Recipes

Pineapple Lemonade

July 8, 2016 by Holly Yzquierdo 4 Comments

Most of the time I drink water but during the summer I crave fruity drinks. You should definitely try this Pineapple Lemonade recipe to quench your thirst.

Everyday after work I pick up the kids from daycare. I’ll admit that by this point in the day we are all hot and little grouchy. My solution is usually a fun drink. Sometimes I’ll just get a sparkling water and add a little fruit juice. But sometimes I want something a little better.

We have a long history of making fun drinks in my house. Whether it’s coffee drinks, smoothies, juice blends or other concoctions. I love mixing seasonal fruits to create a new drink. Remember my Strawberry Lemonade?

One of the best things about making your own drinks is having absolute control of the ingredients. In this recipe, the pineapple juice is very sweet so you may not need to add a sweetener. If it isn’t sweet enough for you go with your favorite sweetener whether it’s sugar, agave nectar or stevia.

Pineapple Lemonade

One of the great things about this recipe is that you can switch it up depending on what fruit you have. I happen to love pineapple but mix in fresh berries to add another pop of flavor!

One thing to consider is that sometimes lemons are very juicy and sometimes I only get a tablespoon or so of juice from them. If you feel you need more lemon flavor try adding some lemon zest. It’s big on flavor and will intensify the glorious lemon taste.

5.0 from 1 reviews

Pineapple Lemonade

Save Print

Author: Holly Yzquierdo

Recipe type: Drinks

Ingredients

2 Cups fresh pineapple juice
1 cup water
10 Lemons
Agave nectar or Stevia to taste
Ice
Lemon and lime slices for garnish

Instructions

In a pitcher add the pineapple juice, water, and agave nectar.
Squeeze the lemons and add the juice to the pitcher.
Mix everything together and allow it to cool in the fridge.
When ready to serve, fill glasses with ice and pour in the lemonade.
Garnish with lemon and key lime slices.
Serve and enjoy.

Follow me on Pinterest for more fun food and drink ideas!

Triple Berry Frozen Yogurt Pops

June 22, 2016 by Holly Yzquierdo 1 Comment

When I mentioned my obsession with making dairy-free frozen treats last week I wasn’t exaggerating. Remember the Mango Lime Ice Pops! I’ve been making every flavor of ice pop and frozen treat I can imagine. I’m only limited by my selection of fresh fruit but I’ve also tried a few other options like these Frozen Yogurt Pops.

I love making frozen treats with just fruit but I decided I wanted something a little creamier! I bought Silk dairy-free yogurt alternative and fresh berries to make these treats come to life.

I wanted to buy vanilla yogurt but my store was out so I went with plain. If you use vanilla yogurt it is already sweetened and you can skip the sweetener. If you use the plain flavor you’ll probably want to add a sweetener like maple syrup or stevia. I recommend you blend everything up first to make sure. If you find sweet berries you may not need much, but sometimes berries are a little sour.

I really wanted to take advantage of the beautiful berry colors (although my white tile floor wasn’t as excited). It’s really hard to measure berries for a recipe so I just estimated amounts and used my Blendtec to blend it all together. You’ll get a vibrant blend of fruity yogurt that is hard to resist. I do recommend a taste test at this point to see if you need to add sweetener. If so start with 1 tablespoon of maple syrup or a packet of stevia and move up from there.

Do your best to get it into your freezer pop molds. After I filled them to 3/4 of the way to the top I carefully dropped blueberries, diced strawberries and halved blackberries into the mold and used a wooden ice-pop stick to push them where I wanted them. This wouldn’t have worked in a juice but since the yogurt and fruit blend was thick and creamy the fruit stayed just where I put it. I also inserted the sticks here too.

The serving size will vary based on your freezer mold size. This recipe should make 4-6 frozen treats.

Triple Berry Frozen Yogurt Pops

Save Print

Author: Holly Yzquierdo

Recipe type: Dessert

Serves: 6

Ingredients

½ cup non-dairy yogurt
1 cup of fresh berries
sweetener (optional)

Instructions

Pour ½ cup of non-dairy yogurt into a blender.
Pour in half of the berries.
Blend in blender until smooth.
Taste and add sweetener if needed. I recommend maple syrup or stevia then blend again.
Once appropriately sweet, spoon into freezer molds until ¾ of the way full.
Carefully drop berries into the molds using whole blueberries, diced strawberries and halved blackberries.
Place sticks into the molds and freeze over night.
To loosen freezer pops, dip the molds into warm water then gently pull out the freezer pops.
Store in the freezer until ready to eat.

This page contains affiliate links.

Mango Lime Ice Pops

June 16, 2016 by Holly Yzquierdo 7 Comments

I’m going to fess up, I have a slight addiction to frozen treats. Yes, that Banana Pudding Ice Cream was just the start! Now my kids have caught it too! I’ve been making loads of vegan ice pops that are out of this world. These Mango Lime Ice Pops are a delicious frozen treat!

As soon as the temperatures rose above 100 degrees here in Arizona I started making a bunch of different ice pop recipes. We’ve had two strong favorites and I’m sharing one of them today.

This Mango Lime Ice Pop may be one of the most refreshing frozen treats I’ve ever had. It’s made with 4 simple ingredients, mango, lime, coconut water and stevia. It doesn’t get much easier than that.

I love mango but I prefer it with other flavors like my Black Bean Mango Salad. My husband and youngest son will eat mango by itself. I think lime is the perfect addition to mango and once you try this frozen treat you will too.

I used the yellow mangos but you could use the pretty green/red/yellow ones. You could even use frozen mango but I’d let it thaw a little. After cutting up my mango I had about 1 1/2 cups. If you have a little more or a little less it will still work.

Other than the simple ingredients you’ll also need a mold for making frozen treats, unless you are doing the small cups or ice cube method. I have two different molds for making delicious frozen treats but I used this one from Amazon. Don’t forget to buy the sticks unless you are using molds that come with sticks.

This recipe makes four frozen treats with a little left over that we ate right then without freezing it! I will definitely make these again!

I was a little concerned that my kids would think they tasted too “grown up” but they loved them too.

Mango Lime Ice Pops

Save Print

Author: Holly Yzquierdo

Recipe type: Dessert

Serves: 4

Ingredients

2 yellow mangos
1 lime (juice and zest)
½ cup coconut water
2 Stevia packets

Instructions

Peel mangos and remove the flesh.
Wash the lime then use a microplane to peel the lime zest.
Squeeze all the juice out of the lime into a measuring cup.
Pour coconut water in the measuring cup (with the lime juice) until it reaches the ½ cup mark. You will use more or less coconut water depending on how much lime juice you have. Pour in Stevia.
Blend in a high powered blender then carefully pour into your treat molds and freeze over night.
To remove the ice pops from the mold, submerge the bottom of the molds in warm water being careful not to get the treats wet.

Banana Pudding Ice Cream

June 9, 2016 by Holly Yzquierdo 2 Comments

I grew up in the south and certain flavors remind me of my childhood. Banana pudding is one of those flavors. I wanted to recreate that flavor in a frozen treat, Banana Pudding Ice Cream was born.

There are a lot of vegan ice cream recipes out there. They aren’t very hard to make and many of them use frozen bananas. You may have heard them called “nice cream.” If you haven’t tried it you are missing out!

For my recipe I wanted to keep it simple but add something to give it that banana pudding flavor. I accomplished that by using Enjoy Life Vanilla Cookies.

Disclaimer: These cookies are not vegan, they contain honey. I didn’t even realize that until I went to write this recipe out. I should have known because it’s right there on the box. We’ve used these cookies for a long time because they are one of the few delicious cookies that are free of the top 8 allergens and safe for people with food allergies. You can use a different cookie like these Snackimals that aren’t safe for food allergies or Enjoy Life Sugar Crisps that are top 8 free.

I’m not one to eat many frozen treats. I’m just not an ice cream type of person but it’s been so hot here in Arizona that I really wanted to start making more ice creams and popsicles for my family. I love that I can control the ingredients and avoid artificial sweeteners and food dyes by spending just a few minutes creating them.

The sweetness from the bananas and the cookies were more than enough for this treat. I didn’t add any other sweetener, just a little vanilla and plant-based milk.

I always have frozen bananas in my freezer because I like putting them in smoothies. If you plan to make this ice cream you can peel the bananas, cut them into pieces then freeze. I usually freeze bananas whole but then I have to peel them and they are much harder to work with that way.

While you don’t need any “special tools” you will need either a food process or a blender. I use this food processor that I bought years ago. You could even use a blender but you might have to use more liquid and stop more often to push the ice cream off the sides. I’m going to try using my Blendtec Twister Jar next!

Banana Pudding Ice Cream

If you love banana pudding you absolutely must give this Banana Pudding Ice Cream a try.

Banana Pudding Ice Cream

Save Print

Author: Holly Yzquierdo

Recipe type: Dessert

Ingredients

4 Bananas, Frozen and cut into chunks
¼ cup plant milk
1 tsp vanilla
6 vanilla cookies

Instructions

Put frozen banana chunks into a food processor and pulse for 2 minutes.
Pour in half the plant milk and the vanilla and pulse again.
Use a silicon spatula to push the frozen banana ice cream around and separate it from the sides.
Add more milk and pulse until smooth, using the spatula when needed.
Break cookies into big chunks and put half in the food processor and pulse into the ice cream.
Stir the half of cookies into the ice cream.
Serve or pour into a freezer safe container and freeze until ready to serve.

This page includes affiliate links.

Breakfast Cookies

June 1, 2016 by Holly Yzquierdo 25 Comments

Yep, we are having cookies for breakfast. These aren’t ordinary cookies, they are Breakfast Cookies and full of fiber and healthy ingredients.

I specifically made these Breakfast Cookies with my preferences in mind. So often, moms will put others needs ahead of their own but when it comes to eating healthy it’s important to take care of yourself.

This page contains affiliate links. That means if you purchase something using one of these links I’ll make a small percentage that helps pay to run this site but it won’t cost you any extra. Thank you for supporting My Plant-Based Family.

Breakfast Cookies aren’t a new idea. People have been making them for years. I wanted my Breakfast Cookies to contain ingredients that I would put in my oatmeal. I’m not looking for a junk food breakfast here. On the contrary, I’m looking for a plant-based, whole food breakfast that is also allergy-friendly and portable for breakfast on the go.

This Breakfast Cookie recipe contains my three favorite seeds, raw pepitas, hemp hearts and chia seeds. I love seeds! They are a great source of healthy fats, protein, and fiber. One of the things I love about these cookies is that even though they have seeds the seeds aren’t super noticeable when you’re eating them.

I make a gel with water and the chia seeds. After I let it sit to congeal I toss the raisins in the water too. It may seem strange but our raisins get so dry. We buy them in bulk and after a while, they get really dry and a little on the hard side. That doesn’t bother my family but I like my raisins to be a little more plump. I usually soak my raisins in warm water for a few minutes before using them. If you are using golden raisins they probably don’t need to be soaked.

To keep it allergy-friendly I use gluten-free oats and a peanut butter alternative. You could use peanut butter or some other nut butter if you prefer. The oats give it substance and the nut/seed butter gives it flavor and acts as the other binder.

You may notice slight vanilla and cinnamon flavors as well. I skipped the chocolate for two reasons. First, I’m going to be eating these on the go and I don’t want little chocolate chips falling out and melting in my car or on my clothes in the super hot Arizona sun. Second, if I ate chocolate for breakfast it would be hard for me not to indulge in sweets all day.

These Breakfast Cookies just have a touch of sweetness but taste much less sweet than your standard store-bought granola bar. I’ve been relying on those a lot lately and I’m trying to get away from it. They are delicious but the “good” ones are pretty expensive for every day.

Breakfast Cookies

I recommend you enjoy these Breakfast Cookies with a cup of coffee. If you decide to share with your kids they may want a cup of plant-based milk.

Yield: 12

Breakfast Cookies

These Breakfast Cookies are perfect for breakfast or snack on the go! These lightly sweetened cookies are full of healthy ingredients your family will love.

Prep Time 10 minutes

Cook Time 10 minutes

Total Time 20 minutes

Ingredients

½ cup warm water
2 tsp chia seeds
¼ cup raisins
1 cup gluten-free rolled oats
1 cup gluten-free rolled oats pulsed in a blender
½ cup peanut butter alternative
¼ cup maple syrup
1 Tbsp raw pepitas
1 Tbsp hemp hearts
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.
Pour 2 tsp chia seeds into warm water and give a gentle stir. Add in raisins if they are dry. Let sit at least 5 minutes.
In a large bowl add the rolled oats and the pulsed rolled oats.
Dump the Soy Nut Butter into the oats and stir well. I have best results "stabbing" the clumps with a wooden spoon.
Pour in the chia seed/raisin water and maple syrup then stir well to incorporate everything.
Sprinkle the remaining seeds, cinnamon and vanilla in the bowl then stir a final time.
Use a spoon to scoop out a ball of dough slightly larger that a ping pong ball. Use wet hands to roll it into a ball then flatten it into a disk. The dough will not spread so the size will be the same after baking. You should have about 12 cookies.
Bake for 10 minutes and allow to cool before eating. Store in air tight container and enjoy within 3-4 days.

Notes

You can substitute your favorite ingredients. Choose cranberries instead of raisins, pick your favorite nut or seen butter, and change up the spices to suit your preferences.

Recommended Products

As an Amazon Associate and member of other affiliate programs, I earn from qualifying purchases.

This page contains affiliate links.

Overnight Oats

May 18, 2016 by Holly Yzquierdo 19 Comments

I want to eat a healthy breakfast but some days I don’t have the time to cook. Overnight Oats are a healthy option for busy mornings.

This page contains affiliate links.

You know I love my Instant Pot Oatmeal but Overnight Oats are even faster. Just spend a few minutes before bed and a few minutes in the morning for an easy breakfast.

I use old fashioned oats. Bob’s Red Mill oats is our brand of choice. But if you need gluten-free I recommend GF Harvest Oats! Their manufacturing process is as good as it gets for keep gluten out of the picture.

We use Rice Dream for most of our cooking. My kids love the vanilla but I prefer the regular unsweetened. I like that it’s shelf stable so I can keep a few in my pantry and not worry about running out without a backup. I have 3 cartons in my pantry right now!

Overnight Oats

Overnight Oats are also perfect for travel! Just bring a bowl or jar with the oats pre-measured. Then pick up some plant milk and fruit at your destination. Easy peasy!

Overnight Oats

Save Print

Prep time

5 mins

Total time

5 mins

Author: Holly Yzquierdo

Recipe type: Breakfast

Serves: 1 serving

Ingredients

½ cup oats (I used old-fashioned oats)
½ cup plant milk
½ banana, diced very small
¼ cup chopped strawberries
¼ tsp cinnamon
sweeten to taste with maple syrup
bluberries

Instructions

In a bowl, combine the oats, cinnamon, maple syrup and milk, mix until combined.
Allow to sit in the fridge overnight.
Dice the bananas and slice the strawberries.
Mix the banana with the overnight oats, then add the strawberries and top with blueberries.

I love bananas and add them to almost all my overnight oats because they are so sweet. I’m really focused on cutting down my sugar intake. Bananas add the sweetness I want. Sometimes I’ll add a touch of maple syrup too.

If strawberries, bananas and blueberries aren’t your thing try raisins or peaches or diced apples.

Sometimes I’ll get a little “fancy” and add fresh ginger or hemp seeds. Really, you can add whatever you like. The fruit is completely optional.

For more information on oatmeal and to see my favorite oatmeal picks check out my Ultimate Oatmeal Guide.

Check out more delicious breakfast recipes on my Breakfast Page!

« Previous Page

Pineapple Lemonade

Pineapple Lemonade

Triple Berry Frozen Yogurt Pops

Triple Berry Frozen Yogurt Pops

Mango Lime Ice Pops

Mango Lime Ice Pops

Banana Pudding Ice Cream

Banana Pudding Ice Cream

Breakfast Cookies

Breakfast Cookies