Today I am sharing a recipe from one of my friends – the wonderful Georgia Harding, naturopath and wellness blogger at Well Nourished. I love her recipes and common sense advice.

This recipe is from her breakfast eBook, Rise and Shine, a cracking book full of yummy and different recipes to eat first up in the morning.

Coco-Chocs

Vital Stats: grain free, gluten free, dairy free, egg free, refined sugar free, vegetarian

Makes about 4-5 cups

Ingredients

Dry ½ cup of each: raw almonds, raw macadamia nuts, raw hazelnuts, raw cashew nuts, raw walnuts, raw pepitas (pumpkin seeds), raw sunflower seeds, sesame seeds, shredded or desiccated coconut

170g (½ cup) sweetener (rice malt syrup, honey or maple syrup)

1 tablespoon of coconut oil or macadamia nut oil

1 tablespoon of raw cacao powder

1 teaspoon of cinnamon powder

1 teaspoon of vanilla powder (or paste)

Method

Preheat your oven to 120℃/ 250℉. Line a large baking or biscuit tray with non-toxic baking paper. Place all of the nuts, seeds and coconut on the tray. You are after more or less a single layer across the tray.

For the syrup, mix together all of the ingredients into a glass jug or bowl. If the syrup is too thick or the coconut oil solid, heat for 5 minutes or so in the oven. Drizzle the syrup as evenly as possible over the nuts and seeds.

Place in the preheated oven for 1 hour, stirring every 20 minutes to make sure all of the nuts and seeds are evenly coated in the delicious syrup. Remove from the oven and allow to cool completely.

Serve

With full fat natural or unsweetened Greek yogurt (or coconut yogurt) and fruit.

Over pancakes or french toast (to increase the protein content).

In a little cup as a snack.

Variations

Nut free: Omit the nuts and increase the seeds.

Fructose free: Choose rice syrup as your sweetener.

Store

Once completely cooled store in a large jar or airtight container in the fridge

Health Benefits

The selection of nuts and seeds provide a fibre and protein dense host of vitamins and minerals. The coconut and coconut oil provide fibre and immune boosting fats. The raw cacao is a wonderful source of antioxidants.

Tip

Soaking your nuts and seeds further improves their nutrient availability. You can also make this in a dehydrator if you have one.

Do you think your kids would love this??

Crio Mac… a chewy chocolate treat!

We can’t stop eating this! It is seriously good. Chewy, chocolatey, nutty and healthy.

Heaven.

It’s a bit like those chewy caramel lollies in texture, but with a rich dark chocolate flavour and the crunch of the nuts. Drooooool!

Crio Bru has so many health benefits (as well as tasting amazing). The cocoa bean (also known as the cacao bean) is one of nature’s most amazing superfoods, offering high antioxidant value, mineral benefits and natural energy. If you don’t have any Crio Bru, you could try making it with water and cacao.

Research has shown that macadamias can help lower blood cholesterol levels,reduce the incidence of heart disease, are high in fibre and contain vitamins, minerals and protein essential in a healthy diet. Read more here.

The vital stats: gluten-free, egg-free, easy to make dairy-free, vegetarian.

Crio Mac

Okay, so this is what you need:

1 1/2 cups filtered water

5 tablespoons Crio Bru (any flavour, but I used Vega Real)

3/4 cup organic honey

2 tablespoons organic butter (I think it would work just fine with coconut oil too)

300g macadamia nuts (or your favourite nut!)

Okay, so this is what you do:

Add the Crio Bru to the water in a saucepan with a lid and gently brew for about ten minutes.

While you are doing that, add the honey and the butter to another saucepan and measure out the macadamia nuts.

You can also prep a tray with some baking paper and a light smear of coconut oil.

When the Crio Bru is finished, strain it into a glass measuring jug and check you still have 1 1/2 cups of liquid. You may need to add a bit of water.

Add the Crio Bru to the honey and butter. On a medium high heat, mix in well and let boil.

Stir it occasionally and keep an eye on it. At about the 20-25 minute mark, it will start to foam and get thicker.

Keep going, stirring all the while, until it gets darker in colour and will coat the back of a spoon.

Quickly add the nuts, stir and pour onto your tray.

Let it cool down and set until you can break bits off (about an hour).

If it’s too soft, throw the whole lot back in the saucepan and cook it a bit more until you get the right consistency.

Try to keep sticky fingers away (I had to hide it well so I could take photos this morning!).

This recipe was inspired by A Girl Worth Saving – a very awesome blog.