Paleo Banana Apple Muffins

Here's a quicky! Appana muffins? Banapple muffins? Palappanana muffins? Nope.

Paleo Banana Apple Muffins

Ingredients

1/2 an apple 

1 large ripe banana

3 eggs

3 Tblsp coconut milk

2 Tblsp coconut flour

1-2 Tblsp cashew nut butter

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp nutmeg

ghee or oil of choice for frying

Preheat oven to 200°C. 

Heat oil in a pan over medium high heat.  Slice apple thinly and then chop into smallish pieces. Fry until soft and slightly caramelised, stirring frequently so they don't burn. While the apples are cooking, place all other ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth. Mix in cooked apple pieces, then spoon/pour mixture into a silicon muffin tray (if you don't have silicon tray, you should be able to use a non-stick pan but I haven't tried.  The silicon trays are brilliant!).  Bake until top springs back (or doesn't dint) when lightly pressed. 

My batch came to ten but it will depend on how much you put in.  The mixture doesn't rise much so you can afford to fill the tray pretty high. You could try adding some baking soda to the mixture to see if they rise, but I haven't managed to find any aluminium free baking soda so refuse to use it. But if you do please let me know how you go!

If you are expecting these to be like cake, you will be disappointed.  They are not like cake. But they are little bites of deliciousness! And high in protein and low in carbs :). And of course you can replace the apples with any fruit you like!  Mmmm I think I will try blueberries next time...

Jas xo

Spicy Chicken Laksa

So I've been in bed sick all day with some kind of fluey headcoldy thing. It's been rather unpleasant! As a result, for dinner tonight I was craving something spicy & brothy. Soupy. I always crave soup when I'm sick. So I made a Laksa.

Spicy Chicken Laksa

Ingredients:

1 large chicken breast, sliced thinly (or some prawns, or both!)

1 onion, chopped into 2cm pieces 

1 carrot, sliced thinly

1 zucchini, sliced

4 largish mushrooms, quartered

Juice of 1 lime

1 tsp fish sauce (optional)

4 Tblsps Laksa paste, or your favorite thai curry paste

3 cups of chicken stock (preferably home made)

1 can of coconut milk

1 packet of Angel hair SlimPasta (or shirataki noodles) 

Heat a spoonful of coconut oil in a decent sized saucepan.  Fry the laksa or curry paste until fragrant, add the onion and the chicken and fry until chicken is mostly cooked. Add the chicken stock, vegetables (you can use any vegetables you like, I just used what was in my fridge - bok choy would be nice), and coconut milk, and simmer on medium heat until vegetables are cooked. Drain the noodles and chop them roughly, add to the soup with the fish sauce and lime juice, and heat through.  Top with fresh coriander to serve (I had run out. Booo).

NB: If you've never heard of SlimPasta, it's not really pasta, but rather, a noodle, traditionally called a Shirataki noodle by the Japanese, who apparently have been eating it for over a thousand years. It's a lot like a rice noodle, and it's technically processed, so whether or not it's Paleo is probably debatable. I however, have made the executive decision that it's fine, based on it's ingredients.  SlimPasta (the angel hair variety only, not the spaghetti - it has extra ingredients which are definitely NOT paleo) , has three ingredients only - Spring water, Konjac Flour, and mineral salt.  Konjac is a vegetable which produces a fibre (called glucomannan), which is suuuuper low in calories and carbs.  I'm open to advice on it but for now, it seems good to me so I'm eatin' it! You can get it in the health food section of most supermarkets these days.

Enjoy!  I'm about to go back for my second bowl. ;)

Jas xo