Sprouting Seeds

I just read Pink's fab blog  showing Beetroot sprouts.. pink sprouts look so amazing.. and as we all know just how healthy sprouts are..  little nosey me went off on a tangent and found them ! You can buy every kind of sprout online from a place in PE at very reasonable prices

http://www.sproutingseeds.co.za


am soooooooo  exited as  lets face it  nothing could be more healthy that  fresh sprouts !!!

so go for it...  and their prices are discounted by 5% until tomorrow ( opening offer)

have a great weekend all
xoxo

GLOSSARY OF SEEDS

Here is alphabetical quick-link list of all of the seeds available from Umuthi Sprouting Seeds with brief descriptions.
Just a Reminder: All of the sprouting seeds are suitable for planting in the vegetable garden as well. 

• Adzuki Beans (Organic) for Sprouts have a distinctive sweet, nutty flavour, ideal for stir fries and veggie burgers.
• Alfalfa Sprouting Seeds, known as Lucerne in South Africa, are very nutritious, vitamin-rich, freshly green tasting sprouts.    
• Apricot Kernels have been used in alternative medicine for many years. Please be cautious with these as they are toxic in quantity.
• Barley Grass Seeds allow you to grow your own baby barley plants for smoothies and barley grass for juicing. 
• Beetroot Sprout Seeds have a mild beetroot taste which enhances a mixed salad. They are very attractive as microgreens too.
• Black Lentils (Organic) for sprouting have a slightly nutty/peppery flavour. High in iron and Vitamins A and C.
• Broccoli Sprout Seeds are one of the most nutritious sprouting seeds you can eat, with a spicy flavour ideal for use in salads.
• Celery Seed is often called for in a recipe and can be hard to find. Adds a strong celery flavor in cooking. 
• Chick Peas (Organic) for Sprouting have a crunchy textureand a mild flavour, high in fibre and Vitamins A and C. 
• Chinese Cabbage Seeds when sprouted offer high levels of Vitamin A and C. Excellent in salads and other Asian dishes.
• Cumin Seed is the pale green seed of Cuminum cyminum, a small herb in the parsley family. Used in cooking.
• Fennel Seed is the oval yellowish-brown dried fruit of Foeniculum vulgare, a member of the parsley family. Used in cooking. 
• Fenugreek Sprout Seeds  have a spicy curry flavour. High in Vitamins A and C. 
• Flaxseeds (Organic Linseed) are very difficult to sprout alone. They can be sprouted when mixed at about 15% in a blend. 
• Garlic Chives Seeds (Chinese Leek Seeds) Though it is actually a chive seed, it tastes just like Garlic.
• Green Lentils for Sprouting have a slightly nutty/peppery flavour. High in iron and Vitamins A and C.
• Green Peas for Sprouting are a special type of pea renowned for its sweet taste and visual appearance. 
• Japanese Radish Sprouting Seeds produce white stems with a sharp, spicy flavour. They add interest to salads and stir fries.
• Maple Peas for Sprouting also known as Carlin peas have a long history in food. As a sprout they are crunchy and sweet. 
• Millet Seed (Organic)
• Mung Beans (Organic Bean Sprout Seeds) are the ever-popular Chinese bean sprouts, high in Vitamin C. 
• Mustard Sprout Seeds provide an easy, delicious way to introduce mustard's spicy flavor into your diet.
• Onion Sprouting Seeds produce mild onion flavoured shoots to enhance a mixed salad. These are a red variety of onion.
• Peanuts for Sprouting become a wonderful sweet and crunchy sprout in only three days. Older sprouts become bitter.  
• Pigeon Peas also known as toor dal are normally eaten cooked, although they are suitable for sprouting too.
• Pumpkin Seeds (Organic) are one of nature's almost perfect foods, helpful in men's diets as a natural prostate protector. 
• Purple Kohlrabi Seed for Sprouting produce interesting bi-colour sprouts and grow into attractive microgreens.
• Quinoa (Organic) is not for sprouting. I provide it here due to popular demand as it is sometimes hard to find.
• Red Cabbage Seeds for Sprouting and Microgreens produce attractive, deep red sprouts that adds colour to salads. 
• Red Clover Seeds look like alfalfa sprouts and have a milder, sweet flavor. Rich in phytochemicals.
• Sesame Seeds (Raw) are tiny, flat oval seeds with a nutty taste and a delicate, almost invisible crunch. Best toasted, not sprouted.
• Soybean Sprout Seeds contain more of the nutrients found in whole soybeans (like edamame and soynuts), good in stir-fries. 
•  Sunflower Seeds for Sprouting have a mild taste, adding a different texture to a mixed salad. Ready in three days.
• Wheatgrass (Organic) Seed allows you to grow your own baby wheat plants for smoothies and wheatgrass for juicing. 
• Wonderbeans (Lupin) have many benefits attributed to them. I make them available due to popular demand.

Raw Beetroot & Carrot Salad

It was only in the last couple of months that I have started to use beetroot in my recipes. This deeply red vegetable had always been relegated to opening a jar of pickled beetroot, and then I only ever opened one of those jars because the man in my house loves this stuff. I just could never get my head around it.

However ...........  I then discovered roasted beetroot ( very yummy with creme fraiche and some balsamic glaze) and I was hooked !  so here in my pursuit of different ways of creating summer salads that are "skinny" is the Raw beetroot ! :)

How to:

Peel and grate about 4 beetroot
Grate 2 large carrots
Add 1 handful dried cranberries
Add 1 handful pine nuts
Add 1 handful sprouted chickpeas

Mix: 
Juice of 1 lemon
1 tbsp tamarind paste
2 to 3 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp soya sauce

That's all..  It is a wonderful fresh tasting salad that can be eaten right away and even tastes nice the following day. ( Perfect for lunch boxes to take to the office :))

Pork Fillet

Pork Fillet is a low fat meat . Combined with herbs and spices and roasted in the oven it makes a very delectable meal.
I have one of those small Romertopf clay pots which can do this sort of meal perfectly well. The way I did it last night was as follows:

2 tbsp olive oil into the pot mixed with Nomu pork rub ( about 1 heaped tbsp).
Rub the porkfillet with this all over.
In the space left over in the dish I cut a bunch of vegies, using yellow pepper, baby onions, tomato and courgette, as well a a few self=sprouted chickpeas for the crunch :):)

I also love adding cut up cucumber and celery as these are what the diet people call "free  vegies" ... and for anyone who thinks that cucumber does not do well cooked..... Its Delicious !

I then sprinkled roast veg herb mixture over the vegies and another dash of olive oil. Into the oven at 180 deg C for about 45 minutes, leaving the lid off for the last 15 minutes.

Iced Tea

I love Iced Tea but don't want to buy the commercial stuff that is full of sugar. So I make my own..  at a fraction of the price and a whole lot healthier as well. In fact I make and drink about 2 to 3 liters a day as when it is not so hot I don't really like to drink water and also if the hunger pangs hit  before another meal is due..  this is the perfect alternative to circumvent the fridge !

 

HOW TO:

In a BIG jug add 4 tea bags Rooibos and 1 teabag Mint Tea

3 to 5 slices of fresh ginger

1 table spoon of Advantage ( aspartame free sweetener)

juice of 2 lemons

Add boiling water and let the tea bags sit until the tea has gone cold and then store in fridge.  If its cold and raining :):)  its also delicious  when you drink it hot !

Mixed Grill

On Sunday I had family for lunch and decided to make something I had not made before and it turned out amazing. Weather was still yukkie in Stellenbosch ( where on earth is the sun????!!)
I had some pork fillet and some bacon  in the fridge and bought a pkt of thin not so fatty beef sausage.
First went to pick some strongish branches of rosemary , took the leaves off, leaving just the top ones on. Then scraped the bark and cut the end to a point .... making the perfect kebab sticks. Alternating bacon, sausage and pork fillet the threaded the kebabs.

 

Into a baking dish a gluck of olive oil and a good sprinkle of Ina Paarman's Rosemary & Olive spice all over the meat. Oven at 180 deg C for about 30 minutes. Turn the Kebabs over halfway through.

I had made earlier on some polenta the following way:  

2 cups water

1 cup milk

1 cup polenta

Heat the water/ milk mix and add the cup of polenta. Stir the same way you would be doing the local "pap".

When it has the right consistency ( smooth, not grainy anymore), add salt & pepper plus about 3 tablespoons of parmesan cheese. Take off the heat and pour the polenta onto a large plate so it ends up with a thickness of about 1cm. Let it go cold and set.

Stage 2 of making the perfect polenta goes like this :):)

Cut squares out of the cooled down set polenta. Heat a little olive oil in a heavy frying pan and fry these oh so nice little pieces until they are golden on both sides. ( don't move them around too much while this is happening or you will loose the crust).

 

Lastly I picked a bunch of baby spinach from my garden. The perfect way to get the best flavours out of spinach is like this:

Wash spinach and shake off most of the water. Heat a large pot with a splatter of olive oil. Cook the spinach with a closed lid for about 30 seconds ( to create steam). Take the lid off. quickly stir for no more than a minute. Take off the heat. Grate some fresh nutmeg over it (nutmeg brings out the flavour of spinach) .. salt and pepper ...  all done.

For dessert I made a skinny fruit cream ...

Into the liquidizer goes the following:

2 bananas

1 can of grenadilla pulp

handful strawberries

1 bakkie of fat free smooth cottage cheese

same amount of low fat yogurt

1 tbsp Advantage artificial sweetener

Blitz the whole lot up. Into a bowl, decorate with some fresh mint and berries and into the fridge for 2 hours.

One can obviously use all kinds of different fruit, but I would always include bananas to create the smoothness of the dessert. 

Prawn Fritata

Clearing out the deep freeze I found a 1/4 pkt Woolies prawns. It was one of those days when I really did not feel like cooking as Tony was up in East London. So I made this Fritata with my new Creusier frying pan  :) ( so chuffed with it !!!) and it goes like this:

For 1 person "on diet"


Defrost prawns ( quantity "as you like it")
Chop a small handful parsley
Grated rind of 1 lemon
1/2 tsp chilli flakes
2 eggs

heat oven to 180 deg C

In a very hot frying pan (metal handles!) quickly fry prawns with parsley, lemon rind and chilli.
Beat the eggs and stir underneath the prawns ( distribute prawns evenly)
Frying pan with goodies into the oven and leave to bake and puff up for about 3 minutes.
Take out and eat before the whole thing collapses with a big green mixed salad.

Note that if you make this for more people it obviously needs to spend more time in the oven :):)

Preserved Green Figs

Its that time of the year again..  My  green fig tree is laden with fruit. Unfortunately its not one of those kid of figs that have the juice inside, no its a fig purely created for making preserves. So here I go again. My first batch is 4kg which should make lots of nice pressies for family and friends. What will be different this year is that thanks to Pink the figs that turned brownish last year when cooked.. this year they have turned out in their natural glorious GREEN ! The magic potion she remembered from her gran was Vitrioel  which my man from the chemist told me is Copper Sulphate (reminding me of when your hair used to turn green in the swimming pool)

2 kg firm, ripe green figs ( leave the short stem on)

2 tbsp slaked lime

3.5 ltr cold water

2.5kg sugar
1 stick cinnamon

lemon juice of about 3 to 4 large lemons (I left the pips in for a bit of pectin)

Knife tip of copper sulphate to add during the boiling in order to keep the fig colour green

Cut a cross at the base of each fig. Mix the slaked lime in the water, add the figs and leave overnight to soak. I put mine into a sink and weighed it down with a wooden board. This ensures the fruit will be tender, yet have a crisp skin. Rinse thoroughly, place in a bowl of clean, cold water and set aside.

Place about 3.5 ltr fresh water in a deep saucepan to immerse the figs, add the fruit and boil for about 15 minutes until tender. Remove from the pot and drain in a colander ( Do not throw the water away ! Measure the water, and make up to 3 litres. Pour back into the saucepan, add the sugar, cinnamon and lemon juice and bring to the boil, stirring until the sugar dissolves. (Don't allow the syrup to boil until this has happened.)

Drop in the figs one by one (don't allow it to go off the boil) and boil fairly rapidly, uncovered, for about 45 minutes until the fruit is translucent and the syrup has thickened slightly. Pack figs into hot, dry, sterilised jars, fill with the syrup and seal.

Makes about 12 x 550 ml jars.

Baked Ricotta & Salad

For some reason I have not really ever used Ricotta before. I came across this recipe of baked Ricotta and as its very low in fat, decided it would make the perfect lunch. As I do a lot of times.. I read a recipe and then do "my own thing" w r t flavours. Hence I am not giving exact measurements here..  just guidelines.

In a bowl  I crumbled the Ricotta and added the following:

2 tbsp chopped chives

1 tbsp Woolies Italien herb mix

1 tbsp tamarind paste

dash of olive oil

Salt & pepper

Slightly oil a ramekin and push the Ricotta mixture into it. Bake at 180 deg C for 25 minutes.

Arrange your favourite salad ingredients on a plate, carefully turn out the baked Ricotta ( ooops mine crumbled a bit) and lightly season salad and Ricotta with Olive oil and  good balsamic.

I really liked the taste of the Ricotta together with a salad and will definitely do it again. I guess one can even become more creative as to the herbs and spices one is using when mixing the Ricotta..  but for a first time - yes not bad at all !

Thai Coleslaw

Having eaten this wonderful Thai inspired salad last Saturday at the Stellenbosch Slow Food Market, I went and got all the ingredients this morning and made a similar salad for lunch today. I read this recipe first at the  Rawlicious recipe book. Its a whole bunch of grating here..  but definitely worthwhile the effort

The quantities  given here is enough to invite 4  people for a lekka lunch :)

2 c red cabbage grated

2 c green cabbage grated

2 c carrots grated

2 c courgettes grated

1 med red onion (chopped)

4 spring onions sliced

1 c loosely packed coriander

handful cashews

handful roasted nu-seeds

2 Tbsp sesame seeds (should have been black ones, but didn't have)

Thai Salad Dressing 

The following goes into your blender:

1 red pepper

1 c olive oil ( I used 1/2 cup)

1 heaped tsp chilli flakes

Juice of 1 lemon

3 tbsp rice vinegar

3 tbsp tamarind paste

3 tbsp soy sauce

2 tbsp honey ( I used Advantage artificial sweetener)

3 garlic cloves

3 cm fresh ginger

1 tsp curry powder

1 tbsp coriander

salt to taste

I know it sounds like a big mission with all these ingredients..  but just chucking them directly into your blender is really not to much of a bother.

This makes a lots of dressing and you won't even have to use it all at once. It keeps in the fridge for a long time and you can use it in other salads as well.

For lunch I weighed 150 g of this salad and accompanied it with 90 g of smoked snoek.. Delicious and really filling !

Flame Tarte / Tarte Flambe

Am not sure the exact way to translate a Flammkuechli,  which is a sort of very thin  pizza covered traditionally with creme fraiche, bacon and onions. Its the typical pub type of food in Southern Germany and the Alsace (where I originate from ). I have seen them done here at the Stellenbosch Saturday food market in a slightly different way with rocket and Parma ham which is also delicious..  If you have a pizza tray on your Weber it is also perfect for a quick snack when doing a braai

• 250 g flour
• 3 Tsp Canola oil
• 150 ml water
• Salt
•  
• 200 g Crème fraîche
• 150 ml  Sour Crème
•  
• Sprinkle of Nutmeg
• 150 g Bacon sliced into small pieces
• 450 g  thinnly sliced Onions
• Some chopped chives
• Baking paper

Heat oven to 250 deg C

Mix flour, oil, water and salt to a smooth dough ( must not be sticky) and roll out to the size of your baking tray not thicker than 2mm. ( you will get about 3  out of the amount of mix)

Line the baking tray with baking paper and transfer the rolled out dough carefully.

Mix the Crème Fraiche and Sour Crème and paint the dough all over.

Add the Bacon and Onions and some Nutmeg.

Bake for 10 minutes or until the edges turn slightly brown.

Sprinkle with a few chives  and enjoy !

Salmon & Steamed Vegies

Its nearly been a week this going on hopefully the very last strict no cheat diet. It was easy, yes really easy. No hunger at all ( guess cause my brain is in the right place :) . They say that the first 4 weeks is the hardest of re-adjustments. Well ...  I am trying to make it as attractive as I possibly can by having lots of choices and different flavours and this seems to be the key to success.

Last night I a lot of different vegies, layed them out in my bamboo steamer ( also added some cucumber which is a "free" vegie and I absolutely adore as a cooked one especially sprinkled with some fresh Dill). Total weight of all these vegies in the pic below was 150 g. Then I seared 150 g of  salmon smeared with a bit of crushed ginger  and covered with roasted sesame seeds and lemon juice. Added a few preserved chilli and lemon pieces and chucked in for good measure some fresh peas ( just for colour). And you know what??????  It tased devine ! Steamed vegies in a bamboo basket keeps the flavour of each different veg separate and one does not even need loads of salt.

Now I just need to get through without a cheat to Monday when I have to get onto That ! scale :) and here I am  now off to the Stellenbosch  Food Market :) yep  sucker for punishment I guess..  but I have to get some of those seedlings which they sell there.

Have a great weekend all

xox

Swiss Christmas Cookies

Tandy's challenge this week are cookies.:)  Seeing that I am not baking at the moment, I still wanted to post some of my dearest childhood memories. I grew up just outside Basel /Switzerland. The 2 months before Christmas was always a hectic baking time at our home. My granny went into overdrive to bake the traditional Swiss Christmas cookies in ginormous quantities. I have rewritten 3 of her most famous  recipes for this first posting and will do another 3 next time. I sourced the photographs of the internet. 

Basler Leckerli (Basel cookies)

These are the very famous bisquits which are sold all year round in Basel  here first the original recipe:)

 

 

Ingredients for two medium size baking sheets:

450 g honey

300 g sugar

1½ tbs  cinnamon

1 pinch of clove powder

½ tsp of nutmeg

100 g  chopped candied orange peel

100 g  chopped candied lemon peel

200 g  ground almonds

Grind skin of one lemon

2 tbsp of kirsch

600g  flour

1½ tsp baking powder

150 g icing sugar

3 to 5 tbsp water

preparation:

Put honey, sugar, cinnamon, clove powder and nut meg in a pan, heat up slowly, then remove from stove.

Add candied orange peel, candied lemon peel, almonds and grind skin of lemon, stir until mixed evenly.

Add kirsch, flour and baking powder, knead on a table to form a soft dough.

While the dough is still warm, roll it out on the back of two greased baking sheets approximately 5 mm (0.2 inches) thick.

Let it rest for about 5 to 6 hours or over night in a dry place.

Bake for about 15 to 20 minutes in the center of the pre-heated oven at 220 °C.

Mix icing sugar and  water, and paint the biscuits immediately.

Cut off stale edges. Cut  in small pieces (5 x 3 cm,)  take them off the baking sheets and let them cool.

Basler Brunsli

Ingredients

250g good dark chocolate, 70%, chopped
⅓ cup cocoa powder
2 tsp cinnamon
¼ tsp cloves
2 egg whites
¼ cup icing sugar
3 cups ground almonds
3 Tbsp Brandy or other
Course sugar for sprinkling (about ¼ cup)

Preparation 

- blend the chocolate, cocoa and spices in a food processor until finely ground
- add almonds and mix well

- in a large bowl, whip the eggwhites until frothy. Add the icing sugar in two batches, whipping well between additions, until firm peaks form

- fold in the chocolate-almond mix and the brandy

- form into two logs, wrap in plastic and freeze for at least 30 mins

- preheat the oven to 170 deg C
- working with one batch of dough at a time, sprinkle your pastry board with sugar and roll dough out carefully over sugar until 1cm thick. Cut shapes (traditionally 2″ hearts are used) and place on a cookie tray. 
Sprinkle each cookie with sugar crystals, pressing slightly on each cookie to embed the sugar a little.
- bake in the oven for 18 – 20 mins

Zimt Sterne (Cinnamon Stars)

Ingredients for approximately 50 cookies (depending on the size of a single cookie):

3 fresh egg whites

1 pinch of salt

250 g icing sugar sugar

1½ tbsp cinnamon

½ tbsp kirsch or lemon juice

350 g  ground almonds

Preparation:

Stir white of egg and salt in a bowl until it is real stiff.

Add icing sugar, stir until ingredients are evenly distributed. Put ½ cup aside for the icing.

Add cinnamon, kirsch (or lemon juice) and almonds, knead to a soft dough.

Roll out dough on a flat surface (it should be slightly covered with sugar), approximately 7 mm  thick.

Cut out stars or other shapes and put them on a baking sheet covered with baking paper.

Let them rest for about 5 to 6 hours or over night in a dry place.

Carefully paint the cookies with the frosting set aside in step 2.

Bake for about 3 to 5 minutes in the center of the pre-heated oven at 250 °C .

Let cool completely before serving.

Skinny Snack

Being on "The Diet" :)   here is another snack that is low low fat and high in protein... |Very simple roasted Pumkin Seeds



How to :

Heat a heave bottom frying pan , chuck in the pumkin seeds,  turn them over and over until they are nicely roasted. Don't just let them sit or they will burn..

Once they are roasted add quite a bit of cinnamon and let the flavour grow while the seeds are very hot still.
Take off the stove, cool down and then add Salt and either Xyletol or in my case I use Advantage which is also Aspertame free.

Eating pumkin seeds is also brilliant to preven pancreatic cancer I am told...

Potato Salad

When downloading some pics just now to do a skinny snack recipe, I found I still had my favourite potato salad on here. I guess I cannot let it go to waste..  so today I'll post the salad and the skinny snack tomorrow..

I normally find potato salads very stodgy if it is just made with potatoes and mayonnaise..  I do however love potatoes and have made "my" version of this salad  since the year dot ...... its light and fresh and NOT stodgy :)

Ingredients:

Woolies Mediteranean potatoes about 1 kg
not too soft boiled and cut into slices. They must still
be a bit warm when you make the salad

English cucumber -  1/2 of a big one very finely sliced

2 red onions finely sliced

6 hard boiled eggs  in 1/4

chives chopped

If  too lazy to do home-made mayonnaise, use Hellmans
and mix with a gluck of olive oil, white balsamic, 1 tbsp Dijon
mustard, juice of 1 lemon plus salt & pepper.

Mix all together and do not put into fridge before serving.

Roasted Chickpeas with Moroccan Spices

See...!  it does not always have to be  potato chips  or tacos...:)

These little gems are delicious and certainly satisfy the graving for a spice snack  in between....

1 400g tin of chickpeas
1 Tbsp olive oil

FOR THE MOROCCAN SPICE MIX:

2 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp chili powder
1/2 tsp sweet paprika
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground allspice
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1/8 tsp smoked paprika

1/2 tsp sugar

Preheat oven to 180C.  

Drain the chickpeas into a colander and rinse well with cold water until no more foam appears. Let beans drain for 5-10 minutes, then pat dry with a cloth or paper towel if they still look wet.

While the chickpeas drain, make the spice mix. (The recipe makes far more than you need, but you can store it in an airtight container for other uses.)

Toss beans with olive oil and seasonings and lay out on a parchment-lined baking sheet.

Roast for about 45 minutes stirring every 15 minutes so they don't burn and cook evenly.

Check for doneness (they should be crunchy and not soft at all) and put back into the oven for 5 minute intervals if they are not ready).

They are also amazing when added to a salad. I often add Dukkha to a salad..  but these give a wonderful crunch!

Boozy Semi Fredo

I've been wanting to post this recipe for a long time now. Never having had a chance to make it I don't have a photo..  and seeing that I am about to embark of this more healthy sort of life style, I won't be making semi fredo for a while :)
Semi fredo is a sort of a creamy dessert that is frozen and can be adapted to whatever flavour or shape you can imagine. The basis always remains the same as in Plain Vanilla :)
This particular one stems from my Swiss/French granny and is a perfect dinner party boozy, delectable piece of culinairy heaven !

Ingredient:

6 large eggs
200 g dark chocolate
200 g ground hazelnuts
1 cup castor sugar
1 Tbsp Nomu Vanilla paste
2 bakkies cream
2 tots of Kirsch or Brandy or Rum

Separate the eggs
Grate the chocolate on a coarse grater
Add the ground hazelnuts, vanilla paste and Kirsch and let this mix rest in fridge for about 30 minutes  for the flavours to intermingle.
Beat the egg yolks and sugar until light and fluffy.
Beat the egg whites until still
Beat the cream until stiff as well ( I know a lot of beating going on here ...:)

To assemble this gorgeous pud it goes like this:

First gently ( no more beating from now on Only Gently does it !) mix the egg and sugar mix under the choc/hazelnut mix.
Then fold in the cream (again gently in order not to let the air out !!!) and then even more gently ( I am now grinning a bit here) the stiff egg whites. Voila ! all done.

In Winter you can serve this cream as is for total and utter comfort dessert. In Summer you serve it as semi fredo. A nice way to do this is to either line a straight glass with baking paper to stand free about an inch above the glass, fill the cream and freeze for 6 hours. Before serving remove the paper and decorate a bit maybe with some raspberries on top. Another idea is to make a "bomb" by lining a round bowl with cling wrap , fill with cream, freeze and after removing from freezer arrange and decorate on a big plate.

That's it folks ! try it .. and if you don't like chocolate and booze, use berries  (some mushed and some whole). As I said..  the base of a vanilla cream always remains the same.

Cooking the right way !

All my life I considered myself as a reasonably good cook. Having been brought up with French and Swiss style of cooking, it obviously always included lots of the "good things" like cream, wine, butter etc etc.. you get the picture I am sure.

However I have finally come to the  conclusion that cooking in my old style does not lend itself to "growing old gracefully" if ones genes are not made that way...  and contrary to 20 years ago.. now the pounds just keep piling on, even with the smallest dicretion. Therefore I have decided  on the need to toe the line so to speak and after signing up today with SureSlim :) I will for the next 7 months ( this is how long it will take I am told to have a body I am supposed to have) cook and invent ways of preparing food that is still as tasty as before BUT without all the goodies I used before. 

I hope that with this way of preparing food on a day to day basis and blooging on it, it will maybe  inspire some people out there to join me on a much healthier eating journey and also coming up with healthy alternatives to the lekka food....:)

Tomorrow I have to go and have my blood tested so the guys at SureSlim can figure out just what sort of choice I will have when preparing meals...  quite scary....  but I guess with writing about it here, I can't really back out now  can I????  :):)

Here is also a pic of the amazing Japanese flowering cherry tree that is in bloom at the moment in my garden!  So amazing with 2 different colour blooms.