Yummy in your tummy Chilli con carne

Quick post about yesterday's dinner. It was a bit different from our usual chilli but scrumptious nevertheless :)

What you need:

• Haricot rouge/ Kidney beans (canned or boil up your own)
• Onion
• Garlic
• Canned tomatoes
• Lean minced beef or turkey
• Worcester sauce (if you have it in stock)
• Chopped up veggies such as carrots, courgettes and mushrooms
• Olive oil
• Stock cube
• Salt and pepper
• Special twist: Cocoa powder, cinnamon and honey/ agave

1. In a hot frying pan, drizzle in some olive oil and lightly brown your garlic and chopped onions.
2. Add your minced meat to the onions and fry till the meat is cooked through.
3. Add the veggies (except the mushrooms, they can be added during the last 10 minutes), the tomatoes, stock cube, kidney beans, about a teaspoon of cinnamon and enough water to allow the mix to simmer gently for about 20 minutes.
4. Once it has simmered for a while, season with Worcester sauce, salt, pepper, a tablespoon of cocoa and about a tablespoon of honey. Taste and play around with the seasoning till it hits the spot. 

The cocoa doesn't make it taste chocolatey but gives the chilli a rich indulgent touch and is similar to Mexican mole sauce. I hope I haven't missed out anything! Quite hard to make chilli look good but this is what it looked like.

Enjoy :)

Also, I love Cassey Ho's quick online workout videos, they vary from 5 to about 20 minutes long and they are so much fun! If you want a perky bum, you should definitely try this!

Have fun!

xxxxxx

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Flourless pizza! uhuh that's right!

I was a bit sceptical about this to begin with. I've seen loads of posts and pictures on Instagram about cauliflower crust pizza, which to be honest, didn't sound appealing at all, however I have been intrigued ever since! Since I had this massive cauliflower in the fridge, I thought why not, worth a shot!!

Most recipes I found included cheese in the crust, but I managed to find a healthier one with 2 spoons of almond meal instead. Recipe on the following link:

http://www.theluckypennyblog.com/2013/05/the-best-dairy-free-cauliflower-pizza.html?showComment=1371739620542#c975254082819871067

I've never been a big fan of pizza, but i must say this is surprisingly yummy! Tom even asked for seconds!! WINNER :)

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Treats for everyone!

Afternoon :), such a busy cooking day! Granola, muffins, energy balls, Lemon meringue pie, healthy pizza, roast chicken, roasted butternut and sweet potato...... zzz I'm ready for a nap!

Slowly getting mum back to exercise after fracturing her rib, so we did 20 minutes of weights today. Therefore, I think she deserves a lovely yummy treat! Her fav, LEMON MERINGUE PIE- made healthy!

And for dad, well dad always deserves a treat :), he adores any sweet Indian cakes such as laddoos or burfis, so I thought I'd make him some DATE AND ALMOND ENERGY BALLS without added sugar  or the need for deep frying.

LEMON MERINGUE PIE
Base:
Mum kept going on about walnuts so I tried to make a crunchy walnut base, simply by crushing up walnuts with a pinch of salt and baking soda, mixing in half a teaspoon of melted coconut oil and finally pressing now the mix into ramekins and baking for 15 minutes at 180 degrees Celsius.
I found the final cooked base a bit too strong tasting and crumbly, although Mrs Law didn't seem to mind it as a contrast to the light lemon curd. I think next time I'll either mix the crushed walnuts with almond meal or make a stack of Lemon Meringue pancakes instead for a lighter yummy dessert!

Lemon curd:

OMG! This is to die for! If you love lemony tasting things, you HAVE to make this!!! Lemon curd without tons of sugar or butter. Definitely going to have this in the fridge ready in a big jar, ready to top toast, pancakes or whatever really. All you need is for about 3 tablespoons of curd:

• juice and zest of 1 lemon (separate)
• 2 tbsp of honey
• 1 egg

1. In a small saucepan, squeeze the lemon and leave it to simmer with the honey until warm.
2. In another bowl, lightly beat the egg. Slowly stream in the warm syrup onto the egg whilst continuously whisking the egg so that it doesn't curdle.
3. Pour the mixture back into the pan and stir on low heat for hardly any time at all until it all thickens up nicely.
4. Stir in the zest et voila!!!

Meringue topping:
Just beat up an egg white with a pinch of salt until stiff, once done slowly fold in a tablespoon on honey.

Assemble it all together and use a blow torch to brown off the meringue or quickly put under the grill.

ENERGY BALLS
These are really yummy whenever you need a little nibble! Urghh i really need to start measuring out my quantities, I usually do everything by eyesight.

• Handful of Almond
• about 8 dates
• couple of spoons of instant quick cooking oats or almond meal
• optional seeds (I use chia) and desiccated coconut

1. Soak the almond and pitted dates in a large bowl or jug ,with water just covering the contents, you can leave this overnight or for a couple of hours till the almonds soften.
2. Pour away all excess water and using a hand blender, blend the nuts and dates together till it forms a smooth paste. I sometimes do not blend it completely, leaving a few chunks of almonds for a bit of texture.
3. Now add a spoon or so of oats or almond meal to absorb any excess wetness. Mix in any additions.
4. Leave the mix in the fridge for a while to harden, form balls and roll into desiccated coconut or cocoa powder.

These can be kept for a couple of days in the fridge as an 'on the go' snack.

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Must have healthy snacks

Hola,

No matter when or where, I always make sure I have my homemade Granola and healthy oaty banana muffins in stock for that time of the day when you're feeling a bit lethargic and in need of some energy!
Oats (not the instant quick cooking type) are low GI which means that they will satisfy and energize you, while helping to keep your blood sugar levels on an even level.

GRANOLA
This is a really easy recipe that you can experiment with and alter the ingredients to your liking.
You can use olive oil instead of coconut oil, however it is worth getting some cooking coconut oil (make sure you don't get the one used for hair, like my dad did!)

To make a large box full, last about a week here with 3 hungry adults!

• Approx 3 cups of bulking agent ( I used 1½-2 cups rolled oats, ¾-1 cup of wheat bran (you can substitute with crushed up weetabix), ½ cup of seeds such as lin, poppy, hemp etc. (optional))
• ½ cup of nuts such as walnuts (optional)
• Lots of cinnamon, I probably use about 1-2 tbsp (to your liking)
• Vanilla, seeds from pod or essence (optional)
• 3-4 tablespoons of coconut oil, melted.
• Approx 6 tablespoons of honey, more if you want a very sweet granola
• 1 egg yolk, OPTIONAL, I only add it if I have a yolk lying around, just to help bind the mixture.
• Water, just enough to bind it all together

1. Preheat oven to about 170-180 degrees Celsius.
2. Mix all the dry ingredients and nuts together.
3. Pour in all the wet ingredients and add sufficient water, usually about 4 tbsp, to bind the mix together all together. (It needs to come together but still be quite dry, I find using your hands to mix works best!)
4. Pat the whole mix down tightly on a non stick tray and bake for about 30 minutes-  40 minutes until golden brown, breaking it up and mixing half way through, as the edges tend to brown quickly. The mini clusters will harden as the mix cools.

NOTE: If you do prefer very big crunchy clusters, add a tad more coconut oil and honey.

BANANA MUFFINS

These are a good way to use up ripe bananas and are handy to have as a snack in the freezer, I've started giving my dad one a day to take to work :)

Makes 12

• 1 cup old fashioned oats 
• ¾ cup wholewheat flour, if you do prefer lighter muffins, you could use ¾ cup white flour or mix half white half brown.
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp baking soda
• lots of cinnamon :), and any other spices you may want such as nutmeg
• 2 tsp of vanilla
• pinch of salt
• a third of a cup of coconut oil, melted
• a third of a cup of honey (these are only slightly sweetened, so if you desire, add more)
• 2 eggs
• 3 ripe bananas, mashed

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius.
2. Mix together the coconut oil and honey till well combined, add the eggs, vanilla and mashed up bananas and mix for a minute.
3. Sift in the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon and salt over the wet mix and pour in the oats. Fold it all together nicely, but make sure not to over mix.
4. Spoon the muffin mix into muffin cases (if using brown flour, you can fill them up as they do not rise as much as white flour based muffins.), and bake for about 15-20 minutes.

OPTIONAL: Rachel messaged me yesterday about blueberries muffins, and these would be perfect with blueberries added in! Any optional add ins such as berries, raisins, walnuts, seeds, flaked almonds, chocolate chips can be added in with the dry ingredients and delicately folded into the mix. 

Here's my granola fruit parfait and a banana muffin,

Happy baking!!

xxx

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Tom killed it today!

Just a quick post before bedtime!

So proud of my little twinny! Today was his third day of having a proper exercise routine and he didn't give up although he's all sore from yesterday's Ministry of Sound Pump it up workout and weight session! (I hope that the motivational board I made him had a role to play in this!).

 We had a few power cuts today :( (welcome to the Tropics!) and our TV in the gym started playing up on us. So instead, I took the dogs for a walk and made Tom do some HIIT, blasts of 30 second sprints followed by 30 seconds of brisk walking to get his heart rate pumping! We did this all along our walk around the neighbouring sugarcane fields, I now think that being a personal trainer would be a very fun job!! I loved running after Tom with Max on a leash, threatening and shouting to push him till the end, future career path perhaps?!

Also, BROWN RICE HAS PASSED THE LAW TEST! As soon as Tom opened the rice cooker, "Is that brown rice?" with a disgusted look on his face. I told him that it was actually fried rice with soya sauce and to my surprised he actually ate it all up without complaining! Such a shame that healthy foods have such negative connotation associated to them, possibly due to all the tasteless boring healthy food out there? Healthy chilli con carne recipe with a twist to be posted tomorrow.

Here's one of my quick morning workouts, also add a few 60 seconds planks here and there, enjoy!

Good night :) xxx

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Chocoholic delights :)

Woohoo second recipe-post of the day, and this one includes 2 recipes! Both very rich, creamy and most importantly, 'chocolatey' desserts. Had a dinner guest over last night and got his approval as well as the old man's, who is very hard to please when it comes to desserts! They are, drum roll please....

• Chocolate mousse (secret ingredient: AVOCADOS )
• Chocolate mud cake (secret ingredient: AUBERGINES )

By adding mashed up veggies/fruit in your recipes means that you can abstain from using oil or butter whilst still keeping your mix moist and creamy.

CHOCOLATE MOUSSE

• Avocado (usually 1/2 is enough per person)
• cocoa powder (depending on how intense you want the mousse to taste)
• agave syrup/ honey to taste

1. Couldn't be any easier!  Just blend it all together and enjoy, Instant chocolate mousse! I piped mine using a piping bag into mini ramekins and left to chill for about 30 minutes. This mousse is very rich and decadent so a little will go a long way and will fill you up nicely! :)

• I know you might be thinking 'Oh, wait a minute, avocados are high in calories and sooooo fattening!' but remember you do need healthy fats in your balanced diet. Avocados also have loads of benefits such as helping with your eyesight, aid to stabilize blood sugar, to reduce cholesterol and the list goes on! 

CHOCOLATE MUD CAKE

This cake is my all time favourite! Gluten free, low in sugar and fat but oh so delicious. The aubergine makes it so rich that you are very unlikely to over-indulge! 

• 1 large aubergine (pierce the skin and microwave or cook in the oven until soft)
• 2 tbsp cocoa powder 
• 3 tbsp honey (more if you'd like a very sweet cake)
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 200 g good dark chocolate 
• 2 eggs
• about 100 g ground almonds

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius, Lightly grease your baking dish with olive oil ( i used a 12 inch glass dish).
2. Break up the dark chocolate into small pieces and melt either using a bain-marie or in a microwave as I do. If using a microwave only heat for about 40 seconds at a time,check and stir, as chocolate can easily burn and go grainy! Once melted, leave to cool.
3. Once the aubergine is warm/ cool enough to handle, scoop out as much of the flesh as possible away from the skin and blend up into a puree.
4. Now, fold the aubergine, eggs, baking powder, ground almonds, cocoa, vanilla and honey into the cooled chocolate until evenly combined. 
5. Pour into prepared dish and bake for 30-40 minutes until a knife comes out with moist crumbs (almost clean).

I usually leave mine to cool, shape the cake with a cookie cutter and microwave for 10 seconds to be served as a warm dessert. Also, any left over bits are frozen and nibbled on in those times of need whilst watching The Mindy Show or Masterchef!!

Now off to cook the lads dinner; healthy hearty chilli and brown rice. I have been offered money if i can get them to like brown rice, haha let's see how this goes!

xxx

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Pancake frenzy!!

these are my go to breakfast, snack, post workout dinner... just whenever meal :)

Basic recipe comes from http://www.blogilates.com/, 1 egg and 1 mashed banana pancakes.
I like to add a bit of bulk to mine though, firstly makes them way easier to flip and work with but also tastier! (not too banana-omelette tasting!)

BASIC INGREDIENTS:

• 1 mashed banana
• 1 egg
• 1 tablespoon of any flour, i usually use protein powder, almond meal, coconut flour or brown rice flour. (If you do want to add quite a bit of protein powder, perhaps as a post workout meal, add some yogurt to the mix as p.powder tends to make cooked pancakes slightly dry.)

OPTIONAL ADDITIONS:

• for added fibre/crunch: teaspoon or so of any of the following chia seeds, poppy seeds, lin seeds,  psyllium husks(available from oriental shops in Port Louis) etc..
• for different flavoured pancakes: 1 tbsp of cocoa, 1 tsp vanilla or any flavouring, orange/ lemon zest, cocoa nibs, dark choc chips, raisins...

1. Just mix it all together until combined, the batter shouldn't be too runny. If so add more banana or whatever flour you're using. When using mini bananas from my garden, i usually use 2 per egg. 
2. You can now add in any additions, however they are just as delicious with the basic recipe.
3. Have a hot pan ready(medium heat), lightly grease with olive oil or coconut oil, spoon a tablespoon of the mix into the pan and shape it nicely with the back of your spoon, flip after a couple of minutes and enjoy!! (You do need a bit of practice with flipping! make sure they bubble up slightly and flip very delicately.)
4. now get creative, layer with whatever you like, i use peanut butter, strawberries, grilled bananas, honey, greek yogurt etc etc you get the idea.. or of course enjoy plain.

let me know how they go :) 

K xxx

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