Smashed avocado oatcakes with orange, onion and cumin

Late last Thursday morning I had kind of missed breakfast but it wasn't yet lunchtime. Upon opening the fridge I was greeted with a bowlful of oranges, a salad tray of red onions and a forlorn looking avocado in need of using up...

I'm not typically a huge fan of avocado on its own as the primary ingredient in my meal but there's always room to change and after seeing a number of delicious looking 'smashed avocado' recipes around the blogosphere and most recently here on Kathy's blog with it's bright colours, temptation struck and I decided to give it a go myself!

This wasn't going to be a long prep or cook time as 10 minutes was all I had... and I was hungry! So I literally sliced up and onion pretty thinly dusted it in cumin and panfried it for five minutes whilst prepping the remainder… The result?  One super simple and super tasty breakfast. I may well be an avocado convert!! P.s I admit my oat cakes were not homemade... I like these Nairns ones for a quick cracker fix.  You could use other crackers or toast for the base if you preferred.

The cumin paired so well with both the flavours of the onion and the refreshing zing of the orange slices, I'd encourage you to use it but of course feel free to swap in any spices if you prefer or you donlt have cumin to hand. I use both ground cumin and cumin seeds so they could be toasted off with the onion. 

I ate an oatcake followed by orange wedge, followed by oat cake.... the orange was amazingly refreshing and also great palate cleanser between mouthfuls of avocado.

Recipe: Smashed avocado oatcakes with orange, onion and cumin

Serves 1

Ingredients:

1 avocado
1 small red onion
A splash of olive oil
1/4 teaspoon ground cumin and 1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds
1 orange- peeled and segmented
Salt and pepper to taste
Oat cakes (or other 'base') to serve
Method:

Slice the onion very finely and lightly pan fry with a little oilve oil and the cumin until soft, approx. five minutes.

Meanwhile prepare the avocado and orange by lightly mashing the avocado so that it is still quite chunky and use one  of the orange segments squeezed over it. And a little salt and pepper to taste.

Using oat crackers (or rice crackers or toast if you prefer) spoon dollops of the avocado mix onto the crackers and top with the panfried onion slices. Decorate the plate with the orange wedges.

For further guidance on making gluten free choices please see this post.

For tips and info on recipe measurement conversions, ingredients, substitutions and the methods behind how I do things.... check out my 'baking tips' tab at the top of the page.

Cookies and cream parfait

It seems you loved the carrot cookies! Well to be honest I don’t blame you… to honour their gloriousness I gave them a simple twist that turns a cookie into the basis for a simple no-bake bressert 

You could use any fairly thick cookie here, they can either be soft or a little it crisp but you’ll want to be able to break them into chunks. I reckon the chocolate quinoa cookies, chocolate pillowcakes (these are fat free) or coconut oatmeal cookies would work really well. Or even any of my breakfast cookies!

The cookie forms the base of the parfait and then gets layered up between soft whippy coconut cream…you can infuse this with lemon, orange, cocoa or other flavours to compliment the cookie base, and fresh fruit for extra healthy zing. You can also add a sprinkle topping or cookie crumbs if you wish. Depending on the shape of your bowl you can layer u as many times as you wish. Mine was wide and shallow so I just used cookie chunks at the base.

This would make a refreshing light summer treat (ok so I am getting a bit ahead of myself!) and reminds me bit of trifle (without the jelly layer of course) oh how I miss trifle!

Recipe: Cookie parfait  

Serves 4 (based on original carrot cookie recipe amount)

Ingredients:

10 carrot cookies (or other cookie of choosing)

approx. 1 ½ cups fairly thick coconut cream plus mix ins if required.

approx. 1 ½ cup fruit

toppings of choice or extra cookie crumbs

Method:

Prepare the coconut cream and set this aside

Break up the cookies into small chunks and place the equivalent of 2 small cookies at the bottom of

a dessert dish (or split into two layers if preferred).

Add a dollop of coconut cream to each dish and then layer fresh fruit on top (repeat these layers depending in shape of dish- i.e wine glass?) Finish with some crumbs of the remaining cookies or other sprinkles of choice.

For further guidance on making gluten free choices please see this post.

For tips and info on recipe measurement conversions, ingredients, substitutions and the methods behind how I do things.... check out my 'baking tips' tab at the top of the page.

Christmas breakfast baked oatmeal

Without a doubt this recipe will be my breakfast choice on Christmas morning…in actual fact I will probably double the recipe and treat my whole family to some warm comforting, creamy, fruity, spiced oats!

This recipe serves two to three, so if you are like I was this morning you can save whatever you don’t eat in one sitting for breakfast the next morning…serve either hot or cold.  Like many of my breakfasts this could easily become dessert, you may simply want to increase the sweetness a little more to taste.

I love the colours and textures in this beautiful dish, the mincemeat gives an amazing Christmas infusion. The best way is to make your own…see this recipe for a sugar free and fat free version, (so easy to make and stores in the fridge for ages), but you could use store bought at a push (it won’t be as healthy) or failing that just add extra dried fruit and spices and mix through a little grated apple, or apple sauce.

A ‘snowfall’ sprinkling of flaked almonds to the top completes the picture. (Oh…and if your are as obsessed with cinnamon as I am add a sprinkle more here also!)

Recipe: Christmas breakfast baked oatmeal

Serves 2

Ingredients

2/3 cup oats

1 tbs ground chia/flax

1 cup soy milk (or other)

3 tbs mincemeat (homemade)

½ heaped tsp each cinnamon and nutmeg (or to taste)

1 small nectarine (or any small orange)

Handful of fresh cranberries

Topping: 2 tbs flaked almonds and a little unrefined sugar if desired  

Method

Part-cook a handful of fresh cranberries (5 mins on the stove or 2 mins in the microwave). Peel and slice the orange into fingertip sized pieces.

Mix all other ingredients together in a small bowl. Spoon into a greased oven dish min. 20x10cm. and press the orange and cranberries into the top of the mixture. Dust with sugar to offset the slight tartness of the cranberries if desired.

Bake at 180C for approx. 20 mins until the topping is golden.  This also tastes good cold the next day!

For further guidance on making gluten free choices please see this post.

For tips and info on recipe measurement conversions, ingredients, substitutions and the methods behind how I do things.... check out my 'baking tips' tab at the top of the page.

5 minute choc orange puddle cake

This dessert came totally on a whim!

I had a sudden chocolate craving and usually when such an attack strikes I have some choc-orange smoosh bars or healthy chocolate fudge to hand. However at this particular moment in time I had neither!

Since a taste for a chocolate orange combo had been planted in my mind, I set about using my silicone egg poacher trick to create a super speedy (I wanted that fix pretty quick!) healthy chocolate puddle cake using the dome shape to encapsulate a melty chocolate centre.

Oh my… 5 minutes later and one awesomely indulgent but healthy chocolate cake was all mine! Ok, so I would suggest reigning in a little self-control and not eating the entire thing in one sitting- it is quite large. (but I won’t tell if you don’t). 

I used buckwheat as my GF flour of choice but other flours of wholemeal spelt if GF is not a requirements are likely to work fine also. I also added in grated courgette for moistness, it works really well and you really can’t tell it’s there. Finely grated carrot or pureed cauliflower would also work well.

This puddle cake could be made into all sorts of flavours…how about substituting almond extract for the orange and adding flaked almonds on top of the cake (or in the silicone mould or bowl before pouring in the batter). Mix through some berries and sugar free jam for a fruity kick.  Or why not go all out and leave out the orange and spread this crazy healthy banana frosting over the top.

Recipe: Choc orange puddle cake

Serves 2-4 (depending on how hungry you are!)

Ingredients

¼ cup buckwheat flour (or whole meal spelt)

¼ cup finely grated courgette (carrot could also work)

2 tbs tapioca flour or arrowroot

Slightly heaped ½ tsp baking powder

Pinch salt

2 tbs cocoa powder or raw cacao

1 tsp ground chia/flax

1 tbs agave and a tiny pinch stevia

1/2 tsp orange extra

3 tbs orange juice

Grated orange zest- optional (I didn’t have any)

1 tsp mild flavoured oil

Approx. 1 tbs worth dark choc chunks (I broke off a chunk from  a dark choc bar)

Chocolate drizzle: 1 tbs agave mixed with 1 tsp cocoa powder.

Method

Add everything (except choc chunks) to a mini blender and blend until well mix and there are no visible courgette strands. You could mix by hand if the courgette strands are very fine.

Using a silicone egg poach or other lightly greased domed microwavable bowl (approx. 12cm diameter) spoon in half the mixture, place the choc chunks in the centre and then top with the remaining mixture.

Cook in the microwave on full power for 90 seconds. Allow to cool for 1 minute before loosening and tipping out into a serving plate.

Serve hot whilst the chocolate centre is still oozing. Serve with a chocolate drizzle if desired.

For further guidance on making gluten free choices please see this post.

For tips and info on recipe measurement conversions, ingredients, substitutions and the methods behind how I do things.... check out my 'baking tips' tab at the top of the page.

Cheesecakes Galore!

I’ve been going cheesecake crazy! Once I’d made the turtle cheesecake and realise it tasted so good…I simply couldn’t resist having a play with a few more flavours. So here you get a super sized post with:

Orange glazed cheesecake

Double strawberry cheesecake

Lemon chocolate mini cheesecakes

I figured since cheesecake was such a  summery dessert I’d get this post in whilst the sun was still here…no doubt it will hide away again soon, at least here in England (or we might be lucky like last year and have an October heat wave!)

So, you might have spied this little teaser a few days ago in celebratory Blog Birthday post! I shared that cake with my family (though I was sorely tempted to eat it all myself) the other two cheesecakes arrived shortly after.

I know that not everyone chooses to or can eat soy, so I am working on a soy free/cream cheese free version…watch this space. But until then you have another variation of the turtle recipe, although this time I added some polenta and nuts to the base to give it a little oomph. Play around with the base ingredients however you wish…it won’t mind!

Recipe: Cheesecake variations

Makes one 8” or two 4” pans (or 8-12 mini muffins cases)

Ingredients- cheesecake base

½ cup oats*

3tbs polenta

1 tbs finely crushed nuts

1tbs buckwheat flour (other flours would probably be fine too)

1 tbs ground flax/chia

Ground cinnamon and vanilla extract to taste (optional)

2 tbs cocoa powder

2 tbs agave or maple syrup (plus a pinch of stevia for optional extra sweetness)

Approx. ¼ cup vegan yoghurt (or regular yoghurt for non vegan)

Ingredients- cheesecake

1 package of silken tofu (I used Mori Nu)

½ cup cashew butter (or an mild light coloured creamy nut butter)

1/3 cup agave plus ¼ tsp pure stevia (add extra to taste if desired)

1 tsp vanilla

1 tsp orange or lemon extract (for the citrus cakes only)

1 tbs orange or lemon zest (optional for the citrus cakes only)

1 tbs ground chia (I used white chia for a lighter colour but it’s not necessary)

Toppings:

Chia jam (see note) and strawberries

Sugar free marmalade glaze

Dark chocolate drops and extra citrus zest

Method

For the base, mix all ingredients together until you have a soft sticky ball of dough. Press the dough into the bottom of a lightly greased cake pan (use one with a removal bottom for ease later on).

For the cheesecake, blitz all the ingredients together in a blender/food processor (I used my Thermomix) and then pour over the base layer in the cake pan(s). Add the sprinkling of choc chips and zest across the top of the batter (for the choc drop version).

Bake the cheesecakes for 15-25 minutes depending on the size of the tins ( the mini muffins took 15 minutes and my 4” tins took just under 20 minutes) Once just golden and a skewer come away clean they are ready- note they may be puffed up when you take them out of the oven (mine were which surprised me!) It’s ok they settle down flat again as they cool.

Chill for a few hours or overnight in the fridge. Once chilled add the citrus glaze or chia jam and strawberries, if using, prior to serving.

Note: to make chia jam, first seen on these pancakes, simple mash or blend a large handful of strawberries and then lix through chia seeds and a little extra agave if needed. Wait for the chia seeds to thicken the ‘jam’ mixture before using.

* for further guidance on making gluten free choices please see this post.

For tips and info on recipe measurement conversions, ingredients, substitutions and the methods behind how I do things.... check out my 'baking tips' tab at the top of the page.

Sticky orange and ginger cake

You know how much I love a super simple two-minute cake, right?

Well, can you imagine how excited I was a week or so ago whilst wandering through the bakeware section of the supermarket, when these caught my eye….

That’s right, they are silicone ‘pods’ for poaching eggs… ah, but I don’t eat eggs. Confused?

…can you see where my thoughts are going yet?

They are the perfect way to create a perfectly domed single serving ‘mug cake’ that can easily be removed for serving on a little dish.  So much prettier than eating straight out of a mug (though nothing wrong with that either!), and so much simpler than trying the line a mug with clingfilm (as I did with my carrot cake) so that the cake can be removed.

Go on treat yourself!

I’ve already tried a few flavour combo’s out…and I have another recipe for another time, but for now how about a bit of sticky orange and ginger cake?

The magic ingredient in this cake is sugar free orange and ginger jam (you could easily use sugar free marmalade and add your own ginger). I use these ‘jams’ for all sorts of things… and they come in loads of flavours (I’d just run out of my blueberry). Great as a glaze, or as a juicy surprise centre like in these coconut tarts. They are sweetened with fruit only.

So onto the recipe itself, I have used white spelt flour but you could easily sub a GF mix (my usual one is equal measures of ground almonds, buckwheat flour and tapioca starch). Some of the jam is mixed through the batter or used as a surprise melty centre and the rest is melted over the top of the freshly cooked cake as a glaze. You will need very  little extra sweetener (if any) so go sparingly!

This sweet and citrusy dessert was the perfect pick me up for my Friday afternoon…and I certainly needed it after I’d given blood in the morning and then without heeding the nurses order of ‘rest and no strenuous activity’ for the rest of the day…I spent it on my feet for 5 hours in the kitchen, and as you know that is often a very strenuous activity. Ooops!

Resting with some cake now. All is better in the world.

Recipe: Sticky orange and ginger cake

Serves 1 (or double up for a sharing portion!)

Ingredients

3 tbs white spelt flour (or GF mix)

½ tsp baking powder

Tiny pinch salt

¼ tsp ground ginger

1 tbs melted coconut oil

1 tsp orange jam (for centre or mixed through) plus extra for glaze

1 tsp agave syrup (if needed to taste)

Up to 2tbs  orange juice

Method

Mix dry ingredients together in a small bowl. Add wet ingredients and mix well.  You can either add the jam to the mixture or reserve it to add as a melty centre.

In another greased/lined small microwaveable dish (or use a silicone egg poach!) spoon half of the mixture, add a dollop of jam to the centre (if preferred) and then spoon the remaining batter on the top.

Microwave for 40 seconds on full power. Test with a finger and if the sponge springs back you’re done. Cook for another 20 seconds if necessary.

Serve cake on a plate and spread a little more jam to glaze whilst the sponge is still hot. Decorate with mango or orange pieces, soy yoghurt/cream and a dusting of ginger.

(look at the gooooey melty centre peeping out at you....!)

For tips and info on recipe measurement conversions, ingredients, substitutions and the methods behind how I do things.... check out my 'baking tips' tab at the top of the page.

Valentines choc-orange cupcakes

I love all the blood orange ideas that are making their way into a few recipes at the moment, the perfectly healthy and natural way of bringing a little bit of pink into your life… what a coincidence that Valentines Day is just around the corner!

So, I wanted to create a little bit of pink and chocolatey indulgence of my own. I couldn’t track down any fresh blood oranges in my part of the world so I had to make do with some fresh blood orange juice instead. All the liquid in this recipe comes from the juice, and being such a vibrant pink colour I had hoped the batter would also be a gorgeous pink shade….hmmm not so much! So at this point I have to admit that I had to supplement this with about 5 drops of red food dye.  The batter was a real rich fuchsia colour at this point, although once cooked the colour was much more subtle.

The cupcake sponge is lovely and light, based on this original recipe but substituting the liquids. I love the combination of chocolate and orange in any form. To emphasise the pink theme without having to resort to playful sugary toppings etc, I sprinkled the tops of the cupcakes and the serving plate with pomegranate seeds. Beautiful…and so much better for you than sugar!

This recipe also showcases my newest healthy chocolate frosting!

Can you guess what it contains…

…yep, more beans!

I love this recipe as it simply another step on from my black bean fudge. You can make both the fudge and the frosting in a matter of minutes without having to wash anything up in between. My perfect kind of recipe! The key is to really blend it well.

If you’re a little bit beaned out, you could use this frosting as an alternative, its also quick and simple to make!

Recipe: Valentines choc-orange cupcakes

Frosting ingredients:

200g prepared fudge mixture

80g soy milk (or any non-dairy milk)

2 tsp agave (or more to taste)

This makes enough to frost approx. 12 cupcakes.

Method:

Simple add all the ingredients to a food processor and blend until really smooth. Adjust the ‘milk’ to achieve the desired consistency.

Cupcakes ingredients:

200g white spelt flour (or GF flour mix)

75g potato starch

1tsp flax seed mixed with 1tbs hot water

3tsp baking powder 

1tbs bicarbonate of soda

50g agave syrup

70g rapadura

¼ tsp stevia

100ml melted coconut oil

50ml soy yoghurt

300ml blood orange juice (the pinker the better)

2tsp vanilla extract

5 drops natural red food colour

Method

Blend all liquids in food processor and melt coconut oil separately then mix in. Mix all dry ingredients together in a bowl then pour into the wet ingredients and beat well to get a smooth mixture. Pour into lined cupcake pans. Bake for 15-20 minutes at 180C. Turn half way through to ensure an even rise. A toothpick will come away clean when cooked.

For tips and info on recipe measurement conversions, ingredients, substitutions and the methods behind how I do things.... check out my 'baking tips' tab at the top of the page.

‘Twelve Days’ day 1: Spiced cranberry orange cake

At my mum’s house, traditionally we wouldn’t put the Christmas decorations up until a couple of weekends before Christmas. However this weekend my sister had popped back home from uni and so with all the Christmas baking plans that I was busy drafting up we decided that we’d break that tradition and get full on into the swing. 

Yesterday afternoon was spent with boxes of decorations all around us on the floor- trying to decide which ones to use and which ones were just a bit too old/battered/silly to put up this year. Nostalgia usually gets the better of us and we end up with a Christmas tree ornament collection that looks so random it is almost an embarrassment to visitors who might not appreciate the odd shaped and badly stitched felt stocking that my brother made in primary school about 20 years ago!

So this year, we tried to keep to more of a theme with just a few of the most important nostalgic decorations allowed permission on the tree. It looks so much better!

We don’t go overboard on decorating the whole house from top to toe, but fairly lights are essential! I love fairy lights- I’d keep them up all year round if I could. They give such a warm happy glow to a space and make me want to twirl around the room! Ok, well maybe that is just me…?

Once the tree was up it was time to sit back with a glass of mulled wine. This year I thought I’d try making my own- it was based on a Jamie Oliver recipe that involves first making a syrup base to mix into the red wine. It was lovely, and I’ve bottled up the remaining syrup to have over Christmas itself. 

Along with mulled wine came dessert (of course we had dinner in between but I‘ve skipped that bit as it wasn’t so exciting!).This dessert becomes the first of the ‘Twelve Days’ of recipes and is super versatile in that it can be served warm as a dessert with custard, served cold as a slice of cake or even baked in muffin tins.

We ate ours warm with custard (Alpro soya custard in fact as I just didn’t have time to make my own).  Mmmm, it was good- dense, moist, lightly spiced and sweet but not overly so with a crisp tang from the cranberries and a warmth from the citrus and spices. Those who like a very sweet dessert may want to increase the sweetener slightly to compensate for the sharpness of the cranberries.  I imagine this cake would freeze well, but I can’t imagine this one being around long enough to test that out!

Recipe: Spiced cranberry orange cake

Makes one 7” cake

Ingredients

2 cups spelt flour

1/3 cup rapadura plus ¼ tsp stevia (add a little extra if a very sweet cake is preferred)

2 tsp baking powder

½ tsp baking soda

½ tsp salt

½ tsp cinnamon

½ tsp mixed spice

4 tbs apple puree

2 tbs coconut butter (melted) or coconut oil

2 tsp orange zest or 1 tsp orange extract

2 tsp vanilla extract

1 banana- mashed

Small tin of mandarins or two clementines peeled in to segments and roughly chopped

1 ½ cups fresh cranberries partially chopped

Method

Sift the dry ingredients together in a large bowl and set aside.  Blend together the wet ingredients (other than oranges and cranberries) in a food processor until well mixed and then add to the dry ingredients. Lastly add the oranges and cranberries to the mixture and mix through gently to break up the oranges but do not over mix. Pour the mixture into a greased  7” round cake pan. Bake at 180C for approx. 25 minutes loosely covering the cake for the final 10 minutes if the top begins to brown before the middle is cooked through.

For a similar cake idea but with a lighter sponge see this post with apples and blueberries.

For tips and info on recipe measurement conversions, ingredients, substitutions and the methods behind how I do things.... check out my 'baking tips' tab at the top of the page.

Chocolate orange 'Smoosh' bar (aka- Nakd bar/Larabar)

‘Nakd’ bars were something I was introduced to (by the boy) very early on, when veganism was still largely an intriguing curiosity to me.  Well, it could be said that if these bars were anything to go by then I’m in!!  I could barely believe I wasn’t eating chocolate, let alone raw fruit and nuts!

Nakd bars are, in effect, the UK version of the American Larabar. Soooo expensive to buy in the shops I noticed plenty of people were making their own versions and I wasn’t going to be left out. The Nakd bars make it even more straight forward in that they list the percentages of each ingredient on the packet itself so making it super simple to copy. However, in typical ‘me’ directly fashion I like to tweak things a little to lay my own mark. Also, I’m absolutely hopeless at following a recipe and prefer to play it by instinct and whatever takes my fancy (this works most of the time but I would be lying if I said all of the time- it comes back to bite me at times!)

The chocolate orange bar was my first taste and still my favourite to this day. To me, in the early days of my new appreciation of food and nutrition, the choc orange Nakd bar seemed the epitome of healthy decadence! 

Recipe: chocolate orange 'Smoosh' bar

Ingredients (use all organic if possible):

100g pitted dates

60g cashew nuts

47g raisins

25g coconut flour

15g cocoa powder

3g chia seeds (optional)

1 tsp orange rind

1 tsp orange extract

The ingredients add up to 250g and will make 5 x 50g bars. I often double or triple the recipe as these bars will keep in the fridge for a couple of weeks (plus i'm usually making more to give to family members).

Method:

Put everything into a food processor and smoosh together until chopped up into tiny pieces and the bowl is filled with a fine sticky powder (and the air is filled with the heady smell of chocolate orange). If you prefer a smoother bar with less chunky nuts (the cashews in the pics are fairly chunky) then process these for a bit on their own first before adding all the other ingredients in with them.

To form into bars I press the mixture into a tin lined with baking parchment or cling film and use the flat end of a rolling pin to firmly pack the mixture down. You could also form into balls or rolls with your hands (although I haven’t tried this). Chill for a while before lifting out if the tin and cutting into bars. Store in the fridge or cupboard if eating within a few days.

The perfect mid-morning pick-me-up!  ……. Or for that matter mid-afternoon, mid-evening, lunch, dinner….