Tag Archives: easter recipe

Kiwi loaf – dairy and gluten free and helps you sleep!

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It’s been a busy couple of months since I got back from my trip to Indonesia and in that time as well as having loads on at work, we’ve had our kitchen re-done and a load of building work at home. As a result, not only have I not been able to do any baking, but I’ve found living in a building site has been impacting on my sleep! So I did some research and discovered that there’s pretty good evidence that kiwi’s (the fruit!) can help improve the quality and quantity of sleep you get (you can read my article about it here). That got me thinking about creative things to do with kiwi’s other than fruit salads! Lots of the research also suggests that a carb-based snack will also aid restful sleep so I thought I’d try combining the two. I stumbled across a recipe for kiwi bread some time ago so now that the kitchen is finally finished I decided to adapt it and give it a go. I wasn’t sure exactly how it would turn out but it’s actually really good and rather like banana bread. It’s not too sweet but you get lovely flavours from the spices which really complement the slightly tangy kiwi flavour – delish, especially warm!

1/4 cup Agave nectar or sweet freedom (or you could use honey or any liquid sweetner)

1/3 cup Almond oil (or other neutral oil)

1 tbsp Ground flaxseed (linseed) in 3 tbsp warm water (or you could use 1 egg)

1 and 1/2 cups gluten-free flour

1 cup kiwi pulp (approx 4 kiwi’s)

1/2 cup chopped nuts (I used hazelnuts and almonds as it’s what I had in the cupboard!)

1 cup Raisins

1 tsp Cinnamon

1/4 tbsp Ground cloves

1/4 tsp Himlayan Rock Salt

1 tsp Baking powder

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees CPut the ground flaxseed in the warm water and allow to thicken, then beat with the agave and oil until well mixed. Sieve in the flour, baking powder, salt and spices and combine. Then add the kiwi, raisins and nuts stirring gently. Transfer to a greased loaf tin and place in the oven for 40 – 45 minutes. Remove from the oven and allow to cool a bit before slicing (or it will crumble – as I discovered as I just couldn’t wait! 🙂 ). Enjoy slightly warm in the evening (or at any time of day to be honest!). Sweet dreams! 🙂

Lemon Chia seed cookies (dairy free, low gluten)

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I know I know – not ANOTHER lemon and chia seed recipe but I’m really loving this combo at the moment and having fun trying out some recipes with them 🙂

This cookie recipe is a departure from my normal suite of ingredients as I’m using some Soya yoghurt. I’ve seen it in recipes before but never used it so thought I’d have a go! It can be substituted for silken tofu if you can’t have soya though.

These need to be flattened out really thin before you bake them otherwise they end up cakey and not crispy (but if you like your cookies like that then go for it!)

1 1/4 cup Coconut palm sugar/ raw unrefined sugar
3/4 cup Olive oil
3/4 cup Soya yogurt (natural or lemon flavoured works best)
1 1/2 tsp Vanilla extract
2 1/2 Cups Spelt flour or gluten free flour blend
3/4 tsp Himalayan rock salt
3/4 tsp Bicarobonate of soda
Zest of 1 large Lemon (plus juice of half a lemon if desired)
1/3 cup Chia seeds

For decoration: Raw golden icing sugar and a few drops of lemon juice

Pre-heat oven to 175 degrees.

Mix the oil and sugar together until well combined. Add the Soya yoghurt and vanilla extract and stir well. Sieve in the flour, bicarbonate of soda and salt and mix well. Finally stir in the lemon zest and chia seeds, and the lemon juice if you like your biscuits lemony!

The batter will be quite sticky and not like a traditional biscuit dough but don’t worry. Drop small spoonfuls onto a greased baking tray. Using the back of a fork flatten these out until they are only a few mm thick (unless you like your cookies cakey in which case don’t!). Bake in the oven for 10 – 15 minutes. Keep an eye on them, if they start to puff up then just flatten them a bit with a fork. Bake until they are golden brown. Remove and allow to cool on the tray for 5 minutes then transfer to a wire rack to cool. Once cool you can ice them if you want to – just mix up the icing sugar with a few drops of lemon juice or water until you get a thick consistency then pipe over the biscuits 🙂

Raw gluten free, dairy free chili chocolates

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The Easter bunny was a bit late getting to my house this weekend but thankfully he did finally make it .. and look what he brought!

These are super easy and quick.

50g cacao butter

40g cacao  powder

1 – 2 tbsp sweet freedom/ Agave (to taste)

1/4 tsp cayenne pepper (or more to taste)

Melt the cacao butter and then stir in the rest of the ingredients. Pour into a silicone chocolate mould and leave in the fridge to set. For the eggs you need to do each half separately then use a bit of melted mixture to glue the set halves together. These chocs don’t do well at warm temperatures so store them in the fridge until ready to eat!

Lemon and Chia seed biscuits / cookies (dairy free, low/no gluten)

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They say better late than never eh? well I do anyway, and that’s certainly the case with this post. As you’ll see from the shapes I cut these biscuits out in these were designed as Easter biscuits but with everything I had going on this weekend with my sponsored cycle I just didn’t manage to get this post up before Easter sunday! I don’t think it really matters though. These are a nice light, crispy, biscuit that is great for any occasion. The lemon and chia theme is running through from my last recipe (lemon and chia seed muffins) – I’m a huge fan of lemon flavoured bakes and I’m loving chia seeds right now so apologies for that! 🙂

These biscuits are super easy to make and you can cut out any shapes you like. The dough can be a bit crumbly but it is just about manageable. This would be a good thing to try with the children over the holidays and they can have lots of fun decorating them. You can use any nut butter you like. If I’d had it I would have used almond I think as it works well with lemon, but the cashew is also pretty good – you get a hint of cashew but it doesn’t over power the lemon flavour and i complements the chia seeds nicely. These could be modifed with other flavours too – ginger, almond (using almond extract and butter), cinnamon – the world is your flavour oyster!

1 1/4 cups White spelt flour / gluten-free flour blend / Rice Flour
1 tsp Baking powder
1/4 tsp Himalayan rock salt
2/3 cup Cashew butter (or almond butter)
3/4 cup Coconut palm sugar / raw unrefined sugar
1/4 cup Almond milk, or other non dairy milk (soya milk, rice milk, coconut milk)
1 – 2 tsp Natural lemon extract
Zest of 1 lemon
1/4 cup Chia seeds

If you are icing them – raw unrefined icing sugar and lemon juice

Preheat oven to 175 C. Sieve the flour, baking powder, and salt into a small bowl. Beat the cashew butter and sugar together until well combined (ideally use a hand beater, but if not then just stir a lot!). Beat in the milk until fluffy, followed by the chia seeds and lemon extract and zest. Stir in the dry mix with a spoon (or the beaters on a slow speed) until just combined. The dough will probably be quite crumbly. Gather it together with your hands and knead into a ball. At this point if the dough seems too dry then add a tablespoon of warm water. You don’t want the dough to be too moist, but it does need to be handleable. I found it best to leave the dough a bit crumbly and just roll out small amounts at a time. If your nut butter was very runny you may need to chill the dough before continuing. The dough can be kept in the fridge for up to 2 days if wrapped well so you can make this in advance if necessary.

Roll out the dough until it’s a few mm thick and then cut out using cutters of your choice. You will probably need to use a palette knife to carefully move the biscuits to a greased baking tray. Bake in the oven for 12 – 15 minutes. I like my biscuits very well done so I tend to leave them in as long as possible! 🙂 They will be a bit soft when you remove them so allow them to cool for 5 mins on the tray, then transfer to a wire rack to cool.

Once cool mix up some icing – use enough lemon juice to create a pipeable paste and then use a piping bag to decorate the biscuits. If you don’t have a piping bag just use a small plastic sandwich bag – out the icing in to one corner then snip the end of the corner off and you can use it as a piping bag. Allow to set and then enjoy with a cup of tea!

Dairy-free, Spelt Shortbread

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I have some friends who love shortbread so I thought I’d try to make some dairy-free, “healthier” shortbread for them. I’ve stuck with spelt flour here as it’s easier to work with than the gluten free flours but I may have a play around with gluten free blends later 🙂 This recipe was a little too sweet for my primary taster so if you don’t like things too sweet reduce the sugar to 1/3 cup. If you like things sweet then up the sugar to 3/4 cup 🙂

wholewheat shortbread

For my first attempt I used white spelt flour and olive oil, for my second batch I lowered the sugar to 1/3 cup and used wholewheat spelt flour and a mix of almond and hazelnut oil. I think I prefer this version – it’s nuttier and the wholewheat gives it a real crunch. It would be better with only almond oil I think but I didn’t have enough! 🙂

1 1/2 cups and 1 tbsp Spelt flour
1/4 cup and 2 tbsp Rice flour Rice Flour
1/2 cup Raw unrefined sugar (golden cane sugar or coconut palm sugar)  (plus some to sprinkle on top)
1/8 tsp Himalayan rock salt
1/4 tsp Baking powder
2/3 cup Olive oil / Almond oil / Hazelnut oil/ Canola Oil  (Or butter 5 1/2 Oz)
2 tsp Vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 325 F. Line an 8″ sponge tin (or shortbread tin) with greaseproof paper. Put the sugar in a food processor and pulse until it’s more of a powder. Don’t worry too much if you can’t get it really powdery – just make sure it’s broken down a bit. Mix the flours, baking powder and salt together in a bowl and add the sugar. Make a well in the centre and pour in the oil and vanilla extract, then combine well using a metal spoon. Keep going until you have a smooth dough then transfer it to the pan and press it down firmly. Using a fork make holes in the top and with a knife score the shortbread lightly into 8 segments. Sprinkle the top with raw sugar if using.

Place in the oven for 40 – 45 mins. Remove and allow it to cool in the pan for 15 minutes then score it again. Take it out of the pan and break the wedges apart and leave to cool on a wire rack. Stored in an airtight container. It can also be wrapped in clingfilm and frozen at this stage – just make sure when you defrost it you defrost it on a wire rack, outside the container you froze it in.

These are perfect with a cup of coffee and also make a fab gift for Easter, Christmas or any time in fact! 🙂

Better Buns! Hot cross ones that is…

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Last week I posted a recipe for dairy-free, gluten free hot cross buns. The taste was spot on but they were a little dense for my liking. I’ve still not worked out the best gluten-free flour mix to use but I had a go with spelt flour and tweaked the recipe just a tad and these are great! They’re not gluten-free, but they are low gluten and spelt flour is often tolerated much better by people with gluten intolerance than normal flour so they’re not awful 🙂

So basically I used white spelt flour, instead of the rice flour, corn flour and xanthan gum and upped the yeast a bit…and….. we have… yummy buns! 🙂 woohoo! 🙂

 

Hot Cross Fun!

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Another weekend and another challenge! This time to have a go at some “healthy” hot cross buns!

So here goes – gluten-free, dairy free hot cross buns! If you’re not fussed about gluten free you could substitute the cornflour, rice flour and xantham gum for spelt flour. If you like it you can use candied peel instead of the orange and lemon zest too. I don’t think this recipe is quite right yet – the flavour seems to hit the mark, and they look ok (if a bit “rustic”) but they are quite dense. I willl have another play around with the recipe next weekend I think and see if I can impove it. I do wonder if it’s the flour mix causing the denseness? I’d be interested to hear how others get on if they try these 🙂 Being a little dense isn’t too much of a bad thing – I still managed to devour 3 of them in one sitting! 🙂

150g Cornflour

100g Rice flour

1.5 tsp Dried yeast

0.5 tsp Xanthan gum

2.5 tbsp Coconut palm sugar / unrefined raw sugar

0.5 tsp Himalayan rock salt

1 tsp Mixed spice

0.25 tsp Ground cinnamon

Zest of 1 lemon

Zest of 1 orange

50g  Olive oil

225 ml Warm water

100g Raisins / currants

For the Cross (optional)

4 tbsps Rice flour

1.5 tsps Cornflour

pinch of Xanthan gum

1.5 tbsps Coconut palm sugar/ unrefined raw sugar

enough water to make a pipeable paste

For the glaze: 3-4 tbsps Golden syrup

Preheat the oven to 180 C. Put the flours, yeast, xantham gum, spices, sugar, salt and orange and lemon zest into a bowl and mix well. Next add the oil and then start to add the water gradually, mixing as you go using a wooden spoon. The mix will have the consistency of a cake batter. Beat until all the lumps are gone. Finally stir in the raisons/currants. Scrape the mixture into the centre of the bowl and cover with clingfilm and leave to rise in a warm place for approximately 10 mins. It won’t rise dramatically but it will bulk up a bit.

The proof is in the pudding.... or the hot cross bun dough!

While you wait you can make the dough for the cross. Put the flours, sugar and xantham gum into a small bowl and add enough water and mix to make a pipeable paste. Put this mixture into a piping bag, or if like me you don’t have one just pop it in a small plastic sandwich bag and then cut off the corner to pipe through.

After the dough has sat for 10 mins spoon it out onto a baking tray. Try to give your buns as much height as possible when you put the dough out. Pipe the white cross over them. Cover the tray loosely with clingfilm and leave to prove in a warm place for another 5 mins.

Place then in the oven for 10 – 15 mins. Check them regularly – the tops should start to brown and they should sound hollow when tapped on the base! Once done remove from the oven and allow to cool. If you want to glaze them then gently warm the golden syrup and then paint over the top while the buns are cooling (warning it makes them deliciously sticky!).  Allow to cool.

These are definitely best eaten warmed or toasted with some lovely home-made jam! 🙂