Carrot Cake Pancakes + Cream Cheese Frosting

28 March, 2013 by Claire | 1 Comment

This recipe was inspired by the raisins I happened to have in my pantry, the baby carrots I incidentally picked up at the grocery on Monday, Easter, and most importantly, my profound love of cake, whether it’s the pan or carrot variation.

Carrot Cake Pancakes
Calories: 241 | Fat: 2.0 g (Sat Fat: 0.3 g) | Carbohydrate: 42.0 g | Protein: 18.5 g

Cream Cheese Frosting
Calories: 46.3 | Fat: 0.0 g (Sat Fat: 0.0 g) | Carbohydrate: 5.8 g | Protein: 5.6 g

ingredients:
1/3 C instant oats
1 t cinnamon
6 T liquid egg whites
1/3 C + 2 T fat free Greek yogurt (I like Fage 0%)
1/4 C shredded carrots
1 t vanilla extract
1 T raisins
2 T fat free cream cheese
1 packet Splenda or Truvia
optional: 1 T sugar free syrup

directions:
1. Combine the oats, cinnamon, egg whites, 1/3 C Greek yogurt, shredded carrots, and vanilla extract in a blender. Blend until completely smooth.
2. Stir in raisins and refrigerate your mix overnight.*
3. In a separate small bowl, mix together 2 T Greek yogurt, cream cheese, and sweetener until completely smooth. Refrigerate until your pancakes are ready to eat.
4. To cook the pancakes, heat a large skillet coated with PAM over medium heat and pour in the pancake batter, flipping after 3-5 minutes. Each pancake should be about ~1/4 of the batter.
5. Stack your pancakes with about 1-2 T of the frosting in between. Top with the remaining dollop and, if you’d like, a drizzle of syrup.

*The batter will be very thin at this point, hence the overnight refrigeration to give it time to thicken up. If you don’t got time fo’ dat, use only 3 T liquid egg whites and thicken with additional oats or flour if need be.

Banana Cinnamon Popsicles

19 March, 2013 by Claire | 4 Comments

I truly hate talking about the temperature outside, but Austin’s weather patterns are certified crazytown. Pre-spring break, you couldn’t leave the house (or scroll through Twitter) without hearing someone whine about the cold and lack of sun. Post-spring break, every conversation starts with, “errrrrmaaahgerrrrd it’s sooooooo hot outside…uuuuugh.”

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a fan of walking to campus with my backpack on, preoccupied the entire time with my concerns about back sweat, but this change in climate did make today’s recipe a bit more apropos. Blending and freezing popsicles while it was pouring rain outside seemed borderline blasphemous.

Anyway, enough about the weather and enough of me being a boring person who only talks about the weather. Getting to today’s recipe just requires a little click of the photo below, which will redirect you to my guest post on The Locus of Style. You’ll get all the dirty deets on these 50 calorie popsicles, which pair perfectly with this week’s warm weather and sun.

Dang it.

Cinnamon Apple Oatmeal Bake

16 January, 2013 by Claire | 5 Comments

Have a cooking, nutrition, fitness, or totally random question for The Slender Student? Ask away!

In honor of the breakfast event chef/author Nisa Burns and I are hosting at CYC Fitness tonight, I thought it’d be a good time to share this cozy recipe I whipped up over the break. It’s a take off of my overnight oats that requires a little more passive cooking time, but goes perfectly with hot coffee and cold mornings.

Cinnamon Apple Oatmeal Bake | The Slender Student

Cinnamon Apple Oatmeal Bake
Calories: 312 | Fat: 5.2 g (Sat Fat: 0.8 g) | Carbohydrate: 49.9 g | Fiber: 9.3 g| Protein: 18.1 g

ingredients:
1/2 C instant oats
1/2 C unsweetened almond milk
1/2 scoop whey protein powder (about 2T or 50 calories worth)
3 T liquid egg whites
1/3 small banana, mashed (peel & freeze the rest for smoothies!)
1/2 small apple, diced
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 t cinnamon
1/2 t vanilla extract
PAM Original nonstick spray

directions:
1. Preheat your oven to 375°.
2. Combine your oats, almond milk, protein powder, egg whites, mashed banana, baking powder, cinnamon, and vanilla in a small bowl, ensuring that all of the protein powder is incorporated.
3. Add in your chopped apples and mix until evenly distributed. Transfer your oat mix to a baking dish well-coated with PAM.

Cinnamon Apple Oatmeal Bake | The Slender Student
4. Bake for 15-20 minutes, until the top has lightly browned and the edges have crisped up.

Cinnamon Apple Oatmeal Bake | The Slender Student

note: If you want to make this recipe but miss the perk of making overnight oats in advance, throw all of the ingredients together the night before, just wait to add the baking powder until the morning of. Then pop them in the oven and go take a shower, check e-mails, or ya know, longingly stare at the oven until you can dig in.

Roasted Brussels and Reds

12 November, 2012 by Claire | Leave a comment

Brussels sprouts are the comeback kid of the vegetable world. They’re that nerdy kid who had the creepy crush on you in high school but who has since lost the braces, cured his chronic acne, and will soon be earning an impressive income at an investment banking firm upon college graduation. He’ll probably marry a blonde.

But really, don’t y’all remember those scenes in the TV shows when the bratty younger sister feeds her Brussels to the family dog behind her mother’s back? Now you can’t scroll through your Pinterest feed or go to a fancy restaurant without seeing an enticing rendition of broiled, roasted, or caramelized Brussels sprouts.

Well here’s just one more of those recipes to add to the list. The beauty of this side dish is that all you have to do is a bit of prep and then they’re good to throw in the oven so you can leave the kitchen to do better things… Like scroll through your Pinterest feed looking for new recipes.

Roasted Brussels and Reds
Calories: 220 | Fat: 7.6 g (Sat Fat: 1.0 g) | Carbohydrate: 34.2 g | Fiber: 7.2 g| Protein: 7.0 g

ingredients:
4-5 Brussels sprouts
1 small red potato (~4 ounces)
1 t olive oil
1 t minced garlic
1 t dried rosemary
10 pistachios
1 T dried cranberries
PAM Original nonstick spray
salt and pepper to taste

directions:
1. Pre-heat your oven to 375º and coat a medium baking sheet with PAM.
2. To prep your sprouts, start by peeling off the outer layer of leaves and give them a good rinse. Then cut off the stems and slice them in half.
3. Cut your red potato into a 1/2 inch dice.
4. In a small bowl, combine your Brussels sprouts, potatoes, olive oil, garlic, and rosemary. Stir until everything is coated with olive oil.
5. Spread the mix on to your baking sheet. Make sure all of the sprouts are cut side down on the pan to make sure they get a good broil. Bake for 10-15 minutes.
6. Once the cut side of the sprouts have browned well and crisped up a bit, flip them and your potatoes. Add your pistachios and cranberries to the pan. Bake for 5 more minutes.

Pumpkin Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

5 November, 2012 by Claire | Leave a comment

I’ve done pumpkin and I’ve done pumpkin chocolate chip. We all know that. But, let me just say, I have never done pumpkin peanut butter chocolate chip.

Well, I hadn’t until now.

These cookies are a triple threat of flavor. The trifecta of all things good in the world. Oh, and they’re also about 100 calories each. Go ahead, have your cookie and eat it too.

Pumpkin Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
Servings: 17 | Calories per serving: 105
Fat: 3.7 g (Sat Fat: 2.1 g) | Carbohydrate: 18.8 g | Fiber: 1.1 g| Protein: 2.0 g

ingredients:
1 C whole wheat flour
1/4t baking soda
1/8 t salt
1 t pumpkin pie spice
1/4 C PB2
1/2 C granulated Splenda for baking
1/2 C brown sugar
2 T butter, melted
1 egg white (3 T liquid egg whites)
2 T unsweetened apple sauce
1 t vanilla extract
1/2 C mini chocolate chips
1/2 C pumpkin
PAM nonstick spray

directions:
1. Pre-heat your oven to 350º and lightly coat a cookie sheet with PAM
2. In a medium mixing bowl, combine your dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, salt, pumpkin pie spice, and PB2)
3. In a larger mixing bowl, combine your wet ingredients (Splenda, brown sugar, melted butter, egg white, apple sauce, vanilla, chocolate chips, and pumpkin)
4. Add your dry ingredients to your wet ingredients half at a time. Fold to combine.
5. Evenly scoop your cookies out on to the cookie sheet. I flattened them out a bit with the back of a spoon sprayed with PAM.
6. Bake the cookies for 15-18 minutes. They’re done when the bottoms have browned and crisped up.

[recipe inspired by SkinnyTaste]