x For Freezer x

Meet lucuma. A spoonful of this silky smooth Peruvian fruit is enough to incite poetry in Jeremy Clarkson.

We team lucuma with hazelnut butter to make these outrageously tasty white chocolates. (Was that a teensy squeal?)

When dried, lucuma is a cracking way of naturally sweetening desserts. You’ll also get a surprising dose of niacin (vitamin B3) to help crusade against cholesterol and depression. What a thoughtful gift for Mother’s Day, eh?

Lucuma is not always easy to find in stores, so I recommend ordering online or with your local health food supplier. It tastes like butterscotch vanilla. Think of it as a unique flavour rather than a straight-up sweetener. Your wallet will thank you.
 

White Chocolate Truffles

Cacao butter gives chocolate its mesmerizing call, and not the dark cacao pigment as is generally assumed. This tree butter is cream in colour, rock solid at room temperature, and intoxicatingly perfumed. One tablespoon, melted, will amplify any chocolate recipe and send your serotonin to another galaxy. Without it, you’d only reach the clouds. 

Cacao butter may require a little sat navving. I get mine online, where I can bulkbuy an artillery of scrummy stuff (like lucuma) without having to leave my lazy armchair. Makes approximately 36 truffles, which will happily live in the freezer.

1/3 cup cacao butter, melted (85ml)
3/4 cup hazelnut butter (185ml)
8 tablespoons brown rice syrup or 6 tablespoons maple syrup
2 tablespoons hot water
3 tablespoons lucuma powder
Pinch of pink Himalayan salt

Lucuma powder to dust

Melt the butter in a bain marie. All this means is placing the broken shards of butter in a shallow bowl over a pan of barely simmering water. Make sure the bowl is at least 4 inches above the simmering water. Remove from heat, and let the butter naturally melt over the hot water for 5 minutes.

Blitz the remaining ingredients in a mini electric blender or food processor. Keep the motor running, and slowly add the melted cacao butter in a steady stream.

Refrigerate this gooey glossy mix in the same bowl, with the blade, for about 3 hours. You should be able to make about 30-40 truffles from the batch. If the mixture seems too hard, or you’ve forgotten about it in the fridge, blitz it again to loosen it up. 

Using a teaspoon, take a teeny amount and form a bon bon between the palms of your hands. Drop into lucuma powder and roll again with dry fingertips. Store in the fridge until the munchies hit. Happy Mother’s Day to Me!

My giddy four year old came up with this recipe, when he accidentally dropped a small jar of beetroot powder into the pot while I was making a halva-style fudge. 

MacGyver has competition. Dynamite stuff.

Sesame are mighty little seeds. They are practically belching with B vitamins, the ones responsible for energy ignition and brain health. There’s a nifty plant-dose of calcium and iron too, for those of you who need to watch their intake (like pregnant wans and childer). This should help.

Pretty Pink Fudge

Marta, a very cool subscriber, sent me this video making one of my fudge recipes in the kitchen with her pet dog. Pharrell Williams even joins in. These fudge recipes are truly the easiest treats you’ll ever make, and possibly even the tastiest. No messin’.

While beetroot powder gives the best glow, freeze dried blackcurrant powder is practically inflated with vitamin C and therefore makes a better choice when your nippers are besieged by school germs. The Fresh As range are available in Wholefoods across the UK and hopefully soon in Ireland. 40g will set you back €5, but is the equivalent of 250g fresh blackcurrants. There’s an awesome freeze dried passionfruit powder too. 

The darkest pot in the picture is the latest Amazonian craze: acai berry. I’m not a huge fan because of its price tag, but it’s hot diggity with chocolate (more on acai berries here). I wouldn’t have bought a packet myself except that my little tinkers threw one into the shopping basket and I didn’t find out until I got home. Bugger. 125g costs €25.

3 tablespoons extra virgin coconut oil

6 tablespoons raw pale honey (or light agave for diabetics)

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Pinch of sea salt flakes

1 x 280g jar light tahini sesame paste

4-5 tablespoons beetroot powder

1 tablespoon dessicated coconut

On a very timid heat, gently melt the coconut oil. Let the honey, vanilla and salt join the party.

With a fork, beat through the beetroot powder and sea salt until the lumps dissolve. Whisk through the tahini.

Quickly scrape the mixture into a small rectangular container, lined with cling film. Lunch boxes are ideal. Decorate with dessicated coconut.

Freeze for 4 hours.