Carrot and Apple Crunch Recipe
In the mood to make something special for your equine friends? Here’s a fun, simple recipe that’s loaded with quality nutrients and tastes great. Your horses will love you for it!
Ingredients
- 1 cup rolled oats and 1 cup of barley flakes.
- If the whole grains are not available, this recipe can be made with whole grain flour, or 2 cups of sweet feed.
- 2 cups oat bran
- 1 cup fresh flax seed
- 4 large carrots, finely grated or pureéd
- 1 cup unsulphured black strap molasses
- 1 cup applesauce or small apple chunks
Instructions
Preheat oven to 300F degrees. Line cookie sheet with parchment paper. Mix molasses, carrots, and applesauce in one bowl. In another bowl, mix the dry ingredients. Slowly combine the molasses mixture with the dry ingredients. Add only enough molasses so that you have a thick dough to work with, and add more bran to your mix, if necessary. The dough should pull away from the sides of your mixing bowl.
Using a tablespoon, drop batter onto a cookie sheet and flatten slightly. If you want to make energy bars for your equine buddy, simply sprinkle flour on a piece of parchment paper, roll out the dough, and score in the sizes you would like. Transfer the parchment paper to your cookie sheet, and away you go.
Bake for about one hour. Check for burning around the edges because of the molasses. After one hour, turn the oven down to 175F, and bake the biscuits for two more hours. Turn oven off and let the biscuits dry out completely. Store in an air tight container or zip-lock bag. You can easily double this recipe and freeze the dough, so you always have something special on hand you can make for your “excellent equine.”
A Note About the Ingredients:
Carrots help more than eyes
Carrots contain betacarotene, vitamin B complex, vitamins C, D, E, and K, and iron, as well as calcium, phosphorus, sodium, potassium, magnesium, manganese, sulphur, copper and iodine. Carrots are valuable as a digestive aid, a glandular tonic, and as a skin cleanser and eye conditioner.
Unsulphured blackstrap molasses
Molasses has a long history going back as far as 1493, when Christopher Columbus brought sugar cane to the West Indies. Until the late 19th century, molasses was the most popular sweetener, due in part, because it was more affordable than refined sugar. Molasses contains calcium, copper, iron, magnesium, manganese, potassium, selenium, and vitamin B6. Always look for blackstrap molasses that is unsulphured, and store it in a tightly sealed container in the fridge or a cool dry place. Opened containers of blackstrap molasses have a shelf life of approximately six months.
“A” is for apple. . . and antioxidant
Red apples contain vitamin C, potassium, phosphorus, chlorine, sodium, magnesium, calcium, sulfur, iron, flourine, and silicon, plus many trace minerals. Apples are powerhouses of antioxidant activity. Why red? Red fruits and vegetables contain specific phytochemicals, specifically lycopene and anthocyanins, that are being studied for their health-promoting properties. Apples, and especially apple peels, have been found to have a potent antioxidant activity that scavenges free radicals, inhibiting the growth of cancer cells. The antioxidant activity of one apple is equivalent to about 1500 mg of vitamin C. Red Delicious, Northern Spy and Ida Red have more potent disease-fighting antioxidants reflected in their higher levels of polyphenol activity.
Sweet, sweet feed Sweet feed is just that. You can buy it or make your own mix. Traditionally, 10 to 20 per cent sweet feed was added to regular grains, to make them more palatable. Commercial sweet feeds are usually corn based or oat based, and then other grains, like wheat and barley, are added to the mix. The addition of molasses makes the regular grain blend a sweet treat. The trick to purchasing sweet feed is to make sure that you are not seeing a mound of molasses. Read labels carefully, and always check for the manufacturing date.
HINT: Molasses is easier to work with if you heat it slightly in the microwave before using. Alternatively, lightly baste a measuring cup with oil and then pour the molasses into the measuring cup. When you add it to the rest of your ingredients, you will avoid a sticky mess.
*Not appropriate for Insulin Resistant horses
