Do you love banana bread? It's one of those desserts/breakfasts/snacks/whatever that tastes exactly like my childhood. We always made banana bread. Not only was it perfect for our tight budget (no food waste here!), but it was a tasty treat for me and my brothers and sisters. As we grew up, we learned how to substitute the white flour for whole-grain flour. As a mother of kids with food allergies, I learned how to make our favorite banana bread dairy-free, low-gluten, and … [Read more...]
Easy Instant Pot Chicken Burrito Bowls Recipe
Let’s talk about the greatest dinner ever: Burrito bowls. Why are burrito bowls the best? For these reasons: Family-friendly (who doesn’t love tacos? Serial killers. That’s who.) Budget-friendly (beans and rice!) Allergy-friendly (GF? No problem. DF? Use guacamole or this easy cashew cream sauce - game changer) Flexible (eat it plain, make it into tacos, serve it with chips, make leftovers into taco soup or nachos.) Use what you have! (change out the beans, use whatever cut … [Read more...]
Dairy-Free Breakfast Egg Bake Recipe Kids Love
Okay, it’s another busy morning, and you’re rushing out the door, when you’re six-year-old announces what he announces every morning 15 minutes after breakfast: “I’m hungry.” I don’t know what it is about kids in the morning, but before my kids hit the tween stage, they needed a big breakfast. Now, my older boys can fix their own breakfast (Thank you, Kids Cook Real Food!), but I still have a younger one who is hungry for breakfast about 3 times every morning. Kids Love this … [Read more...]
Weekly Food Prep Tips: 5 Easy Healthy Meal Foods I Prep Every Week
Okay, let’s talk about food prep for healthy meals. When my fellow Pinterest junkies and I think of weekly meal prepping, we think of cute, glass rectangular containers with snap-on lids and neat rows of fitness-friendly clean eating food, like rice, diced sweet potatoes, perfectly sliced chicken breast, and steamed vegetables. While this is a super fun way to eat, and I will never hate those of us organized enough to pull off cute meal prepping, for most of us, this isn’t … [Read more...]
Gluten-Free & Dairy-Free Lasagna Recipe
Are you gluten-free and dairy-free? Are you gluten-free and dairy-free and miss comfort food? If you are, you're gonna love this recipe. It's the secret to all of your dairy-free gluten-free comfort food dreams. Lasagna is one of my favorite comfort foods (call it my Italian-American heritage or just a love for all things cheese and pasta), but for a while, I was dairy-free and gluten-free. Lasagna and other cheesy pasta favorites were no longer on the … [Read more...]
Dairy-Free Chocolate Cake Recipe (No Weird Ingredients!)
Question: Do you like chocolate cake? What about healthy chocolate cake? I know some of us are all about making real food desserts that taste indulgent. And some of us would rather we not mess with their classic chocolate cake. But what if you need someone to mess with your dessert? When my boys were little, they had a dairy-allergy and were gluten-sensitive. This meant that all of our desserts needed special attention. You can't make a normal birthday cake without gluten or … [Read more...]
Healthy Broccoli Salad Recipe: Seasonal Winter Salad
Are you ready for a healthy, easy side dish that’s full of all those sweet and salty flavors we love? If you have never had broccoli salad, you are missing out on one of the best ways to eat your veggies. It’s like a chicken salad… but with broccoli. Mkay, maybe that won’t convince you to try it. But the fact is, this salad deserves a place at your next lunch date, your next meal prep session, and your next meal. When you’re trying to eat better, broccoli salad will help you … [Read more...]
The Best Dairy-Free Cookie Substitutes: Dairy-Free Gingerbread Cookie Recipe
Christmas cookie season is here, which is great news! But for those of us with food sensitivities and allergies, cookie season gets complicated. Today I want to show you a dairy-free cookie recipe for Christmas - specifically gingerbread, but you can use these tips for many different Christmas cookies. It’s actually really easy! And they taste amazing. In fact, you’ll hardly taste a difference between these and your classic, buttery Christmas cookies. I’ll also show you how to make them … [Read more...]
Easy Instant Pot Bean Soup Recipe
Let’s make an easy, comforting, healthy dinner that is about as budget-friendly as you can get! In Fall and Winter, we crave soup. It’s one of my favorite meals to make for several reasons: Simple Clean ingredients Leftovers! - Just reheat and serve with bread or crackers and a side salad Allergy-friendly - it’s so easy to make soup that is free of the top 5 allergens or fits your friend’s new vegan/paleo/keto lifestyle Budget-friendly - broth, vegetables, maybe some rice … [Read more...]
How to Make Sheet Pan Pancakes (Dairy-free Real Food Recipe)
Need a nourishing, budget-friendly, real food breakfast for school mornings? Or do you just hate flipping pancakes? We got you covered in this recipe. First, let’s acknowledge how amazing pancakes are. When you transition from processed food to real food, you might have to say goodbye to a lot of food that was in your regular rotation - sugary cereal, frosted toaster pastries, sticky-sweet fluorescent-colored yogurt. But with real food, pancakes only get better. No boxed mix means no … [Read more...]
Roasted Vegetable Recipe: Seasonal Fall Salad with Fresh Herbs
Let’s talk about salads in the fall & winter months. If you’re looking for a way to spice up your roasted veggie recipes while it’s cold outside, I recommend trying something a little different. Usually, we think of salad as fresh, crisp, cold, crunchy veggies drizzled in a creamy dressing and tossed together. Salad is amazing. But in the fall and winter, a lot of our favorite salad veggies are extra-expensive. And their taste...disappointing. What if we combined everything … [Read more...]
Why My 5-Year-Old is My Most Helpful Kid in the Kitchen
You would think that my older kids would be better helpers in the kitchen than my youngest. While there are certain times and tasks where an older cook is amazing in the kitchen, here's a fact: My 5-year-old can't be beat. Are There Kitchen Chores for a 5-Year-Old? 5-year-olds should not be around sharp knives, hot stoves, or hot ovens. At first glance, it looks like they cannot be very helpful in the kitchen. However, young kids are far more capable than we think. RELATED: 10 … [Read more...]
Kids Cook Dinner Night! Dinner Recipes Kids Can Make
It’s summertime! The perfect time to encourage our kids to develop skills that are harder to focus on during the school year. We want our kids to enjoy their summer and fill it with lazy days, outdoor play, and getting lost in library books. But we also want to help them keep their minds sharp. Also, since they are home all day and want to snack 1,467 times a day, it’s only fair they learn how to be independent, creative, and confident at meal-time. Years ago, Katie shared something … [Read more...]
Breakfasts Ideas Kids Can Make This Summer
It’s summertime! While we adjust to new schedules and fun plans, it’s the perfect time to encourage our kids to develop life skills that are harder to focus on during the school year. We want our kids to enjoy their summer and fill it with lazy days, outdoor play, and getting lost in library books, but we also want to help them keep their minds sharp. Also, since they are home all day and want to snack 1,467 times a day, it’s only fair they learn how to be independent, creative, and … [Read more...]
Homemade Cashew Cream Recipe
Are you dairy-free? If you are or you ever have been, you know what I mean when I say comfort foods are the hardest thing to give up. That's why I created a dairy-free gingerbread cookie recipe. Today, I'm sharing my cashew cream recipe. It’s not that dairy-free eating doesn’t taste good, or that it’s extremely hard. It’s just that comfort food is nearly always creamy and fatty and delicious - and usually not dairy-free. RELATED: Beginner's guide to going dairy-free with … [Read more...]
Healthy Side Dish: Spicy Tahini Roasted Cauliflower Recipe
The last thing we need is another "pretend cauliflower" recipe. We have cauliflower pretending to be pizza, cauliflower dressed up like steak, cauliflower dressed up like macaroni and cheese, and buffalo chicken. This recipe is cauliflower pretending to be nothing but cauliflower. It features the greatest chameleon of the cruciferous vegetable family in all its glory - as a delicious, crispy, flavor-packed side dish vegetable that needs no disguise. Roasted Cauliflower Recipe with Spicy … [Read more...]
Vegan Turmeric Lentil Instant Pot Soup Recipe
Turmeric Lentil Soup is one of the most popular soups in our home. If it’s winter or rainy outside and I want a budget-friendly, real food winner, this is it. The best part is that it doesn’t take any special ingredients. We almost always have them on hand, even if it’s the end of the week and I desperately need to go grocery shopping. ;) Instant Pot Lentil Soup This soup is the perfect candidate for the Instant Pot. All of the ingredients hold up well in the pressure cooker, it doesn’t … [Read more...]
Chocolate Dessert Hummus Recipe
If you’re looking for a simple, real food, budget-friendly dessert I can’t think of anything better than Chocolate Dessert Hummus. It’s made with real, whole ingredients, it’s naturally-sweetened, it’s ready in minutes (No baking! No waiting!), and it’s gluten-free and dairy-free - without any expensive, specialty ingredients. We make this all the time in our home, and if you’re never tried it, we’re about to change your life! Chocolate Dessert Hummus Okay, dessert hummus is about … [Read more...]
How to Convert Any Soup Recipe for the Instant Pot
It’s no secret that we love the Instant Pot around here. If you are cooking from scratch and trying to eat more real food, the Instant Pot is a game-changer. It makes perfect rice, homemade yogurt, and rich bone broth in under an hour. During soup season, we love Instant Pot soup recipes. Did you know you don’t need a special Instant-Pot-approved soup recipe? In this post, I will show you exactly how to convert your favorite soup recipe into an Instant Pot recipe using 3 simple steps. How … [Read more...]
Real Food Peppermint Freezer Fudge for the Holidays
Here’s a simple, real food Christmas dessert that’s full of probiotics and easy enough for the kids to make! Healthy Dessert for the Holidays The holidays are full of desserts and treats. Whether from school, family, or parties, junk food and candy crawl out from the woodwork during the holidays. At our house, we combat them by stocking simple real food treats at home. Sometimes we freeze homemade cookie dough already rolled into balls, so they’re easy to bake. I almost always keep … [Read more...]
