Carocolate - Carob Bars

Chocolate cravings? In need for some comfort food or some handy sweets on your road trip or something to give your kids for Christmas?
Try carocolate (carob bars). It's yummy, and according to some of my usual testers, it's the best thing I have ever created. It's vegan (of course) and very healthy 100% HiFi food, meaning it doesn't contain any added sugar, flours, or pressed oils and is high in fiber. It's also high in calcium, which is no surprise, since carob, dates, and nuts are all high in calcium. It's also very easy to take with you on trips, or cycling workouts, that's why you can use it as energy bars.

Since it doesn't need cooking or baking, it's done in about 5 min.

You need:
- 2 cups of dried dates
- 1 1/2 cups of nuts (almonds, hazelnuts or cashews)
- 1/2 cup of carob powder
- 1 vanilla bean
- pinch of cinnamon

You do:
If you want the aroma of roasted nuts in your bars, start by roasting the nuts for a couple of minutes in a oil-free pan or in the oven. Process all the ingredients in a food processor (or with a hand-blender) into a sticky coarse dough. The finer the dough, the finer the final product. Shape the dough into bars, by pressing it down and cutting it with a knife. That's it. Enjoy!

Michael

Vegan Sources of Calcium, a case study (me)

I am always asked a lot where I get my calcium from and I usually say: from dark green leafy vegetables (DGLV), which is where I think I get most of my calcium from. However, I am not really sure how much DGLV actually contribute. I do eat a lot of them, but I don't necessarily eat them every day.

Also, most vegetarian and vegan food recommendation rely a lot on calcium fortified foods, which I don't eat in general. On the other hand, there is a little bit of calcium in most plant-based foods, so it would surprise me if one couldn't get enough calcium from just eating healthy HiFi Foods.

To get a better idea, I ran a little test. I recorded my food intake for on arbitrary day to see whether I actually get the recommended 700mg of calcium a day.

If you want to do the same thing, which I recommend, use this to find out about the calcium content of your food.

So here is what I ate on Wednesday the 30th of October 2013

breakfast (I have breakfast habits that are peculiar to some people):
pea soup - 500g of green peas (120mg),
salt, chili, black pepper, water

lunch:
200g of grapes (20mg)
2 bananas (20mg)
150g cashews (50mg)
250g dates (150mg)

dinner:
100g kale (100mg)
200g broccolli (100mg)
2 tblsp flax (50mg)
2 tblsp sesame (70mg)
4 tblsp nutritional yeast (0mg)
1 cup omega thrice-cream (mango and walnuts, 30mg)

Calcium (sum): 710mg

Conclusion: I have to say that I pulled out some high calcium foods for dinner, because I felt that I might not make the 700mg and even with those foods I barely made it.  Here is what I have learned from this little study:

(1) calcium is something you really need to pay attention to.

(2) If you eat a high fruit diet, fruit (dates, bananas, grapes, oranges) do significantly contribute to your calcium intake.

(3) Nuts are quite high in calcium

(4) My main sources of omega-3 fatty acids (flax, walnuts) are also very high in calcium, so there is a double reason to eat them

(5) Sesame is very high in calcium - a few spoons here and there gives you a significant calcium boost

Simple Chunky Flax Pasta

There are some days that call for pasta and you don't want to eat the highly processed gluten-free pastas you can buy in supermarkets and health food stores. So here is a very quick recipe for healthy gluten-free 100% HiFi whole-grain pasta that takes you all the way from grains and seeds to ready cooked pasta in about 30 min.

I don't buy flour anymore, because only by grinding the grain myself I can be sure that the flour is 100% HiFi. Grinding takes about 2min for the flour used in this recipe, even if you only have a tiny seed/coffee grinder like me.

(Takes about 30min)

You need:
- 1 cup of brown rice
- 1 cup of buckwheat
- 1/2 cup of flax seeds
- water
(- salt, if you need it)

You do:
Grind rice, buckwheat, and flax seeds into flour. Mix the flours well. Add water and beat the dough until it's firm, but not breaking. Roll the dough out as thin as you like (and as much as you can manage) and cut into strips. Cook for 5 to 10min (depending on the size of your pasta). Make some great pasta sauce and enjoy it.

HiFi Bread

This is my first attempt of making HiFi bread. Getting the dough right was a trial-and-error approach (adding a bit of that and more of that), so I can't give you exact quantities yet. However, it turned out quite excellent, both in terms of consistency and taste.

You need:
- brown rice
- oats
- pumpkin seeds
- xanthan gum
- water
- dates

You do:
Soak dates over night. Blend or process dates and soaking water until syrup. Grind brown rice, oats and pumpkin seeds in a seed grinder. Mix it all in a bowl until dough is not sticky, but not crumbly. Bake in the oven until ready (about 45min).

I will work on this until I have the exact quantities.

Hot Carob Cashew Drink

Here is another nice hot drink and a good alternative to hot chocolate.

(Takes about 3 min)

You need:
- a blender
- about 1l of boiling water
- 2 tblsp carob powder
- 10 small dates
- about 15 cashew nuts.

You do:
Put all ingredients in the blender and blend until smooth.

Use less or no cashews if you like it less creamy (fatty). Use less or no dates if you like it less sweet. Carob powder is already somewhat sweet. On the other hand, both whole dates and whole cashew nuts are HiFi - they won't harm you. So why not indulge?

Michael

Eat more - weigh less (1)

That you don't have to starve yourself to lose weight is something I realized only a few years ago, after lots of research and personal experience. In fact, if I want to lose weight, I increase the amount of food I eat. Let me explain this.

In my experience, there are 3 kinds of hunger:

1. Volume
This first type of hunger is the hunger of your digestion system for something to do. This is related to the sheer volume of food you eat.

2. Nutrients
This is probably a more subtle hunger. Your body needs a few hundred nutrients (maybe a few thousand - we don't really know yet). It manifests itself in specific appetites or food cravings.

3. Energy
Every cell in your body, in particular the brain and the muscles burn glucose. Your body needs a lot of it.

The first thing lesson of the HiFi Weight Loss Diet is to understand the difference between these kinds of hungers and not to confuse them. If your body needs some nutrients, it won't ever be satisfied by another load of nutrient-lacking high processed sugary or fatty food with lots of calories.

What you need to eat is high volumes (seriously) of highly nutritions HiFi food. If you eat unprocessed plant foods with all its fiber you get the volume through fiber and water and all the nutrients that are in unprocessed plant foods. If you are on a diet, you never want to have hunger number 1 and number 2 - so dig in!

Avocado Walnut Dressing for Carrots

You think you are not eating enough carrots? Well, some more surely wouldn't hurt. Eating carrots always seems like a good idea to me, but apart from the occasional one that I just snack without any preparation, I don't eat that many to be honest. I don't like cooked carrots, so my only option is carrot salad. As part of my new "eat more carrots"-project, I have created a nice dressing, that is fully HiFi, so you can drown your carrots in it without control.


(Takes about 10 min)

You need:
- a hand blender
- a mandoline
- about 4 medium-size carrots
- 1 avocado
- 1/4 cup of walnuts
- 1/8 cup of sesame seeds and a seed grinder or 2 tblsp of tahini
- 1 orange
- 1 lemon
- 1 piece of garlic
- 1 piece of ginger
- 1 piece of chilli
- no salt (seriously, you don't need any)

You do:
Cut the carrots into small sticks using the mandoline. Grind the sesame seeds into a paste with a seed grinder. Put the sesame paste and the other ingredients into a tall container and blend until smooth. Mix the dressing with the carrots. Enjoy.

Michael