Healthy and Yummy Banana Cake – Healthy holiday dessert

Banana Cake - this time I put some plums on top

This is my favourite banana cake recipe. It is incredibly simple and feels great to eat a second helping guilt free.

I’m certainly not suggesting you replace your Christmas pudding but here is a healthy suggestion for one of your holiday meals.

Recipe below:

Ingredients

• 1 cup bran
• 1 cup milk (almond or other)
• 1 cup wholemeal self-raising flour (or use half whole-wheat and half
• buckwheat)
• 2-4 ripe bananas (very ripe works best)
• 1 cup chopped dried fruit and/or nuts: prunes, almonds, figs, rasins,
• sunflower seeds.  You could also try fresh fruit like apples, etc

Preparation

• Heat oven to 180 C
• Soak bran with milk for couple min, then add other ingredients.
• Mix well.
• Pour into greased baking/caking pan or tin loaf (works as a loaf or flat as a cake)
• Bake for 1-1.25 hours (until sharp knife comes out clean)

More healthy recipes

Kale Soup – Healthy holiday dinner

Healthy and tasty soup with lots of Greens

Ever wonder if there was any way to make kale taste good?  Try this soup.

Recipe below:

Ingredients

• 750g Kale (approx. 3-4 cups)
• 350g potatoes (approx. 2 cups)
• 1 onion
• 3 carrots
• 1 garlic
• 50g butter
• 125 ml cream (approx. 1/2 cup)
• 1 litre broth (msg free)
• salt, pepper, nutmeg to taste

Preparation

• Cut kale in stripes, wash, blanché in saltwater (cook quickly for 3min or so)
• Peel potatoes and carros and dice
• Dice onion and garlic
• Fry onion and garlic in butter
• Add kale, carrots and potatoes and saute for a few minutes
• Add broth and cook until soft
• Puree it all and add cream
• Season with nutmeg, salt, pepper

Consider adding a small piece of chicken or fish on the side, to accompany the soup. For example, sprinkle basil, salt and pepper, and drizzle grape-seed oil on a piece of chicken and pop in the oven for approx. 30 min.

More healthy recipes

Mette’s Gluten Free Bread

It is possible to have yummy gluten free bread….

275g Dove Farms Gluten Free Brown Bread Flour (Doves Farms and available at many health food stores)

125g quinoa flour 

2 TBS psyllium husk

1 TBS of xylitol (natural sugar substitute)

2 Tsp(heaped) dry yeast

1.5 Tsp salt

125g whole linseeds

125g sunflower seeds

2 eggs

1 egg white

300ml water

100ml rapeseed oil or coconut oil

10ml apple cider vinegar

Mix the dry ingredients together and mix the wet ingredients together. Combine both together in food processor for 3 min.  The final mixture will be quite loose (unlike regular bread dough).   Pour into greased bread tin.  Cover and leave to rise in a warm place for 1.5 hours.  Bake for 35 min at 180 C.  (To test if done, knock on bread and listen for hollow sound).   Allow to cool before serving.  Enjoy!

Beetroot and Chocolate Mousse Cake

This flourless, eggless mousse cake is a real oddity in that it tastes both sweet and slightly savoury, and it seems to alternate flavours of chocolate and beetroot on the tongue. And it tastes great with whipped cream. It can be made vegan by using some of the really good sugar and dairy free chocolate available. If you can’t get really dark chocolate, then use the darkest you can find and add a few tablespoons of dark cocoa-it makes the cake that much richer.

Makes one large 24cm cake (enough to feed 10-12)

• 375g roasted and peeled beetroot, cut into chunks
• 450g firm silken tofu
• 70g unrefined caster sugar
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 350g chocolate (minimum 60% cocoa solids) melted
• chocolate shards or fruit and cream to serve (optional)

Preheat the oven to 180˚C (gas 4) and line the base and sides of a 24cm loose-bottomed round cake tin with baking parchment-but don’t grease it.

Place the beetroot, tofu, sugar, vanilla and baking powder in a food processor and blitz to a fine puree. Tip into a bowl and mix in the melted chocolate.

Pour into the tin and bake for 30minutes. The cake will look quite uncooked but don’t panic-it will be fine. Leave to cool completely (it’s quite a soft cake), then remove from the tin and place on a large plate. Store in the fridge until needed, but bring back to room temperature before serving.

To serve, simply cut into wedges and decorate with chocolate shards or serve with fruit (it’s great with berries, pineapple and mango) and, if you like, cream.