Apple Spice Granola Recipe – a staple in our house

Ever been suspicious of what these supermarket breakfast cereals contain? Often less nutrition than the cardboard boxes they come in.

Here is a time proven raw granola recipe I was introduced to years ago by my good friend and mentor Chad Sarno. Not much tweaking needed to happen since. Some creations are just perfect. Saying that, especially this basic granola recipe is almost crying for some playful changes or addition of ingredients like Maca powder, chia seeds, cacao nibs, Sacha Inchi powder, freeze dried fruit slices etc.. Knock yourself out! 😉

Don’t be afraid to substitute or add other nuts and seeds like pumpkin seeds, coconut chips or brazil nuts. Just adjust the amount of date paste to obtain the desired sweetness.

I often use sprouted buckwheat for this recipe as it is a reasonably priced alternative to lot of highly priced nuts, like pecans or walnuts. Buckwheat also dehydrates beautifully into a crispy crunch. I believe the thick ‘slimy’ run-off from the sprouting grains also helps to bind the granola clusters together – similarly to what happens with flax and chia seeds when you soak them.

This brings us to another great little secret wit this recipe. By soaking and sprouting the nuts and seeds and then mixing the wet ingredients with date paste, apples and whatever spices and superfood powders you want to add, you achieve a natural clustered crunchy granola after dehydration. Adding wet and dry ingredients to nuts and seeds before dehydration and then dry the lot together in clusters, bars or any shape, will nicely attach the flavours and hold all other components together.

Now just pop your granola clusters into a bowl, add some banana slices and pour your freshly made almond milk or raw organic Jersey cow’s cream over it and enjoy!

You are still waiting for the actual recipe, right?!
Here it is:

Apple Spice Granola
Makes 4 cups

1 c pecans or walnut pieces, soaked10-12 hours 1 c almonds, soaked 10-12 hours 1 c sunflower seeds, soaked 10-12 hours 1 c hulled buckwheat, sprouted for 1-2 days 1-2 c date paste 1/2 t vanilla extract

2 T chia seeds 3 apples, diced small 2 T cinnamon, ground 1 T maca powder t natural sea salt 1/2 t lemon juice

1. Keep the sprouted buckwheat aside. Using the food processor, pulse all other nuts and seeds until coarsely ground. Add in a large bowl to the sprouted buckwheat.
2. Also using the food processor blend the dates with a small amount of water until it becomes a smooth paste. Dry dates will require soaking over night.
3. Toss the paste along with the diced apples, chia seeds, maca powder, cinnamon, vanilla extract and salt with the nut mixture. Hand mix well. Adjust flavour with lemon juice.
   
4. Continue by crumbling the ‘wet’ granola onto Teflex dehydrator sheets and dehydrate at 145 F for 2 hours. Over the next hours turn the temperature gradually down to 115 F. Turn trays periodically. After 6-8hours flip over and remove Teflex sheets. Dehydrate at 105 F for 12 more hours or until crisp.
   
   This process is important to stop the granola from fermenting during the dehydration process. Not that it would be bad for you, yet the flavour would be slightly different 😉 It would definitely clear up any phytic acid remnants after the soaking and sprouting.
   

   Notice the space between the clusters when wet!

5. Store in sealed glass jars.

Enjoy!
René
🙂

Raw Chocolate Bar Recipe – Finally!

After filling my Facebook page and ‘Timeline’ with tempting pictures of raw chocolate bars I received so many orders that I will have to move to a more empowering strategy. How about you make these beauties yourself and send me a sample?! 😉

“Give a man a chocolate bear and you’ll feed him for a day. Teach him…”

Although the recipe listed below has been working well for me over the months you might encounter problems when adding nut flours or fruit powders to your liquid chocolate mix. Sometimes the cacao butter separates when cooling down (especially when adding liquids). To avoid this from happening you can melt just 50% of it and shave the rest with a grater. That will keep the temperature of the whole mix down. That also means your chocolate will solidify quicker. I tried it today. Worked like a Charm! Also the surface of the finished bars seems to be much smoother.

Be aware that when making raw chocolate you will leave the field of approximates and enter the Sacred Realm of Alchemy. So tread carefully and record your recipe trials and precise amounts!

And here we go with:

Raw Chocolate Bars

Makes enough chocolate to brighten a hairy day
(36 ice cube tray bars and 1-2 teddy bears)

1 lb (454g) raw organic  cacao butter 2 c cacao powder 1.5 c cane sugar/xylitol, ground into a powder 1 t + vanilla powder 1-2 drops lime juice (Not more!) 1-2 drops tamari sauce ¼ c raw cacao nibs, optional 1 t freeze dried fruit powder, optional

1. Melt the cacao butter carefully in a bowl over hot water. Be careful not to overheat it. Stir continuously! That will yield about 2.25c of liquid.
2. Transfer to a blender jar and add the remaining ingredients. Mix at high speed till everything is emulsified into a homogenous mixture.
3. Pour the liquid mixture into chocolate molds or small plastic wrapped tartlet shells. You can drizzle some fruit powder into the mold before pouring the liquid chocolate. Silicone ice cube trays are best.
   
4. Drop the cacao nibs into the liquid chocolate. They will float. You can stir them in if you wish.
   
5. Chill. The quicker the chocolate solidifies the better.
6. Serve on cold dishes or paper as the chocolate melts easily.

Tip: Variations can be made with different essential oils and essences. Use your imagination! Citrus oils work well, Geranium goes, and even Basil rocks!

Great New Zealand made freeze dried fruit powders and whole fruit here: Fresh As!

Enjoy and Happy Birthday!
René
🙂

PS: While we are on it… To further your raw chocolatier education please do yourself a favour and visit my dear friend Amy Levin’s website www.ooosha.co.uk! She is the ‘Master of Raw Chocolate’ and has a bunch of her best recipes listed on that website. Make sure you try the Textured Mocha Truffles!

Raw Food Survival Class – The Art of Raw Chocolate

…with samples, of course!

Believe it! We are announcing a raw chocolate class.

This will be the ultimate in making delectable desserts, snacks, cakes and presents using raw cacao in all its various guises – right on time for Easter.

Mark this date in your calendar:

Wednesday, March 28th, 7 – 9.30pm,
Wise Cicada Cafe, 23 Crowhurst Street, Newmarket
Auckland, New Zealand

You will learn:

• How to make a variety of simple, yet stunning chocolate cakes, cookies, drinks and desserts.
• How to make delicious shakes, using raw cacao and other superfoods.
• How to entertain friends and family with your own sweet chocolate treats, pralines and chocolate bars.
• Which flavours enhance or combine well with chocolate.
• What ratios are required for a rounded flavour and also consistency.
• What secret ingredients will make any of your creations a hit with your audience.

As always, a complete recipe booklet and samples are included.

Your investment: $60.-/person

Space is limited to 20 people. Book yours today by ringing René on 0275551622 or contacting us here.

Oh, upon frequent request at our previous classes we will actually have some of the presented sweets for sale after the class. Bring your piggy bank!

See you there!

René

🙂

Super Hero Bliss Balls – Superfoods kicking butt

These ones were the hit at the Prana New Year Festival 2012 ‘Chocolate Bar’ at the Barn. Having arrived here you might have been looking around on the web for a decent Bliss Ball recipe that didn’t just sport some nuts and dates rolled into a ball. I’ve been in your position and couldn’t find any either that deserved the ‘Bliss’ with the Balls.

So here is a proven recipe that has some serious ‘Bliss Potential’. They are a great treat, last a while in the fridge and can be altered to have a different dusting (try Mesquite or Lucuma), the goji berries replaced with Acai, etc. Just make a few batches of this recipe and then start playing. I would love to hear from you. And while you are on it, please take a few pictures, as I haven’t any good ones of these yet 🙂

Super Heroes as supporting act to Müsli slices

Super Hero Bliss Balls

A lunchbox treat for Super Heroes!

Makes a few

• 2c dried shredded coconut
• 2c Cashews, dry, ground into flour
• 2T Chia seeds
• 1/2c Goji berries, soaked
• 1/3 c date paste (dates blended into a paste with just enough water)
• 1T Maca powder
• 3T raw cacao powder
• ½ t Vanilla extract
• 2T raw cacao nibs

•  1-2 T raw cacao powder for dusting

1. Combine the coconut, cashew flour, chia seeds, maca powder, 3 T of raw cacao powder and the cacao nibs in a large mixing bowl.
2. In a food processor pulse the goji berries then add to the date paste. Now add the moist ingredients, incl. Vanilla extract, to the dry mix in the bowl. With your hands mix everything well.
3. With a 1 T measuring spoon scoop even amounts of bliss ball mix into your hand and roll into evenly round balls.
4. Dust each ball individually by loosely rolling it in raw cacao powder in a separate bowl. Let it gently roll around in your hand to apply the cacao powder firmly to it and to shake off any excess powder.
5. Refrigerate for 1 hour then place on a platter and serve – or hide in the Super Hero’s lunch box.

Enjoy, and try keeping up with the demand!

Rene

🙂

Superfoods 101 – an introductory class to exotic ingredients

Here comes a brilliant opportunity for you to figure out what all these weird named packages are: Superfoods!

A live food demonstration at the Wise Cicada, February 22, 2012, 6.30pm.

• What’s in them?
• What are they good for?
• How do they taste?
• How can I use them to my best benefit and greatest taste?

Have you ever wondered how to use: Camu, Yacon, Macqui, Acai, Maca, Sancha Inchi, Chia (apart from Babak’s Chia Drink), Goji berries, Cat Claw, Stevia, Lucuma, Turmeric, Nopal, Noni, Cacao, Mangosteen, Mesquite, Beepollen, Yum, Spirulina, Hemp, Coconut oil, Barberries, Chlorella, Golden Berries, Mulberries, CMD, Pomegranate, and a few more…

I’ll have Ross J Sims from Living Foods Lifestyle assisting me with this class.

Ross and his wife Michele La Chante are running a Superfoods focused business and are also the New Zealand representatives of Navitas – THE Superfoods company. Many of the Superfoods on the Wise Cicada‘s shelves are imported by Michele and Ross. Ross will be there to talk about the superfoods we present to you in this class and will also answer your questions about them.

I myself will be introducing some delicious ways of using the featured products in your daily nutritional routine and meals. Without giving too much away I can already promise you some ice cream, a few great tasting smoothie ideas, raw chocolate and a few others.

You will take a recipe booklet home and get to sample the superfoods we feature that night as well as everything I demo in front of the class.
All of this for an investment of NZD60.- only.

Due to the nature of this class and the amount of samples we will be giving out the space is limited to 20 students only.

Please book early by contacting us here or by ringing René directly on 0275551622. Alternatively you can book your place at the Wise Cicada.

We’ll see you on February 22, 2012 from 6.30pm – 9pm at the Wise Cicada Café in Newmarket – on a natural HIGH!

René

🙂

PS: As you can see above, the list of so-called superfoods is long, so expect more superfoods classes to follow this ‘101’ edition!

Chocolate body paintings available upon request only 😉

Chocolate Haystacks – a quick and easy crowd pleaser for the holidays

This recipe was inspired by our dear friend Elaina Love of Pure Joy Planet.

It’s one of those things you make once and then just keep doing until they become so familiar that you don’t even require the recipe. After a while you replace the thread coconut with soaked, dehydrated and coarsely ground pecans, add some cocoa nibs and cinnamon to the mixture… you know how it goes 😉

At the Wise Cicada Café we produce them in big batches on over-sized baking trays, pressed firmly, chilled…

…and then cut into 128 individual pieces. Our guests just love them with their coffee or tea. What you see here is only half a tray (cutting board too small :-))

And here we go:

Chocolate Haystacks

Makes about 30 piece

• 3 c or 250g thread coconut (or soaked, dehydrated and then coarsely ground pecan nuts)
• ¾ c organic virgin coconut oil, liquefied
• ½ c organic cocoa powder (Equagold is offering great stuff too – non-organic though)
• ¾ c Rapadura® dehydrated cane juice or organic raw sugar
  or ½ c agave nectar/maple syrup (the latter goes well with pecans!)
• Zest from 1 organic orange or a few drops of high-quality organic essential citrus oil
• 1 t vanilla extract
• ¼ t lemon juice
• 2 T Cocoa nibs, optional
• 1/2 t organic cinnamon, ground, optional

Method

1. If you are using organic raw sugar or Rapadura, blend it in a dry blender jar into a powder.
2. In a bowl whisk all the ingredients except the thread coconut together until the batter emulsifies.
3. Now, with a spatula or your hand, mix the batter in with the shredded coconut.
4. With a teaspoon and the fingers of your other hand shape into small haystacks and place on a tray.
5. Place the tray in the refrigerator or freezer to cool down and solidify the haystacks. They will become soft at temperatures over 26°C so serve them cold!

Voila! Enjoy and happy holidays!

Lydia and I will be in the Cocomandel – ah Coromandel 🙂 catering the raw dessert side of the Prana Festival. We might see you there!

René

🙂