BREAKFAST SURPRISE!
Top a bowl of pumpkin purée with your fruit and nut favourites
All four of my daughters love frozen acai bowls because they feel like you’re eating ice cream for breakfast, except healthier.
If you haven’t hopped on the acai bowl craze, allow me to update you. Superfood acai berry purée is blended up with fruit — usually berries or banana — and then served thick, creamy and semifrozen, topped with granola, fruit, nuts or other goodies.
You can buy gorgeous berrytopped bowls at juice bars across the country, or make your own by blending up the base, pouring it into individual bowls and freezing. Once frozen solid, they’ll last for weeks.
But, you’ll need to let it soften a little to achieve the desired consistency, which means this is a great make-ahead breakfast. Stock up the freezer with frozen bowls, and pull them out as needed to thaw a few minutes on the counter, adding toppings, and eat.
But frozen breakfast bowls are also fantastic as a to-go snack in a lunch box: An ice pack slows down the thawing enough to have the bowl at the perfect texture about two hours later. And don’t worry if you miss the mark: even if it completely thaws, the bowl stays tasty, even if more smoothie-bowl-esque than ice-creamy.
Today I’m winterizing this summertime treat by swapping out the acai and bringing in the beloved flavours of the season in my pumpkin and spice breakfast bowl.
Pumpkin purée (the can will say pure pumpkin) is not only perfectly seasonal, but it boasts a lot of vitamin A (more than a day’s worth in one serving), and a smattering of other vitamins, minerals and fibre.
And, it’s naturally sweet, so not a lot of extra sugar is needed to make this breakfast feel like more of an indulgence than it actually is.
Loading up the freezer with these bowls is an excellent planahead strategy, whether you’re a mom of four or you just want to streamline your mornings.