Vegan Carrot Cake w Coconut Chantilly Cream Icing

My beautiful best friend Tess came down and stayed with me for a week recently, and that's how this cake came about. NYE 2015 leading into 2016, almost a week after my birthday, and it came out that I hadn't had a birthday cake. Well this was simply no good, and we had just been pondering what to make and bring to a NYE party, so cake it was! Carrot cake to be exact, no explanation needed. Vegan, gluten free, delicious, complete with a creamy coconut icing, demolished by a whole party of people; this cake ticks all the boxes.

What you need:

For the cake:

2 and a quarter cups of buckwheat flour
4 tsp of baking powder
1 tsp of baking soda
4 tsp of cinnamon
1 tsp of nutmeg
Pinch of sea salt

1 cup of mylk of choice (we used Nutty Bruce Almond Coconut Milk)
1 cup of coconut sugar
2 cups of grated carrot
1 fresh vanilla bean, scraped out (alternatively, 2 tsp of vanilla extract)
1 cup of mashed banana (about 2-3 bananas worth)
1 tablespoon of chia seeds

For the coconut chantilly cream icing:

2 tins of full fat coconut cream
1 vanilla bean, scraped out (or 2 tsp of vanilla extract)

What you need to do:

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees celcius, and grease your baking pan (we used coconut oil spray).
In a large bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder and soda, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt.
In a separate bowl, whisk together the mashed banana, mylk, chia seeds, vanilla and coconut sugar.
Add the wet ingredients to the dry, fold through, then add the grated carrot and fold until just combined.
Bake for 50-60 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean.

For the icing, don't shake the coconut cream cans up before you open them; simply open them up, and scrape out the top layer of cream. The coconut cream and the water separates in the can, and you only want to keep that top layer of cream and ditch the water. In a bowl, whip the coconut cream with the vanilla using a whisk or an old fashioned egg beater. Refrigerate for 2 or so hours, or until it has set. Wait until the cake is completely cool before icing, or you'll end up with a (delicious) puddle of coconut around your cake (speaking from experience here!)

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Super Easy Vegan Banana Bread

When I was in high school, I absolutely loved the banana bread they sold at the canteen. At least a few times a week I'd be down there buying a slice as a post-lunch snack. So over-the-top sweet and moist, and usually eaten straight from its wrapping. And it had banana in it, that had to count for something… right? Right?! Maybe not.

Well my love of banana bread has not faded, but since discovering the more wholesome, nourishing, plant-based side of life, the type of banana bread my tastebuds sing for has definitely changed. Banana bread is quite a regular go-to for whenever I feel like baking; I just love how versatile it is, how many different delicious extras you can add into the mix, and how cosy comforting it is when you have a cup of tea in one hand and a slice of warm bread in the other.

I wanted to create a vegan banana bread recipe which was super uncomplicated, because often a lot of the recipes I see for it have a million and one ingredients and I don't know about you guys, but my head explodes. I made this loaf a week ago and a friend and I demolished almost all of it over afternoon tea, so I knew it was a winner and I'd have to make it again. And now I'm currently nibbling on my third slice of this freshly baked loaf. I'd call it a success. The bread uses only a handful of ingredients, and you could very easily play around with that basic recipe; I've used a lovely organic wholemeal spelt flour in this recipe, but I'm sure you could pretty much use any flour you have on hand. Also if you don't have coconut sugar on hand (you should buy some…) you could sub it with any other type of sugar. You could add in walnuts (which I plan to next time, yum), cacao nibs, coconut, berries, pepitas, sunflower seeds, chia seeds - the world is pretty much your oyster here.

What you need:

1.5 cups of spelt flour (or buckwheat flour for a gf version)
1/2 cup of coconut sugar or raw sugar
4-5 overripe bananas (should be around 2 cups worth)
1/4 cup of mylk of choice (I used oat)
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla extract or powder
2 tsp baking powder

What you need to do:

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius, and grease a loaf tin. Mash up your bananas until they're super creamy (I use a potato masher) and add in the vanilla and mylk. Sift your flour and baking powder into the banana mixture, add the sugar and cinnamon, and mix until just combined. Transfer into your loaf tin, and pop into the oven for 45 minutes (and enjoy the smell of baking banana bread permeating the air, uh huh honey).

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Banana Beetroot 'Ice Cream' Smoothie (Bowl)

Would you just look at the colour of this baby! Serve this up to someone who suffers from the age-old misconception that all healthy food is dull and I think you'll change their minds. Remembering to bake up some beetroot the night before is definitely the hardest part of this breakfast bowl, but it's so worth it every now and then when enthusiasm strikes! In saying that, I have made a banana beet smoothie bowl using grated raw beetroot before, and it turned out wonderfully and a gorgeous bright lighter pink colour (see the final photo on this post). Also, it's totally up to you how much liquid you add to the mix. Depending on how much you add you'll end up with either banana beet ice cream or a banana beet smoothie - both delicious and super beautiful.

What you need:

5 frozen bananas
Half of a small baked beetroot (I cut my beet in half, wrapped it in foil, and baked it at 200 degrees celcius for about 45 minutes)
1 tsp cinnamon
Liquid of choice - water, almond mylk, coconut water etc - in the amount of your choice (for ice cream, just a splash)

What you need to do:

Blend the banana until they start to turn creamy, add in the cinnamon, the beetroot and the liquid, and blend until fully combined! Transfer to your bowl/glass/jar, top with whatever you please, and consume! Easy peasy.

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Banana Berry Smoothie Bowl

This smoothie bowl is quite the regular on my breakfast menu, and for good reason. It's completely delicious, and of course completely good for you. Are you surprised? Nope, good. I just want all the self-lovin' up in here! It's super easy to make and also super versatile, so feel free to add or subtract anything you please. Sometimes I'll add a big handful of greens into the mix, which is a great way of sneaking in some extra nutrition to your morning!

What you need:

4 frozen bananas (or 2 or 3 or 5 or 6 or however many you please)
1 cup of frozen mixed berries
1 heaped teaspoon of cinnamon
1 teaspoon of maca powder
A splash of almond mylk/water/coconut water

What you need to do:

Blend. It. Up. Real good. That's it! Transfer it into a bowl, and top it with whatever you please. My usual toppings are:

Loving Earth Caramelised Buckinis (activated raw buckwheat)
Coconut flakes
More fruit, such as banana, plum, peach, berries
Cacao nibs
Goji berries
Chia seeds

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Raw Chocolate Coconut Truffles (vegan, raw, gluten free, sugar free, nut free)

I arrived home from work yesterday in one of those give-me-all-the-snacks moods. You know the mood I'm talking about, right? I'm not the only one? Considering Easter is this weekend, I have chocolate on my mind, and I had been wanting to give raw vegan truffles a go so these proved to be the perfect opportunity. Chocolate + snacks + raw vegan goodies = yes please! I know most raw vegan truffles have dates as their base, but we didn't have any dates in the house, and lordy they're so expensive here! So I made do with what I had on hand, and they turned out fabulously delicious, naughty-tasting but definitely not bad for you in the slightest. You could very easily add anything you want into these babies; the buckwheat is optional, as are the chia seeds, but both add a delicious bit of crunch. You could try adding in almonds or walnuts, or basically any nut or seed, if you so desire.

Hope you all have a wonderful, chocolate-filled Easter!

What you need:

1 tablespoon of raw cacao powder (I use Loving Earth)
1.5 tablespoons of raw coconut oil, room-temperature
1.5 tablespoons of liquid sweetener of choice (maple, honey, rice malt, etc)
Half an avocado
1/2 of a cup of desiccated coconut
1 teaspoon of cinnamon
A pinch of sea salt

1 teaspoon of maca (optional)
2 teaspoons of chia seeds (optional)
1 tablespoon of raw buckwheat (I used Loving Earth's caramelised buckinis) (optional)

What you need to do:

Mix together the cacao powder, coconut oil and liquid sweetener, until it's a delicious chocolate-y mess.
Add in the avocado, and mash it up well until everything is mixed together nicely.
Add the coconut, cinnamon, sea salt, maca, chia, and buckwheat, and mix everything together.
In a small muffin tin lined with small patty pans, dollop a couple of teaspoons of the mixture into each patty pan. Pop into the freezer for 15-20 minutes, to allow the coconut oil to re-solidify.
This is where it gets fun and messy. Making sure your hands are nice and clean, roll the mixture from each patty pan into a ball (it'll be a little sticky!). Roll the balls in your choice of more coconut, or cacao powder, or both.
Pop back into the freezer, and eat whenever you can't wait any longer! The longer they spend in the freezer, the more truffle-y they become, but I totally understand if you don't hold out for that ;)

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Hot Cross Bun Muffins (Vegan and Gluten Free)

I find there's something so nostalgic and cosy about Easter time, and I completely adore it. Maybe it's the shift of the seasons happening at this time of year, the summer warmth giving way to the colder and cosier months. Maybe it's the fond memories that I have of chocolate-fuelled long weekends spent running around my grandparents' home in the mountains (I can't say much has changed…). Maybe it's the understated and easy-going nature of Easter, compared to Christmas, as families come together to spend time with each other, without that seemingly inescapable stress that Christmas time brings. Maybe it's simply that smell of baking hot cross buns, the scent of cinnamon reaching every corner of the house.

As I've grown older, hot cross buns have steadily overtaken chocolate's prime status as my favoured Easter treat (!) and I find myself hanging out for them in the months leading up to Easter. I just can't say no to a freshly-toasted, dried-fruit-studded, cinnamon-spiced, subtly sweet homemade hot cross bun (especially when paired with a cup of tea!). But I think it's their fleeting, transient nature that I love most - with only a few weeks out of every year in which to make the most of their goodness, they take on a somewhat ephemeral quality.

These muffins were very much a trial-and-error experiment. I obviously wanted to bake up some hot cross buns myself, however I've had zero time for bread-making lately, so I thought why not take the whole yeast step out of the mix and see what I end up with? I basically ended up with scones, which were fabulously delicious and hot-cross-bunny (heh) regardless. I then played around with the recipe, remade them, and ended up with these muffins instead. The texture is deliciously soft, and subtly sweet, studded with currants and a hint of citrus, and to top it all off, I made the cross out of raw cacao for extra deliciousness. Plus, they're vegan, gluten free and refined sugar free - much unlike the buns you find in supermarkets.

Hope you enjoy them as much as my family and I did!

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Vegan carrot, orange and ginger cookies

Grain free, refined sugar free and vegan carrot, orange and ginger cookies with crunchy buckwheat and cacao bits! These cookies. They're addictive. I'm warning you now. But they're also ridiculously good for you, so it's all fine. In fact, I wouldn't judge you if you ate them for breakfast… I might just join you. But aside from that, they're the perfect mid-afternoon snack to tide you over til dinner, the perfect I-need-a-treat-with-my-cup-of-tea snack, the perfect damn-it-it's-only-11:30am-and-I'm-ready-for-lunch snack, or the perfect middle-of-your-shift-at-work snack when you just need SOMETHING to nibble on (which is how these came about…). There are so many wonderful flavours in these cookies - a little bit nutty from the buckwheat, a little bite from the freshly grated ginger, fruity-sweetness from the orange zest and juice, little bites of deep, earthy chocolate from the raw cacao, plus they're a little bit carrot cake-y! They kind of taste like a muesli cookie except minus the muesli… Does that make sense? Just try them, you'll understand.

Ingredients (note: unfortunately I'm a very erratic experimental baker and don't measure my ingredients perfectly, so use your discretion to decide whether to add more or less of anything… eek)

1 and a 1/4 of a cup of buckwheat flour
1 tsp baking powder
A teeny pinch of sea salt
1/3 cup of raw buckwheat groats
1/2 cup of cacao nibs
1 tablespoon of coconut sugar (this is totally optional, depending on how sweet you like your cookies!)
1 grated carrot (about a cup's worth)

1/4 cup of maple syrup/agave syrup/honey if you're not strict vegan
1 tablespoon of soft coconut oil
Juice of half an orange (just eat the other half, nom)
1 tsp freshly grated ginger
1 tsp cinnamon

Method

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius, and grease a tray (I use coconut oil to do this) and/or line with baking paper.

Mix the buckwheat flour, salt, baking powder, optional coconut sugar, buckwheat groats and cacao nibs all together in a bowl. Add the carrot and mix.

In a separate bowl, combine the coconut oil, maple syrup/honey/agave, and orange juice, then add the grated ginger and cinnamon. Add this to the flour mixture and stir until combined. Here, I actually added an extra tablespoon or so of buckwheat flour because I thought the mixture was little too wet, but judge it for yourself. The mixture should still be reasonably wet and sticky!

Dollop tablespoons of the mixture onto the tray, shape them a little if you wish, and then pop them into the oven for 15 minutes! Devour, and try not to burn your fingers when they're fresh out of the oven and you juST CAN'T HELp yourself.

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Caramelly banana mango chia breakfast smoothie

During summer, I crave nothing more than fresh fruit smoothies for breakfast. Aside from being a completely delicious and refreshing brekky option, they're incredibly versatile and they pack a serious nutrition punch. I'm constantly playing around with my smoothie ingredients - so many different fruits, different combinations of fruit, coconut water or almond milk, different powders, greens or no greens… I could go on. But I won't. Instead I'll leave you with this morning's creation, which turned out deliciously caramel-like and super-satisfying.

You'll need:

3 frozen bananas
1 mango

Blend these two up together, so they're nice and creamy (it may be tempting to just eat it all like this… I won't blame you)

1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp maca powder
1 tsp mesquite powder
1 tblsp chia seeds
Coconut water/almond milk/water (entirely up to you, all are delicious)

Add all these tasty, super body-lovin' ingredients and blend it up. Add as much liquid as you want, until you reach your desired consistency - if I'm having a smoothie bowl, I'll use less liquid so it's nice and thick, but otherwise I probably add a cup or so of liquid.

I topped my smoothie with some raw buckwheat groats, which added a tasty crunch, but the possibilities of toppings are also endless (coconut flakes, more chia seeds, berries, cacao nibs… Get experimental!)

Sip away!

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Banana peanut butter bars

Grain free, refined sugar free, wholesome banana peanut butter bars with cacao chips, walnuts and buckwheat. Phew. Was that a mouthful, or what? A delicious mouthful. These babies are the perfect energy-packed, goodness-filled, tasty snack for busy mornings, hectic afternoons, as a little something to tide you over until dinner, or for dessert! I basically threw whatever I had in the pantry that I thought would be delicious into these bars, so a few of the ingredients are optional add-ins. And if you have other ingredients on hand that you think would go nicely, feel free to play around!

The buckwheat groats, cacao nibs, and nuts make for a delicious balance of textures, and the banana flavour is subtle but, paired with the peanut butter, perfect. Every ingredient is nutritious, and the bars are protein-packed with healthy fats (coconut! Nuts! Buckwheat!) AND lovely carbs (bananas!), so they're basically a square meal, amiright…?

I'm sure any other flour would work just as well but remember that coconut flour absorbs a lot of moisture, so if using another flour, make sure you reduce the amount of water you add. You could also use a different sweetener instead of coconut sugar if you don't have any on hand!

Ingredients:

¾ cup raw buckwheat groats

¾ cup coconut flour

½ cup coconut sugar

½ cup cacao nibs (optional, but delicious)

½ cup of walnuts (optional, or any other nut!)

Pinch of salt

1 tsp of baking powder

2 eggs

½ cup of water (more or less, as required)

1 Tblsp of soft coconut oil

2-3 mashed bananas (I used three smallish ones)

½ cup all-natural peanut butter

1 Tblsp honey

1 tsp vanilla extract

Mix the coconut flour & sugar, salt, baking powder together, before adding the buckwheat groats, cacao nibs and walnuts and mixing it all up. Add eggs and stir through well. In a separate bowl, mash the bananas, add the peanut butter, honey, vanilla, and coconut oil (you're allowed to eat a spoonful of this fab mixture… Or two… I ~~won't~~ can't judge).

Add the wet ingredients to the dry mixture, stir together well. Add the water so that you have a lovely dough that sticks together well.

Pop into a lined and greased tray, push down so it’s all nice and flat. Bake for 25 minutes on 180 degrees Celsius, leave to cool, cut into squares/rectangles/however you fancy, and nosh!

These actually taste even better the day after as the peanut and banana flavours mature, so if you have the patience/restraint, save a few for that reason… If not, I certainly won't hold it against you.

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Banana coconut chia pudding

After a fabulous trip to the Bondi farmer's markets (photos to come!), and the purchase of a bottle of raw almond milk was made (how absolutely adorable is the milk bottle?!), chia pudding was calling out to me. My darling best friend Tess, who lives up at Byron Bay, is staying with me currently and had never had chia pudding before, so breakfast was decided upon. I made up the recipe for this banana coconut chia pudding as I went, hope you love it and eat it as quickly as we did! This serves two, but you can easily half the recipe.

1 and a half cups of almond milk
1 banana
5 tablespoons of chia seeds
4 heaped tablespoons of greek yoghurt
A few handfuls of shredded coconut
1 heaped tspn maca powder
1 heaped teaspoon of cinnamon (if not more... I love my cinnamon)
A big drizzle of honey (optional, but tasty)

Throw all ingredients except the chia seeds into a blender, and go crazy! Then add the chia seeds, and blend again. Pour into two glasses/jars, pop the lids on, and leave in the fridge overnight. To serve, we chucked a few almonds and some coconut flakes on our puddings. Devour!

The raw almond milk we bought was lovingly made by Inside Out Nutritious Goods, a Sydney-based small business specialising in almond milk. Aside from the drop-dead cutest packaging ever, this almond milk is divinely nutritious and the tastiest I've tried. Check out their facebook or their instagram.

(Me with my almond milk! Wahoo!)

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