National Relaxation Day and Sweet Potato Muffins

Today is National Relaxation Day! So it seems like the perfect time to talk about….well, relaxation. Relaxing is not something I’m great at.

I’ve got a Type A personality, so of course, I always want to be in control of everything. This is counterproductive when you’re trying to let everything go. I make a conscious effort to set my stress and any issues I’m facing aside so that I can chill out because relaxing really is important for both the mind and body. I can definitely tell, though, if I haven’t been relaxing enough. My headaches become more severe. My back is much more achy. My memory becomes cloudier, and I have trouble remembering where I parked the car. I’m learning to pay more attention to these signs so I can learn to live more stress free and be generally more relaxed.

Here are some of my favorite ways to relax:

1. Take a hot bath (bonus relaxation: Add Epsom salts and/or essential oils)
2. Read an interesting book
3. Go for a walk (with or without music)
4. Watch a funny TV show or movie
5. Exercise (My favorites include dance, strength training and yoga)
6. Write (Whether it’s a blog, journal, diary or just on a scrap of paper)
7. Stretch
8. Play with your pets (Volunteer at an animal shelter or visit a friend if you don’t have pets of your own)
9. Practice mindful deep breathing
10. Take up a new hobby

It’s #10 I’ve been focusing on a lot more recently. My new hobby is cooking, as I’ve mentioned before, and I’m really enjoying finding new recipes and trying them out. Thank goodness for the power of Pinterest. My “recipes to try” board is growing quite quickly, but I sometimes get in the habit of making favorite foods over and over again. Not that there’s anything wrong with revisiting old favorites. I know I like them, and I know what I’m doing when I cook them. But I also know that I can’t really grow my cooking muscles if I don’t explore new recipes. With that in mind, I took on a few new ones this weekend with great success (if I do say so myself)! I made taco hand pies for lunch this week (which we’ll get to in another blog post), and I made sweet potato muffins for snacks.

pre-baked sweet potato muffins

Recently, I’ve been on a sweet potato kick. More specifically, mashed sweet potatoes. If I had known how easy they were to make and how delicious they are homemade, I would have been making them ages ago. Alas. I know now and they’re basically all I want to eat. I had some leftover in my fridge when I stumbled upon this recipe for sweet potato muffins.

Baked sweet potato muffins

They sounded delicious, but I wanted to see if I could make them a little healthier. I researched ingredient substitutions and discovered that you can sub agave for sugar (⅔ agave to 1 cup sugar) and applesauce for vegetable oil (I did about ¾ cup applesauce for ¾ cup oil). This was the first time I had ever attempted to modify a recipe, and I have to say I’m very pleased with the results. My muffins came out delicious, moist and flavorful.

I apologize for my crappy food pictures. Unfortunately food photography is not a skill I have mastered. This muffin was delicious though.

Sweet Potato Muffins (modified from Good + Simple blog)

Ingredients
3 cups of mashed sweet potato*
2 cups flour (I used whole wheat flour)
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp baking soda
¼ tsp baking powder
½ tsp salt
⅔ cup agave syrup
¾ cup applesauce**
3 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla
½ cup ground flaxseed meal
Pecans (optional) (I added nuts to mine)

Instructions

1. To prep the sweet potatoes (this can be done a day or so ahead if you want to break up the muffin-making process): Pierce the potatoes with a fork and place on a foil-lined baking sheet. Bake at 400 degrees for approximately 45 minutes, or until the inside is soft when poked with a fork. Remove and let cool. When the potatoes are cool, peel off the skin and mash the sweet potato filling with a fork or masher until any big lumps are gone. Measure out 3 cups worth of filling. Or you can make mashed sweet potatoes ahead of time (see below).
2. To make the muffins: In a large bowl combine the flour, cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder and salt. In a separate bowl, combine the agave syrup, applesauce, eggs, and vanilla. Stir the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, and then add the sweet potato (and pecans).
3. Pour into muffin tins/cups. Sprinkle flaxseed on top of the muffins. Bake at 325 for approximately 30 minutes. (It took about 40 minutes for mine to bake through. I tested with a toothpick to see when it came out clean).

*I used leftover mashed potatoes I made with this recipe – I subbed brown sugar and cinnamon for salt and pepper

**I didn’t measure this exactly – I used 2 individual serving cups of unsweetened applesauce