Sweet, salty and smokey roasted Chickpea snack

Sweet, salty and smokey

Snacking has a notorious reputation for being fatty, high calorie and convenient. Even the 'healthy bag of nuts' option are often roasted in salt and fat with added preservatives. But lets face it snacking is not just a pleasure it is essential sometimes; It picks you up in a long active day, keeps you motivated in long periods of study and after work out snack are vital to repair muscles. So what you got to do is snack right!

Personally I think homemade snacks are the best, you know exactly whats in it, you can make large batches and store them making them cheaper and you can adjust the taste to exactly how you like it. Here i have come up with a snack that is a crazy crunchy creation- sweet, salty and smokey roasted chickpeas with apricots.

These have no added oil or sugar and are packed with protein, iron and fiber. The taste is inspired from Moroccan dishes where dried apricots and salty smokey savory flavors are often combined to amazing effect. The chickpeas do not taste like a tagine however but still pretty darn tasty and satisfying.

Sweet, Salty and Smokey Chickpea Snack

Ingerdiants
1/3 cup chickpeas
3 table spoons maple syrup
1 1/2 tsp of smoked paprika
1 tsp of reduced sodium salt
1 garlic clove crushed
1/2 tsp of cayenne pepper (1 tsp if you like it hotter)
1/4 tsp cinnamon 
Freshly cracked black pepper
4 dried apricots

-Drain and rinse chickpeas and place in a clean tea towel. Fold the tea towel in half and rub the chickpeas around to losen their outer skins.
- Peal your chickpeas (this takes a while but worth it, trust)

- Lay on a baking tray and put in a 180 degree oven for 5-8 mins. I would advise you line your tray with tin foil as it makes cleaning up much easier, however we didn't seem to think foil was a useful thing to have on the shopping list this week..

- While the chickpeas are in the oven, mix the remain ingredients in the bottom of a medium mixing bowl. Taste, you may like it hotter, more salty, more Cinnamon just make sure its a punchy flavour as it will get milder when cooked.
-Remove the chickpeas from the oven and add to mixing bowl, toss in your sweet, salty, smokey mixture. Then place back on tray and bake till the chickpeas are crunchy, about 10-15 mins (they catch easily keep an eye on them) 
- When crunchy and done place in a clean mixing bowl and leave to cool. While they cool chop up you dried apricots and mix in with you chickpeas. Store in an air tight container once fully cooled ready when you need a good healthy snack. Bravisimo!

 

Time for Tea

The weather was so lovely yesterday and due to my beau and my best friend finishing their last exam a impromptu tea party had to be thrown!

I have two tea sets one, the brown, is from my sister who brought it back from Vietnam. It is carved from coconut shell and is traditionally used for honey tea (a combination of bee's pollen, special honey and green tea). My other tea set is just cool. It's glass and has a glass infuser so you can use and loose leaf or tea ingredients and see it infuse. At this tea party in the glass pot is lemon and ginger with optional honey and in coconut pot is white tea and pomegranate. Just in case you were wondering..

Because of this tea party i thought it would be appropriate for me to tell you a little bit about the benefits of different teas and a few facts about them.

All Teas

• All teas help hydrate and detox as they are liquads filled with differnt anitoxidants and help flush out the bad stuff
• Hot teas help keep you full where as iced teas help boost your metabolism 
• Tea was originally only used as a tonic and for medical uses only

Green Tea

• Made from the same plant as black tea but the leaves aren't allowed to oxiadize by heating on a high heat for a short amount of time, stopping the fermenting reaction
• Lower in caffeine then normal tea and drunk with out milk (often with honey or lemon)
•  Full of antioxidants that benefit your skin and general health
• Can help aid weight loss as it improves the function of the liver, burning fat effectively
• Can help with bad breath and immuntiy as it is a natural anti bacterial drink
• Can help prevent cancer

White Tea

• White tea is very similar to Green tea however it is harvested at a younger age and is less processed then Green tea as it is steamed then dried
• Due the process (or lack of it) white tea has the same as, but more of the antioxidants found in green tea
• White tea has very little caffine
• However white tea is less common and often more pricey

Herbal Teas

• Peppermint tea helps problems with gas and digestion
• Camonmile tea is ment to calm and help with sleeping
• Rooibos tea is rich in vitamin C and other minerals some beleive it helps with skin problems
• Echinacea tea helps boost the immune system

Hope that has added to your tea knowledge! If not there will (hopefully) be more post on tea things such as how to make your own tea and how long and the best way to brew tea.

Keep calm and drink tea.

Sweet Potato Pie bites with A Nut crust and Maple Glaze, from Sneak Peak post

Here is my improved recipe from my 'sneak peak' post.

First make your own nut cream! This replaces the butter, cream or cream cheese that is often used in Sweet Potato Pie. If you don't have the time or patients to do this use a pre-bought vegan yogurt/cream, however it is much more satisfying to make your own.

Almond Vegan Cream

Ingredients
1/2 cup of raw almonds (cashews work aswell)
1  pitted date
1 tsp of vanilla
Water

-Soak your almonds for 3-4 hours or over night.
-Drain and add to a food processor along with the date and just enough water to cover the almonds. BLITZ!
- Once the mixture has created a smooth consistency pass through a sieve removing most the pulp. Because your not using a cheese cloth or a finer strainer as you would if you were making almond milk you get the consistency of double cream. Add vanilla and store in a air tight tub in the fridge till needed.

Sweet Potato Pie bites with A Nut crust and Maple Glaze

Ingrediants

Crust
1 cup of pecans
1/2 cup of cashews
5 soaked dates
1 tbsp of maple syrup
1/2 tsp of salt
1 tsp of cinamon
1 tsp of ground ginger
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/4 oats
1/4 oat bran

- In a food processor blitz together pecans, cashews, and dates. Once the mixture looks like sticky dread crumbs place in a bowl and mix in other ingredients.
-In a square pan firmly spread mixture pressing it into the sides and corners to it resembles a crust.
-Bake at 180 Degrees Celsius till lightly golden and crisped. Set aside...

Filling
1 1/2 large sweet potato
1/2 cup of Almond vegan cream (or vegan yogurt/cream)
5-6 tbsp of maple syrup
 1 tsp of cinamon
1 tsp of ground ginger
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp of grated lemon zest
1 tsp of vanilla extract
pinch of salt

- Cook sweet potatoes (microwave of oven roast them) until flesh is tender. Leave to cool and peal away skin and add flesh to a medium mixing bowl.
-Mash the sweet potato of blitz with a hand blender till it is a smooth puree.
- Add remaining ingredients and mix well. Fill your nut crust with the mixture and smooth out the top.
- Bake at 180 Degrees Celsius till the top is slightly golden, about 10 mins tops.

Glaze
1/4 cup maple syrup
1 tsp of vanila

- Heat your ingredients in a small pan, when your pie is our the ovens spoon the heated glaze over the top and tilt the pan around to the glaze has full coverage.
- Switch your oven to grill and broil your pie for 5 mins maximum s not to burn your pie.

- Leave your pie to cool then remove and cut into squares. Voila!

Crumbly crust beware

Hozaaa!!!!!!

Served with soya yogurt and sprinkle of Cinnamon, fancy.

Enjoy Amigos

 

Low GI Muffin Time

Ok, so my mum asked me to bake some low GI muffins from a recipe that she liked the look of. GI stand for the Glycemic Index, an index that rates different carbohydrate containing foods on how quickly the body digests the glucose in these foods. The lower the GI the slower the digestion and release of the glucose. By eating low GI foods your blood sugar levels remain more constant meaning you have less sugar peaks and and dips which can lead to cravings, binges and diabetes. Having Low GI food in the house is especially important for my family as my Dad's diabetic (type 2) and needs to try to maintain a constant blood sugar level.

Here was the recipe..

Of course I changed it. Well, we didnt have butter milk! And I thought there was WAY too much sugar (even if it was natural raw brown sugar) for a low GI recipe. So I omitted the fat, added banana, used low fat yogurt and added other tasty things.

The mess I create when baking.

So here is my version, lets bake.

Wholemeal, Chocolate Chip, Walnut, Cacao Nib and Banana Muffins

Ingrediants
175g wholemeal self raising flour
125g plain self raising flour
125g chocolate chips
1/4 cup walnuts (crushed)
2 tbsp Cacao nibs
1tsp of cinnamon
1 tsp of ground ginger
1/3 tsp of  ground cloves
Pinch of salt
150ml of Low fat vanilla yogurt
1/4 cup of almond milk (unsweetened)
1 1/2 bananas
75g of soft raw brown sugar
1 tbsp of lemon juice
1 tsp of apple cider vinegar
2 eggs

- Mix together flours, chocolate chips, walnuts, Cacoa nibs, spices and salt in a large mixing bowl. Set aside.
- Blitz together yogurt, almond milk and banana until smooth. Then stir in sugar, lemon juice and vinegar (this replaces the acidity in the buttermilk).
-Add the wet yogurt mixture to the dry ingredients in 3 stages alternating with the two eggs gently folding to incorporate all the flour. Do not over mix.
- Spoon into cup cake cakes and bake for 15-20 minuets at 180 Degrees Celsius. Voila!

I made little heart muffins as well cause I'm a nerd.

Sugar Free Jam

I love jam
I don't love the amount of sugar in it. In Hartley's Strawberry Jam there is 61g of sugar in 100g of Jam. Not to mention they add Gelling agent, Sodium Citrates and Glucose fructose syrup. That's less then 40% fruit in your fruit jam...
So for others who still want there sweet fruity jam but don't all that sugar, here is a sugar free jam that is more exiting then your bog standard strawberry.
The secret to thickening the fruit with out the gelling agent and sugar is chia seeds. This ancient seed dates back to Aztec times and they are full of the good stuff, Omega 3, dietary fiber, calcium, iron, protein, potassium not to mention loads of antioxidants. Seriously they are insanely good for you. The other awesome thing about chia seeds is that when they are submerged into a liquid they create a gel that thickens the liquid they are in. Boom we have an all natural, healthy gelling agent. Hozaaa jam time. 

Magical seeds

Mango, Apple, Pear and Ginger Chia Seed Jam,

Ingredients
Half a medium mango
1 pear
1 eating apple
1 tsp of minced ginger
1 lemon (un-waxed)
1 tbsp of Honey, or liquid sweetner (to taste)

1 tbsp of sweetener (to taste)
3 tbsp of water (ish)
2 tbsp of Chia Seeds

- Roughly dice mango, apple and pear and put in a medium heavy bottomed pan. Add ginger, honey and sweetener. Get your lemon and with a peeler, peal 3 strips of peal and add to pot. Slice open your lemon and add a tbsp of the juice.
- Add your 3 tbsp of water and turn the heat on. You may need to add less or more water depending on how juicy your fruit is.
 -Stir your fruit mixture over a medium heat until all the fruit has broken down.  Then remove from heat and take out the lemon peal. I didn't wait for it to cool before a blitzed it (cause i live my life on the edge) but if you don't like hot fruit puree in your eye leave to cool then blitz.
-Taste, this is your change to add more sweetener/ginger/acidity. Each jam at this stage will be slightly different as fruits vary in sweetness and acidity as they ripen so taste and change if need be.
-Place pureed mixture back on a low heat and had your chia seeds stir for about a minuet and remove from heat. Leave to cool and but in tubs. This mixture keeps for about 1/2 weeks in the fridge.

I put them in little tubs.. They're so cute, like little baby jams

Sneaky Peak

Sneaky Peak

Living in the UK to me sweet potato is a tasty orange potato that you can bake, roast, put in curries and make in to a variety of savory things. However since being introduced to the wonderful word of the web and discovering many American Food Blogs, I have been really interested in using Sweet Patato in Sweet dishes. Not only does sweet potato have health benefits, as it is low GI and packed with vitamins, but it gets me exited that I'm using a vegetable for pudding (I know, it's a sad life I live). As I haven't worked with sweet potato as a sweet before its going to take a few tries to get the recipie bang on but here is a sneak peak.

The idea is like a sweet potato pie, but cut into squares/bite size pieces but with an nutty almond oat flapjack inspired crust, no refined sugar or butter and all whole healthy ingredients. Any suggestions or tips for my sweet potato adventures be sure to comment. I will probably maple syrup next so hopefully soon you will see a recipe for 'Maple Syrup Sweet Potato Pie Bites',

Freshened Up Walnut, Apple and Celery Salad for Family BBQ

I used to LOVE apple celery and walnut salads that you could but in little pots. The combination of crunchy sweet acidic apple, savory celery and nutty walnuts is one of my all time favorite. However whenever you buy them they are drowned in creamy mayonnaise style dressing... ughhh.  Not only does this dressing often contain dairy or eggs, making it unfriendly for vegans and lactose intolerant, but full of saturated unhealthy fat and god knows what, sugar, preservatives, etc etc...

Fresher lighter better.

So when asked to make a salad for our Family's BBQ tonight I thought I would take this salad and make it vegan friendly and a lot more healthier and in my opinion fresher as its not drowned in creamy dressing. My version has sweet sour dressing with apple cider vinegar which is meant to curb sugar cravings and is sugar free as I use agave.

Freshened Up Walnut, Apple and Cerlery Salad

Ingredients
1 1/2 sticks of celery
1 small sweet onion
1 large Granny smith (you can use other eating apples but prepare for a lesser salad, granny smiths rule)
1/4 cup (heaped) of walnuts
Hand full of raisins
3 tbsp of apple cider vinegar
4 tbsp of agave syrup (or honey)
tsp of whole grain mustard
Salt and pepper

-Mix together 3 tbsp of the agave (reserving one tbsp), apple cider vinegar, mustard in the bottom of your salad bowl and add salt and pepper to taste. Your dressing should be slightly more salty and sour then you would like it as when as the water from the salad will neutralize it slightly.
- Dice apple, celery and onion and add to you dressing, toss so all the salad is coated. The vinegar in the dressing will stop the apples browning and partially cook the onion so it is less harsh.. clever ;)
-Lightly crush walnuts (I used a pestle and mortar) and add to a hot pan with a pinch of salt.

Me crushing some nuts

- When the nuts are lightly toasted add the reserved tbsp of agave stir around your pan for 30 seconds more and remove walnuts from heat into a bowl or plate to cool.
- Once cool add the walnuts with the raisins and toss. Cover and refrigerate till needed, the longer you leave this salad the more the flavors 'get to know each other' and the tastier it will be (like left over chilli and curry)