It’s November 2018. The weather is cold but I was looking for an alternative to a heavy, winter meal. Salad-like, but still substantial. Warm but fresh. Filling but light. Something so full of vitamins and minerals that I could say – wow, Ana, you’ve outdone yourself again! Get ready to seduce your taste buds with explosive flavours of: *fresh mint *sweet pomegranate and *nutty hummus Not unimportantly, I had a pretty good time preparing this meal since it was all easy to bake, cook and put together. Or, as I’ve illustrated in a graph: You can make your own falafel by looking up a recipe online, but I just bought it ready-made. Tried the…
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Rice 101 | How to Buy, Cook & Eat rice + Health benefits
AS A STUDENT, I would often make rice for dinner, paired with deep-freeze spinach and something crazy on the side, like plain mixed lettuce. I know, I know… that doesn’t make any sense. TO MAKE MATTER WORSE, the rice would usually turn to mush (be overcooked), sometimes be too chewy (undercooked) and almost never turned out just right. AFTER YEARS OF OCCASSIONAL EXPERIMENTING, and thanks to the influence of good cooks around my friends and family, plus a lot of trial & error, I’ve got a grip on making good rice. IF YOU ALSO STRUGGLE with making rice because it hardly turns out right – or if you love…
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Aubergine & Raisin Risotto-Stuffed Bell Pepper
If you want to eat healthy (which I know you do), adopt vegetable stuffed meals in your diet. This Moroccan-Mediterranean fusion of a dish fits perfectly in that repertoire, it’s easy to prepare on a weeknight and extremely healthy due to high vegetable content. Aubergine tastes great paired with raisins (I use yellow ones – which I thought meant they are made from white grapes, but just found out it actually means these raisins have been treated with sulphur dioxide to keep their color, bummer). Still, yellow raisins are a bit sweeter and plumper than black raisins, which works great in risottos and stews. This recipe is suitable for a healthy food pattern,…
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Delicious & Healthy Brownies (Less sugar, More walnuts)
Delicious, moist brownies chock-full of bitter-sweet walnuts. There’s wholegrain flour in the batter and deliciously crunchy almond flakes on top. I baked a batch this morning and I won’t lie to you – had 3 pieces as breakfast. Yum! Less sugar and more walnuts make this recipe the perfect alternative to traditional unhealthy desserts. These brownies are diabetes-friendly due to high fiber content and a lower glycemic index (making your blood sugars not raise as fast). Recipe inspired by Gaia’s Kitchen Cookbook, here’s Gaia’s cookbook on Amazon! Print Recipe Delicious, Healthy Brownies with Walnuts and Almonds Cuisine Healthy Prep Time 10 minutes Cook Time 20 minutes Servings pieces Ingredients 140 grams…
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Squash, Tomatoes & Black Beans in Creamy Coconut Sauce
This delicious, healthy & simple vegetarian Kerala Curry recipe is based on a recipe from the ‘Fresh India’ cookbook. Squash is in season, perfect to combine with heart-healthy black beans and aromatic spices such as garam masala mix. Serves 4 for amazing dinner, prep time 45 minutes from start to table. Ingredients for Oven-roasted Squash 1kg butternut squash, unpeeled, cut into thin wedges 1 tbsp garam masala a sprinkle of salt and pepper Ingredients for Creamy Coconut sauce 1 onion, diced 2 green chilis, diced 3 garlic cloves, minced 400g tin black beans, rinsed and drained 150g ripe tomatoes (or tinned tomatoes if not in season) 400ml good coconut milk…
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Healthy Snack: Vegetable Filled Spinach & Feta + Squash & Feta Pastry Triangles
These pastry triangles filled with spinach and squash are simple, healthy and delicious. Perfect hearty snack on cold, rainy autumn afternoons and great leftovers for lunch. Pair it with a large green salad for a very satisfying dinner. Spinach & Feta Puff Pastry Recipe Olga (whom I’ve met on Instagram) created a beautiful recipe for Spinach & Feta Triangles and submitted it on Ana’s Bananas (submit your own healthy recipe). I loved it and got inspired to create a recipe for Squash & Feta Triangles as well. Taste buds in bliss. Dairy against diabetes? Out of all dairy products, fermented ones, such as cheese and yoghurt, seem to have a good effect on…
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Healthy, Dairy Free, Creamy Avocado & Basil Pasta Sauce
Avocado is perfect for making pasta sauce – rich in healthy fats, tastes great paired with basil, is a deliciously creamy dairy-free alternative and carries a lot of nutrients. Follow my blog with Bloglovin I love a good organic tomato sauce on pasta, but having the same sauce every time doesn’t cut it for my freakishly foodie nature. Of course I could buy other supermarket pasta sauces, but have you ever noticed how many strange additives there are in there? Bleh. It’s much healthier to make your own pasta sauce than to buy some additive-stuffed sauce that’s been standing on supermarket shelves for months. Avocado & basil unite to form a creamy yet…
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Simple Wellness Soup
Follow my blog with Bloglovin You don’t need quinoa (kee-NU-wah) to eat healthy. Below awaits a recipe with local, seasonal & afforadable ingredients that together create a soup that is exceptionally good for your health. If you are battling the flu or trying to ward one off, this is the perfect soup to make! When my parents used to force me as a kid to eat savoy cabbage soup (in Croatian: kelj), I’d make all kinds of funny faces at them and fiddle with my food. Now I find myself cooking the same stuff, ah the irony! Turns out cabbage is just as good for you as my parents were saying. You’d…
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Dumplings with Pak Choi
Making Dumplings with Pak Choi takes 10 minutes from the moment you enter your front door to the moment you sit down at the table to eat – it’s easy, healthy and quick. That’s also why I call it the recipe for power couples – those amazing couples where both people are working hard, being awesome at what they do, and rushing home late without much oomph (definition) to cook (oops). To your rescue comes this Dumplings with Pak choi recipe, introduced to me by a power couple themselves, Madi & Mathias. In 10 minutes of whizzing about in the kitchen, you will have a satisfying meal loaded with vibrant, green vegetables…
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Indian Summer Salad
As I’m walking around the cookbook section in a bookshop a couple of weeks ago, a pop of color catches my eye – it’s the “Fresh India” cookbook by a lady called Meera Sodha. Indian cooking finally made simple and not taking 5 days of bending over the stove to make? Yes! This summer salad is refreshing and full of flavors (it originally also includes a spoonfull of sugar, which I leave out). Enjoy it with a big appetite – it has a grand total of zero (0) calories, really. Fun fact: I buy my bell peppers organic because peppers fall into EWG’s (Environmental Working Group) category of the dirty dozen. This is…
