Two very different sweet breads, both delicious!

Yesterday I made this Cinnamon Swirl Bread for my sister and her husband to enjoy (I got to taste some too!).  I scoured the internet for recipes that would at least partially work in the bread machine.  Now that I feel comfortable making the dough in the machine then baking it myself in the oven, I want to get some more practice in.  The recipe in the link above worked out really well.  The only thing I'd do differently is cook it for about 5 minutes more, as the bottomw of the loaf was a little dense. We tasted some toasted, but Nat was thinking about making french toast with it.  I look forward to hearing about it!

Today, I saw a recipe for Chocolate Flax seed Bread on one of my new favorite food websites: http://www.tablespoon.com/.  I thought this was a brilliant recipe because it tricks you into thinking you are eating something healthy because of the flax seed when in realty there is still butter and sugar and white flour in it... but oh, so what, who cares.  Try it... it's still way better for you than a milk chocolate candy bar or most of the other junk food out there.

I didn't have whole flax seeds on hand so I just used the same amount of flax seed meal.  As long as the flax seed meal is fresh, you get the same benefits of whole flax seed (high in fiber, anti-cancer and anti-diabetes properties) but without the crunch.  I thought the cake was light, airy and delicious.  As suggested by the recipe, it would taste great warmed up with a little vanilla ice cream. I had mine with a cup of skim milk.  A really nice afternoon snack.

The cinnamon bread was definitely more like bread, and tasted best toasted with butter.  The Chocolate bread was more of a light cake.  Both were really good and I'll file those away in my "future recipes" file.

I think i need to start cooking up some more healthy meals this week, so I'm working on that.  I've been in carb mode and might need to take a break before my clothes start fitting too tight! Do you have any favorite healthy meals you like to cook for your family?  Please feel free to share with us.

Chow for Now! :)