Anti-inflammatory recipes help you practice daily meal prep and healthy eating habits, that pay off in your long run toward longevity. Below are recipe links from this blog to inspire your year, no matter what season you’re in. To your anti-inflammatory life! 🎉
Because an anti-inflammatory diet helps protect against inflammation in the body (skin, joints, teeth, vital organs) that are health warning signs.
And preventing inflammation flare-ups help protect against and prevent chronic diseases, such as cardiovascular diseases that are still among the highest causes of mortality.
Chronic inflammation is linked to tell-tale body signs that can also lead toward certain cancers and cognitive decline.
And type 2 diabetes (or lifestyle diabetes) is the one of the fastest growing diseases on our planet. No matter what genes you were bestowed, anti-inflammatory habits help fight against what’s stacked up against you in the environment that you don’t have control over.
Anti-inflammatory foods were and are a leading source of prevention, where anti-inflammatory spices are a big deal. Adding more spice in your life and to your diet helps support better health and longevity.
And sticking to an anti-inflammatory diet is also a remedy from following Diet Culture of some kind. It’s a long-term healthy eating strategy.
Where whole and minimally processed healthy food and ingredients in meals and bakes you eat are at the core of anti-inflammatory foods and your health eating. Anti-inflammatory foods are real (nutritious) foods that the body recognizes as healthy
And this includes plant-based foods, so eating plant-forward helps the body. And foods on a Mediterranean diet, which is a type of anti-inflammatory diet that includes healthy proteins and healthy fats, such as wild fishes and olive oil.
👉 To learn more, grab my FREE Anti-Inflammatory Diet Food Guidewith printable food lists to help you make more healthy decisions for grocery food shopping. And get insights about an anti-inflammatory diet in the free guide.
And here on these pages of Anti-Inflammatory Lifestyle (Winter/Spring edition), you’ll discover simple and easy recipes you can make weekly. And get inspiration about anti-inflammatory living and seasonal foods you can lean into (that are more abundant and coins per ounce). To turn the pages forward/backward, click on the arrows at the lower corners of the pages. ↪
One of my favorite meals is weekend brunch. 😊 You can make your own no-butter bearnaise for a lower-calorie and anti-inflammatory-infused olive oil brunch sauce to pair with delicious savory meals like Eggs Benedict (with French bistro vibes🍽️). You can make this recipe and other healthy-conscious (but always tasty) waffle iron recipes.
And low-sugar desserts where the sweet tooth list is growing (variety is the spice of life! 🍥)
🍴You can also get more anti-inflammatory recipes and food ideas for the table from the Summer/Autumn anti-inflammatory food recipes. 🥄 That for some may be the season you’re celebrating and living out (literally or figuratively!).
Sponge cake roll is one that I embrace as a cake fan, and because cake fun is how I happy roll. And the cake texture does live up to the sponge name, like this sponge cake…
That looks like it will be sent off as a spring letter (onto an eating table).
…And you can make your own sponge cake with your own personal design 💌
It’s easy to make a unique imprime pattern (your imprint) where you bake the cake batter pattern you make for a minute on the cake pan, and then add and spread the rest of your batter on top to complete the bake off (or like I saw on The Great British Baking Show bake off).
And while you may be wondering how easy this is to make, I’ll first say it’s easier to make than it looks.
Below I give you the shortcut ways…
That starts with making the batter that you spread onto a silicone baking mat. One shortcut is you don’t need to go to the pan edges. Because the batter should hold its own without sides.
…Because it’s a wet batter, but never runny.
…Which is also a good battery test for your batter on how it will turn out.
And if you use a silicone baking mat (or a Silpat) with orange lined edges, you can use those edges as guidelines for where to stop. Because it’s tempting to go to the pan edge.
Your batter spread doesn’t have to be ruler straight, as the ends will get cut off at the end after baked,
And if use a half or full pan (12″ x 18″ or 20″) for your bakes, they make silicone mats that fit perfectly. Metal pans were the ones I saw daily in hotel and restaurant kitchens when I managed catering events and parties.
They will work well for this application. Like on this 12″ x 18″ pan setup with a thin layer of the batter recipe. And you can make a smaller rectangle if you want a thicker sponge. That’s up to you!
Then bake for about 12 minutes. Most other cakes can take 45 minutes or longer to bake… but this is a sponge cake roll that’s a quick bake, and that can save you minutes.
Thank you, magical oven!
And you’ll know it’s baked done because the sides will be baked done, just before they brown. And if the cake edges brown, that’s okay as you can cut those off later, but that’s your sign to take it out of the oven.
But the best way is to check the oven at the timer 12 minute mark. I could’ve pulled this one out at 11-and-a-half minutes, but I wanted to give it a few more seconds.
When it’s out of the oven, peel warm off the Silpat. You may have to wait 1-3 minutes, as it’ll will be super hot. Use your safe gloves. But don’t let the sponge cake cool before rolling it up because the cake needs to be shaped warm-hot, or it will likely cake break later.
And peeling is so satisfying to do, especially for the scrapbooker in me that likes to work with her hands and anything that’s like paper. This one is edible paper. 😊
I rolled this one tight on a separate kitchen towel, but a fast shortcut is to roll up the peeled-off sponge cake on the silicone mat you baked it on. No kitchen towel needed.
Then it can be rolled all-in-one, and then clipped or tied up temporarily like a scroll to keep the spiral swirl shape, until it’s cool. 🍥
So you decide how you want to roll it up.
Tip: Roll it tight like a sleeping bag as it will tend to spring back some. Even for a spring roll like this one. 💕
So if you just keep in mind that A LOT of action critically happens with a sponge cake roll when it’s piping hot out of the oven, you’ll be golden! (With most other cakes you don’t do anything with it, until it’s cool.)
…So be ready!
And then after cooled, either resting at room temperature or chilling in the fridge, your efforts will be rewarded with a nice swirl if you’re lucky…
The final part is deciding what you want to fill your sponge cake roll in. You can do this in stages, like frosting a cake.
So you don’t have to make all the cake decisions at once if that’s overwhelming, or you don’t have a final sponge cake vision. You can keep decorating for the next day.
I often don’t decide in advance, and change it up as inspired with how I feel when it turns out. Then I decide the enhancing flavors and colors. It’s like naming your baby after he or she is born.
So you can bake the cake (with or without a pattern) and then decide on the filling and final zhugh (toppings) later. And that makes it your own cake personality.
Yessss!… It can be so much more than just cake. It can be filled with a jam or stuffed with whipped cream or ice cream… use your delicious food pairing imagination.
For my healthy tastes, I often like to use a thick Greek yogurt. But here I turned it into a raspberry jelly roll to keep it light. You can even make a chocolate balsamic glaze to go with melted chocolate…
This is a fun sponge texture cake that you can bake quicker than most regular cakes, and add your own pattern and flavors.
Course Dessert
Cuisine American
Author Brandy @ Healthy Happy Life Secrets
Equipment
Silpat or silicone baking mat
Baking pan
kitchen towel (optional)
baking spatula
Ingredients
3largeeggs, separated
1/2cupplain flour
1/2splash of lemon juice, cream of tartar, or white vinegar (for egg whites)
1Tbsporange or lemon zest (optional)
1tspbaking soda
1/8tspsalt (or pinch of salt)
1/4cupjuice (pineapple, lemon, or orange)
1tspvanilla extract
1/3cup granulated sugar
Cake filling (jam or Greek yogurt for healthier version)
Instructions
Separate egg whites from yolks. Tip: it's easier to separate eggs cold and straight from the fridge. Then let them warm to room temperature.
In a bowl, beat egg yolks and add in sugar. Add juice and vanilla.
In the same bowl, mix in flour to make a slightly thick batter.
In a separate mixing bowl, beat egg whites until stiff peaks form. Add in cream of tartar, lemon juice, or white vinegar to help stabilize.
Gently hand fold in fluffy egg whites (a little at a time so it's more evenly mixed in as the yolk batter is thicker).
Spread batter onto a rectangular baking sheet/pan with a silicone mat (Silpat recommended) or baking sprayed parchment paper. Level batter with a spatula or knife.
Bake at 325°F/165°C for 12-15 minutes. Watch closely toward the end/12 minute mark until the edges are baked but not browned.
Immediately or within a few minutes from warm-fresh-out-of-the-oven, peel off cake from the mat or paper. Then roll up in silicone mat (or a towel) into a spiral log. Clip or tie up so it stays rolled tight.
Let cool for 20 or more minutes at room temperature or in the fridge for quicker results.
Then cut off cake roll ends.
Add filling of choice (Greek yogurt for healthy). Plate and enjoy!
Notes
You can use all monk fruit sugar but it will not have the same texture as granulated sugar. Combining both can make a happy medium.
Protein smoothie bowl is dreamy color-enhanced with healthy anti-inflammatory powder supplements like spirulina, that’s also high in protein… and that you can learn more about below. Plus, how to blend in the superfood powder to make a tasty bowl (and not just a healthy one!).
Spirulina if you don’t know, is algae. It sounds like what you and I may have studied in school under a microscope or saw floating in a pond. I saw both in my journey.
Today, it’s no longer controversial in food and as a food ingredient. It’s also no longer a hold-your-nose-to-swallow healthy food that tastes like medicine when you find the right mild one that’s much easier to come across and source online today.
…Because I remember when I tried to source blue spirulina before 2020, and it was not online ready yet. But back then, I did buy green algae spirulina that quickly brought me back to the smells of living next to a pond and walking into a pet store, getting closer toward the fish aquarium sections.
But I blended some of the powder into my green smoothies with a bunch of pineapple to try and sweetly mask the taste.
And then one day I noticed the blue spirulina powder on the market. I had seen the powder in a bowl coming out of a smoothie place years earlier.
I was excited for getting the powder because I knew what aqua bright colors it could make.
…And so I did! And you too can make a breakfast protein smoothie bowl into a mermaid blue…
With the concentrated spirulina powder I had, I added a few drops of healthy plant-based Pandan gel that I discovered had been available for a while. It’s the vanilla extract of the east. And has an earthy taste and dark green color if you’re not familiar.
With the blue powder and green gel combined together, you get a cool blue-green aqua shade. Is it blue or is it green? That’s between your color mix and cones’ perceptions in your eyes.
And whatever the soothing end color, for me this has become a loved yogurt smoothie breakfast morning bowl. It’s also one of my site colors for daily inspiration.
Spirulina Protein Powder
But more than color, spirulina is also more than half protein! Between 57-70 grams in 100 grams that you can add to your grocery healthy protein list.
it’s an alternative for a protein powder if you don’t like whey (that comes from dairy).
Or collagen powders (that come from animals).
Spirulina is plant-based, and has other benefits like it’s a high antioxidant potency for anti-inflammatory health. The blue-green algae colors are filled with chlorophyll, that are especially good for body immunity and detox.
Blue spirulina is great for smoothies or a protein smoothie bowl. It makes for a fun healthy drink or bowl with natural colors.
Blended up with yogurt or milk white as the base medium, you get a lighter shade. It’s really an eat-from-the rainbow drink because white contains all the colors.🌈
But you can also go deep green or deep blue marine blue by blending in blueberries to blue spirulina.
And if you want to go wild purple, you can even make a deep purple color by also blending in strawberries or raspberries. Now that’s one royal bowl. 👑
And if you’re deciding which powder to add based on protein amount, here’s the healthy skinny…
Spirulina vs. Collagen (vs. Whey) Protein
Collagen is animal protein and has about 90 grams of protein per 100 grams, so it’s more than plant-based spirulina. Hydrolyzed collagen is the finer version of collagen.
In case you’re wondering, bone broth has less than 10 grams per 100 grams, since it’s diluted (vs. powder supplement). Collagen is a type of protein found in bone broth.
Fun fact: Even though you hear fitness people talking about and taking whey powder commonly for weight lifting and muscle building, you’d think it came from an animal source. But it’s actually 70-90 grams of protein that comes from dairy (as in separating curds and whey in the cheesemaking process)… and milk is not just for babies.
So the choice is yours… you can add whey, spirulina, or collagen into a protein smoothie bowl if you’re trying to rack up more protein points.
You’d never know in a pretty Tiffany blue bowl that you can dunk a spoon in… maybe even today?
And if you like this dreamy color and healthy idea, you’ll probably like this idea too, to make a healthy blue frosting you can have for breakfast (and feel good about feeding your body)… and/or a berry yogurt smoothie you can make in seconds with a Magic Bullet.
You can also turn a protein smoothie bowl into a drinking smoothie by simply blending in the liquid portion of the yogurt, milk, or other liquids.
Healthy brownie with fiber (and protein) can be made with wheat bran and wheat germ. You can 2XX (and fibermaxx). And have a delicious dessert good for breakfast or anytime.
Oh, and healthy especially with buckwheat flour added that’s in this fudge-like brownie recipe.
Also, learn how each kind of flour impacts your healthy brownie’s texture, and which flour has the most fiber. So you can decide which fiber to add in this healthy brownie. I’ll help you below…
Fiber is plant-based indigestible food that helps digestion. Think of whole wheat and other insoluble fiber sources, like tumbleweed passing through and picking up particles that would otherwise stay longer in your body.
Soluble fiber is good for helping cholesterol and blood sugar. And supporting optimized weight below the belt.
And daily fiber helps you feel leaner and look your best in your jeans… and who doesn’t love that?
So a healthy brownie is a simple way to lace in healthy ingredients that help our health… and satiate a sweet tooth. And in the duo benefits, you have your choice of healthy ingredients.
Here’s the healthy skinny, so you can make your ingredient choice as to which ones you want to include for your brownie this time.
First up is is the wheat germ ingredient, that’s the seed. It’s where it all begins for a wheat kernel…
Wheat germ has more protein and Vitamin E that also is an antioxidant. And wheat bran has more fiber than the good germ which is good for weight management.
Wheat bran is also part of the wheat kernel, like the skin or outer layer that’s super high in fiber. When you buy wheat germ, you’re getting more vitamins and minerals that embryos carry. And wheat bran has more fiber.
Whole wheat flour is more common and balanced with germ and bran in it, but it’s more processed. It includes the endosperm, that’s the middle layer and starchy section that helps make more flour.
Think of whole wheat flour as the more healthy alternative with more protein and fiber compared to or vs. (white) all-purpose flour.
Then there’s buckwheat… that’s a gluten-free flour choice.
Buckwheat is a super food and is actually not a wheat. That’s why it’s gluten-free. It has an even higher amount of fiber for fibermaxxing if that’s one of your heatlthy missions. It’s a good add for most sweet and breakfas-y dessert recipes like a blueberry scone or buckwheat ginger cookie snap.
…So those are the wheat options (both gluten wheat and gluten-free buckwheat flour)… and then there are a couple other good healthy brownie gluten-free options, including coconut flour and oat flour.
Coconut flour vs. whole wheat flour vs. oat flour
For the healthy brownie recipe options, you can decide between whole wheat flour, oat flour, and coconut flour as the main brownie flour. And the others (germ, bran, and buckwheat) are healthy supporting adds.
If you’re trying to do a fully gluten-free healthy brownie, buckwheat, oat, and coconut flours or a combo of them would be good choices.
Coconut flour is super high in fiber with over 20 grams or more per 1/2 cup (about 100 grams). Coconut flour has more insoluble fiber (and more fiber than oats). Oats has more soluble fiber (overall 3-4 grams of fiber per 1/2 cup or about 100 grams). Whole wheat flour has 6-7 grams of fiber per half cup.
If you’re looking to control blood sugar or cholesterol, then oats would be a good brownie ingredient choice. And the best choice for a healthy fudgy brownie. You can simply grind rolled oats to make the flour.
And besides coconut and oats, another gluten-free alternative is black beans that will give a more lumpy brownie with 6-9 grams of fiber.
It’s a good option if you have extra bean cans around (or kicking the cans deciding which ingredients to choose 😀)… and you want to have a more balanced soluble and insoluble fiber eating experience. For a brownie with black beans, to enhance flavor, you can add black coffee as a flavored liquid instead of regular water.
Healthy Brownie Tastes and Textures
Adding or subtracting flours won’t impact the brownie taste negatively (as cacao powder or chocolate-y flavors is the main brownie flavor and another healthy ingredient).
Unsweetened 100% cacao powder (cocoa baking powder) is anti-inflammatory. It helps to make this an overall low-sugar brownie.
And for a healthier sweetener, honey is also used, but you can substitute for a smidge of healthy monk fruit sugar (that’s better for a cake-like brownie, e.g. with whole wheat flour).
For additional flavor pairing or for no-added sugar, you can use peppermint extract for a chocolate mint brownie or coffee to enhance the cacao flavor tastes.
And besides tastes, you can favorably change the texture of the brownie you choose by the flour choices you make.
Whole wheat flour (a fully gluten option) will help make your brownies flour-cake-like, and a smoother batter (less healthy bumpy or rustic). And if you add baking powder (and/or baking powder), that will help the brownie rise in the oven.
But gluten-free flours like coconut flour will stay about the same height before and after the oven bake. Coconut flour brownies will be more dry for texture: the coconut flour batter will be more dry and the brownies out of the oven will be too.
For coconut flour brownies, I leaned into coconut tastes with shredded coconut here…
…And finely ground oat flour brownies will give more of a fudge-y brownie (like a flourless cake). The baked brownie will look more like the batter, than not at all. Brownies are simple that way. You can kinda predict what they will look like on the other side of the oven. 😊
…Where the brownie batter will be more like a slightly sticky cookie dough with some grainy oat bits. And more like a store bought brownie mix than say with coconut flour.
So, weighing fiber types/amounts and brownie texture differences and what’s priority to you, will help tip the scale toward as to which flour(s) you choose this time for your healthy brownie plate.
And as you’re deciding flours if you haven’t already, this brownie recipe also has egg white and applesauce as healthy binders.
…Which btw I love substituting using any butter or egg yolk with unsweetened applesauce in a healthy brownie. And if you like applesauce in general, you’ll also like a fruit roll up or applesauce cobbler.
Longer Lasting Brownie
Applesauce will help your brownie last longer if you want to make a larger batch. And coconut oil will help that mission too.
You can use another oil like light olive oil or canola oil, but it will not last as long at room temperature. Those oils can grow rancid quicker at (warmer) room temperatures.
And the same goes for liquid choices. Milk (and liquids that need to be refrigerated) will not last as long vs. using water (or an enhancing liquid like black coffee).
…So now that you have all the brownie ingredient notes, are you ready to make this delicious, one-bowl batter recipe?
This is a 2X fiber brownie that has no black beans. It's fudge and less cake-like. This will make 6 small brownie bites or 2 regular size square brownies.
In one bowl, hand combine ingredients with a spoon.
Bake at 350°F/180°C for about 15 minutes. Do not overbake.
Notes
If you want to turn this into a cake-like brownie, add 1/4 cup whole wheat flour and 1 tsp baking powder.Oat flour is better at blood sugar and lower cholesterol and coconut flour is good for supporting regular digestion. Coconut flour will make a more dry brownie, and oat flour will give a more fudgy brownie.Add enough water (or liquid) to get a smoother batter that fully incorporates the flours of choice.
Stress and burnout go hand in hand. It’s like a boiling tea kettle that’s sitting on high heat (stress) on the stove, and running low on water that’s quickly evaporating as the seconds hand moves forward.
It’s only a matter of short time before the pot burns, and the kettle’s whistle dies.
We put ourselves in those type of pressure kettle situations in life by saying yes and taking action to give us results. But we can overwhelm ourselves when we say yes to too much, too often.
Your yes starts out as a healthy exercise, but over time you’ll run dry if you run out of steam.
…You add stress when you don’t add more water or life to your situations that you learn from. Like most, you’ve been learning since you were a child.
That’s when stress likely first showed up and started accumulating in the body keeping score.
Healing from those past memories is a healthy way toward your future.
And like most balanced areas of life, a little stress is healthy and human, like pursuing a one-and-done challenge for experience and growth, but when you tip the scales to a no-happy-situation-end in sight, that’s when it’s adding stress to the body in some way.
…And then there are situations happening around us that are out of control. Like daily world news or situations where we know they’re out there looming and impacting our lives… but we put the worry thoughts aside and we go about our daily life.
Those situations take a small daily toll on the mind-body even if we get out of that headspace for some time.
It’s like steam happening in the background that we know about, but don’t feel.
These type of daily stressors are part of life’s undercurrents and happenings.
But burnout is not. It’s applied to a specific area of life, that’s usually work… where overwhelm,or additional burdens worsen your situation.
