Healthy pancakes

I’m pretty excited about this recipe. If you read my breakfast blog you’ll know I have a life long love affair with lemon and sugar crepes. This love was so strong that when asked the “what would you request as your last meal on earth?” question, my reply was always “Crepes with lemon and sugar”.. I never thought that this would change.

But now, I can honestly say it has!

I’ve been making these healthy pancakes for a few months now and every time I am shocked at how brilliantly delicious they are! I even convinced one of my clients who doesn’t like banana to try them and he also thought they were delicious (surprisingly you can’t taste the banana).

And the most shocking thing is that a few weeks ago I had lemon and sugar crepes and while I enjoyed them at the time, afterwards I thought to myself “I really don’t need to eat them ever again”. I felt quite unwell in the hours after eating them due to the ridiculous amounts of processed castor sugar and all I could think is that I wished I had eaten my healthy pancakes instead.

Sometimes I get an image in my head of the former me gaping at myself in wide eyed horror, mouth open, clearly wondering who this new Laura is! That’s the image that flashes through my head when I think about this pancake scenario!

So without further ado here is the most amazing gluten free, dairy free, refined sugar free, totally guilt free

Healthy Pancake Recipe

Ingredients:
– 1 Banana
– 2 eggs
– 2 tablespoons blanched almond meal
– A little bit of coconut oil for cooking

Method:
1. Blend or whisk banana, eggs and almond meal together.
2. Heat a small amount of coconut oil in a frying pan.
3. Cook batter like a normal pancake flipping when the edges start to brown and bubbles appear on top (smaller pancakes are easier to flip).

Serve with coconut yoghurt and berries. (Serves 2)

Yes it’s that easy! Enjoy these for breakfast, dessert, morning tea, dinner, lunch ANY TIME!

Buckwheat Biscotti

I am pretty proud of this unbelievably good gluten free, refined sugar free buckwheat biscotti recipe.

Last week I decided I was going to make buckwheat biscotti and bought the ingredients before I'd looked up any recipes online. When I got home and searched for recipes I couldn't really find any! So I had to invent my own!

YOU WILL NEED:

• 1.5 cups buckwheat flour
• 1/2 cup coconut flour
• 1.5 teaspoons baking powder
• 3/4 cup coconut sugar
• 4 lightly beaten eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 cup dried cranberries
• 1 cup shelled unsalted pistachio nuts

Method:

1. Preheat your oven to 160C
2. Sift flours and baking powder into a bowl, add sugar and mix together
3. Add eggs, vanilla, cranberries and pistachios. Mix until a dough is formed.
4. Lightly flour your workbench with buckwheat flour and knead the dough until smooth
5. Dived into 2 logs and place on tray lined with baking paper
6. Bake for 30 minutes then remove from oven and allow to cool
7. Use a serrated knife to slice the biscotti log into biscuits - approx. 8mm thickness
8. Place slices back on baking tray and bake for 15minutes or until golden and cooked through
9. Allow to cool and store your delicious buckwheat biscotti in an airtight container

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Guilt free "Bounty" bars.

I love Bounty’s so much.. They were probably my favourite chocolate bar as a child. The problem I find with Bounty’s nowadays is:
a) they are too small (does everything seem to be shrinking?)
b) they are too sweet (sugar is the number 1 ingredient which means they are more sugar than coconut).

I’ve always been a coconut freak. When I was little I used to persuade my mum to buy coconuts at the supermarket and then I’d make my dad open them (with a lot of effort and tools – think vice’s, hammers and nails) so that I could enjoy the delicious goodness inside. To me, the taste, smell and feel of coconut is just like being transported to an island in Fiji…..

I have to admit that I probably couldn’t live without ever eating a Bounty again..
Enter the healthy version!

This is surprisingly easy to make and only has five ingredients!

You will need:

Filling

• 2 cups desiccated coconut
• 200ml coconut cream
• 3 tablespoons maple syrup
• 3 tablespoons melted coconut oil

Chocolate

• 1 cup melted coconut oil
• 1/2 cup raw cacao
• 3 tablespoons maple syrup

To make:

1. Blend (I used my stick mixer) the filling ingredients to combine
2. Press the filling ingredients into a dish lined with baking paper (filling should be about 1cm thick)
3. Place in freezer for approx. 15 minutes until it starts to go firm

4. Blend chocolate ingredients to combine well (if using a blender, pour chocolate mix into a small bowl. If using stick mixer, remove the blade and leave chocolate in bowl)
5. When the filling is firm, remove from freezer and break into rough pieces.
6. Dip pieces into chocolate and place back on the lined dish
7. Put back in the freezer for 5 minutes
8. When set, remove and repeat steps 6 and 7
9. Once the chocolate has hardened you can transfer the bars into a container to keep in the fridge and enjoy as a guilt free treat 

Notes:
– These chocolates must be kept refrigerated because the chocolate will melt really easily.
– If your coconut oil goes hard in the jar, melt it by placing the jar under the hot tap (with the lid on)
– I had a little bit of left over chocolate mix so I made 8 little hazelnut butter filled chocolates. If you have filling left over, you can do the same 

Protein Balls

A couple of people have asked me for protein ball recipes this week.

I have a few of these high protein, healthy snack recipes in my repertoire but this is probably the one that most people will have the ingredients for already in their pantry. Well, that might be wrong.. If I’ve totally lost touch with reality… But I created this recipe out of ingredients I had in my pantry!

You will need:

  1+ 1/3 cup nutmeal (I used almond and hazelnut meal)

  ¼ Cup flaxseeds (Linseeds)

  2 Dates

  ½ tablespoon tahini

  1 teaspoon toasted coconut chips

  3 tablespoons hazelnut butter

  ½ teaspoon coconut oil.

Method:

1.       Blend ingredients, adding them in order of list.

2.       Once well blended and moist, roll into balls and refrigerate until you need a snack.

Did I mention that it’s ridiculously easy to make these?!

Enjoy!

Healthy Muesli Bars

A client recently asked me to help her modify a Muesli Bar recipe to make it healthier. We took out the refined cane sugar and replaced it with coconut sugar, making the bars lower GI and higher in essential nutrients, replaced the butter with coconut oil so it won’t impact cholesterol levels and won’t turn rancid when heated. I also threw in some chia seeds for omega 3, calcium, antioxidants, protein and iron.

I’ve made two batches of these delicious bars now and they are a hit! I thought I should share the recipe in case you want to do some lunch box baking this weekend!

You will need:

• 1 cup rolled oats

• 1 cup coconut flakes

• ½ cup almond meal

• ½ cup chia seeds

• ½ cup sunflower seeds

• ½ cup pumpkin seeds

• 1 cup currants/sultanas

• 1/3 cup coconut oil

• ½ cup raw honey

• ¼ cup coconut sugar

• Method:

• Line a 3cm deep 16cm x 28cm baking pan with baking paper.

• Dry cook the oats, coconut and almond meal in a frying pan over medium heat stirring for 8-10 minutes or until golden. Add the dried fruit and seeds and set aside to cool.

• Heat coconut oil, honey and coconut sugar in a small saucepan over medium heat, stirring until sugar dissolves. Bring to boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer without stirring for 7 minutes. Add to dry ingredients and stir to combine.

• Spoon mixture into the pan and press down with a large spoon. Allow to cool, cut into 16 squares and store in an air tight container for up to 7 days.

ANZAC Cookies - Healthy ones of course!

ANZAC day is coming up fast so its time to start thinking about getting your ingredients together for your ANZAC cookies.

These cookies are a hit in my house, really easy to make and totally delicious!

You will need:

• 1 cup almond meal
• 1 cup rolled oats
• 1 cup desiccated coconut
• ½ cup coconut sugar
• ¼ cup coconut oil
• 2 tablespoons raw honey
• ½ teaspoon bicarb soda
• 1 tablespoon water

Method:

1. Combine almond meal, coconut, sugar and oats in a bowl.
2. In a small saucepan slowly heat and stir the oil and honey until melted.
3. Mix the bicarb soda and water in a small bowl, remove saucepan from heat and add the bicarb mixture to the saucepan. The mix will froth.
4. Pour the liquid into the bowl of dry ingredients and combine well.
5. I rolled mine into 20 cookies but could’ve made 2-3 more if my partner hadn’t been hovering around eating the raw mix!
6. Place on a cookie tray or baking tray lined with baking paper. Bake on 150 degrees C for 13-15 minutes or until golden.
7. Allow to cool

About the ingredients:

I've used Almond meal instead of flour to make these cookies a great wheat free option (please note they are not gluten-free due to the oats). It also makes them a fairly good protein snack - Yay!

Coconut oil is used instead of butter as it is high in medium chain fatty acids and will not raise blood cholesterol. In fact, it is good for heart health.

Coconut sugar has twice the iron, four times the magnesium and over ten times the zinc of brown sugar. It’s a great low GI alternative to cane sugar.

Honey is used instead of golden syrup. Golden syrup is made in the process of refining sugar cane juice into sugar, or by treatment of a sugar solution with acid. Honey is made by bees so is naturally a better choice and is full of antioxidants. I've used raw honey as its even more antibacterial and healthful!

These cookies are such a great Low GI, healthy oil, protein-full snack and they are very difficult to stop eating! Enjoy them on ANZAC day or any time of year!