Recipe: Banana-Apple Baked Oatmeal

I love having oats for breakfast and a baked oatmeal is a great variation on just oatmeal. It's takes a little bit of time so I usually have this in the weekends or when I'm working from home. It can also be a perfect dessert! But then use a tiny ramekin!

Duration: 40 minutes

The ingredients:

• 25 gr rolled oats
• 1/4 sliced banana
• 1/4 sliced apple
• 1 egg white
• 35 ml unsweetened almond milk
• 1 tbs agave syrup
• 1/2 ts cinnamon
• 1/4 ts baking powder
• 1 tbs coconut grater
• 10 gr dark chocolate (80% or more) nibs

Directions:

1. Preheat your oven to 175 degrees of Celsius. 
2. Then mix all the ingredients except for the coconut grater and chocolate nibs in a bowl. 
3. Spray the inside of a small ramekin lightly with coconut oil and put the mixture in. 
4. Sprinkle the coconut grater on top and bake for 35 minutes in the oven.
5. Finish with the chocolate nibs and your delicious baked oatmeal is ready to be eaten!

Enjoy!

 

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Lunch Recipe: Amazing Salad Wraps with Ham and Chicken

As you probably have guessed by now, I often like to have salads for lunch. But when it's really hectic with work I sometimes just can't find the time to eat a salad and then I tend to just grap a sandwich for lunch (eating salads just takes longer then eating a sandwhich). But since I also want to limit my intake of gluten I often feel like somewhat guilty when I do this. But now I found the perfect solution! Okay, it takes a little bit of time to make them but it's worth it and when you do this before you go to work the only thing left to do when it's lunch time is eat them! You can make these salad wraps with any ingredients you have in your refrigerator!

The ingredients for 2 salad wraps:

• 4 large lettuce leaves
• 1 slice of chicken breast and 1 slice of ham
• 1/4 cucumber
• 1 tomato
• 1/2 avocado
• 1 egg
• 1 ts truffle mayonnaise
• 1 tbs roasted pine nuts
• Salt & pepper

Directions:

1. Cut the cucumber into small strips and slice the tomato, egg and avocado.
2. Put 2 lettuce leaves on a cutting board. Put the slice of chicken breast and slice of ham each on another leave followed with the cucumber, tomato, egg and avocado. Season with some salt & pepper and put some mayonaise and roasted pine nuts on top. To finish put anothe lettuce leave on it and roll up. Keep it together with toothpicks. 

Coconut Meal Pancakes

Today I made this amazing clean pancakes for lunch. They are made of coconut meal so gluten, dairy & sugar free! Coconut meal is lower in calories compared to almond meal but you can't just replace almond meal with coconut meal in recipes. The main difference is that coconut meal is highly absorbent and you only need a little bit of it to produce delicious recipes. For example, if you need 300 grams of almond meal, you only need about 1/3 to 1/2 of coconut meal. However, the amount of eggs in recipes of coconut meal is higher! This is because the meal is naturally dry, so you need eggs and water (or for example coconut milk, almond milk etc.) to make sure that your recipes isn't that dry. If you see recipes with coconut meal they almost always say that it's important to mix the batter really well. This is because coconut meal clumps strong. The best way to avoid this is by using an electric hand mixer. Some benefits of coconut meal include that it contains high levels of proteins, fiber and good fats so it fills u up pretty good. Therefore it's a perfect lunch for after a morning workout, or a delicious breakfast that keeps your blood sugar levels stable during the morning!

Duration: 20 minutes

The ingredients for 8-10 small pancake:

• 25 gr coconut meal
• 100 ml water (or coconut milk)
• 2 organic eggs
• 1/2 tbs apple cider vinegar
• 1/4 ts himalayan seasalt
• coconut oil

The ingredients for the topping:

• 1 tbs greek yoghurt (leave it out if you want to have a dairy free meal)
• handful of strawberries, raspberries, blueberries & some banana slices (use any kind of fruit you like!)
• If you're a sweet tooth you can add some agave syrup.

Directions:

1. Mix all the ingredients for the pancakes until it's smooth and let it sit for 10 minutes so the coconut meal can absorb the water.
2. Heat up a little bit of coconut oil in a skillet and make little pancakes (if they are to big they will break)
3. Then bake the pancakes on medium heat for about 2 minutes, turn them (gently) and bake for another minute on the other side. 
4. Put them on your plate, add 1 tbs of greek yoghurt in the middle and fresh fruit on top and your delicious, clean pancakes are ready to be eaten!

Enjoy!

Quinoa Risotto

I eat quinoa at least once a week since it's gluten free and it contains high protein levels. Since I just love risotto, but try not to eat white rice, this quinoa risotto with mushrooms is absolutely perfect!

Duration: 30 minutes

The ingredients for 1 serving:

• 80-100 gr quinoa
• 3 tbs olive oil
• 250 gr mushrooms: I prefer chestnut mushrooms
• 1/2 vegetable stock cube
• 1 small white onion
• 2 garlic cloves
• 1 tbs hazelnuts
• 3 tbs grated parmesan cheese
• fresh rosemary, thyme and parsley

The directions:

1. Heat 1.2 liter water in your kettle and wash the quinoa. Cut the onion into small pieces and fry the onion in one tablespoon olive oil and one crushed garlic clove. 
2. Add about 1 tablespoon of finely chopped fresh rosemary leaves and the quinoa. Crumble over the vegetable stock cube and 1 glass of boiling water and let it cook on medium heat until the stock has been absorbed, stirring regularly. 
3. During the stirring process (which takes about 20 minutes) add cups of boiling water until the quinoa is done (you need approximately 1 liter). Meanwhile chop the mushrooms. 
4. Remove the pan from the heat when the quinoa is done and stir in 2 tablespoons of grated parmesan cheese, some fresh thyme leaves and let the quinoa soak for 5 minutes.
5. Bake the mushrooms in 2 tablespoons of olive oil and one crushed garlic clove . Add some fresh thyme leaves and finely chopped parsley.
6. Stir about 3/4 of the mushrooms trough the risotto and add salt, pepper & parmesan cheese to taste and put the risotto on a plate, finish of with the rest of the mushrooms. Garnish with some fresh parsley and the crushed hazelnuts!

Enjoy!

Dinner recipe: Stuffed Pumpkin

Since I don't eat a lot of red meat I need to find another source to make sure I get enough iron in my system! Iron is an important mineral for our body since it's part of hemoglobin of our red blood cells. Hemoglobin ensures that oxygen is transported to every part of the body through our blood. In addition, iron is also a key aspect in developing antibodies. Antibodies are an essential part of our immune system since they help fight illness and other harmful substances that enter our bodies. Pumpkins are rich in iron, but also contain high levels of other vitamins and minerals like Vitamin C, B, A and magnesium. This recipe is a perfect way to eat pumpkin and is from Amber Albarda's cooking book (only available in Dutch). I made some small changes and suggest you serve it with some quinoa on the side.

The recipe isn't as quick and easy as most of my other recipes but it was so good that I just had to share and it's perfect for in the weekends!

Duration:  1 hour

The ingredients for 1-2 servings (depending on how big of an eater you are):

• 1 pumpkin (bottle shaped, see picture)
• 1 red onion
• 1 sweet pepper
• 1 garlic clove
• handful pine nuts
• feta cheese
• Olive oil
• 1 tbs chili powder
• Fresh mint leaves

What you do:

1. Preheat your oven to 200 degrees Celsius. 
2. Cut the pumpkin in half and remove the seeds. Cut out the pulp (I used a melon spoon since this is easier than a knife) until about 1 centimeter from the edges. Place the hollowed pumpkin halves on a griddle, sprinkle with salt & pepper, drizzle with 1 tbs olive oil and bake them for 45 minutes in the middle of your oven until soft.
3. Cut the onion and pulp in pieces of the same size. Heat a little bit of olive oil in a pan and bake the onions and cut pumpkin for 10 minutes. Then add the crushed garlic clove and bake for another 5 minutes. Meanwhile you can cook the quinoa as stated on the package. 
4. Scoop the onion-pumpkin mixture into the pumpkin halves, sprinkle over the chili powder and pine nuts and the crumbled feta cheese.
5. Roast the pumpkin halves for another 10 minutes in the oven until the pine nuts are golden brown and the feta cheese has melted a little bit.
6. Put over the fresh mint leaves and your delicious stuffed pumpkin is ready!

Variation tip: Use soft/crumbled goat cheese instead of the feta cheese!