There’s something so special about having a tall stack of pancakes for breakfast or brunch. I always make them for my family and friends. This stack of fluffy raspberry and rose pancakes are thick and filled with raspberries. In this post I’ll show you exactly how you can make these pink pancakes.
…Archives for February 2017
Spiced Roasted Cauliflower + Rainbowl
“Another Rainbowl!?” You might ask, to which I’ll answer “of course! And there plenty more coming your way”. It might seem to become repetitive, but trust me, each bowl packs it’s own flavour, offering a new colourful experience. And to be honest you can skip the rainbowl and use the roasted veggies in whatever dish you like, or eat them as a snack, yes they work great as a snack item!
The main components for this bowl are the roasted cauliflower, romanesco and broccoli, but feel free to use only cauliflower. I bought a fun vegetable pack from my local supermarket Albert Heijn (not sponsored), which came with mini white and purple cauliflower, mini broccoli and mini romanesco. You know I couldn’t let that purple cauliflower slip through my hands!
But don’t worry all of these could easily be replaced by one big cauliflower, no need to find the oh so elusive purple cauliflower! This recipe was a bit to spicy for one of my friends, but I don’t blame her since I threw in a adjuma pepper, seeds and all, whoops. So if you’re not blessed with a stomach lined with metal use half a pepper or skip it all together. But by now you must know that almost all of my recipes are open to interpretations.
If you are choosing to go for a rainbowl and want to make some of those colour transforming “unicorn” noodles you can follow the instructions posted here. I personally love creating colourful dishes like this because eat colour has its own beneficial properties, so try to eat as colourful as possible. Eat the rainbow!
Let me know if you liked the recipe in the comments below and if you decide to recreate this dish feel free to tag me on Instagram as I’d love to see your creations!
One Love,
A.J.
Spiced Roasted Cauliflower Rainbowl
Ingredients
- 1 big cauliflower or 2 small ones a small brocolli and a small romanesco
- 1 serving unicorn noodles
- 1 serving baby spinach or greens of choice
- 1 roasted sweet potatoe (optional)
- 3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- 1/8 tsp fenugreek
- 1/8 tsp nutmeg
- 1 tsp cumin seeds ground
- 1/2 tsp coriander seeds ground
- 1/4 tsp oregano
- 1/4 tsp cinnamon
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- salt to taste
- 1/2 adjuma pepper or pepper of choice (optional)
Instructions
- Start by preheating the oven to 175 degrees celcius or 350 farenheit. In a bowl add the olive oil and the spices (fenugreek, nutmeg, cumin, coriander, oregano, cinamon) and minced garlic. Add salt to taste, mix well. Once you've cut the cauliflower (and brocolli & romanesco) in bite size pieces you can toss them in the bowl with the spices until they are evenly coated.
- Spread the vegetables out on a baking tray and bake them in the oven for about 23 minutes (depending on your oven) while shaking them up a bit halfway through. Once they are done you can assemble your bowl and enjoy!
Five ways I deal with feeling down (low on energy)
We all experience feeling down, the way we deal with it though, that’s quite personal. I’d like to share five things I do when I’m feeling quite down, and no not depressed, I feel that most of these things are too hard to do when feeling depressed, which is something I myself am very familiar with. Maybe I’ll share more about that later but for now I myself am still struggling to practice what I would preach when depressed, and these things might be able to prevent from spiralling into a depression, at least for me.
Look I’m not a psychologist or psychiatrist, I’m simply speaking from experience. These things might not work for everyone, so take them with a grain of salt! I made a promise to share more of the things that bring me a bit of happiness in my life, which with this platform is an important message to share. Besides me there are many other people dealing with mental illness so if only one of them finds these posts helpful then my mission is complete!
One thing I want to stress is that these are not meant to suppress your feelings, always try to embrace and not judge your emotions, they ask our attention for a reason! These are tools that help me feel a bit better while I’m still embracing my feelings, not shoving them away. Now here are the 5 ways I deal with feeling down:
- Connection: Sometimes all we need is a listening ear, or a big hug, I know it sounds super corny, but sometimes knowing we’re not alone is all we need. You could talk with a loved one or someone who went through something familiar. Just make sure you feel safe and comfortable speaking with this person, otherwise it might have the opposite effect.
- Movement: When I’m feeling down It’s very easy for me to disappear into the couch or on my kitchen stool, this can sometimes lead to hours with little to no movement. To make sure this doesn’t happen I either go out to take a walk or practice some yoga, regardless of what you do moving the body helps release feel good chemicals in the brain such as endorphins. Another way yoga and walking (or any other exercise) helps me is that it makes it easier for me to stop worrying by bringing me in the present moment, connecting with my body and breath and when walking with my beautiful surroundings. Don’t push yourself just set simple goals, like a 10 minute walk or 1o minute yoga practice, before you know it you might find yourself in a nice flow of movement and energy and before you know it that 1o minute walk turned into an hour or than 10 minute yoga flow turned into an hour-long flow.
- Cleaning: I think we all are familiar with that feeling of calm after you cleaned your room or house. You can even go a step further and might use some sage to smudge the house. Regardless of how you clean the house the process might become as mindful as taking a walk. I also always feel a bit content after cleaning knowing I’m still productive.
- Hobbies/Passions: Most of us have probably been told to “go find a hobby”, and honestly sometimes it helps. It took me almost all my life to find a hobby that became a passion of mine, which is creating recipes and sharing them through pictures on instagram and this blog. So sometimes when I do feel down I try to cook a new dish or recreate a dish I really love, cooking for me can become a form of meditation. I’m not telling you to go find a hobby, I think they have to come to us and when they do, use them when possible!
- Self Care: If all fails try pampering yourself, take a shower or bath, cook yourself (or order) a delicious meal. Try listen to your favourite music, music that makes you feel happy, light some candles and read a book, just be kind to yourself.
I hope these tips are a bit helpful and maybe they’re not! Regardless of if they work or not I challenge you to find what works for you, to become aware of this, simply becoming aware of what works and what doesn’t is enough. Just make sure that you’re being kind to yourself. It’s okay to feel down sometimes, just make sure you stay in charge and it doesn’t overwhelm you. Here is where I have to stop because I’m not there yet myself, I still have moment where I’m drowning in melancholy, and that’s fine for now.
One Love,
A.J.
Magical Sushi Bowl
If you like sushi you will love these bowls! They’re great if you’re feeling a little bit lazy bit still and don’t feel like rolling out that sushi mat. I myself am a big lover of sushi and honestly don’t mind the prepping, but this bowl might win it over those delicious maki rolls, well at least when I’m eating alone that is. There’s just something fun about enjoying a big platter of maki rolls when dining with friends, right!?
The reason I love this bowl so much is that I’m able to pack it with many different ingredients you normally wouldn’t find in a maki roll, such as…
Hot Spot #2 – Snoeptastisch – Zwolle
Sadly this hot spot is no longer around. But you can still order their products online!
The past weekend I went to visit my friends in Zwolle, which is located in the east of the Netherlands. There we took a stroll through the city centre and before we left to go to their home they wanted to show me a candy store where they sell vegan candy….
Chickpea Sweet Potato Curry
Another curry recipe!? Is that even a question? Of course there will be another curry recipe, heck there might even be a hundred if it were up to me. If you’ve seen/read my previous curry recipe you might know that I grew up eating tons of it, and if you didn’t, well now you know. A dish so complex in flavour, deserves as many variations as one can imagine, when it comes to curries I don’t stick to any rules, you could call me a curry rebel.
As usual feel free to play around with this recipe. If you hate sweet potato you could easily swap this for normal potatoes or maybe you want to add carrots. To this dish I also added some sweet corn for texture and taste and some baby spinach at the end for some colour and added nutrition, but feel free to leave these out. You could also add some cilantro or coconut cream, remember there are no rules to this dish!When it comes to finally eating the curry you could choose to have it over rice, or maybe you’d like to eat it with some roti or other flatbread, it’s all up to you how you’ll enjoy it. I decided to be a little extra and made some purple rice, added some fresh spinach, an avocado rose and some purple sprouts for some extra nutrients and colour.
Now let’s go ahead and make ourselves a delicious dinner, and don’t worry about making too much, you know leftovers are the best right!?
Let me know if you liked the recipe in the comments below and if you decide to recreate this dish feel free to tag me on Instagram as I’d love to see your creations!
One Love,
A.J.
Chickpea Sweet Potato Curry
Ingredients
- 1 big onion
- 4 cloves garlic
- 2 big tomatoes
- 2 tbsp curry masala powder
- 1 tbsp veggie bouillon
- 1 can chickpeas
- 1 big sweet potato cubed
- 1 can corn (optional)
- 1 habanero/adjuma pepper (optional)
- 1 handful baby spinach (optional)
Instructions
- Start by sautéing the onion and garlic and if you want to keep this oil free you can try water sautéing them. Once the onions are browned you can add the chopped tomatoes and spices, cook this until the tomatoes are completely broken down and almost turned into a paste.
- Now add the remaining ingredients and cover with water (if you're using baby spinach add this at the end). Let it simmer till the sweet potatoes are done and until you reached your favorite consistency. If you'd like more sauce you can add water and if you'd like it to be thicker you can break down some of the sweet potatoes. Enjoy over rice or with roti, or whichever way you prefer.
Unicorn Rice + Rainbowl
If you’ve been following me for a while or even a short moment you might have seen me using “unicorn noodles” in most of my dishes, well there’s a new unicorn in town and this ones about to steal the crown! You obviously already read the title or seen the thumbnail, but let me introduce to you, unicorn rice, yes hear me unicorn rice! The fun part about creating recipes is being able to name it whatever the heck you want, so yes this is Unicorn rice, why? Well it’s blue/lilac and has the ability to transform it’s pigment to hot pink… Sounds like a unicorn to me.
But seriously though, how much fun is this? Also the rice might have the same ability as the noodles but they both deserve individual posts. You can do this with whatever rice you like, but using the technique on short grain rice has to be my favorite! But enough chit chat, you didn’t come for my hype, but rather for joining me on the hype train, so let me share some instructions so we all can have our unicorn rice.
1 Cup rice of choice (short grain is my fave for this)
1 chunck of purlpe cabbage
water
Directions:
- Start by putting the purple cabbage in a small (sauce) pan and add about 2 cups of water. Turn on the heat to a low temperature and let the cabbage simmer until the water turns almost deep blue. Once the water turned deep blue turn off the heat and remove the cabbage, use it for a salad or stir fry, or maybe for the bowl!
- Now wash your rice and add it to a pot, instead of cooking this with regular water add the deep blue water. Ok now comes a very important note! Make sure that when you cook the rice it’s on the lowest heat possible, it might take a little longer, but if the heat is too high the colour will change and might even turn out light brown (yuck). Now cook it until the rice is done, this will take somewhere between 15 and 20 minutes.
- Once the rice is done you can use it for whatever dish you like, but wait here is where the magic comes in.
- To make the rice turn from lilac/blue to hot pink all you need it some lemon juice or any other form of acidity. It’s basic science actually, since the pigments in the cabbage have been transferred into the rice.
Now we’ve figured out how to create the rice, let’s put it into action by creating a delicious bowl using this rice. You know what, if you’re not feeling like making this rice you can use whatever rice or grain you want! Find the recipe below. As a sauce I used my Miso beet sauce and a drizzle of sriracha, but feel free to use any other sauce I can imagine this would be delicious with this Satay Sauce.
Keep in mind that when you’re making this rice even the slightest interaction with acidic food will make it change colour as you can see on the picture above. I pushed the mango down and it reveals a more lighter almost faded colour because of the slight acidity in the mango.
Let me know if you liked the recipe in the comments below and if you decide to recreate this dish feel free to tag me on Instagram as I’d love to see your creations!
One Love,
A.J.
Unicorn Rice + Rainbowl
Ingredients
- 1 serving (unicorn) rice
- 1 serving bell pepper
- 1 serving sporuts
- 1/2 avocado
- 1 serving mango
- 1 handful baby spinach
- 1 serving (cheri) tomatoes
- 1 piece lemon
- 1 serving sauce of choice
Instructions
- Cut all the ingredients in bite size pieces and simply assemble the bowl the way you like. Or toss everything together, it's your bowl. Enjoy!
Chocolate Banana Granola
Don’t throw away those nasty looking bananas that have been hidden away in your kitchen maybe even growing some mold on the skin. As disgusting as these bananas might look, they make a delicious component in this crunchy recipe. But not only this dish thrives from using over ripe bananas, you should try them in more baked goods such this banana bread or try making…
Let’s Try # 5 – Go With The Glow Salad
So for those living in the Netherlands, or visiting (you’re all equally welcome *wink*) I’ll be reviewing a new salad available at SLA, a dutch health food restaurant. The dish is a collaboration between SLA and Go With The Glow Let me start by explaining a little bit about Go With The Glow and the origin of this dish and why I’m so stoked to be trying it out (besides me being a super foodie and trying out new food).
Look at me stuffing my face though! Thats how you can tell their food was great, well to be honest I’m a food monster, but yeah their food was awesome!
First of I’ll talk a little bit about Go With The Glow, created by two power women & sisters Loulou and Isabella Machiné. I was first introduced with them through one of their vegan brunches, they were kind enough to invite me for a delicious brunch in the centre of Amsterdam. Go With The Glow reaches out to eating establishments to, together with these locations, create a vegan menu, which they later share with people from around the country. By doing so they make a huge effort to spread the word on a plant based lifestyle, and they do it in class, by introducing people new to the lifestyle with a deliciously nourishing dish that will leave them with a great first impression of what it means to life a less cruel life. Besides just the food they also entertain their guest with inspiring presentations and talks from other people thriving on a vegan lifestyle. And last but not least by working with these awesome ladies these eating establishments end up adding more vegan menu options to their menu, which is a huge win for the vegan community!
These incredible women teamed up with SLA, a salad bar in the Netherlands with locations in Haarlem, Amsterdam, Utrecht & Den Haag, to create a delicious salad of the month. Even though SLA isn’t all vegan/plant based there are many vegan options on the menu! This salad included greens, sprouts, sesame mushrooms, broccoli, black rice, coconut sweet potato, turmeric cauliflower and a tamarind dressing.
Now let’s go to the verdict, what are my thoughts on this salad!?
Me and a friend went to try this for lunch, well for me this ended up being a brunch because I accidentally skipped breakfast (whoops)! So it’s safe to say that I was very hungry.
First off I’d like to say that even though this is a salad, it in no means is a side dish, because this dish stuffed me! It left me satisfied for a couple of hours and really gave me the energy I was craving for after accidentally skipping breakfast.
For me it was definitely a salad that grew on me with every bite I took. The first bite I took had me like “ok nice” and I ended up swallowing the entire dish, it’s really tasty! Especially the 5 spice in the dressing combined with the sesame mushrooms got me good, growing up with Chinese cuisine it hit a soft spot for me!
Now will I order this salad again!? Well most definitely, YES! I don’t know if I’ll be back at SLA during the month of February, but if I do I’d get another one of these delicious bowls, with extra avocado, because avocado is life am I right!? Since this is a monthly salad you should make sure to get it while it’s hot! I mean cold!
Did you like this post? I hope you did because I’ll be making more trips beyond the kitchen to find great vegan food and of course share my finds with all of you.
One Love,
A.J.
I would rather be weak!
First off I want to point out how privileged I am for being able to have little breakdowns every now and then. I know how it is to be in a “survival mode” and am aware there are people living in countries and or situations, who’m might not be able or privileged to live outside of this survival mode. Just wanted to point this out, and I think this topic of privilege deserves a post on its own.
These posts are meant to shine some bright and positive light on more serious and though evoking topics. Now when one of my friends stumbled upon this piece of graffiti, we immediately, without much thought took some fun shots, because why not right? It wasn’t until I edited the pictures I realised we were drawn to this wall for a reason and I finally understood the meaning behind it.
In the past I’ve heard things like “don’t show them your emotions, keep them to yourself and be strong, don’t let them see your weaknesses.” or “don’t be a sissy, real men don’t cry”. Not only these words but also more mental and physical abuse have led many, including me, too shut down and keep to ourselves, because bottling up our emotions means we’re strong right? Like being vulnerable is a weakness. I believed this long enough to let it become my reality, consuming me from the inside out. Let me share with you why I think that being “weak”, actually makes you stronger.
During therapy one of my biggest struggles was opening up, I hated crying, because it was never appreciated, I considered it a weakness, or an opportunity for people to take advantage of my weakness. Now I won’t take you through the entire process, because it took a couple of moons, and to be honest it’s an ongoing process, but I am finally able to be “weak”, and you want to know the funny thing, I’ve never felt so strong. I’m able to live my own truth, regardless of what others might think of me. I’ve found compassion for myself, which helps me find compassion for others, and ultimately makes me feel more connected with the people in my life.
They said boy’s don’t cry? Well this one does, regardless of gender or age, you’re allowed to express your emotions, they aren’t you, they’re simple a part of you. We have them for a reason. There is so much more to say about our emotions, which I’ll definitely touch on, but for now let’s stick with being vulnerable.
You know, sometimes it takes a good cry to find some release, yesterday I taught my first yoga class and the entire day my heart was racing a million beats a minute, or at least that’s what it felt like. At a certain point I just needed a big ugly cry to release all of this stress, which was building up inside. Before the class started I was transparent in my emotions, I was no longer panicky, but felt vulnerable and nervous, I told them, and taught an amazing class afterwards.
Another magical thing that happened when I stared to open up and embrace my emotions is that I started making true and meaningful connections with the people in my life, for this I might be most blessed, I mean I still feel lonely from time to time (especially in a full-blown depression) but for the most part the connections, made through me being more open, have exponentially enriched my life.
Now I’m not telling you to go and throw everything on the table, just start by being kind to yourself, you’re not weak for being human. Share with those that mean a lot to you, and maybe even strangers, who knows what kind of wonderful experiences can come from this. Now for me, I’d rather be vulnerable and “weak”, than to be disconnected and alone with my emotions. Don’t let anyone take this away from you.
I hope you like posts like these, cause there are more to come. I want to use this platform to spread awareness amongst more delicious recipes!
One Love,
A.J.