I didn’t expect to go so long without posting, but here is my first recipe of 2018! The beginning of the year was pretty hectic, what with work, attending prenatal classes at the hospital, and just trying to get everything organized before my leave, and most of all, before our baby’s arrival. I’m now a couple days into my maternity leave and I finally feel like I have a chance to breathe this year.

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I didn’t get my act together in time for a traditional Canada Day recipe to celebrate Canada 150 (real talk: I’m still testing it), so I bring you this non-traditional recipe of Whole Wheat Flax Pancakes with Stewed Rhubarb. Thick, fluffy pancakes with ruby-red stewed rhubarb and drizzled real Canadian maple syrup, this breakfast is a great way to kick off the upcoming Canada Day long weekend. I consumed a lot of pancakes in the last two weeks to perfect this recipe and I can honestly say that without a doubt, this has become my favourite go-to recipe.

Trevor and I don’t have any real plans for celebrating Canada’s sesquicentennial, but we live in a pretty big city so I’m sure we’ll stumble onto something fun to do. Since the days have been getting longer, we’ve been making a point to get out more instead of hiding out in our air-conditioning. Earlier this month, we explored the Art Gallery of Ontario, enjoyed a free visit to the Royal Museum of Ontario, and wandered through the Taste of Little Italy Festival (complete with a pitcher of sangria and pizza on a patio). Our neighbourhood is also having monthly film screenings in the park and everywhere I turn it seems like more farmer’s markets are popping up. Have I mentioned that I love this time of year? I’m definitely getting my fill of Vitamin D with all this sunshine.

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Whenever I think of my greatest food weakness, I always narrow it down to freshly baked bread. The delirious, glorious smell of fresh bread has always sent me into a complete tailspin. During my early twenties, I spent a summer during university working the storefront of a family-run bakery in Regina and it was pretty much a dream come true for me and my deep love of carbs. A good portion of my summer paycheck went back to that bakery and I would stock up on their homemade bread, dinner rolls, poppy seed loaf, and their daily cinnamon buns.

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I’m living, breathing and eating ALL the chocolate things right now. I know January is supposed to be all about getting back on track, eating healthy and getting off my couch, but right now I don’t think I could handle seeing another salad. Or another weight loss ad.

I don’t know if it’s the time of year or the lack of sunshine, but I’m currently going through the January blahs. I’ll be having a perfectly normal day, but then I’ll come home and want nothing to do with anything. No TV, no internet, I just want to hold up under a blanket in my bedroom, preferably with one of the chocolate bars I brought back from Mexico. I know this is just one of those weird seasonal things that will pass, but I just hope my current chocolate supply holds out until then.

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I had every intention of posting something right after I attended the 2016 Food Bloggers of Canada Conference at the end of October, but the universe had other plans. Remember earlier last month when I had a minor cold and then said that I couldn’t remember the last time I was sick? Well touche universe, touche. Right after the conference, I was hit with a horrible bout of the dreaded common cold. To give you an example of how crazy it was, I took a couple sick days from work and my FitBit told me that during one day, I slept off and on for 15 hours. During the weekends, I became the queen of two-hour afternoon naps. At one point, I was even convinced that my stomach was sloshing around from all the tea and hot soup I was consuming. I’m now slowly getting my energy back (a little cough here and there), but it’s still a miracle that Trevor hasn’t caught it (knock on wood, hah).

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Over the years, the most popular post has been my recipe for Easy Yogurt Overnight Oats (thanks, Buzzfeed) and as the temperature continues to go up, it’s easy to see why. They are super easy to make because all the prep is done the night before and you get to wake up to a cold, creamy breakfast that can be dressed up with all the fruit and toppings your heart desires. A definite plus for me because I tend to be very zombie-like first thing in the morning and the window between waking up and leaving for work tends to feel very short.

Lately, I’ve been posting a quick photo of my weekday breakfasts on Snapchat and it’s helped me become a little more creative with what I eat. When I was a teenager, I was perfectly happy with a large bowl of Cheerios or another kind of cereal, but over the last years I’ve discovered that boxed cereal doesn’t fill me up the same way. Right now, I’m really into simple foods with lots of veggies or fruit (hello berry season!) and anything that doesn’t take a lot of time to put together.

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When I decided to take some time off from blogging at the end of November, it was never my intention to be away for this long. But as I type this, it’s already the second week in January. I hate to admit it, but during many of those weeks, I really struggled to get my blogging mojo back.

I would have to say that the biggest reason for this is because my tastes have shifted over the years. While I still enjoy baking cookies and muffins and chocolate anything, I’m noticing that as time goes on, I’ve gravitated more to a more healthier lifestyle.

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To say that August was an interesting month would be a complete understatement.

I had every intention to get back into the blogging swing of things when we returned from our summer vacation in mid-August, but when I stepped back into my kitchen, things felt different. I fully expected to be refreshed and inspired, but instead, the opposite happened. I was thrown very quickly into the “catch up” part of work and soon fell into the trap of making weird, lazy suppers of deli meat sandwiches and packaged mashed potatoes. We experienced a bit of a cold spell and instead of my usual BAKE ALL THE THINGS mantra, I would come home from work and watch episode after episode of mindless TV on Netflix.

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Even though Canadian Thanksgiving is over, pumpkin is still very much a big deal here. We’ve been eating leftover pumpkin pie tarts (made with coconut milk for Trevor), pumpkin gingerbread loaf and now I’m back to eating pumpkin for breakfast. It may seem like overkill right now, but soon we’ll be in the middle of the holiday season with gingerbread, peppermint and eggnog. The fall season is very, very short and I was nicely reminded of this the other day when I noticed some retail stores have already started to put out their upcoming holiday merchandise. I was so not ready to see that much red and green so soon after my long weekend.

I recently took on the challenge of roasting pumpkins to make my own puree, and wow, what a difference it was compared to the canned stuff. I’m all for using canned food when I’m in a pinch, but sometimes I forget the obvious of how much tastier (and cheaper!) it can be to go that extra mile. Of course, I forgot to document the process because taking apart a pumpkin, gutting it, cleaning, and trying to keep the seeds can be a messy job. Two small 3lb “pumpkin pie” pumpkins took me a little over an hour and that was before they were even placed in the oven. Luckily, I ended up with a sizable bowl full of pumpkin seeds to roast and over 4 cups of delicious pumpkin puree.

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As an early (not by choice) riser, I’m a big believer in having a good breakfast to start my day. As much as I would love to have a proper sit down breakfast each morning, I’m usually strapped for time. Once I get up, shower, get dressed, pack my lunch and make sure I have everything ready for the day (such as my gym bag for days I hit the gym after work), I usually only have about 10 minutes to make/eat my breakfast and enjoy a cup of coffee before I catch my 7:03am bus (ugh) to the subway station.

Since my morning time is so limited, I’m also a big believer in getting as much ready as I can the night before. I usually get my lunch ready while I’m making supper and I try to pack my gym bag while I’m brushing my teeth. Now that the weather is starting to warm up, I’ve started to re-introduce yogurt overnight oats into my breakfast routine. This saves even more time because all the prep happens the night before and I get to wake up to ready-made, cold and creamy oats that I can decorate with different nuts, fruit and spices. The great thing is that overnight oats are super portable and on days where I’m really running late, they can be made in a mason jar or portable Tupperware container and thrown in my bag with a spoon. A nice, healthy, and cheaper alternative to waiting in line at Tim Horton’s every morning!

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