AUSTRALIA DAY

With Australia day just around the corner, and the temperatures that we’ve been experiencing around the country of late, the last thing that we want to be doing is to have a traditional lamb and snags on the barbie. This year we are going to go for more of a laid back, no cooking and easy to take on a family picnic day.

australia dayaustralia day 2

I have simply taken finger foods that I have in my fridge and cupboard and arranged them on a platter. The platter on the left contains, plain rice crackers, olives stuffed with sun dried tomatoes, goat cheese and spicy dried sausage. While the platter on the right has, radish, carrot sticks, cucumber, cherry tomatoes and roast beetroot dip. Other things that I could have used on these platters are, celery, left over roast meat, capsicum and fermented vegetables.

To finish off your relaxing enjoyable lunch why don’t you try refreshing fruit skewers?

australia day 1

I hope you all have a safe and fun filled day with family and friends.

DONUT

Ahh donuts, they bring back so many fabulous memories of when my kids were babies and after having story time at our local library we would head over to the shops and have fresh hot cinnamon donuts as our treat for the week.  Even now as I walk past the fresh donut shops I think gee I would love one of them right now J.

1 cup (120g) Almonds

1 egg

2 tsp Honey

½  tsp Vanilla concentrate

¼ tsp Bi-Carb soda

¼ tsp Baking Powder GF

2 Tbs Cocoa Powder

½ Cup coconut milk

 

  1. Add the Almonds to the TM bowl 1 min / speed 8.  Scrape down the sides and repeat till you reach a nut butter consistency.  You may find doing it in 20 or 30 sec blocks works better for you.  Time will vary depending on the oil content of the nut.
  2. Once you have formed a nut butter you then need to add the rest of your ingredients to the TM bowl and mix 1 min / speed 4.
  3. Place you mixture into a pre oiled doughnut tray and back in the oven at 175 degrees for 15 min.
  4. Allow the donuts to cool for around 10 min in the tray then take them out and allow to fully cool on a cooling rack. Or you could eat them while still warm

Once your donuts are cool you can then ice them if you wish. I iced mine with coconut butter.

‘Original recipe from The Spunky Coconut’

 

EASTER FUN

Carrot Balls

I dont have a recipe of my own but just finished making carrot balls but changed them slightly to suite a friends nut allergy.  In placement of the nuts I used Pine Nuts and for the nut butter I used tahini.  They turned out realy well.

Hope you all have a great Easter

http://urbanposer.blogspot.com.au/2012/03/raw-carrot-cake-balls-giveaway-upgrade.html

NIBBLES

Time flies when you are having fun. Not only have I been enjoying the sights of the Margaret River region I’ve also been busy trying out new recipes. Trying new recipes has been a little tricky with Matt working night shift and the girls and I having to relocate to the local library during the day while he sleeps. All the recipes that I have been trying still needs some more tweaking before I’m willing to share them with you. Just so you keep your appetite here are a few things that I’m working on, Sweet potato slice, Flat bread and Bagels.

There are a simple things that my family and I enjoy on a regular basis and I would love to share it with you. There is no set recipe just amounts of what you would like to eat.

NIBBLES

 

Nibbles, how much more info do you really need. This is so easy to prepare and is always a winner in our house. My girls love to have a choice about what they are eating and when I serve up a table full of carrot sticks, celery sticks, cucumber, sun dried tomatoes, olives, artichoke harts, egg plant, smoked oysters, crackers and a dip of any flavor, they don’t know what to start with. We always find that every time we have nibbles there is always one thing that gets finished first but it is never the same thing every time. Other nibble ideas are capsicum, cherry tomatoes, boiled eggs, apple, nuts and even chips (home made are the best).

MANGO MADNESS

MANGO MADNESS

Well it’s mango madness time of the year here in the tropics and I sure am loving all these fresh mangoes. Most years we freeze a whole heap of mango cheeks and use them throughout the year, but this year we won’t have the freezer space so we are in overdrive drying as many as we can.

 

 

 

 

 

We can’t dry all the mangos, we do have to eat them fresh as well. Fresh mango and cherry salad with coconut cream seems to be on the cards for me most days for afternoon tea.

The girls are hooking into the mango smoothies, and Matt is eating them chilled straight off the cheek.

MANGO SMOOTHIE

1 Mango peeled and cut

Rice, almond, coconut Milk

then blend and chill.   Delish

What is your favourite way to eat mangoes?

Do you have a great DF, GF mango recipe?

VEG & TUNA

Ok here is something ridiculously simple yet it is one of my favourite lunches.  This one is good for the working person that needs to get lunch ready quickly or for those that want a quick fix for dinner.  I often have this for lunch at work where I am the generally the only one there and need to answer phones and serve customers.

Veg and Tuna

1 bowl of frozen vegies

1 small can of tuna

Herbamare seasoning

 

Heat the bowl of vegies to desired temperature.  Season with Herbamare seasoning and then place the can of tuna on the top.

It’s as easy as that, now all you have to do is find the time to eat it.

PIZZA

When you start on a new way of eating you go through cravings for the things you used to be able to eat. This is quite normal, food is addictive and you have become accustomed to that way of eating. I am no different. I like pizza but only good pizza, I don’t really like the big chain pizza companies. I’ve been making home-made pizza for some time now but it was time to change the recipe so that it was GF and DF. Adapting the recipe to be GF was the easy part, but what about all that cheese that goes on top?  Replacing that stumped me for a little while then I remembered, one of the big chain companies puts egg on their pizza. What if I made an egg and coconut milk mixture for the top of my pizza?

 

Pizza

1 packet of Laucke GF easy Bakers bread

I mixed this packet according to the instructions and found that it was a little wet so I just added coconut flour till it was at a right consistence to roll out.

1 packet of bread made 2 pizzas

 

Tomato Paste

Cut up vegetables of your choice

2 eggs whisked with an equal amount of coconut cream (this is for the replacement of cheese)

 

Roll out your dough and place on a pizza tray, spread on the tomato paste and add your toppings (not the egg mix yet).  Place your pizza in the oven and then pour the egg mix over the top.  Cook till golden brown.  You are now ready to eat your very own home made pizza.

FRESH SPRING ROLLS

We are heading out of town for the weekend and when we go away I like to do most of my prep work before I go so that I can enjoy the weekend away as well. Getting together with family and friends always means stacks of food and plenty of drinks. This is a nice light refreshing snack or meal that will keep nicely in the fridge for 24hours.

Fresh Spring Rolls

1 packet rice paper

Lettuce shredded

Carrot grated

Celery julienne

Sprouts

Fresh mint

Chicken breasts diced (you can use any meat or sea food)

Your favourite seasoning (I like herbamare seasoning)

Coconut oil for cooking

I don’t have exact quantities on the ingredients because it all depends on how much of each you like in your roll. You can add any other ingredient or take out any, depending on your tastes.

Prepare all your salad ingredients and place them in individual containers so that you can put a little of each in your roll.

Dice your chicken breasts and coat in your favourite seasoning. Heat some coconut oil in a frypan or wok and cook you meat. Allow this to cool before you put together your rolls.

Follow the instructions on the packet of rice paper and make your rolls.

Dipping Sauce

2 Tbsp. Fresh Lime juice

1 tbsp. Fish sauce

1 tbsp. Water

1 tbsp. Sweet chilli sauce

2 Tsp Fresh grated ginger

2 cloves of crushed garlic

Crushed Almonds

Put all the ingredients into a jar and close the lid, now it’s time to shake shake shake. You are now ready to sit down with your family and friends and have a magnificent feast.