Forgetful Momma

Secular Homeschooling in Canada

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Healthy Banana Chocolate Oatmeal Muffins

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I’m sharing another muffin recipe with you because we love how easy they are to grab and go in the mornings around here. These ones are healthy banana, chocolate oatmeal, yum! We grab them before sitting down to our read aloud, which is how we start our school mornings, Hubby can grab one on the way out the door for work.

Healthy Banana Chocolate Oatmeal Muffins

Healthy Banana Chocolate Oatmeal Muffins

*This post contains affiliate links, see my disclosure policy for more information.*

My first tip would be, I only had regular semi sweet chocolate chips, and I wanted smaller pieces so I threw them into my little food processor. Best choice. It gave a consistent chocolate through the muffin, plus I sprinkled a little over the tops, delicious.

What you need:

  • 1 ⁄2 cup uncooked quick oats
  • 1 ⁄2 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1 large egg
  • 1 large banana, mashed
  • 1 1 ⁄4 cup all-purpose flour
  • 1 ⁄4 cup unpacked brown sugar
  • 2 tsp baking powder
  • 1 ⁄2 tsp baking soda
  • 1 ⁄2 tsp table salt
  • 1 ⁄2 cup mini chocolate chips, divided
  • 8 fl ozplain unsweetened almond milk

How to make Banana Chocolate Oatmeal Muffins:

  1. Preheat oven to 375ºF. Coat 12 muffin holes with cooking spray.
  2. In a large mixing bowl, milk, oats, vanilla extract and egg; set aside 5 minutes for oats to soften and then stir in banana.
  3. In a separate bowl, stir together flour, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
  4. Stir flour mixture into yogurt mixture to moisten ingredients (do not beat – the dough will be very thick).
  5. Reserve 1 tablespoon chips; stir in remaining chips.
  6. Spoon batter by heaping tablespoons into prepared muffin holes; sprinkle each with a few reserved chocolate chips.
  7. Bake until golden brown and a tester inserted in center of a muffin comes out clean, about 15 to 18 minutes.

These are simple to make. Very quick, so quick I didn’t take any photos during the making process.

Simply toss and mix all the ingredients together in a bowl. Either line your muffin tin with liners, or grease your muffin tin. If you use liners, give them a spray with non-stick spray. These are very sticky.

Healthy Banana Chocolate Oatmeal Muffins

Healthy Banana Chocolate Oatmeal Muffins

Yield: 12
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 18 minutes
Total Time: 28 minutes
Healthy Banana Chocolate Oatmeal Muffins

Ingredients

  • 1 ⁄2 cup uncooked quick oats
  • 1 ⁄2 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1 large egg
  • 1 large banana, mashed
  • 1 1 ⁄4 cup all-purpose flour
  • 1 ⁄4 cup unpacked brown sugar
  • 2 tsp baking powder
  • 1 ⁄2 tsp baking soda
  • 1 ⁄2 tsp table salt
  • 1 ⁄2 cup mini chocolate chips, divided
  • 8 fl ozplain unsweetened almond milk

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 375ºF. Coat 12 muffin holes with cooking spray.
  2. In a large mixing bowl, milk, oats, vanilla extract and egg; set aside 5 minutes for oats to soften and then stir in banana.
  3. In a separate bowl, stir together flour, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir flour mixture into yogurt mixture to moisten ingredients (do not beat - the dough will be very thick). Reserve 1 tablespoon chips; stir in remaining chips.
  4. Spoon batter by heaping tablespoons into prepared muffin holes; sprinkle each with a few reserved chocolate chips. Bake until golden brown and a tester inserted in center of a muffin comes out clean, about 15 to 18 minutes.
Nutrition Information:
Yield: 12 Serving Size: 1 grams
Amount Per Serving: Unsaturated Fat: 0g
© Ashley Mullen
Category: Breakfast

These are perfect for making ahead on the weekend for the week ahead. they make a great breakfast on the go, a nice snack to pack as you head out the door running errands or head to different extra curricular activities.

Similar post you may be interested in:

Blueberry Muffins
Blueberry Muffins from Scratch

Growing a Snack Garden with Your Kids

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Growing a snack garden with your kids is fun, and helps them to learn about health and delicious foods. Focusing on a snack garden adds an element of fun for kids, who isn’t going to love a garden they can eat.

Growing a snack garden is the perfect way to introduce your kids to eating healthy foods because you’re not too likely to be growing chocolate or candies. Right?

Growing a Snack Garden with Your Kids

Growing a Snack Garden with Your Kids

*This post contains affiliate links, see my disclosure policy for more information.*

If you don’t have the ground space to planting a snack garden in your yard try planting container gardens. These are some of our natures snack garden mix of fruits and vegetables.

The more you involve them in the planting process the more likely they are to eat the vegetables you grow.

Snack Garden Plants

Tomatoes

While we of course loved the “regular” or hot house tomatoes my kids preferred the small cherry and sugar tomatoes. They are bite sized and perfect to picking off the vine and popping in your mouth.

Sugar Snap Peas

The peas…. oh there were too few of them please we messed up on the support and they died. But they were amazing. I have great memories of eating sugar peas from my great-grandmothers garden.

Carrots

We bought seeds for some fun colored purple carrots as well as the typical orange carrots ones. Because our ground is very hard packed and clay like we were unable to just pull them out. Instead we had to dig them out, give them a really good wash and then crunch away.

Broccoli and Cauliflower

My first piece of advice is to be aware that critters love broccoli and cauliflower and if you don’t cage them in you won’t get to eat them, we learned this the hard way. Cauliflower was Austin’s request last year and we’ll know better for this year.

Rhubarb

This is the easiest snack you can grow because once you plant it it continues to grow. Just leave a couple stalks when removing others to promote new growth. And remind your children to not eat the leaves as they are poisonous.

Berries

Strawberries and blueberries, raspberries and black berries. I don’t have a lot of experience growing these but the few I had growing last year were eaten every quick and straight from the plant. Have you eaten a warm strawberry fresh from the plant? It’s heavenly.

The Complete Work Smarter Not Harder Gardening Course is open and taking new students!!!

It starts at the foundation.. with your soil and how to properly prepare a healthy soil then move into everything planting… who, what, when, where, why, and how… then we will move into dealing with all the common problems like irrigation, pest, disease, and fertilizer.. all the way up to basic seed saving…. all that while working smarter not harder with organic minded methods.

You will be learning some unusual methods that go against the typical way of thinking and stepping out of the box! Go get started learning now!

Homemade Fajita Seasoning

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There is just something about making your own recipes instead of having to go buy a mix to finish making supper. Knowing a recipe, or where to find a recipe, for your own seasonings is extremely helpful. This homemade fajita seasoning recipe is just one excellent example.

Homemade Fajita Seasoning

Homemade Fajita Seasoning

This post contains affiliate links, see my disclosure policy for more information.

If you have been reading Forgetful Momma for any amount of time, or have checked out my Recipe Box, then you know that I prefer to make our own seasonings. This Fajita seasoning is no different.

Why do I make so many instead of buying them? Simple. I have all the spice in my cupboard, so why buy them in a little bag, costing more money than I really need to, when they are already in my cupboard.

What you need:

How to make Homemade Fajita Seasoning:

Mix all the spices in a bowl and use in place of packaged.

Homemade Fajita Seasoning

Homemade Fajita Seasoning

Yield: 2
Prep Time: 5 minutes
Total Time: 5 minutes

Ingredients

  • 1 tbsp cornstarch
  • 2 tsp chili powder
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1 tsp paprika
  • 1 tsp white sugar
  • 1/2 tsp onion powder
  • 1/2 tsp garlic powder
  • 1/2 tsp ground cumin

Instructions

  1. Mix all together in a bowl and use as needed for a recipe.
Nutrition Information:
Serving Size: 1 grams
Amount Per Serving: Unsaturated Fat: 0g
© Ashley Mullen
Category: Condiments

We have been growing our own herbs through the summers along with our vegetables and fruits. If you too grow your own herbs, you can dry them and then use them to make this fajita seasoning and other dried seasoning mixes.

We have a dehydrator that we use for fruits, for drying our herbs, and for making beef jerky once in awhile. This one is very similar to the one we have a use. Ours is a bit older now but still works amazing. I have a number of pots of herbs on the go this summer, fingers crossed that they all grow. Apparently our chicken will love some of them.

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Chicken Fajita Pasta Skillet
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Chicken Fajita Pasta Skillet

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As moms of any kind – stay/work-at-home, working outside the home, homeschooling, etc, quick meals that are easy to clean are the best, this chicken fajita pasta skillet is the best. Not only is it quick and easy to clean up, but you’re getting all the food groups in there too. I’m a big fan of skillet meals now because they tend to be quick and they have easy clean up. A huge hit with my kids is our eggroll skillet, add a little plum sauce and enjoy.

chicken fajita pasta skillet

Chicken Fajita Pasta Skillet

*This post may contain affiliate links, see my disclosure policy for more information.*

And for whatever reason, pasta seems to be a huge hit with all kids! Everyone loves carbs though right?

Grab some beautiful peppers and enjoy this healthy chicken fajita pasta in 30 minutes.

What you need:

  • 1 lb boneless skinless chicken breasts, towel dried, and cut into bite-size portions
  • 3 TB fajita seasoning, homemade or store bought packet, divided in half
  • 4 TB olive oil, divided
  • 1 medium onion diced
  • 2 bell peppers, any colors seeded and diced
  • 5 cloves fresh garlic, minced
  • 1 cups low sodium chicken broth
  • 1 can, 10 oz diced tomatoes with juices
  • 8 oz dry pasta
  • freshly ground black pepper, to taste

How to make this Chicken Fajita Pasta Skillet recipe:

You’re going to start by cooking your chicken breasts – sliced or diced into bite sized pieces, with half of the fajita seasoning in a little EVOO in a deep sided skillet.

chicken fajita pasta skillet

Once your chicken is just cooked, remove from your skillet, it will get cooked more soon so try not to over cook it.

Add a little oil and your sliced peppers, garlic, onions and remaining fajita seasoning and cook until tender, about 2 minutes.

chicken fajita pasta skillet

Once your veggies are tender stir in tomatoes, 1 cup of chicken broth, and uncooked pasta.

Cover and let it boil gently until pasta is cooked, about 15 minutes. (Aren’t those peppers and onions beautiful?)

chicken fajita pasta skillet

Once your pasta is cooked, add your chicken back into the skillet and let it heat through.

[bctt tweet=”A healthy chicken #fajita in one dish, easy clean up for a busy day. #recipe” username=”forgetfulmomma”]

chicken fajita pasta skillet

While it’s still hot, serve this chicken fajita pasta with a little shredded cheese of your choice on top, we used cheddar as that’s what we had on hand.

French’s Crispy Fried Onions would be amazing on this too. We love them, we have an Amazon auto subscribe set up for delivery for these.

chicken fajita pasta skillet

Chicken Fajita Pasta Skillet

Yield: 5
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 20 minutes
Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients

  • 1 lb boneless skinless chicken breasts, towel dried, and cut into bite-size portions
  • 3 TB fajita seasoning, homemade or store bought packet, divided in half
  • 4 TB olive oil, divided
  • 1 medium onion diced
  • 2 bell peppers, any colors seeded and diced
  • 5 cloves fresh garlic, minced
  • 1 cups low sodium chicken broth
  • 1 can, 10 oz diced tomatoes with juices
  • 8 oz dry pasta
  • freshly ground black pepper, to taste

Instructions

  1. In a large heavy pan heat 2 tbsp oil over high heat until oil is hot. Add chicken and half the seasoning, tossing to coat well. Spread chicken in a single layer and let cook undisturbed for about 1 min, or until browned on bottom side. Flip chicken over and repeat until both sides are browned. Remove chicken to a large bowl and set aside.
  2. Add remaining 2 tbsp oil to the pan over high heat. Once oil is hot, add the onions, bell peppers, and garlic, along with remaining half of seasoning. Stir well to coat; stir often and cook until veggies are tender, 2 min.
  3. Add broth, tomatoes with all its juices, and dry pasta to the same pan. Bring liquid to a boil and immediately reduce to a low boil. Cover and let cook for 15 min. until pasta is cooked. Liquid should be mostly absorbed. When pasta is cooked, add the chicken back to the same pan. Add freshly ground black pepper to taste. Stir to combine and heat through.
Nutrition Information:
Serving Size: 1 grams
Amount Per Serving: Unsaturated Fat: 0g
© Ashley Mullen
Category: Main Course

Recommended Products for Making this Recipe:

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chicken fajita pasta skillet

Slow Cooker Chicken Fajitas

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These slow cooker chicken fajitas are healthy and tasty, and as the days get longer and warmer we’re spending more time outside and I’m looking to spend less time cooking, and less time with the oven and stove off. Keeping the heat out of the house, the slow cooker is the perfect solution.

Slow Cooker Chicken Fajitas

Slow Cooker Chicken Fajitas

This post contains affiliate links, see my disclosure policy for more information.

What you need:

  • 2 lbs boneless skinless chicken breast
  • 1 14.5 oz can diced tomatoes
  • 1 red orange and green bell pepper
  • 1 large yellow onion halved and sliced
  • 4 cloves garlic minced
  • 2 1/2 tsp chili powder
  • 2 tsp ground cumin
  • 1 tsp paprika
  • 3/4 tsp ground coriander
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 3/4 tsp pepper
  • 2 Tbsp fresh lime juice
  • 1 Tbsp honey

How to make Slow Cooker Chicken Fajitas:

My favorite part of this meal is the colors of my peppers, and peppers in general. I love them. Slice them to the size perfect for your family. For hubby and I sliced like this is good, but I tend to slice them through the middle for my kids, who can be picky on whether or not they are eating peppers day to day.

Slow Cooker Chicken Fajitas

Pour some diced tomato over the bottom of your slow cooker, layer some peppers over the tomato and top with your chicken breasts. Season the tops of your chicken.

Slow Cooker Chicken Fajitas

Add remaining tomato and peppers.

Cook on low for 6-7 hours.

Shred or slice your chicken.

Remove 1- 1 -1/2 cups of the liquid, the juice from the tomato and peppers cooking. Mix together the lime juice and honey, then add to your slow cooker. Put your chicken back in.

Mix carefully then serve how you’d like.

Chicken fajitas are great on warm tortilla shells. But its also great the next day if you have leftovers but run out of shells, you can serve it over rice or pasta, or just eat it the way it is.

Slow Cooker Chicken Fajitas
Slow Cooker Chicken Fajitas

Slow Cooker Chicken Fajitas

Yield: 5
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 5 hours
Total Time: 5 hours 10 minutes

Ingredients

  • 2 lbs boneless skinless chicken breast
  • 1 14.5 oz can diced tomatoes
  • 1 red, orange and green bell pepper
  • 1 large yellow onion, halved and sliced
  • 4 cloves garlic, minced
  • 2 1/2 tsp chili powder
  • 2 tsp ground cumin
  • 1 tsp paprika
  • 3/4 tsp ground coriander
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 3/4 tsp pepper
  • 2 Tbsp fresh lime juice
  • 1 Tbsp honey

Instructions

  1. Pour half of the canned tomatoes into the bottom of a slow cooker and spread into an even layer. Top with half of the peppers and half of the onions. Sprinkle garlic in. Top with chicken breasts.
  2. In a bowl whisk together chili powder, cumin, paprika, coriander, salt and pepper. Evenly sprinkle the seasoning over chicken breasts. Top with remaining tomatoes, then layer in remaining peppers and onions.
  3. Cover and cook on low heat 6 - 7 hours, until chicken has cooked through and veggies are tender.
  4. Remove chicken, and cut into strips, or shred. Ladle out 1 - 1 1/2 cups of the broth in slow cooker (mostly tomato liquid) and discard. In a small bowl whisk together lime juice and honey and add to slow cooker along with chicken and season with additional salt to taste if desired. Gently toss.
Nutrition Information:
Serving Size: 1 grams
Amount Per Serving: Unsaturated Fat: 0g
© Ashley Mullen
Category: Main Course
Slow Cooker Chicken Fajitas

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