July 13, 2021

Raw Caramel Choc Slice

(AD) This caramel slice is mouth-watering amazing! Better still, it’s full of whole food ingredients that are good for you! Here’s the recipe. If you make this, please let me know what you think! x x

Raw Caramel Choc Slice  

Ingredients:

Base layer:

¼ cup coconut oil (melt this if it isn’t in a liquid form)

¼ cup rice malt syrup (alternatively you can use maple syrup)

½ cup raw cashews

½ cup oats

½ teaspoon cinnamon

Three grinds of sea salt

Optional: Include 1 scoop of vanilla protein powder of your choice if you want an extra protein boost in this recipe.

Caramel layer

1 cup coconut cream

1 cup dates

½ teaspoon cinnamon 

½ teaspoon vanilla bean powder

3 grinds of sea salt

Top layer

½ block of dark chocolate (to keep the recipe vegan, just choose a dark vegan chocolate instead)

Method:

Base layer 

Line a square tin with baking paper. The first ingredients to go into the Vitamix include the melted coconut oil and rice malt syrup (this is so it blends easily). Next put in the cashews, oats, cinnamon and salt. Then add the protein powder if you want to include that. Blend in the Vitamix until smooth and then put the mixture in to the lined tin. Place this into the freezer to chill for a short time while you make the next layer.

Caramel layer:

Place the coconut cream into the Vitamix first so it blends well. Next place the dates, cinnamon, vanilla bean powder, and sea salt into the blender and blend this until it’s creamy and smooth. This layer tastes so good it’s easy to eat this directly from the spoon! But resist the temptation to do that and put this layer immediately on top of the base layer. Put this back into the freezer for a short while when doing the next layer.

Top layer:

Put a big pan on the stove full of 2cm of water and boil. Then place a glass bowl into the centre and next place the chocolate in this bowl. The water heats the chocolate without burning it. This is called a bain-marie. When the chocolate is melted, spoon it out on top of the caramel layer. This hardens quite quickly, and I’d recommend getting a large knife at this point to cut it into slabs or squares before the chocolate fully hardens and can be harder to cut. Now put the cut-up slice into a plastic box and into the freezer. Pull out a piece of the slice whenever you feel like one!

Hack 1: Buy the broken-up pieces of cashews at your local bulk buy store. They are so much cheaper! The nuts are going to be blitzed in the Vitamix anyway and so it makes sense to save cents here! Actually, you can save a lot of dollars.I got a 1kg bag of cashew pieces for $15.50 (more than enough for this recipe and with lots of leftovers. While a 1kg bag of whole cashews cost over $10 more – at $25.80.

Hack 2: Keep leftover nuts in the freezer. They last a lot longer and keep their freshness better. 

This post was kindly sponsored by Vitamix. To buy one of these epic machines, get them through Kitchen Nook #sponsoredpost #vitamixnz

Rachel is a wellness speaker and the author of Balance: Food, Health + Happiness

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October 18, 2019

Peanut Butter & Honey Choc Slice

My kids give this recipe the big thumbs up. It’s not always easy to please my three boys when it comes to baking – especially the teenager. But all my boys dig this. The secret ingredient is the new 100% natural 1839 Mānuka honey, which is a premium Mānuka honey from New Zealand. This is uniquely triple churned so it is silky smooth and mouth-wateringly delicious. Mānuka honey is well known for its antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, and good health benefits.

Pair this delicious honey with a crunchy peanut butter and, of course, the all-important chocolate top and bottom nutty layers, and it’s quite simply heavenly. This slice is nutrient-dense, great for satiety (it fills you up) and of course, yummy. Give it a whirl too and let me know what you think! Good luck with stopping at one piece. I ate three in the first sitting. And people wonder why I run and lift weights… This gal LOVES to eat amazing kai!

Ingredients & Method

Base

1 cup hazelnuts

¼ cup cacao powder

½ cup raw cashew nuts

2 tablespoons 1839 Mānuka honey

Pinch of cinnamon

3 tablespoons coconut oil

pinch Himalayan salt

Middle Layer

1 cup crunchy peanut butter

1 cup coconut cream

pinch Himalayan salt

2 tablespoons of 1839 Mānuka honey

Top Layer 

300g cacao butter

¼ cup cacao powder

pinch Himalayan salt

3 tablespoons 1839 Mānuka honey

First layer. Place the nuts in a blender and blitz them until they are fine crumbs. Then add the cinnamon and salt. Next, spoon the coconut oil into a pan on the stove and gently melt it. Once melted, turn off the stove and add the honey and mix with a spoon. Next, put the honey and coconut oil into the nut mix. Use a spoon or your hands to mix well into a wet crumb. Place baking paper into a cake tin. Pour this mixture into the tin and then press it down with your hands. Place the tin into the freezer while you make the 2nd layer.

Second layer. Place the peanut butter and coconut cream into a pan and heat gently while using a spoon to combine these ingredients into a smooth blend. Once blended, turn off the stove and add the salt and honey and stir well. Next, spoon this onto the base layer and then put the this back into the freezer while you make the top layer.

Top layer. Place the cacao butter into a pan and melt slowly on a low heat. Then remove from the stove and add the honey by stirring it in. Next add the cacao powder and salt and stir until silky smooth. Take the slice out of the freezer and then pour this chocolate layer on top. Then place the completed slice back into the freezer for 30-minutes. Remove from the freezer and cut it into slices roughly. Then place all the slice in a container in the freezer. Dip into it whenever you want a piece!

PS I can’t promise that your kids will not sneak into the freezer when you are not looking and scoff the lot. Or does that just happen at my place???

This recipe was kindly sponsored by 1839 Mānuka honey. To check out this silky smooth honey click HERE 

Blog by Rachel Grunwell: Wellness expert, coach, yoga + mindfulness teacher, and wellness columnist for Good mag, Indulge mag, and the Herald online. Rachel is the author Balance: Food, Health + Happiness which boasts 30 global experts sharing science-based wisdom on how to live healthier and happier + 30 nourishing recipes. Find out more HERE.

1839 Manuka honey is triple churned so it is silky smooth and almost fluffy. There are no gritty bits! It just melts in your mouth. The stuff in the pouch is divine. It’s easy-peasy to squeeze it out.

September 29, 2016

Spooky Gluten-Free Gingerbread

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By Rachel Grunwell

 

Halloween is a fun time for my family. The kids love to dress up all scary or witchy and go trick-or-treating around our neighbourhood on October 31. We’re in the Auckland suburb of Mt Eden where families are used to little ghostly and ghastly costume-wearing kids turning up at the door!

Instead of lollies, these gluten-free gingerbread men are a yummy treat to give the kids – or to give other little trick-or-treaters. Or just to make up anytime for fun!

My youngest witchy – son Finn, aged 5 (pictured) – gives these the thumbs up. He loves helping in the kitchen – and of course, taste-testing the bats, pumpkins and legless gingerbread men.

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Your kids will love making these too and so give them a whirl! Or if you have a cool and creepy recipe then share it with me too!!

 

Spooky Gluten-Free Gingerbread

Ingredients:

3 tablespoons Chelsea Golden Syrup

½ cup Chelsea Organic Coconut Sugar

1 teaspoon each of mixed spice and cinnamon

1.5 teaspoons ground ginger

1 tablespoon water

50g butter

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1 ½ cups rice flour

½ cup potato flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

(add 2 teaspoons xanthum gum if you have it in the cupboard as this helps with binding the ingredients, but it’s not absolutely necessary)

 

Instructions

Place Chelsea Golden Syrup in a pan, along with Chelsea Organic Coconut Sugar, mixed spice, cinnamon, ground ginger and water.

Heat until the sugar dissolves and then switch off the heat place the butter in the pan to melt.

Let the mixture cool a little and then add the baking soda.

In another bowl, put the sifted gluten-free flour and baking powder. Then add the heated ingredients from the pan and mix until a workable dough. Add more rice flour if you need it (i.e. if the dough is too sticky). Then sprinkle a generous amount of rice flour on your bench and use a roller to roll out the dough. Press Halloween-style cookie-cutter shapes in this. Use a spatula to lift the shapes up from the bench and onto the trays (so they stay in one piece).

Bake these on a greased tray, 180-degrees for about 10 mins.

 

Note: Use a spatula to lift the shapes from the tray onto a cooling rack and then pop them into a container.

 

Icing:

150g dark chocolate

110g of coconut cream

 

Melt the chocolate in a double boiler (keep stirring throughout). Add the cream and mix. Leave this to cool to room temperature. Then pop it into an icing bag and pipe onto the biscuits. I used edible glitter too for an extra cool effect.

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Find more delicious recipes for these school holidays at chelsea.co.nz

 

This post was made possible thanks to Chelsea.

 

#NZBlogger #chelseasugar

 

Rachel is a recipe creator and wellbeing columnist for two magazines. She’s a yoga teacher, marathoner and director of the InspiredHealthNZ website, which inspires Kiwis to live a life they love. Follow Rachel on Facebook and Instagram.

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November 16, 2015

Carrot Cake with Cashew Cream Icing

carrot cake + Chelsea Raw Sugar

Here’s my Carrot Cake with Cashew Cream Icing !

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By Rachel Grunwell

Here’s a recipe for Carrot Cake with Cashew Cream Icing that I created, which tastes really good.

Ingredients:
1.5 Cups of Brown Rice Flour
½ Cup of Coconut Flour
½ Cup of Potato Flour
2 Tablespoons of Ground Chia 
2 Teaspoons of Baking Soda
3 Teaspoons of Ground Cinnamon
Pinch of salt
4 Eggs
1 Cup of Raw Sugar
½ Cup of Olive Oil
1 Teaspoon of Vanilla
5 Grated Carrots (peeled and grated)
½ Cup of Raw Walnuts (chopped)
1 Cup “Sour Milk” (mix 1 tablespoon of lemon juice to 1 cup of milk)

Instructions:
Turn oven to 180-degrees. Put baking paper in a baking tin and spray this with cooking oil. Sift the flours, ground chia, baking soda, cinnamon and salt in a bowl. In another bowl, whisk the eggs, sugar, olive oil, vanilla, carrots and sour milk. Next, combine both bowls of ingredients together and then add the walnuts. Place the mixture in the baking tin and bake for 45-minutes at 180-degrees (or a bit longer if you use a deep baking tin).
Cool on a wire rack and then ice. I used cashew cream icing.
To make the Cashew Cream Icing I just put 1 Cup of raw cashews in a bowl of filtered water for about four hours to soften. I then rinsed them and put the cashews in a blender with just a little fresh filtered water and blitzed them until smooth. I put the cashew “cream” in the fridge to thicken up and then put it into a piping bag (with a swirl tube on the end) and piped this onto the cake (but you could just spread it with a knife more quickly if you wish). I topped with edible flowers and served this up to the chief taste-testers – my kids. Oh and the bloke loved this cake too.

Give this recipe a go!!! It’s delicious and has just the right amount of sweetness. If you make it then please let me know what you think! Eve better send me a pic of your masterpiece so I can go ooooh and ahhhh and we can talk carrot cake!

June 6, 2015

Gluten-Free Protein Pikelets

chickpea pikelets

 

By Rachel Grunwell

Sometimes I’m just after a sweet-as treat – especially if I’ve done a big, long training run. These are gluten-free and yuuuuuumy! Here’s the recipe:

1/2 Cup Chickpea Flour

1/2 Cup Brown Rice Flour

1 Teaspoon Xanthum Gum

1 Teaspoon Baking Powder

2 Eggs

1 Cup Almond Milk

1 scoop of Natural Clean Lean Protein Powder

1/4 Cup Chelsea’s Demerara Sugar

Throw all the ingredients into a blender. The mixture is thick and so you can thin it down with more milk to make bigger pikelets. I use a tablespoon of mixture to make each pikelet (cooked in coconut oil). I topped mine with raspberries, sliced banana, maple syrup (and there are some mint leaves for show!) If I had yoghurt in the house then I would put a dollop of that on too!

Good luck keeping all the peeps away from these delicious morsels! Unless you want to share…

 

 

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