Exchange Sugary Desserts For This & Notice What Changes...

Here is November's archive file! 

Mmm comfort food that is healthy, delicious and can even help to relax your little ones with no refined sugar rush...

Homemade Compote With Granola

Healthy Christmas Treats

Christmas can be a wonderful time of year, celebrations with the family for whatever the season may mean to you, delicious food, snug evenings in around the fire place playing games as well as a little bit of magic for the little ones too.

Christmas can however cause a lot of unnecessary stress especially when doing the supermarket runs. We seem to be bombarded with junk food and sugary treats at every aisle, mainly aimed at children. Not only do these foods on a regular basis harm the health of growing children, they can also increase stress levels as the body fights the toxins, saturated fats and refined sugars.

This is not to say we cant enjoy some chocolate, sweets or other festive goodies out there. However just notice the wide range of variety of more wholesome brands available. If you are counting the pennies, wonderful homemade treats can be great fun to make involving the children too.

A few healthier Christmas snack options (some of which can also be used as stocking fillers)...

• Tangerines, Satsumas, Mandarins...what a better way to bring in one of their 5 a day!
• Homemade carob treats (simply melt a bar, mix with dried fruit and nuts and leave to cool before cutting into chunks). This can be wrapped in little bags as a tasty stocking filler.

• The same mixture can be made with added orange rind and rolled into a ball shape when cool enough to handle. Wrap in foil and add to stockings as a tasty chocolate snowball.
• Use the previous carob mixture and mix with a little desiccated coconut, rolling into small truffle shape balls and coating with more coconut. Mini snowballs!
• Check out your local health food shop for tasty sweets free from sugar, gelatin, artificial colours and preservatives...and yes they taste great!
• Melt a carob bar into a lovely rich thick sauce and allow kids to dip their tangerine segments  or nuts into the sauce.
• Dried fruit and nuts in mini bags.
• Mini packets of raisins.
• Fruit leathers, fruit snack bars.
• Homemade popcorn with a few drops of umeboshi seasoning...kids will love this!
• Vegetable sticks and tortilla chips with dips (avocado, hummus, beetroot...)
• Kids non alcoholic mulled wine: red grape juice, orange juice and a few mulled wine spices.
• Roasted chestnuts in the oven.
• Sweet potato wedges
• Sweet potato and apple cake. The touch of cinnamon makes this cake a perfect festive treat.

Mmm Sweet Potato

Sweet potatoes offer great natural sweetness which children of all ages love. Not only do they taste great, they help nourish the spleen and pancreas, helping to stabilise blood sugar levels.

 

Check out the delicious sweet potato recipes on this blog (more to follow)...

Sweet Potato Wedges

Sweet Potato Treats

Sweet Potato and Apple Cake

Sweet Vegetable Bake

Oven Baked and Delicious

Other sweet potato recipe ideas include sweet potato and red lentil soup, sweet potato and beetroot soup, mashed sweet potato with orange rind, mashed sweet potato with suede, and jacket sweet potato with various fillings.

Smoothies And Juices

Why not try a few of these out this summer? All you need appliance wise is either a hand held blender for the smoothies or a smaller juicer for the juices.

 

You may notice that I don't use ice in juices and smoothies, not only does this water down the flavour, it can also put more strain on the body (especially the kidneys) if excessive amounts of ice cold drinks are consumed. A freshly made juice or smoothie is perfect and the sooner it is drunk once made, the more vitamins you and your family will be able to absorb. Also see a previous post on this blog called ´The White Stuff´ for more information about dairy foods.

 

Smoothie Ideas

Using banana and rice milk as a base you can create very creamy 100% dairy free smoothies. Rice Milk is preferred to soya as it is easier for the body to digest as raw soya products can cause inflammation and bloating. By adding a  few grains of sea salt you can also bring out the natural sweetness of the fruit and help balance the acidity thus making it easier to digest.

• Banana, Rice Milk, Strawberry
• Banana and Rice Milk with Almonds
• Banana, Rice Milk and Blackberries
• Kiwi, Apple, Banana and Orange
• Banana, Rice Milk and Pineapple
• Banana, Rice Milk and Peach
• Fruit Salad: Banana, Kiwi, Orange, Strawberry and Rice Milk
• Peach, Orange and Apple Juice
• Banana, Rice Milk and Cinnamon
• ?? (Experiment and enjoy creating your own flavours!)

 

Juice Ideas

MMmm fresh carrot juice! If you haven’t tried it, add it to your to do list this summer. Children will love the natural sweetness.

• Carrot and Apple
• Carrot and Pear
• Celery, Apple and Mint
• Pear and Apple
• Carrot, Orange, Apple and Beetroot
• Carrot, Apple and Celery
• Apple, Orange, Cucumber and Mint
• Apple, Cherry, Orange
• ?? (Experiment and enjoy creating your own flavours!)

 

Simply Delicious!

Last weekend saw another great seminar at 'La Escuela de Alimentacion Natural y Energetica' in Barcelona. Here is a great recipe idea by David Marcos, one of the Teacher Training students.

Simply core, peel and half some apples and cook by pan frying or steaming. Mix carob sauce with raisins and chopped nuts and place in the centre of each apple half. Decorate with an agar agar glaze, chopped nuts and strawberries.

YUM!



Sweet Potato and Apple Cake

This is my adapted version of a recipe from a large Health Food store. It is very easy to make this rich, moist and delicious cake...and there is no added sugar, gluten, wheat, or dairy.

Get children involved - they will love making this!

Check out the recipe section of this blog for the recipe. YUM!