits and veggies. The problem is, I am EXTREMELY picky when it comes to my produce. If anything has a soft spot, bruise, cut, or even just a tad too hard or too soft, I find it incredibly hard to eat and 9 times out of 10 will put it right back. But one way I have discovered to get around this is making chips. I have been making batch after batch of both apple and banana chips. It gives them a bit more flavor, they last longer, and no soft patches! Another thing I have found helps when I just want a quick snack is portioned out sandwich baggies with my favorite veggies. For example I will take a little baggie and throw in some baby carrots, red and green pepper slices (one veggie I don't mind being sliced), and then when I feel snackish I just pull one of these bad boys out, add either some tomato or cucumber and I have a great, healthy, and filling snack that I can take on the go. Another thing I have been attempting is adding more fruits and veggies in with my meals. So I will add some steamed broccoli or some grilled tomato to my lunch or dinner. Grilled tomato as weird as it sounds is actually amazing! Goes great with an omelette or a sandwich. And in today's blog I am going to add both the recipe for my apple and banana chips, and my recipe for grilled tomato, and both of these are more of a how to than a recipe. But does that REALLY matter? So here it goes!
Apple and Banana Chips
Apples (as many as you want)
Bananas (as many as you want)
Lemon juice
(optional)
Cinnamon
Brown sugar
So the first thing you want to do is preheat your oven to 225 degrees, next cut your apples and bananas, cut the apples into very thin slices, and remove any seed that get caught in your slices. As for the bananas cut them into medium sized slices, and cut horizontally to make the most of your banana. Now put about a cup of lemon juice into a medium sized bowl. Dip your apples and bananas into the lemon juice (this stops them from turning brown and icky). Now throw your fruit slices onto a cookie sheet, I put parchment paper on mine which I found really helped with the clean up, but other wise just a greased sheet will do. If you chose to do both bananas and apples on the same pan do it half and half. And as for spacing put them as close together without letting your slices touch. Now put them in your oven for approx 1 1/2 hours. if you feel like they aren't crispy enough feel free to leave them in for an extra 1/2 hour. By this point your banana and apple chips should be completely dried out and ready to eat.
Tip: I love sprinkling a little cinnamon and brown sugar on my apples before they go in the oven, just to kick it up a notch. Mmmmm Yummy!
Tip: I would recommend putting your apples and bananas on separate sheet trays, I just found it worked much better.
So there is my fruit chip recipe. I will admit my first batch was terrible, I mean spit it out and gag bad, but I convinced myself to try again, and let me tell you, they turned out so much better, it was unbelievable. So I now highly recommend these make your own, and for a little extra guidance, do not be discouraged if your batch doesn't turn out first time 'round, it happens to the best of us. Now onto the next recipe, grilled tomatoes!
Grilled Tomatoes
Two Roma Tomatoes
(Optional)
salt, pepper, and other seasonings
So what you have to do first is get you pan all heated up, so turn the heat up high. Once its preheated, spray it with some pan or put a tad bit of oil down in the pan, just a couple drops. Now cut the ends off, but you have to do this carefully, you want the bottoms flat, at the same time you don't want to cut off too much other wise you will get a leaky tomato. Next slice them in half and sprinkle a little salt and pepper on. Now you are ready to put them in the frying pan, turn the heat down to a high medium, put them in bottom down. Leave them in until they get a nice little char on the bottom( about one minute ) and flip them over so you get the same result on the top side. By this point they should be ready to pop onto a plate and eat up.
Tip: Experiment! Try different seasonings, try scooping out the seeds and putting in some sort of filling, or even try some new toppings, I have found bacon, cheese, and spinach, work wonderfully well.
And there ya go! Two of my new favorite recipes at your finger tips. So have fun with these and try new things, see what combinations work and which ones don't. Maybe mushrooms would work on those tomatoes with some caramelized onions and some smokey mozza... definitely something I will have to try. Till next time, see ya!
*Pictures to come :)
