Healthy Breakfast Quinoa

This morning I woke up and realized I only had a tiny, tiny amount of oatmeal left. Since I’ve been trying to eat mostly vegan lately, I didn’t want to eat yogurt or eggs for breakfast, so I thought I’d get a little creative and use inspiration from many recipes I’ve seen to create my own breakfast quinoa.

The result was actually amazing! I can’t wait to try this again tomorrow morning.

Since I rarely use real recipes and I just make things up as I go, here I’ll try to describe my process, in case you want to recreate it (which you should, because this was SO good).

Ingredients:

Quinoa

Almond Milk

Raisins

Dried Apricots (or any dried or fresh fruit)

Cinnamon

Honey

Almonds (or walnuts)

I already had quinoa pre-made from last night, but if you don’t, you can start from scratch, which might actually be better. (I’ll be trying that tomorrow.) Mine was a quinoa-bulgur wheat mix, but I recommend just straight quinoa. I had… a normal serving size? About a cup? Not really sure. You can be more precise if you want.

I put it in a little sauce pan, turned the heat on low, and poured in some almond milk (but not too much at first). I tossed in some raisins, and a small amount of honey and cinnamon and some sliced dried apricots (though you can use whatever fresh or dried fruit you desire). I mixed it all together and kept adding almond milk until it was a consistency that looked good to me (I didn’t want it to be too watery but you can make it as watery or dry as you’d like). At the end, I chopped up some almonds (if you have slivered almonds, or shelled walnuts, even better so you don’t have to deal with cutting whole almonds) and tossed them in, and gave it a little taste test to see what I thought. YUM.

Since I had a tiny bit of oatmeal, I cooked that and mixed both together, and the result was a delicious, sweet, healthy, protein-filled, fiber-filled, nutrient-dense breakfast to start my day. Seriously this might be my new favorite thing. Dare I say… better than oatmeal??

TRY IT. I dare you.

Here are some suggestions for things to add, though the beauty of this is that you pretty much can just do whatever you want and it will most likely be amazing.

– Fresh blueberries

– Fresh strawberries

– Almond butter

– Avocados

– Maple syrup

– Peaches

– Mashed banana

– Protein powder

– Chocolate chips

– Greek yogurt

… The list can go on as far as you’d like. Just some ideas to get you started.

Seriously this is my new favorite discovery. Can’t wait for tomorrow!

Peanut Butter + Banana Protein Smoothie

Holy mother of all that is good, I just made a bomb fucking smoothie. Check it out…

1 banana

1 scoop protein powder (I use Sun Warrior vanilla)

1 tablespoon peanut butter

1/2 cup almond milk

About 1/8 cup water (or however much you think is necessary. Just a little is fine)

Blend that shit up. Drink it on down. Maybe cry a little ‘cus its so damn good.

I discovered that my house does indeed have a blender – a hand blender, actually, which is even better. So, since I’m tacky and had nothing else, I used whatever I could find (a nasty old tupperware container. IT WAS CLEAN I SWEAR) and tossed all my ingredients in there to blend. I was decent enough to drink it out of a cup for you, so be thankful.

Almond milk? In France! C’est n’est pas possible!

I would prefer natural, organic peanut butter, but in France, anything “natural” or “organic” or “healthy” or “not a complete hazard to your health” is considered snobby and is super expensive, or just doesn’t exist, so finding Skippy was a little miracle for me at the corner supermarket. Ehhh. (I’m not really complaining… lets be honest here, we all know Skippy tastes better than the watery organic shit.)

Looks like the kind of thing you make when you’re a kid and you think its funny to waste a bunch of food for the sake of your stupid little game. Like mixing ketchup and wet, soggy bread, or something, and trying to convince your little sister to eat it. NOT THAT I EVER DID THAT OR ANYTHING…

Et voilà! Your perfect barf-colored smoothie. It’ll knock your socks off, I swear.

** Note: I originally added 4 ice cubes, but my blender couldn’t crush them so I took them out, mid-blend, and added them back in later, only to realize that smoothies with ice cubes in them are kinda weird, so I took them out again. For future reference, use ice cubes if you have a real blender. If not, just skip them.**

This loin-tingling sensation has 285 calories and it’ll keep you full for hours. Its great for post-workout, or for breakfast, or for whatever moment in your day when you’re like, damn, I waunt that. Because even healthy people can treat themselves! Shiet.