Pumpkin Tumeric and Orange Soup

Pumpkin, Tumeric and Orange Soup

INGREDIENTS:

1 Pumpkin

3 to 4 onions

4 -6 cloves of garlic

1 piece of tumeric about an inch long (more or less to taste)

2 vege stock cubes

1 orange

olive oil

salt 

pepper

METHOD:

• Fry onion and garlic in olive oil in a large pot. 
• Take skin off pumpkin and chop into smallish pieces, add to onion and garlic and lightly fry to bring out the flavour.
• Grate some of the rind off the orange into the onion mixture.
• Peel tumeric and grate into the onion and pumpkin ( Be careful as fresh tumeric will stain everything yellow)
•  Add your vege stock cubes and then add water to the pot until the pumpkin is just covered.
• Simmer until pumpkin is cooked, then Blend.
• Cut orange in half and juice it, add orange juice to taste with a little salt and pepper
• Serve and enjoy (I added a little tofu sour cream to mine on service....was delicious!!!)

Tumeric pumpkin and orange soup

succulents

succulents

My passion for succulents continues, last count over 60 different variety's and still there is more!!

Thought i would share a few of my favourites with you.

Agave

 This cutie grows from a single leaf

Super spiky!

Brilliant colour

Babies

Cacti

Pinky tips and a super cute flower

Great ground climber and hanger

One of my outdoor pots looking divine

Blues

These are so easy to grow it is not funny!!

Beautiful colours

Sharks teeth

Grows from a single leaf

I love this one!

Bear paw

Colours change with different amounts of light

Good uses for coke cans. Pea like succulent in the foreground, grows super long!

Recycled my old bag and added a bit of colour to the garden

Lambs tail this one...lol...it's the kiwi in me!!

Something to do with lambs succulent...it is woolly feeling too!

 

In a t pot 

Warty

See that amazing flower down and to the right...that is this sucullent's flower! Amazing!!

Most stunning flower!

Albino corn! Has the tiny purple flowers.

Got lots to share if you live local message me!

Raw falafel with garlic aoili

Raw falafel with garlic aoili

This is an awesome recipe that is great to have in the fridge at all times so you can throw in on the top of salads for lunch or pop it into wraps. It lasts well in the fridge and combined with the aoili i find it is irresistible!!!

Falafel ingredients:

* 2 cups of roughly chopped carrots

* 1 cup of dry sunflower seeds

* 1/4 cup of flax seeds, after grinding should equal 1/3 of a cup (grind your own using a coffee grinder)

* 1 cup of fresh parsley well chopped

* 3 tablespoons of diced onion

* 1 clove of garlic crushed or minced

* 1/4 teaspoon salt (you can add less or more to your desired taste)

* 1/2 teaspoon cumin powder

* 1/2 teaspoon curry powder

* 1/2 cup of sesame seeds (to be added after processing the above ingredients)

Method:

* Place carrots in food processor and blend until they are nearly a paste.

* Add sunflower seeds, garlic and spices and process until well mixed.

* Add onion and parsley and process well, scraping the sides if needed to get the mixture well mixed.

* Move the mixture to a large bowl and add sesame seeds, mix well by hand.

* Roll approx 1 tablespoon at a time and roll into balls, place the balls on the teflex dehydrator sheets.

* Dehydrate 2 - 12 hours depending on how moist you want the inside of the balls to be. Move balls to mesh sheets after an hour of dehydrating, flip them in the process. The more you dehydrate them the crispier they become.

Garlic aoili ingredients:

* 1/4 cup of dry cashews

* 2 cloves of garlic

* 1/8 teaspoon of salt

* 1 lemon juiced

Method:

*  Place nuts, garlic and salt in food processor and blend till no chunks

* Transfer the mixture into a bowl and add lemon juice, whisk, chill, enjoy!!

Raw herb crackers

Raw herb crackers

This is an awesome recipe that i found in a book call 'Everyday raw' which was lent to me by a friend of mine. It has some awesome recipes in it, this one is super easy and the crackers are so so so yummy!! I have all the herbs used growing in the garden so this is a super practical recipe for me. 

Almond meal you can buy in bulk from the Industrial estate at Santos, i have found it is a lot cheaper than buying it anywhere else. 

The recipe can be halved if you do not want to make such a huge amount, i often do this as i live by myself and like to eat fresh!! Remember that flax seeds go rancid once ground fairly quickly.

 A great recipe for vegans as it contains nutritional yeast which is high in vitamin b12.

Ingredients:

4 3/4 cups of Almond flour

A selection of raw foods, the crackers are on the right hand side,

1 cup of oat flour

1 cup of flax meal

2 tablespoons nutritional yeast

2 teaspoons of salt 

2 tablespoons of olive oil

2 cups of water

2 teaspoons well chopped oregano

4 teaspoons well chopped thyme

4 teaspoons well chopped rosemary

Mix all ingredients together in a large bowl. Spread very thin on Teflex sheets, about 1 cup per sheet.
Cut with a pizza cutter to desired size, recommended 8 down and 8 across in the book but u can go with whatever size u want here.
Sprinkle with sea salt.
Dehydrate 2 days approx
Transfer to dehydrator screens and dehydrate until crispy.
Cool and store in air tight containers


* Once you have made them once and have got used to the consistency of the 'batter', you then can add some nuts and seeds to the mixture. I have tried adding sunflower seeds and sesame seeds, i added about 1/3 of a cup of each and just added a little more water to compensate for the extra ingredients.......i really like the sunflower sesame addition to the crackers.

* I also have made a batch using almond, cashew and walnut meal instead of just the almond meal, use the same amounts but u can play with the ingredients a little....these were also a success and had a nice flavour too!!

Kale chips

KALE CHIPS

I am starting to get excited about winter planting again as it includes two of my favourite vegetable....broccoli and Kale.

I randomly ended up buying some kale chips in a health food store last year, i was sick of the good old potato chips and thought i would give them a go so when i got my food dehydrator i started experimenting with making my own kale chips, i came across 2 favourite recipes and became addicted to them, i do not think that i ate a potato chip at all last winter!!

Kale Chip recipes

'sour cream' flavour

Ingredients:

1 large bunch of kale

1 cup of cashew nuts

1 cup of water

3 spring onions

1 teaspoon of salt

Method:

Put cashews and water into a bowl and soak while you prepare the kale.

To prepare the kale wash and dry then remove the veins of the kale leaf and chop into bite size pieces. ( If the kale is really small u can leave them whole and just remove the stem, however it is important to remove the veins in anything large as they will get really hard as you dry them.)

Blend cashews, water, spring onions and salt together (you can add more or less salt to taste, try the mixture and add to taste)

Put the kale into the cashew mixture and mix around carefully with your fingers until each piece is well coated .

Then simply lay the coated kale onto the dehydrator sheets, try not to overlap them too much as you will find that they stick together, this part of the method can be a bit tedious but it is well worth it as kale chips are fantastic!

Then dehydrate until crispy....i use the living foods setting on my dehydrator as i want to keep the goodness in them (41 dg C)

Store in an airtight container and enjoy!!

Curried kale chip flavour

Ingredients:

1 cup of cashews

1 cup of water

2 - 3 teaspoons of curry powder (use more or less depending on your own taste)

1 teaspoon of salt

Method: 

same as above..........remember to test mixture after blended and add more or less salt and more or less curry powder depending on your own taste. Enjoy!!!

'sour cream' kale chips ready to go

Raw Carrot and Onion Bread

I have been delving into raw foods since i purchased my dehydrator recently and this is an amazing bread that i found online at The Raw Warung. It is so simple and easy and really delicious, i am coming up with new variety's every time i make it and will update the variety's section at the bottom of the page when i think i have more winners!!

Enjoy making and creating!!

Raw Carrot and Onion Bread

Ingredients:

2 Large carrots

2 large onions

1 cup of flax meal

1 cup of water

2 tablespoons of water

1 teaspoon of salt

Method:

Mix water and flax meal together and set aside to soak.

Grate onions and carrots add to flax meal mixture.

Add salt and oil and mix with hands.

Spread fairly thinly onto teflex sheets and put into dehydrator.

Dehydrate on 105dg f or 41dg c for 2 hours, flip over onto mesh sheets and dehydrate for a further 4 to 6 hours or until you have your desired consistency.

Top with your favourite toppings and enjoy!!!

Raw carrot, onion, beetroot bread

Store in airtight tupperware containers (if it lasts that long)!! 

Variety's I have come up with so far!

2 large carrots
1 1/2 large onions            grate all of these and add to flax meal...method same as above
1/2 large beetroot

Difficulty * (* = kids can help - ***** go ask grandma!!)

Chilli Jam

Chilli Jam

1  1/2 Kilo of a combination of your choice, taste and desire........chillies (the bulk of the 1  1/2 K), roughy chopped, remove seeds for less heat; onion, garlic, coriander, ginger (grated), galangal (grated)...any combination are fine, if you don't have galangal just omit it, as with any other ingredients u wish to omit ( except chillies!)

 

1 1/2 Kilo Sugar

 

Jam Setta (Pectin in a sachet!) cheating u may think but sooooo  easy u wouldn't not use it!!

 

1/3 C water

 

In a large jam pan put ingredients and water and simmer until soft.

 

Heat sugar and Jam setta in oven for 6 mins, add to Ingredients in the Pan and stir constantly while the sugar melts. When melted bring to the boil stirring constantly, boil vigourisly for 9 mins, checking the Jam for setting after 6 mins and then again at 9 mins. re boil for 3 more minutes until reached your desired setting.

 

To check Jam is set, take pot of boil and leave for a few minutes, take a teaspoon full and drag across a frozen cold pack/lid, if it sets you are done.

 

Leave Jam to cool in pan for 10 mins, heat Jars ready for Jam ( a teaspoon thrown in the jar with some boiling water is easy)

 

Dry Jars throughly, fill with jam, leave to cool. Add lids when cool.