Thick & Creamy Vegan Vanilla Shake

I wasn’t sure whether to call this a shake or a smoothie, because it reminded me so much of a vanilla milkshake so I opted for calling it both. This is one of the best smoothie (shake) recipes I’ve come up with so far. I was actually going to call this a breakfast smoothie until I decided to have it for dinner too because I enjoyed it so much.

This is one of those quick and easy smoothie recipes that is just so delicious and nutritious that there’s no excuse not to make it any time you need a quick meal or pick-me-up.

Vanilla, honey, maca and lucuma are all superfoods. Sesame seeds have more protein than any other seed or nut, are loaded with calcium, iron, and magnesium. Plus they contain lignans that can help burn fat. Flaxseed (also called linseed), is high in omega-3 fatty acids, antioxidants, and fiber. Oats are the king of the grains, they help lower blood cholesterol, are a good source of magnesium, zinc and vitamin E and are also very high in fiber. And the humble banana… contains potassium and vitamin B6, which the body needs to make serotonin the brain-chemical which makes you feel good. Bananas also have plenty of fiber, and it’s a particular type of fiber that aids bowel health, and has been found to lower the incidence of bowel cancer. Whew! And if you need any more convincing, just taste it.

Ingredients:

4 cups water
4 ripe bananas, peeled (fresh or frozen)
1 cup oats *
4 tbsp sesame seeds
2 tbsp flaxseed (linseed)
2-3 tbsp honey or agave nectar (to taste)
1 tbsp ground cinnamon
2 teas natural vanilla extract
dash of Himalayan sea salt
1 tbsp maca-root powder or lucuma powder (optional)

Instructions:

Grind the sesame seeds and flaxseed to a fine meal. A coffee grinder works beautifully for this, otherwise use a high-powered blender (make sure the inside of the blender jug is dry). Grind the oats to a fine meal in a coffee grinder or a high-powered blender.

Add all the ingredients to the blender. Blend well until, rich and creamy.

Makes 5 cups.

* Oats are almost always cooked, even when you find them as oat groats. It’s very rare to find truly raw oats, but if you want a 100% raw shake and can’t find raw oats you can substitute buckwheat groats instead. Just soak and sprout them for a day or two, but make sure to use them before the tails get longer than the buckwheat seeds. You can dehydrate the sprouted buckwheat and grind it, or just add the fresh sprouted buckwheat to the blender. The result is not as creamy in texture, but it’s still really nice and super healthy.

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Creamy blueberry coconut smoothie

Today I decided to take a break from my usual green smoothie for breakfast and go with an all-fruit smoothie.

I recently cracked open a couple of fresh coconuts, and I still had some coconut water left, so I decided to use that, as well as some of the coconut flesh. The result was a beautiful, creamy, fruity smoothie with a hint of vanilla.

Blueberries and coconuts are both superfoods. Blueberries are considered one of the best foods for fighting free-radicals and repairing cell damage thanks to the anthocyanins they contain, which also give them their blue color. They also have anti-inflammatory properties, protect against dementia and are great for the eyes and memory, especially as we get older. They also contain resveratrol which protects us against cancer and heart disease. Coconuts contain the most heart-healthy oils of any food. Prunes are good for the digestion, they help nourish the friendly bacteria in your gut. They also contain lots of beta-carotene, and lower cholesterol. Cinnamon helps to even out blood-sugar levels and prevent mood swings. So this smoothie is not only delicious, but awesomely good for you.

Ingredients:

1 cup coconut water
3 cups water
3 bananas, fresh or frozen, peeled
handful of fresh coconut meat
1-1/2 cups blueberries, frozen
3-4 prunes (or 1 tablespoon of honey or agave syrup)
1 teas ground cinnamon
1/2 teas natural vanilla extract

Instructions:

Put about a cup of water and the prunes into the blender and process until the prunes are well blended. The prunes will add sweetness and can be replaced by honey or agave syrup, you can adjust the amount you add to suit your taste.

Pry a handful of fresh coconut meat from the shell. If the coconut meat still has the brown inner shell on one side cut it off. A sharp knife will work but I like to use a vegetable peeler. The fresh coconut can be a bit slippery because of all the beautiful coconut oil it contains, and I feel like the vegetable peeler is a lot safer than using a knife, and it works just as well.

Add the fresh coconut, and all the other ingredients and blend until smooth. Drink immediately.

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Sesame Halva

I love halva, the Middle Eastern dessert made from sesame seeds. I’m not even sure how they make it but I decided to make my own healthy, raw version. Actually I was going to see if I could make raw tahini with my blender because I’ve not been able to find a raw tahini here in NZ. My blender ground the sesame seeds really well, but I was having a bit of a sweet craving and I ended up abandoning my tahini experiment in favor of raw halva. I didn’t regret it, it really hit that sweet spot!

This isn’t an exact recipe, but it’s such a simple recipe with so few ingredients that if you just let your taste buds guide you and you can’t go wrong.

Ingredients:

Sesame seeds (raw)
Honey or agave syrup
Vanilla extract
Dash of Himalayan sea salt

Instructions:

Make sure your blender is really dry before you start. If there’s any moisture the sesame seeds aren’t going to grind up so well.

Pour sesame seeds into the blender and grind them to a fine meal. Stop frequently and using a spatula scrap down the sides, and fluff up the meal and seeds that will end up underneath the blades at the bottom of the blender jug, then continue blending. Do this until you have ground all of the sesame seeds.

Pour the sesame meal into a bowl. Add honey to taste and enough to form a dough. Add a dash of Himalayan sea salt, not enough to make it salty, but the salt will bring out the other flavors. Add vanilla extract to taste. I used about a cup of  sesame seeds and 1/4 teas of vanilla extract. You don’t need much. Mix by hand until all the ingredients are thoroughly blended together.

Pinch off a little bit of the dough and roll them between the palms of your hands into little balls. I made mine very tiny, about a heaping 1/2 teas worth of dough. They probably came out about the size of cooked chickpeas. They were the perfect size. Even though it’s raw, this is a very concentrated food, so you don’t want to eat too much at a time.

Keeps well in the fridge. In fact I think it’s even nicer the next day after it’s been sitting in the fridge, it seems to bring out the flavor.

Variations:

• Add ground cinnamon to the sesame meal. It adds a nice, subtle flavor.
• Add some raw cacao powder to the mix, or roll your halva balls in raw cacao powder to give them just a hint of chocolate flavor.

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Vegan Vanilla Ice Cream

I was having a sweet craving this evening… actually it was going on all day and I was trying to come up with something I could make with what I had on hand. Finally, the idea for this hit me. And oh did it hit the spot… the tahini adds an extra smoothness to this so it’s even more like real ice cream than most frozen banana-based non-dairy ice creams. The vanilla extract and rapadura go so nicely together, creating that sweet, vanilla flavor.

Even if you eat dairy, it’s worth trying this for it’s own sake. Totally guilt-free desserts, I love ‘em! Try some of my other raw vegan ice cream recipe too.

Ingredients:
1 ripe banana
3 frozen bananas
1 tbsp tahini
1 tbsp rapadura sugar (or sweetener of your choice)
1 tbsp water
1 teas organic vanilla extract (or vanilla pod if you have it)

Instructions:
Peel the ripe banana and break it into pieces into blender. Add the tahini, rapadura, water and vanilla extract. Blend until smooth. Add the frozen bananas and blend again until smooth and creamy.

If you want this to be an all-raw dessert, be sure to use raw tahini. Often the ready made tahini is made from lightly toasted sesame seeds. I’ve had trouble finding raw tahini in New Zealand, but you can buy grinders and juicers with attachments that allow you to create your own. I love tahini so much, and it’s such a small part of most of my recipes that I just use the best organic tahini I can find, even though I’m trying to eat a mostly raw and living food diet.

Eat immediately!

Serves 2.

Kitchen tips: To cleanup I added about half a cup of water to the blender jug (no soap, just water) and blended on high until most of the remains had been ‘water blasted’ off the sides of the jug.

Zoe loves Vegan Vanilla Ice Cream

I poured this ‘vanilla banana milk’ into a bowl for my dogs and Zoe loved it! She lapped up every last drop and came to see if there was more of this yummy stuff left.

Zoe works hard, her day-job is in excavation. It’s hot, thirsty work. A cool, thirst-quenching treat like this is just the thing after a hard day’s work.

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Vanilla Beans

I adore vanilla, the smell as well as the taste. For quite a while now I’ve been wanting to search out a recipe for making my own vanilla extract. I was thinking it might be a bit expensive though, since vanilla beans are so expensive. Well, I’ve just come across a utterly simple, perfect vanilla extract recipe completely by chance… well, okay maybe it was serendipity at play The great thing is it doesn’t look like it’s going to be that expensive in the long run because this recipe makes heaps, and you can keep reusing the vanilla beans to make more.

This is actually my new favorite site, lots of excellent information and great stories here, so I encourage you to have a look around on the rest of the site too. But here’s what you’ve come here for…. the Homemade Vanilla Extract recipe. If you end up making some, be sure to come back here and comment to let me know how it turned out.

Did you know?

Vanilla beans come from a special variety of orchid?

Photo credit: mr.smashy flickr.com

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