When I’m an Anxious Annie, one of my self-soothing practices is to make baked goods and eat them. AND I MAKE NO APOLOGIES ABOUT THIS, TO BE CLEAR. The cool thing is you get to benefit from my anxiety. Enjoy these brownies - they’ve got a surprise ingredient in them!

I created this recipe because I was in need of healthy snacks to send off to school with Hattie…that didn’t contain nuts. We eat this as a breakfast, dessert, or layered with yogurt for a parfait-style snack. It’s ridiculously easy to make and it’s pretty darn tasty. Enjoy!

Zucchini is starting to come up like whoa.

If you're growing your own, you're probably seeing all the pretty yellow flowers bust out, as well. EAT THOSE. Squash blossoms contain vitamin C, beta carotene, iron and calcium. They're another way to add variety to your diet. Try out this recipe and you won't be sorry!!

Another fun kale salad to add to your routine!

Dropping this recipe just in time for your Fourth of July Festivities. Enjoy!

Always on the hunt for a decent bar that doesn't have weird ingredients or tons of sugar, I came up with this. Lots of protein, fat and fiber to make it a proper snack. And a minimal amount of sugar. (If you want to the low down on sugar—is it really that "bad"??—check out the latest and greatest from The Funk'tional Nutrition Podcast.)

Lentils are a great source of resistant starch. Resistant starch is starch that our bodies cannot digest, so it travels down to our large intestine where our gut bacteria can digest it. (P.S. SO COOL.) Those bacteria ferment the resistant starch to short-chain fatty acids, like butyrate. Butyrate does a LOT for us - a crucial component of gut health, and also helpful for brain health, weight maintenance and cancer prevention.

This sauce is one way to slam a bunch of veggies down. You won’t regret making it. TRUST.

Make-ahead recipe for a hearty grain-free breakfast.

This pasta is protein-packed and veggie-loaded. Perfect for when you're looking for healthy comfort food, or a meat-free dinner.

I used Banza pasta, which is pasta made from chickpeas and pea protein. I order it from Thrive Market, like most of my dry goods (click here to save 25% on your first order!) I think it's super tasty, but use whatever pasta you like!

We’ve been doing a deep dive on nutrigenetics and nutrigenomics. It’s some complex stuff, and it kind of makes me want to hide my head in the sand.

But it’s also the future of understanding nutrition, disease prevention, and health, so nutrition professionals really should have a decent grip on this stuff. Why is it so important?

A yummy recipe for protein-rich snack balls!

Just so you know, creating a recipe title is hands down the hardest part of writing a recipe. I don't even know what's happening here. It's a type of bread. But it's not banana bread or zucchini bread or pumpkin bread. It's good. And there's a whole can of beans in there, so that's pretty tricky, no?

There are five different fruits and veggies slammed into this smoothie bowl. If made according to this recipe, it offers up about 400 calories, 14 grams of fat, 11 gram of fiber and 25 grams of protein. Not too shabby whether you're feeding it to your kids, or eating it yourself!

I'm developing lots of new recipes for my new nutrition program. And I'm gonna share one with you this week because Super Bowl and chili go together like...super bowl and chili.

I've been making veggie chili for over a decade, and I've never once written down a recipe. But I did you guys a solid and actually measured out ingredients and listed out steps. I tweaked my OG recipe a little bit to make it more detox-friendly.

I wanted an easy and nutritious snack that we could pack up on the fly...so I made these cookies. They contain fat, protein and fiber—the 3 things I look for in a hearty snack. They’re super tasty (pleased both the adults and toddler), but definitely not your traditional chewy gooey chocolate chip cookie, more like a snack bar in cookie form. So heads up there. We’ve already made them 3 times. Try ‘em out!

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to get healthy. That’s not the issue. The issue is how we approach it. Diet culture instills unrealistic ideals of beauty and provides us with unhealthy ways of achieving them. And then they make a hefty profit.

So smoothies it is. A boon for you, because I'm coming up with different recipes to keep things fresh. I'm also dumping these recipes into my Funk'tional Holidays Facebook group—so head on over there if you haven't already! I've got other holistic practitioners adding free workouts, yoga videos, meditations and Ayurvedic practices to keep you healthy and sane throughout the holidays!

BUT! This week I popped into the Durham Juicery like the college kid I think I still am and ordered the Faster Than Light smoothie. I can’t even explain the joy that it brought me. It was cold, creamy and creative. It was so good I told my husband about it later that day. And texted my friend before going to bed that night because I was still thinking about it. And then made it for breakfast the next day.

What does apple sauce have to do with gut health? Check out today's blog to learn more. Or just skip ahead to the recipe—it's the easiest apple sauce you will ever make.