The last  few years, I am dating coffee in the weekends. I am obsessed with green tea, always have been, and don’t feel a need to have coffee during the week at all. But the moment I wake up in the weekend, I can’t wait to get downstairs and enjoy a cup of good black coffee while I’m preparing breakfast. Black coffee is a new habit I developed while doing the Whole30 challenge and one that makes the ‘good’ part even more important as you can’t cheat the taste with milk and/or sweetener.

One of my favorite coffees is since recently PURO fairtrade coffee. Organic coffee  lovingly blended, roasted and packed in Turnhout, Belgium (but available in many other countries too). I have received different bean blends for trial and I fell in love with the Puro Noble blend – 80% Finest Arabica mixed with 20% Premium Robusta which gives the coffee a hint of dark chocolate. It’s strong but smooth, exactly how I like my weekend coffee to be. And as it turns out, it tastes great in Ice Coffee as well, which is I must confess still the only type of coffee that drink with milk. Organic almond milk, that is.

Ingredients
100ml Puro Noble espresso
150ml unsweetened organic almond milk
5 drops liquid stevia (optional)
ice

Method
Make coffee, add cold almond milk and 5 ice cubes. Sweeten with stevia.

Have a lovely SUNNY weekend darlings!

xoxo,

Marta

Ingredients
500g rhubarb
100g tagatose (I used NuNaturals)
120g ground almonds
20g ghee (clarified butter)
20g coconut oil
20g sliced almonds

Method
Chop rhubarb into chunks the length of your thumb. Put in a saucepan with 60g tagatose. Simmer covered on a low heat for about 5 minutes. Transfer the rhubarb into a baking dish (medium sized).
In a bowl, rub the ground almonds, ghee, coconut oil and remaining tagatose until you have a crumbly topping. Cover rhubarb with the topping and put in the oven for about 15 minutes.
In a pan, dry roast sliced almonds until golden. Sprinkle over the rhubarb crumble for serving.

I played with a few stylings of the chips and ended up with two I really liked. I usually keep the styling consistent but I couldn’t decide which one I wanted to use so I am posting both. I’m curious to hear your thoughts on whether you like the first or the second styling better!

Ingredients
2 sweet potatoes
Pinch of smoked paprika
Pinch of sea salt
1tbsp extra-virgin olive oil

Method
Preheat oven to 200C. Clean sweet potatoes and slice them as thin as you can with a knife (you can also peel them if you . In a small bowl, mix olive oil and smoked paprika and toss the potatoes with it.

On two baking sheets, arrange the potatoes in a single layer. Bake for about 20-25 minutes. Let cool for 5 minutes to make the chips crispy!

Sprinkle with sea salt and enjoy!

Ingredients
125g strawberries, trimmed
3 lemons
bunch of fresh mint
1l water

Method
Fill jar or water can with water. Juice one lemon into the water. Slice 2 remaining lemons. Add strawberries, mint and lemon slices into the jar and put in a fridge for at least 1 hour (if possible more). The water will take over the taste of the fruit and mint and will make a delicious delicate lemonade. If you’re a sweet tooth, feel free to add honey!

Ingredients
200g strawberries, cleaned, trimmed and sliced
2 tsp balsamic vinegar
5 big mint leaves, chopped
25g crushed pistachios

Method
Mix strawberries with balsamic vinegar and put in the fridge for 20 minutes. Take out, add chopped mint and crushed pistachios and enjoy!

Love,

Marta

Ingredients
3 apples, peeled and cut in cubes
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tbsp organic almond butter (unsweetened)
100 ground almonds
25g ghee, cold
handful of raspberries (or other berries)

Method
Preheat oven to 180°C. In a small bowl, mix apples with cinnamon. In a small baking dish arrange the apples.
In another bowl, mix ground almonds, ghee and almond butter. Crumble the mixture over the apples and put in the middle of the oven. Bake for 35minutes. Remove from the oven, let cool for 5 minutes. Sprinkle with berries and enjoy!

Love,

Marta

Whole30 is basically a 30 day nutritional reset, designed to help you restore a healthy metabolism, heal your digestive tract, calm systemic inflammation and put an end to unhealthy cravings, habits, and relationships with food.  Note, it’s NOT a diet (but yes, you’ll probably lose a few pounds). It’s based on Paleo eating but is a little more restrictive – long story short what you’re eating is fruit, vegetables (except for legumes), eggs, sea food, fish, chicken and meat for the carnivores, olive oil, coconut oil, some nuts and seeds, water , tea and coffee (black).  Very important – sweet potato is allowed!

Even though I have been eating healthy for the past millions of years, I have been feeling tired a lot and needed something to improve my digestion. Whole30 challenge was exactly what I was looking for, I’m on day 10 and I feel like a new person. My energy level is back on track, I haven’t had any cravings at all. And the best thing is, I’m never hungry. The frittata is the first Whole30 recipe I’ posting but there will be more – I promise!

Ingredients
1 tbsp coconut oil
1 bit sweet potato, peeled and cut into small cubes
2 shallots
2 leaks (white part), sliced
6 organic eggs
1 tbsp chopped chives
Salt & pepper

Method
Heat oven to 180°. In a medium oven-safe frying pan, heat coconut oil over medium heat. Cook shallots, potatoes and leaks undercover for about 5 to 7 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Beat eggs in a small bowl with salt and pepper and pour over the veggies. Sprinkle with chives. Cover the pan with an aluminium foil and bake for 20 minutes in the oven. Take out the foil and bake for another 10-15 minutes.

You can serve with a salad on side.

Love,

Marta

We visited Bordeaux in what is called ‘en primeur’ week. For those who are not familiar with the happening, it’s the time of the year where everybody rushes to Bordeaux châteaux to try the precious nectar of the year before. Unbottled. From the barrel.

Straight from the airport, we rushed to Château Pape Clément, one of the oldest documented histories of any estate in the region, where we were able to catch a glimpse of the characteristics of 2012 vintage by trying close to 50 wines (=heaven). Even though the Château Pape Clément wine is one of the best we have had, many of the less pricey wines we’ve tasted were really delightful and will definitely find their way back onto my table.

At night we hit the town to taste some of the Bordeaux sweetness (thank you Sweet Bordeaux), followed by a scrumptious dinner and bars many of them serving the 2012 vintage. It’s where we found out that our guide, Benoît-Emmanuel Trocard, is a wine maker himself and his gigantic bottles of wine can be found all around the city’s bars.

Friday morning started with a class at the L’Ecole du Vin de Bordeaux situated in the Bar à Vin (which has pretty much become our ‘local hangout’) where we learned more about the region, the grapes, the terroir and ended the class with a scent recognition exercise that we failed miserably.

My favorite part of the trip was a visit to Château de Fontenille owned and run by Stéphane Defraine – a Belgian wine maker living in the region. “Being a winemaker is a life, not a job”, said Stéphane who bought Château de Fontenille in 1989 and have dedicated his life to making it a success.

His Bordeaux wines (including his very special Magic 7 wine) were wonderful but it was the passion for what he does, his and his wife’s implausible hospitality (and maybe their three cats) that made it into an unforgettable experience.

After we worked hard helping with the process of bottling wine (ok, maybe not sooo hard), Stéphane gave us a fortaste of wine blending followed by a homemade feast prepared by his wife. While enjoying the fromage, pain and vin, we shared stories on our shared passions, food and wine.

On Saturday, the sun was shining and it was a perfect day for Printemps des vins de Blaye – food and wine festival in the Citadelle de Blaye! A full day of wine tasting, workshoppin’, boat trippin’ and enjoying spring (which let’s be honest, have made us wait for itself for-freaking-ever).  But the best part of the day was wine blending workshop where we got to make our own  wine, have it bottled, labeled with our own brand (woot woot for Princess Misia wine) and take it home!! Stay tuned as I might invite one of you for the grand opening (of the bottle).

Before leaving Bordeaux on Sunday afternoon, we strolled around this beautiful city and did what I love to do most when I’m travelling- visited a local market. There is just nothing better to get to know a local way of life and local produce than the local market.

À la prochaine,

Marta

Hugs,

Marta

After spending the entire Saturday in the kitchen calculating, cutting, shredding, mixing, stirring and baking (my oven has passed the ultimate test with hours and hours of continuous work!) we ended up with the following sugar-free and wheat-free dessert menu:

All desserts were sugar-free thanks to the products of NuNaturals which both Vanessa and I regularly use in our cooking!

Our desserts were served with hot & cold tea – courtesy of Gingerlove and Tao.

The crowd seemed to enjoy the desserts and we were happy to see familiar faces at our dessert bar including Amaury from amoorie.be, Charlotte from Scene by C and Petra from Sprinkles on a Cupcake.

As we all know, we can’t  only live on desserts, no matter how healthy they are, so luckily our food team included Jean-Baptiste – the owner and chef behind the Keep on Toasting food truck! I have been excited to try his already famous croqs made with spelt bread for a while now and this was a great opportunity not only to stuff myself with them (yep, I had 3!!) but also to experience the food truck from the other side. What I love about Keep on Toasting menu is that it’s partly crowdsourced from customers and if you let Jean-Baptiste know beforehand you are coming over and you have food restrictions like gluten – he will make sure to have gluten free bread ready for you! Check Keep on Toasting website for more info on where you can try his delicious croqs!

As requested by you girls, I am sharing the first recipe from the event:

SUGAR-FREE WALNUT BROWNIES  

Big hug,

Marta