Healthy Fall recipes
If you guys couldn’t tell, I’m obsessed with fall, and with fall comes amazing food. In this post I want to share three of my favorite healthy fall recipes.
Food can help make us happy and excited and also gives us something to look forward to. I love to use fall spices and seasonal ingredients when I cook, and that’s what I did with these recipes.
Breakfast: Chai granola
This recipe is quintessential to a perfect fall morning. The sweet combination of cardamom, cloves, cinnamon, and nutmeg come together in harmony with a hint of spice from the ginger and black pepper to make your stomach smile.
Tools: One large bowl, a large cookie sheet lined with parchment paper, a spatula, and measuring tools.
Ingredients: 4 cups old-fashioned rolled oats, ¾ cup coconut, 1 ½ cup nuts (I used ½ cup pumpkin spiced pumpkin seeds, ½ cup walnuts, and ½ cup pecans), 1 heaping tsp of salt, 1 ½ tsp of vanilla, 1 tsp of ginger, 1 tsp of cloves, 1 tsp of cardamom, 1 tsp of nutmeg, 2 tsp of cinnamon, 5 cracks of black pepper, and between 1/3 and ½ cup maple syrup.
Recipe:
Preheat oven to 350°F.
Combine all ingredients in your large bowl.
Pour the granola onto the sheet pan.
Bake for 21 to 24 minutes, stirring halfway.
Let the granola cool for around 45 minutes, and enjoy.
How to eat: You can eat this granola plain, over yogurt, or with milk. I eat it with almond milk and blueberries!
The addition of blueberries adds the perfect “zing” to balance out the fall flavors, as well as antioxidants and fiber.
Ellavate it: You can ellavate this bowl of granola by adding poached pears for an enhanced fall flavor.
Brunch: Nourish Bowl
Sometimes we aren’t quite in the mood for breakfast or lunch, so luckily for us, the world created brunch. Nourish bowls contain veggies, healthy fats, proteins and carbs to make us full and energized. This nourish bowl is great for brunch because the yolk from the poached egg flows out onto a heap of fresh, herbaceous kale. The firm and slightly chewy texture of the forbidden rice contrasts with the silky whipped sweet potato making this bowl satisfying.
Tools: A pot of boiling water
Ingredients: Forbidden rice, whipped sweet potato topped with turmeric, kale, poached egg, and roughly chopped pistachio, your favorite lemon vinaigrette (I use Glaser Organic Farmers Simple Garlic Lemongrette from Whole Foods).
Recipe
Poach as many eggs as you want.
Assemble your ingredients in a bowl.
Eat!
Substitutions: If you don’t have some of these ingredients, don’t sweat it! You can substitute the forbidden rice with another grain such as quinoa or farro, the egg with any other protein, and the sweet potato with another vegetable. The goal of this bowl is to have a mix of nutrients and textures, so get creative.
Lunch: Salad
This is seriously my new favorite salad! It is the cornucopia of fall with its extensive list of seasonal flavors. The roasting of these vegetables brings out their natural sweetness and combines with the creamy, tart goat cheese. The pleasant juicy nectar from the pomegranate seed pops as soon as your tooth pierces the outer coating.
Tools: Sheet pans lined with parchment paper
Ingredients for the salad: Figs, arugula, butternut squash, roasted brussels sprouts (by the way, my life is a lie because I never knew this was the correct spelling of brussels sprouts), pomegranate seeds, goat cheese, honey, olive oil, salt.
Recipe:
Preheat oven to 425°F.
Roast the figs with a plop of honey for about 5-10 minutes.
Roast the butternut squash and brussels sprouts with olive oil and salt for 22 minutes turning the pan halfway through the cooking.
Assemble all ingredients and add dressing.
Ingredients for the maple miso dressing: 2 tablespoons Grey Poupon Dijon mustard, 2 tablespoons pure maple syrup, 4 teaspoons apple cider vinegar, and 6 tablespoons olive oil. All you have to do is mix these ingredients together.
Healthy food doesn’t have to be boring you just need to ellavate it!