craving – CLARE HOPKINS

You know when you have that sudden craving to bake? Well, I experienced this at about 11pm last night and stayed up until midnight baking & feasting away.

I usually head straight for the cacao and dates to make something super chocolatey, fudgy and sweet, but for some reason today my eye caught the two overripe bananas that were sitting on the kitchen ledge.

So, I preheated the oven to 180˚C and gathered together what I could find in the pantry for my banana and almond muffins. These can be vegan and are gluten free.

I used almond meal instead of ordinary flour, as it is high in protein and vitamin E – providing essential nutrients whilst filling you up (read more here). The bananas are the perfect natural sweetener, and they provide a sweet note as well as potassium and fibre.

Dry Ingredients:

1 cup almond meal
1/2 cup rolled oats
1 tsp baking powder
Sprinkle of salt

Wet Ingredients:

2 eggs (use an egg replacer for the vegan option)
2 bananas
1 tsp vanilla essence
1 tbsp almond milk (or any milk of your choosing)

I popped the dry ingredients into a blender, whisked them together (make sure the oats are ground into a fine powder) and poured them into a bowl. Then I blended the wet ingredients to form a runny mixture, which I combined in the bowl with the dry ingredients.

I placed about 2 heaped spoonfuls of mixture into 8 lined cupcake tins. All they needed was 30 minutes in the oven (check with a skewer – no mixture residue should be on it when you poke it through the middle of a muffin), and they were done. Voila!

Nutritional Breakdown (per serve):

137 calories/572 kilojoules
5.0g Protein
8.5g Fat (0.8g Saturated)
9.0g Carbs
43mg Sodium

If there was a prize for the world’s biggest snacker I would win. I’ve never been able to get my head around having 2-3 big meals in a day. I like to eat every 1-2 hours to keep my energy levels up.

I once read that women snack 15% more than men. I’m sure that differs from person to person, but if you want to read more of that research head here.

Currently, my favourite sweet-savoury snack is roast pumpkin.

I tend to opt for more filling snacks (mixed nuts, serving of fruit, roasted Fava beans or chickpeas, roasted vegetables) because they have that satiation factor that keeps me full for longer and stops me from grabbing sugar-filled treats for energy.

Roast pumpkin is a staple snack that can also be made to accompany lunch and dinner meals.

Method:

After preheating the oven to 200˚C (400˚F), I do peel and chop up about 1/3 of a pumpkin into bite-sized pieces. Make sure they are small so that they cook all the way through.

I lay the pumpkin pieces out on a tray that’s lined with baking paper, and drizzle some extra virgin olive oil over the top. I go for extra virgin olive oil because it’s an unrefined oil that retains the natural vitamins and minerals found in olives.

I season them with thyme, basil, salt, and paprika and then garnish them with a handful of chopped walnuts, for extra flavour and crunch.

Then, I slide them into the oven for 30 minutes.

You should also try this recipe out with capsicum (Bell Pepper), sweet potato, low carb potatoes, and other mixed veggies.

Let me know if you give it a go!

What’s your guilty pleasure?

Tag: craving

Banana and Almond Muffins? Yes pleaaassee

My Guilty Pleasure… Roast Pumpkin