The Great Back to School Breakfast Extravaganza

We have been busy little bees around here lately getting ready for back to school for the kids and back to work for me.  Planning, organizing, and now the fun part.... cooking!  I wanted to pick a morning where I could do a month's worth of healthy breakfast cooking that I could freeze for those super busy mornings.  My 10 year old son is at "Mom Camp" this week, so we picked three recipes we could crank out pretty quickly. 

The first recipe we tackled was for Egg, Sausage and Cheese Breakfast Sandwiches.  Think the sandwich you pick up from a certain fast food restaurant that is coated with grease.  Tastes great, not great for you.  We made our own healthier version with whole grain English muffins, organic cheddar cheese, local farm eggs and turkey sausage. Our goal was to cook up 24 of these tasty sandwiches we could freeze and cook later, but you can obviously cut the recipe down to a smaller size.

Egg and Cheese Breakfast Sandwich

Ingredients:

24 Whole Grain English Muffins

24 Large Brown Eggs

24 Turkey Sausage Patties (2-16 oz tubes made exactly 24 sausage patties)

Shredded Organic Cheddar Cheese

Directions:

1) Oil muffin tins and crack an egg in each tin

2) Bake eggs in the oven at 350 for 10-15 minutes

3) Cook sausage patties 

4) Toast English muffins, opened, in the oven while the eggs are cooking

5) Add cooked egg and sausage patty to each English muffin.

6) Sprinkle with cheese

7) Leave sandwiches open faced and place in the freezer for one hour.  Once frozen, remove sandwiches from freezer and place them in plastic wrap, tin foil or use a vacuum sealer.  I placed them in packs of 4 and used the vacuum sealer to make them last longer when frozen.  

8) When it is time to serve them, just remove frozen sandwiches from plastic or foil, microwave for 1-1 1/2 minutes, or place in the oven at 350 degrees for 25 minutes.

Yum!  24 breakfast sandwiches, done!

While the eggs and sausages were cooking, we started making the batter for the pancakes and heated the griddle.  These are not your typical pancakes, y'all!  They are packed full of healthy goodness and taste pretty darn awesome.  Just ask my helper.  He ate about half of them.  This recipe makes about 48 pancakes, so even if you eat lots of them, you will still have plenty to freeze.  I sealed them in packets of 8 to make them convenient to reheat in the toaster on busy mornings.

Banana Oat, Almond and Quinoa Flour Pancakes

Ingredients:

2 cups Oat Flour

1 cup Quinoa Flour

1 cup Almond Flour

1 tsp Salt

1 tsp Cinnamon

2 tsp Baking Soda

2 tsp Vanilla

1/3 cup Oil

1/3 cup Apple Sauce

2 Tbsp Honey

2 cups Milk (can use soy, rice, almond, etc.)

1 1/2 cups Water

2 Bananas, mashed

5-10 Strawberries, mashed

1-2 cups Blueberries

Directions:

Add all ingredients except water and fruit.  Mix together.  Add bananas and water.  Continue mixing.  When finished, hand mix strawberries and blueberries in batter.  Y'all know how to cook pancakes, so I'm going to just let you do your thing here.  I of course had to sample one and they are great just plain.  My helper decided they are also great with a little organic maple syrup.  They would also be delish with homemade jam (we have both strawberry and blackberry waiting to top these yummy creations).

Don't you love the action shot?  He is the master of flipping some pancakes!

Confession time: I cheated with the waffles.  I bought a package of Bob's Red Mill 10 Grain Pancake and Waffle Mix to make my waffles.  But I added stuff to them, so that makes it a little better.  The directions call for 1 cup of mix, 2 eggs and 2 tablespoons of oil.  I doubled the recipe and added some of my own stuff.

10 Grain Waffles

 

Ingredients:

2 cups of Bob's Red Mill 10 Grain Pancake and Waffle Mix

4 Eggs

2 Tablespoons of Oil

2 Tablespoons of Organic, Unsweetened Apple Sauce

1/2 tsp Cinnamon

1 tsp Honey

1 tsp Vanilla

2 cups of Water 

Directions:

Mix all ingredients except water.  Add water until you reach desired consistency. Grease your waffle iron well.  A little tip: don't open your waffle iron until it lets you know it is time.  Even if your helper is very anxious to see how they turn out.  Cause it will result in a mega waffle disaster.  Just trust me here.  Stick a pancake in his mouth and make him wait.  When the waffle iron indicates they are ready, open to a beautiful and tasty breakfast treat!  This made 6 mega waffles.  With my tribe, 2 big waffles will be a breakfast, so I froze them in packs of 2.  Will be great topped with fresh fruit, maple syrup or fruit preserves.  

That's it!  It took about 2 hours start to finish (including prep and cleaning time) and we ended up with 24 breakfast sandwiches, 48 pancakes and 6 mega waffles.  All I will have to do is give them a big old glass of milk and either fresh fruit or a fruit smoothie to go along with their reheated breakfast treats.  When I'm feeling ambitious, or at least awake, I might also add scrabled eggs or turkey sausage to the pancakes or waffles, but the advantage of using the almond and quinoa flour is they are already full of healthy, filling goodness.

Coming soon.....

The Great Back to School Breakfast Extravaganza, Take 2!  Next we will be making healthy muffins galore to freeze, and individual packets of oats with dried fruit we can grab and heat in the mornings to make much better for you instant oatmeal.