Healthy Lemon Curd in the Thermomix

I am a big fan of sweet, gooshy textured desserts. My favourite things to eat include custards, ice cream, chocolate mousse and tiramisu. If its squishy and creamy, I'm into it! Lemon curd is another favourite, and I'm just so chuffed to have come up with a recipe whose ingredients are good for me, using an unprocessed sweetener. This lemon curd is so healthy, in fact, that I even found once that it alleviated my symptoms when I had a cold! Lemon is a great unsung healing agent, anti viral as well as anti bacterial, and coconut oil boasts the same qualities.

 I've used this recipe for lemon merengue pie and mini lemon tarts, both using almond flour pie crust. It also makes a wonderful food gift in a pretty jar.

When I make it I use rise malt syrup as the sweetener. If you plan to use raw honey instead, start small. Honey is much sweeter and has a stronger flavour than rice malt syrup, so I'd try a quarter of a cup. 

Lemon Curd Recipe

1/2 cup fresh lemon juice (100g)

1/2 cup rice malt syrup (170g)

Scant 1/2 cup coconut oil (70g)

3 eggs and 1 yolk

Place all the ingredients into the thermomix. Set to 70 degrees for 7 minutes on speed 4.

Tadaa! Enjoy it any way you like. If you have a great idea for including this recipe in your baking, let me know!

The milky way - Day 5 My Whole 30

It's only day 5 but there are already some intriguing developments in my experimental foray into strict paleo territory! At first I had wicked sugar cravings. No surprises really, I coped by eating my body weight in bananas. After a few days the sweet cravings wore off, to be replaced by a different and unexpected craving; dairy.

I mentioned in the last post that I believe in raw dairy and yoghurt as beneficial components in the diet, provided your ancestors were known to consume it. My ancestors certainly did consume it, so I have been blithely consuming raw milk, raw butter, raw cream and yoghurt, as well as Gouda cheese (for its elusive vitamin K2 content) to my hearts content. My breakfasts were often smoothies with raw milk, yoghurt, egg yolk, berries and banana. My snacks were often cheese, my late evening treat was yoghurt laced with honey, vanilla, banana and nuts. In between I'd have glasses of raw milk, straight up. These are the things I'm missing now.

However my sinuses are not missing these things, nor I assume, are my intestines. They're dancing for joy at a five day reprieve. I've felt my sinuses clearing (gross but true!) and my head feels lighter without all that gunk up in there, and I'm breathing more easily, and probably more efficiently. That alone can amount to big health benefits. (For more info on breathing better, look up buteyko method)

And now that I think about it, its not the first time I've craved dairy. When I was pregnant with my boy my yoghurt cravings were so strong I took to carrying disposable spoons in my handbag. I'd walk around the streets of Melbourne with 250g tubs of Jalna natural, easily finishing one a day. We even bought a yoghurt maker, thinking it might reduce the cost of my humerous addiction. 

A pregnancy craving can be laughed off, or rationalised as my body asking for beneficial bacteria, but now I see this is a little more serious. I probably have an intolerance to dairy. I'm devastated. Boohoo. 

Perhaps one day, when my intestines are in good health, with balanced flora, I'll be able to consume small amounts of raw dairy. Until then, I'm off the juice.

Recipe post: Sugar free banana cake with chocolate cream cheese frosting

I have another cake recipe to share! I made this for a friend's birthday recently and it was a hit, and really simple to make! If you have a thermomix or similar it's a breeze. It's a matter of throw everything in an blitz, my favourite kind of recipe! You can also vary it in any way you like, by adding different spices, nuts, lemon zest or even chocolate chips.

Cake ingredients

125g butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup honey, rice syrup or maple syrup, or a mixture of any of these
1 1/4 cups mashed overripe banana (about 2 large bananas)
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
100ml buttermilk (or raw milk mixed with yoghurt)
225g (1 1/2 cups) gluten free or spelt self-raising flour
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
nutmeg, I like a whole tsp but you add to taste!

Whizz all these in the processor or thermomix, then bake in a 20cm sandwich tin for about 40 mins, or til a skewer comes out cleanish. It won't be totally clean, it's a very moist cake.

Cool completely, then refrigerate before serving, preferably overnight. The texture is like a banana mud cake!

Icing ingredients

3 bars well...naturally sugar free chocolate, milk or dark (about 135g)
250g cream cheese, preferably home made (from yoghurt)
1/3 cup maple syrup

Melt chocolate in a double boiler then leave aside to cool.
In a processor blend cream cheese and maple syrup, then add melted chocolate and blend til smooth.
Slather over the cooled cake thickly!

Please leave your comments if you make this cake, and let me know how it went!

Bread Habits - staff of life or contributor to chronic disease?

This habit change will be about bread. Bread has been known throughout history as 'the staff of life'. For most people bread is a huge part of the diet, and we're told it's good for us, which is easy to believe since humans have eaten it for several thousand years. However the reality is that bread is now a very different beast than it was even 150 years ago, increasingly so, and it has become a big health problem for everyone in the developed world today.

Just pause a minute to consider your bread habits. How much bread do you eat in a day? Which bread do you buy? Why do you buy it? Are you buying the 'healthiest' bread available? Or do you choose based on taste? Or texture? Or the brand you grew up with?

What if I told you that bread in general is a very nutrient poor food? It's marketed as a fibre rich food, but compared to any fresh vegetable or fruit, stacks up very badly. A wheat grain is indeed high in fibre, however about 94% of it is lost in the milling process. Bread is so nutrient deficient, in fact, that if synthetic vitamins and other guff weren't added it'd be downright poisonous (like confectionery). As it is, I class wheat bread as an 'antinutrient'.

To get right to the point about bread; there's only one in Perth I'd recommend consuming regularly. It's the Organic 100% Rye from Bodhi's Bakery, and you can buy it almost anywhere these days, even supermarkets. There are four things that make this bread a better choice than any others. (Unless, of course, you're gluten intolerant, in which case either avoid bread at all, or find one made from sprouted gluten free grains.) It's probably significantly more expensive than what you're buying now, that's fine. Don't eat it every day, and don't have more than two slices per day. And remember that health is worth paying for, slow acting poison is not!

1) It's Rye, not wheat.

There are several problems inherent in wheat itself, in its current, selectively bred incarnation, which make it worth avoiding. The reasons for its wide use in baked goods are that it gives a good yield to farmers and an attractive and tasty product to food industry. But compared to other grains it's not even close to being the best nutritionally. Wheat is also known to be a great favourite of opportunistic gut flora, like candida albicans, so avoid it for the sake of your gut flora!

2) It's stone ground.

In the late 1800's a brilliant breakthrough was made in flour milling. It put an end to inefficient, laborious stone grinding of grain. It was steel rolling! Problem with it was, unbeknownst to anyone, steel rolling was causing a health crisis. This new processing method was busting up the endosperm in every little grain. Stone grinding didn't do this, thus the most nutritious part of the grain was left intact. When steel rolling became widespread, people started to suffer on mass from symptoms of nutritional deficiency. The remedy was the addition of a few synthetic nutrients to the flour after it was milled, however they have never matched the levels found in an original wheat grain. Yet this seemed to fix the problem and no one has questioned it ever since. However it is widely documented that the omission of bread from the diet can be an effective treatment for many chronic diseases, so the problem has not gone away at all, it's simply less acute.

3) It's sourdough.

Our ancestors have always soured their grains. They knew this was the only way to render them digestible. We now know why. Grains contain phytates, chemicals which block digestion and make it difficult to absorb nutrients. Souring predigests the grains somewhat, neutralising the phytates. This takes the pressure off our digestive system and renders the bread less acceptable food for opportunistic gut flora, like candida. It's important to avoid any bread that isn't a REAL sourdough (and plenty of so-called sourdoughs out there aren't real these days). In fact, most bread is given no time at all to ferment, more yeast is added instead, which gives another set of problems for the gut.

4) It's organic

For obvious reasons, this is ideal! Don't need pesticides in your bread.

So that's why I choose Bodhi's Organic 100%. You try it too, and see if it gives you a happier tummy!

Whole Food Parties

As promised, this post is about catering a kids party using health foods and sugar substitutes. It's perfectly possible to do this. I did it recently; everyone asked for my honey ginger cake recipe, there were zero cookies left after 2 hours, and one Mum even discovered her 4 year old was mad for fresh blueberries.

In addition to the routine dips, rice crackers and veggie sticks, there was a zucchini slice made by Mum, cut into finger sized pieces, and little meatballs made by MIL. The sugar free sweets included a chocolate cheesecake slice, a ginger honey cake, chocolate chunk cookies and the birthday cake. There was also some cut up fruit.

The birthday cake was a butter cake recipe from taste.com.au, into which I substituted gluten free flour and rapadura sugar. I could also have used coconut sugar. I experimented with using my thermomix to turn the rapadura into icing sugar, which worked well texturally speaking, but didn't taste awesome! I'll keep experimenting and give a recipe when I'm satisfied.

The ginger honey cake was a variation of a wonderful recipe I found in Clean Eating magazine. Here's my version:

1.5 cups stone ground spelt flour
1 tbsp baking powder
1.5 tbsp ground ginger
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ground cloves
1/2 cup unprocessed honey
1/2 cup egg whites (that was about 4)
1/2 cup milk
1/3 cup organic cold pressed peanut oil

Preheat oven to 180

Sift dry ingredients into a large mixing bowl.

In a medium bowl, whisk wet ingredients until combined. Pour into dry ingredients and combine, then bake in a sandwich tin about 25 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean. You can also use it for cupcakes.

See? Great recipe, nothing to it!! Also great because the cake actually improves with time in an airtight container, so I was able to bake it 2 days in advance. On the day I cut it in half and filled it with whipped cream. Yum. And low GI.

Gluten free honey sweetened cut out cookies: here. You can use some other flour if you like, I used a stone ground spelt and the recipe needed about a cup and a half rather than one cup. If you cut them into cool shapes, like the birthday kids' newly acquired age, as Nigella suggests in 'How to be a Domestic Goddess', they don't need fancy icing. For a christmassy feel, just add ginger, cloves and nutmeg, poke a hole in them before they go into the oven, then hang them from the tree by a ribbon when they cool. Nawww

The cheesecake slice was a matter of googling 'no bake chocolate cheesecake' and following the recipe for the filling, substituting rapadura for the sugar. I had also bought Well...Naturally's sugar free dark chocolate bars from the supermarket. I infused them into some cream by heating it on the stove and melting the chocolate into it. It chilled in the fridge, then I whipped it and used it in the cheesecake.

I have also had success making a honey cheesecake which is gaps friendly using this recipe by Sally Fallon-Morell. I usually halve it though, to fit a 22cm spring form pan. And it's amazing if you add 200g of pureed strawberries to the mixture! I put in some with the honey, some to swirl through the mixture, and the rest I drizzle over the top. Food of the gods.

The cheesecake crust, however, was 130g of pitted medjool dates, 130g of organic almonds, 20g of raw cacao (or more if you're game), 2 tbsp virgin coconut oil and a splash of vanilla extract. You can also throw in a handful of dessicated coconut. I blitzed this in the thermomix til the almonds were broken into small chunks, but not totally homogeneous with the rest of the mix. Then I pressed it into a biscuit tray and stuck it in the fridge.

The chocolate chunk cookies were easy too, just a matter of substituting rapadura and gluten free flour into this recipe from Joy of Baking.

At a recent brunch party, I served piklets made with stone ground spelt flour, eggs and milk. The topping options were lemon, honey, maple syrup, whipped cream and fresh berries.

I also made little yoghurt cups with mango or berries and maple syrup.

There are so many options and with a little imagination, the run-of-the-mill fairy bread starts to look pretty boring!

At the moment I'm experimenting with ice creams and Christmas cakes, all gaps friendly. I'll hopefully post about those delectable morsels before Christmas!

Yummy Mummy's Super Snacks

"Get used to eating your meals cold" they all said when I was pregnant. But after Antonio was born I wondered, what meals? Who has time to make food for themselves? I was doing well to grab an apple most days. But of course we must eat properly, because mum's health is baby's health, and mum's food becomes baby's food. Not only that, but a well nourished mamma makes more milk, copes better with the inevitable sleep deprivation, feels less overwhelmed and more in control of herself. This was not me in the early baby days! So I have spent much time devising a system to ensure I have quick, easy health food on hand. In the process I've learned that being healthy has much in common with being a mum. Both require prioritisation, mindfulness, fore planning, flexibility and a lot of self love.

My answer to the issue has been to prepare large batches of snacks in advance, snacks which are very nutrient dense; high in fats, protein, vitamins and minerals. Here are my favourite superfood snacks.

Dip - not the supermarket sludge, but home-whizzed super dip! You can use avocado or home made cream cheese extracted from yoghurt. To this I add a huge handfull of fresh herbs, anything you like, they're all packed with their own respective goodies, half a clove of garlic, pine nuts and some sprouts. You can add any other flavours you like after that. I like a bit of home made roasted capsicum and some olive oil. You could put in some olives, sun dried tomatoes, feta cheese, roasted pumpkin...go crazy! And don't forget a good pinch of ground sea or rock salt.

Veggie sticks - with which to eat your dip. Chop them the night before and stick them in an airtight in the fridge. You can also use them for a quick half an avo.

Bliss balls - these sweet treat superfoods really fill you up! You can pack them full of awesomeness. Coconut oil, nut butters, activated nuts, tahini, raw honey, spices like cinnamon, cloves and cardamom, raw carob or cacao, orange zest, ginger root... Just blitz it all up in the processor. Dates make a great base but you can use any preservative free dried fruit. Mmmm....

Smoothies - they take a few seconds to whizz up and you can use them to really improve your health. You can use nut milks, raw milk, bananas, apricots, egg yolks, coconut oil, flax oil, fresh or frozen berries, yoghurt or kefir. You can also do green smoothies, with a fruit base and some green veg, for the most awesome energy kick you'll ever get in a glass.

Banana - for times that you're out of the house and need to pick up a power snack, have bananas. Yes, plural. You won't get the richness of good fats, but 'nanas are power packs of energy and electrolytes, while being low in fructose. And very filling! Also, bub can share it with you, and it's amazing how sweet their disposition becomes when they've had a healthy snack!

Chicken soup - this isn't a trick I do myself, but a girlfriend swears by a thermos flask full of chicken broth! She sips it whenever she feels her blood sugars slipping. See the post 'eating warm' for the recipe.

For me, the lack of time to do anything for myself puts a downer on my mummyhood. I found that keeping my tummy full of healthy food makes all the difference. So if you are feeling deprived as a Mamma, I highly recommend you try these ideas. A quick and easy superfood snack can transform your life! They'll keep you full and happy, and it's so very true that a contented Mamma means a contented baby. And its so empowering to know you can turn your own mood around so easily!

Happy power snacking!