Carob marzipan truffles

I finally found some raw organic apricot kernels in Finland! To celebrate this awesome discovery, I just had to whip up some raw marzipan. Personally I think there is something magical about the combination of really dark, slightly bitter chocolate and sweet rich marzipan. So, as soon as we got home I started soaking some almonds and later that evening we enjoyed these little treats (WHY does blogger tilt my pics nowadays??):

Marzipan:
1 handful of almonds, soaked 8 hours
1-4 apricot  kernels
Agave syrup, to taste

Peel almonds after soaking. Place almonds and apricot kernels in a powerful blender and process into a nut butter. Add some agave to sweeten. Roll into tiny balls by hand.

Carob-coating:
Carob powder
Coconut oil
Agave syrup
Pinch salt

The idea is you make a little mountain of carob powder, and then slowly add liquid (=oil, agave) to it until the right consistency and taste is achieved.You want it pretty thick, so that it stays on the marzipan balls. My carob chocolate was pretty grainy (as you can see from the pic), not nearly as smooth as it would've been using raw cacao powder. We chose carob, because of the caffeine in raw cacao. If however you prefer using cacao, go right ahead.  To assemble the truffles, roll the marzipan balls in chocolate until they are coated all around and chill in the fridge to set.

Tiramisu

It was my husbands birthday two weeks ago, so of course I wanted to surprise him with something scrumptious. My mind went back and forth with what kind of a cake I would make (nice rhyme!), but at the end it came down to what my husband loves most - coffee, nuts and chocolate. He no longer drinks coffee daily, only on special occasions. These days he has also switched to organic coffee infused with medicinal mushrooms (etc Reishi, Cordyceps). Iherb sells and ships these even to Finland with an affordable price, and their flavor is as good as any other regular coffee brand.

Of course, since coffee is used in this recipe it is not entirely raw. What it is, is my own take on a healthier tiramisu. It is my best attempt to recreate this delicious Italian dessert without cream, sugar and amaretto liquor. I do think that once these key flavor ingredients are omitted, the coffee is necessary to keep it resembling the original. If you don't care for it, just omit it. In this case I would add some almond extract to bring out some amaretto flavor in the cream.

Base:
Raw, organic almonds
Raw cacao powder
Honey, coconut oil
dash salt and organic vanilla/almond extract

Process almonds into a powder, mix with rest of the ingredients in a bowl. The mixture should be firm enough to shaped on a serving dish with your hands. Taste it to make sure the flavors are balanced, you don't want the base too sweet. Set in the fridge to chill.

Tiramisu cream layer:
3/4 C Reishi Coffee (I use Longreen, better tasting and cheaper than MadreLabs)
2 handfuls of cashews + 1 handful of peeled almonds
Honey/agave, to taste
Lucuma powder (for nutritional value and sweetness)
Almond extract

Soak almonds overnight and cashews for a couple hours. Make the coffee, allow it to cool down to room temperature. Blend everything until smooth, thick creamy consistency. Spread on the base with a spatula/knife. Set in the fridge. This is best when served the day after making, because the flavors continue to intensify and develop. Sprinkle with grated raw chocolate or cacao powder. Enjoy!

This recipe does not specify amounts, because it all depends on how thick a base you want or whether you like your tiramisu in several layers. The precise amounts of the ingredients are best determined by tasting. With this nut-coffee ratio the cream takes on a rich but not overpowering coffee taste. It is however a good idea to add the coffee slowly to make sure you get the right taste and texture. 

A tiramisu like this makes for a nice introduction to raw desserts. It is easy to prepare and it resembles a well-known "regular" dessert in both texture and flavor. I am already planning to serve this for my coffee-loving in-laws next time they come to visit.

Orange fudge brownies with date frosting

My in-laws came for a visit today. It is always a bit scary to cook for your mom-in-law, especially when you don't bake the traditional coffee table "treats" she is used to. I can bake, quite well even, but I just don't care for it anymore. Raw desserts are so much better than dairy and gluten free baking. Like many of you, I would also like to see my family and friends eat better and I try to teach them about healthy eating (subtle hints) when they visit. I gave up the preaching a long time ago, now I just attempt to wow them with how good real food can be.

To my suprise, my mother-in-law RAVED about these brownies, had seconds and thirds and also requested the recipe. Big hit! When we told her, that they are no-bake, she was even more amazed. Mission accomplished.

Orange fudge layer:
1,5 C almonds
200g or little less than 0,5lb dried figs, soaked
1/3-1/2C carob powder
4 tbsp coconut oil + some fig soak water
1-2 tbsp honey, or to taste (feel free to omit)
Dehydrated organic orange peel, to taste (I put 1 tbsp)
2 tbsp lucuma and 2 tbsp maca powder, optional
Pinch salt

Blend until a smooth "ball" of dough. Chop a handful or two of walnuts, and fold in. Shape into a large square on a pretty serving dish, place in the fridge. This should be a rather stiff dough, so only a brief chill in the fridge is sufficient.

Date frosting
10 dates + handful of raisins, soaked
Soak water
2 tbsp lucuma powder, optional but adds great flavor
1/4C carob powder
(pinch salt)
(vanilla)

Blend until smooth, spread on top of brownie layer. Chill & Enjoy.

If I were making these for just us two, I would add some ginger to the brownie mix. For this occasion, I thought ginger with "mock chocolate" may have been just little too exotic.. :)

1st birthday party and double-chocolate apricot cake heaven

Apricot double-chocolate bliss

Dark chocolate cake layer:

2 C almonds

1 C raw pumpkin seeds

1/3 C raw cacao powder (or less)

1/3 C coconut oil (or less)

1 C soaked raisins (or dried sweet fruit of choice)

some dried dates

raisin soak water

vanilla

dash of Himalayan/Celtic sea salt

Process the nuts and seeds into a powder, but avoid separating the oils into a paste. Add the dried fruit, cocoa powder and as much liquid oil+water as necessary to get a uniform ball of dough you can shape in your hands. Add vanilla and pinch of salt. Taste and add more sweetener if desired.

White chocolate layer:

150 g raw cacao butter

70g ground almonds

70g cashews

1 large ripe banana or 2 smaller

Water

Agave syrup, to taste

Vanilla

touch of fine-ground dried orange/lemon peel

(pinch salt)

Melt cacao butter in a warm water bath (105F or 40C). Grind nuts, add banana and liquid cacao butter. Then pour in agave, vanilla and citrus peel. I did not measure ingredients exactly and you don't have to either. You want the consistency of a pudding and a wonderful, sweet rich nutty chocolate flavor.

Apricot preserves:

soaked organic dried unsulfured apricots (not the poisonous yellow ones!)

Agave

little lemon juice

Blend until jam consistency, or use a ready-made organic apricot preserve.

Constructing the cake:

Mold dark chocolate cake layer into 3 separate cake layers, mine were round and about 7-8 inches in diameter. Chill them first until they are firm, and once they are firmed up make the white chocolate filling. I made the dark cake layer the night before and the white chocolate layer first thing in the morning. Then place the first dark layer on a serving plate, layer with apricot preserves and a layer of white chocolate. Add another dark layer, the jam and the white chocolate. The last layer is one with white chocolate, then decorate it with grated mint chocolate and dried pink cranberries. The mint and the cranberries really enhance the experience. Chill in a fridge until ready to serve. Our party lasted for a few hours, and it still kept well in room temp.

Making the food for the party was really a series of unfortunate events. I had ordered the cacao butter well in advance, but due to some problems it did not arrive in time. We figured we could get some from Tampere once we got there, but then there was an accident where a bus caught fire and we were stuck in traffic for 1,5 hours. First we went to Ruohonjuuri, and they had none. Called Punnitse & Säästä, they didn't have it either. We thought Runsaudensarvi was closed, but thankfully they had special Xmas time hours and were still open. And they had it! So cake was still on the menu.. until the night before when our current food processor broke beyond repair. I had to use my mothers small electronic hand-mixer, which somehow got stuck and cut deep into my left index finger. For a moment I thought it was actually cut off, but the cut is "only" down to the bone. Still hurts.

Regardless, everything turned out great and all 12 guests enjoyed themselves. Everyone besides me and my husband were strangers to raw cuisine, but they still loved the cake. The complete menu was:

The Birthday cake

Raw lingonberry brownies

Raw Tzatziki dip with dipping size pieces of celery, yellow carrot, zucchini and broccoli

Organic yeast-free 100% rye bread with all natural butter (which we didn't eat, but others enjoyed)

Green shrimp garbanzo bean salad (shrimp stir-fried in garlic, salt, pepper and olive oil, with fresh cucumber, dill, mixture of green salads, boiled garbanzo beans, dressing: olive oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper)

Everyone ate and people were intrigued. Mission accomplished :) Unfortunately we had so much fun and our hands full with a certain little toddler that there are only a few pics. We might get some more later from friends.

Chocolate banana scallops

This is a very simple recipe, probably many of you have eaten similar treats. But there is something so fundamentally delicious about it, I just had to share. I swear, I'll never touch a factory-made piece of chocolate again.

The name originates from the inspiration from the banana scallops Richard Blais made on Top Chef Season 4. This is not about exact measurements, but rather the combination of premium ingredients in a perfect ratio.

The recipe:

Chocolate:

Few tablespoons liquid cold pressed coconut oil

3-5 tbsp raw organic cacao powder

1/4 tsp honey (to taste, I sometimes don't put any)

1-2 tsp raw organic bee pollen (crunch!)

1-2 tbsp maca powder

1-3 tbsp lucuma powder

dash Himalayan salt

2 sliced organic bananas

Mix chocolate ingredients in a small bowl with a spoon. Taste and throw in however much of anything you feel like. Cut up banana into "scallop" slices, dip and coat in chocolate. Place on a dish and allow to set in the fridge until firm, it won't require too much patience.

Enjoy with your favorite tea or other beverage :) Seriously, the sweetness of the banana with the lucuma-maca flavored chocolate combined with the hint of saltiness.. raw chocolate heaven.

Btw, I just ordered a Stöckli Dörrex dehydrator, which will be arriving in a week. So looking forward to that, I'll certainly post more of my recipes once I finally can execute my ideas properly! My husband also upgraded to a Canon EOS pro cam, so the pictures will also improve drastically. Stay tuned.

Schwartzwalder Cherry torte

It's been a while, but I just got an amazing job opportunity. That along with my university studies, 11-month-old daughter and my husband doesn't really leave time for blogging. I still have to write my post on baby food and in future hopefully do more educating rather than "just" recipes. Or what do you think, would you be interested in reading about nutrition and a healthy lifestyle? How to teach your child to enjoy pure food? Maybe I should just stick to making desserts ;) 

Cherry Chocolate cake:

140g ground almonds and 1/2 C soaked pumpkin seeds

raisins and dates to desired sweetness and texture

1/2 C cacao or carob powder

hazelnut/vanilla agave

coconut oil

pinch salt and cinnamon

Process until a uniform, thick ball of dough. Shape into three about 1/2 inch 
thick round layers (on separate dishes), chill to firm up in the fridge. 

Cashew-coconut cream:

about 50-50 cashews and thick, pure coconut cream

lucuma, raw honey, vanilla, pinch cinnamon

Filling:

Organic, sugar-free (no artificial sweeteners!!!!) black cherry preserve OR
Fresh cherries pureed with sweetener of choice

Once the cake mixture is set, blend smooth in a blender. Spread first cake 

layer with cherry jam, dollop some cream and spread evenly. Add another

layer of cake, cherry jam and cream. Decorate with a layer of cream and

grated (raw) mint-chocolate. The mint really makes the difference. Put back

in the fridge until served, at least for an hour.

Lingonberry lucuma brownies

A friend of mine came for a visit today. She has quite a few allergies, so I couldn't use any nuts. I thought of making chocolate brownies without nuts. As if that wasn't a challenge already, right when I was about to add the raw cacao powder into the food processor I realized she is allergic to chocolate. I asked her, if she knew whether she is allergic to pure raw cacao or just the industrial, processed chocolate. She doesn't know, and since I didn't want to risk poisoning her, I opted for carob. Raw cacao, although (falsely) touted a superfood, should always be consumed in moderation due to high caffeine content and other health risks.

Brownies:

1 C pumpkin seeds

1 C raisins

12 dates

1/2C carob or raw cacao powder

5-6 tbsp coconut oil

0,5-1,5tsp cinnamon, 2 tsp lucuma

dash Himalayan salt

1/3 C lingonberries

Process seeds, fruit, carob and spices into a firm ball. Fold in whole lingonberries by hand.

Shape into a square and allow to firm up further in the fridge.

Frosting

Carob (or cacao) powder, coconut oil, vanilla or hazelnut agave

Stir with a spoon to combine. Coat the brownie squares with the forsting and serve.

These were a huge hit. The tartness of the lingonberries really works great with the richness of the brownies. The pumpkin seeds actually worked great, none of us missed the traditional walnuts. If you have a cup of them on hand though, feel free to substitute the walnuts for the seeds. If you want, you could also substitute part of the carob for cacao.

Isn't that red rose beautiful? I was so happy to come home from university today, my husband and daughter had had the best time together, the house was clean spot-free and there was a huge bouquet of red roses on the table. It's fathers' day this Sunday, I better make sure I show him just how lucky I am to have him as my husband and as a father to our daughter.

Chocolate hazelnut swiss roll with raspberry mint mousse

Swiss roll "dough"

2 C almond pulp (from soaking and making almond milk out of 1,25 C almonds)

(1-2 tbsp finely ground hemp seeds)

3-4 tbsp coconut oil

1/2 C raw cacao powder

organic hazelnut-flavored agave (or agave+natural hazelnut extract)

4-6 dried dates, soaked for 30min

dash Himalayan salt

Blend in a food processor, taste and adjust flavor to your liking. Add enough coconut oil to make a uniform dough, it shouldn't be too wet but rather have the consistency of thick chocolate mousse. The almond pulp should be rather dry. Spread into a rectangular shape on a non-stick surface, dehydrate for a couple hours on one side and about an hour on the other. Keep an eye on it, don't let it dry and crack.

Raspberry-mint mousse:

1 C raspberries (frozen and thawed)

3/4 C cashews, soaked, rinsed and drained

juice of 1/2 lemon (I even added some lemon pulp)

coconut oil

3-6 dried dates, soaked

good fresh mint leaves, to taste

(agave if you want it sweeter)

Blend first nuts, add thawed raspberries.Then add rest of the ingredients and blend until creamy. Add only enough coconut oil to get the right texture, make sure it doesn't get too runny. If it does, add psyllium husks.

Hazelnut chocolate frosting (best frosting recipe EVER!)

1/2 C raw cacao powder

few tbsp coconut oil

hazelnut agave

couple soaked dates

Blend dates and cacao powder, then alternate adding coconut oil and agave little bit at a time until taste and texture are perfect. Right consistency is that of a chocolate syrup/sauce.

After you've dehydrated the swiss roll, spread the mousse on top and roll up. If it doens't look too pretty, covering it with delicious frosting will fix it. Decorate with crushed almonds/hazelnuts. Refrigerate before serving (couple hours for a firmer and easily sliceable texture).

I've been practically living in labs lately, so excuse me for not posting for a while. I hope this recipe helps me gain some forgiveness :)