Banana Blueberry Almond Pudding

I am told that I mainly post recipes for sweets and treats and HiFi comfort food, even though that's not mainly what I eat. Maybe that is true. The reason for that is that most of my staples are relatively simple and there is not much of a recipe to post. I eat massive about of boiled vegetables and tons of fruit.

Anyway, I promise that I will have more posts on my staples. However, today's post is another treat. It's a banana pudding, and, to be honest, I don't understand yet, why it (sometimes) gets a pudding like consistency. Blending some foods at high speed for a little while somehow does something that I haven't yet fully grasped. It might have something to do with the heat and the fiber. Or the protein. Or not. The important thing is that it tastes nice and feels good.

You need:
- about 6 to 8 ripe bananas
- a cup of blueberries
- about 1/4 cup of almonds
- 1/2 liter (~1 pint) of water

You do:
Throw it all in the blender and blend it. Then fill it in a form or a glass. It will solidify a bit within a minute or so. Or it won't. If it doesn't you will have a nice vegan blueberry milkshake.

Vegan banana "milk"

This is one of the simplest and fastest recipes I know, but it's very tasty, energizing, refreshing, and particularly great after exercising. It's like a banana milk without the milk, but when you try it you will see that it needs absolutely no milk or anything else to make it creamy - the bananas alone make it creamy.

I recommend this in particular to people who have just started to be vegan and are looking for a milk substitute - it's quickly made and, in my opinion, it beats every processed milk substitute you can buy in terms of taste and nutritional content.

(Takes about 3 min)

You need:
- a blender
- 4 large ripe bananas (with little black spots like in the picture)
- 500ml of water

You do:
Put the water and the bananas in the blender and blend until smooth. Enjoy.

Michael

Reference: I can't claim ownership for this recipe (I guess it's not much of an invention to start with) and it's probably not possible to figure out who made this for the first time. However, I know I saw it for the first time on my friend Olivia's website in a list of things you can do with bananas (the page is in German).

Omega Thrice-Cream

Walnuts are one of the foods richest in omega-three fatty acids. Why not combine them with some frozen fruits and make some HiFi sugar-free vegan ice-cream?

You need:
- 1 cup of walnuts
- 4 frozen bananas
- 3 oranges
- 500g of frozen mango pieces

You do:
Peel the oranges and blend them until smooth. Add the bananas and blend again.  Stir in the frozen mango pieces and let it sit for a few minutes so that the mango can defrost and doesn't ruin your blender. Add the walnuts. If you like some walnut chunks, blend it only for a moment. If you want smooth ice-cream blend longer.

If you eat a quarter of the ice cream you just made, you have your daily requirement of essential omega 3 fatty acids, so dig in - it's good for you!

By the way: the powder used for decoration is carob powder and ginger powder.

Michael

P.S. This ice cream hasn't been engineered to be smooth right out of the freezer, so if you keep it in the freezer, you need to take it out about 10min before you eat it.

"Drinking the Green" - Orange Banana Rocket Smoothie

Most smoothies have a juice as a base ingredient. Juicing is a process that removes most and sometimes even all of the fiber. Hence, these smoothies are not 100% HiFi - they contain the fruit sugar, but not the fiber that regulates and slows down its uptake.

In this recipe, I create a 100% HiFi smoothie by blending the whole (peeled) oranges, instead of pressing or juicing them. Hifi orange smoothies, which are already nice refreshing drinks on their own contain (in contrast to pre-packed or even freshly pressed orange juice) all the insoluble fiber of the orange. Insoluble fiber regulates your blood-sugar level, and cleanses your colon.

As a side note: For leafy greens, it is particularly important to buy organic ones (if you can afford it), because they have a very high surface to weight ratio, so the non-organic ones are likely to be loaded with pesticides.

You need:
- a blender
- 400ml of water (or more if you want your smoothie to be more liquid)
- 3 (medium-size) oranges, peeled.
- 70g organic wild rocket
- 5 ripe bananas

You do:
If you have a high powered blender, you can just throw all ingredients in there and blend them. If you have a cheaper blender, I recommend the following procedure:
Put the oranges into the blender with about 200ml of the water and blend until smooth. Add the organic rocket and blend until smooth. Add the bananas and the rest of the water and blend until smooth. I usually add my daily dose of B12 in the end and blend it in for like a second.

Green smoothies are so much a part of my daily life that I dedicated a series of artworks to them.

Enjoy,
Michael

Mousse au la la! - Vegan Carob "Mousse au Chocolat"

I love carob. Carob powder is just the dried (and sometimes roasted) fruit of the carob tree ground into powder. It's very high in fiber (also very high in calcium and potassium), naturally sweet and, unlike cocoa, it doesn't contain any psychoactive substances like caffeine or theobromine.

This recipe is a sweet and creamy (and yummy) mousse without sugar, and also without milk or cream.

You need:
3 table spoons of fine carob powder
1/4 cup of soaked roasted almonds (roast them very lightly in a pan without oil or in the oven and soak them for a couple of hours in water and discard the water)
2 ripe bananas
1 small tea spoon of cinnamon
1 small piece of fresh ginger or 1 pinch of ginger powder
1 vanilla bean (scrape the inside of the bean with the edge of your knife to pull off all of the tiny black seeds that are found inside and use only them)

You do:
Mix all ingredients really well in a food processor! Chill! Enjoy.

Michael

NEW: If you like sugar-free carob recipes, check out my carob cookie recipe.