Vanilla Oatmeal Nice Cream Sandwiches (v, gf, r)

Who says you can’t enjoy ice cream sandwiches when you’re vegan!? You totally can with this quick and easy recipe that I adapted from one of my favorite bloggers! It’s vegan, gluten-free, refined-sugar free, basically raw, and completely delicious!

It makes a great breakfast or snack for anyone!

Enjoy!

Oatmeal Nice Cream Sandwiches

makes 6 sandwiches

adapted from this recipe by Emily Von Euw

Cookies:

• 1 and 1/2 cups gluten-free rolled oats
• 1/4 cup dates or raisins
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 tablespoons maple syrup
• 1/4 cup melted coconut oil

Nice cream:

• 3 frozen bananas
• 1/4 cup nondairy milk
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 tablespoon vanilla

For the cookies: Make oat flour in a food processor by processing oats until they are a flour-like consistency. Add in the dates/raisins, cinnamon, maple syrup, and coconut oil and pulse until you get a doughy mixture. You may need to add a tablespoons of water to get the dough to stick together. Press half of the dough into the bottom of a lined 9×3 bread pan and set aside.

For the nice cream: blend the bananas, milk, vanilla, and cinnamon together in a high speed blender until smooth and thick like soft serve.

Scoop the ice cream evenly on top of the cookie layer already in the bread pan. Freeze until solid, then press the remaining half of the cookie dough on top of the banana mixture. Put back in the freezer until the top cookie layer is solid, then cut the mass into sandwiches and enjoy!

Store these babies covered in the freezer.

Have a wonderful day, beautiful!

xx Ellie

Peanut Butter Prints

I love peanut butter. I love jelly. I love peanut butter & jelly.

After all, I am peanut butter & Ellie!

These peanut butter cookies make a perfect snack or dessert. You can even just make the cookie dough and eat it because there are not any raw eggs in it (See photo below)! They’re soft, sweet, and delicious! Make and enjoy!

found on Pinterest

Peanut Butter Prints

adapted from Chocolate Covered Katie

makes around 15 cookies

For the Cookies:

• 1/2 cup natural peanut butter (or another nut or seed butter if you are allergic to peanuts)
• 3/4 tsp baking soda
• pinch of salt
• 3 tablespoons whole wheat flour
• 1/4 cup raw cane sugar
• 2 tbsp brown sugar
• 1/4 tsp flaxseed meal + 3/4 tsp water mixed together to form a flax “egg” OR 2 Tbsp applesauce
• 1 tablespoon non-dairy milk
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Cookie Toppings:

• strawberry jam (homemade is best)
• melted chocolate chip mixture (melt some chocolate chips in the microwave and stir them together) or some sort of chocolate spread
• other types of jam

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Mix dry ingredients (including peanut butter), then add in the wet ingredients. Form the dough into balls. Bake for 8 minutes. The cookies will magically flatten out (a lot) when baked. They will also look underdone. However, they will firm up! Make a little indent in the cookie and add a teaspoon or so of your favorite jam or spread (Nutella or a Nutella-like spread would be great on these cookies as well!) in the indent. Let cookies cool for at least 5 minutes before removing and devouring.

Have a nice day!

xx Ellie

Peanut Butter & Banana Nice Cream

I love the combination of peanut butter and bananas. It’s my favorite combo along with peanut butter &  jelly and pb & chocolate. I just love peanut butter. What’s not to love? Well, unless you’re allergic, and then I can understand how you don’t love breaking into hives when you eat it… but for those who can eat peanut butter, this simple recipe is bowl-licking good.

Plus it’s soooo simple that it takes less than 5 minutes to make! All you need is a food processor/ blender/ magic bullet, some peanut butter, and some frozen bananas. It’s the perfect recipe because it is so simple and so delicious! 

serves 1-2

• 2-3 heaping spoonfuls of peanut butter (another nut/seed/fruit butter would work as well but peanut butter is the best)
• 3 frozen bananas 
• 3-4 tablespoons of nondairy milk

Peel ripe bananas and stick them in your freezer. My advice? Peel a bunch of ripe bananas and put them in a bag/ container in your freezer so you can whip ’em out and add ’em to nice cream or smoothies. 

Take bananas out of the freezer and add them plus all the other ingredients to a food processor/ blender/ magic bullet. Blend baby blend! Add more peanut butter if you want it extra peanut-buttery. Add more nondairy milk if you want your nice cream more milkshake-ish. Spoon the nice cream into a fancy bowl or just eat it out of the machine! Top with cacao nibs, chocolate chips, peanuts, coconut flakes, berries, MORE PEANUT BUTTER, or whatever else your heart desires! Enjoy, and lick the bowl clean if you want! 

Happy New Year! Nice cream is a great way to start the new year off right. 

xx Ellie 

This post is part of A Vegan Holiday, a collaboration among vegan and veg-friendly bloggers. Follow along on social media with #AVeganHoliday. Want to learn more or become a contributor? Find out more here or here. 

Butternut Squash Bisque

This week is busy. School, packing, and homework (and getting ahead on homework because I am missing school next week!) are taking up the majority of my time. However, I am officially packed for my trip to Asia! We leave Saturday morning (2 days! Eek!)! We’re gone for 3 weeks, so I packed a lot of stuff. It was challenging to figure out what to pack, but some useful websites helped me out! I’ll post a “What I’m Packing for a 3 Week Trip” tomorrow on the new travel part of my blog (made specifically to document my trip!). 

My family is in a flurry to get everything done before we leave. We’ve been so busy packing, getting documentation and stuff together, and getting ahead on work and school since we’re peace-ing out next week. This doesn’t leave us much time to cook/ bake! Something that we have been making is soup, because it doesn’t take long to whip up! Soup is just so fantastic for whirlwind days like today! 

This soup is based on a recipe from Cooking Light cooking magazine. The version my mom and I based it off of is non-vegan, so we made it vegan! It’s quick, easy, low-calorie, and delicious! Not to mention gluten-free, sugar-free, nut-free, soy-free, AND vegan! A winner for everyone! 

Enjoy some warm and comforting soup! 

serves 2-3

• 4 cups cubed peeled butternut squash (about 1 pound, or 2 squash)
• 1 tablespoon olive oil 
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 4 large shallots, peeled and halved
• 1 (½) piece ginger, thinly sliced (or 1 Tbsp ginger paste)
• 2 and ½ cups vegetable broth
• pepper

Preheat oven to 375°. Mix/ toss the first 5 ingredients in a roasting pan. Bake in the oven for 50 minutes or until tender, stirring occasionally. Cool for 10 minutes. Place half of mixture and half of broth in a blender and secure the lid. Blend until smooth. Pour into a large saucepan. Repeat procedure with remaining squash mixture and broth. Cook over medium heat 5 minutes or until thoroughly heated. Top with croutons, nuts (Pepita seeds are pictured), and/or pepper. Enjoy and, if you feel like it, slurp it up like Belle and the Beast both do in Disney’s Beauty and the Beast!

Have a nice day!
xx Ellie

This post is part of A Vegan Holiday, a collaboration among vegan and veg-friendly bloggers. Follow along on social media with #AVeganHoliday. Want to learn more or become a contributor? Find out more here or here. 

Blueberry Banana Sorbet

Happy hump day! I hope your week is going well thus far.

Earlier, I was craving something that was cold and could satisfy my sweet tooth. The solution? Blueberries and banana blended together to create a satisfying sorbet (can you tell I love to use alliteration?)!

If you’re super adventurous (or need to eat more veggies), go ahead and add a cup of spinach to the sorbet! You won’t be able to taste it, and it won’t even change the color of the sorbet. It’ll just add a few more vitamins and make the sorbet EVEN MORE healthy!

This is barely a recipe, which is nice! You can just go to your freezer, pull out some frozen fruit, blend it together, and enjoy! It takes 5 minutes or less. This is great when you’re busy, or if you’re just too lazy to actually make a full-fledged snack, meal, or dessert!

Blueberry Banana Sorbet

Serves 1

by Ellie H.

• 1 frozen banana
• 1/2 cup frozen blueberries
• 1/4 cup nondairy milk (I used unsweetened almond milk)
• optional: 1 cup spinach or another leafy green

Simply blend the ingredients together in a high speed blender like a Vitamix. You will need to use the tamper to blend the ingredients. You might want to add a bit more milk, too, depending on how thick you like your sorbet/ smoothie/ nice cream. Scoop the mixture into a bowl with a spoon when all ingredients are blended together. If you want to make your sorbet even prettier, add some coconut, dried fruit, granola, or vegan sprinkles to the top of it. Then relax, enjoy, and be transported to a summer tropical blueberry paradise. This makes a great breakfast, snack, dessert, etc. that you don’t have to feel guilty about enjoying!

☆ Have a wacky Wednesday! ☆

xx Ellie