GREEN FRIED RICE

The countdown to Christmas has begun. London is decorated and all sparkly and the tree will soon be up. This is the first year that I've made some effort to have an advent calendar, it is something we don't have in the Christian Orthodox tradition. It is completely commercialised in the West, you can get it anywhere and they usually hide chocolate treats behind 24 windows. 

I have made one for Luka this year using Ikea's grey cabinet as a backdrop, tree branches are traced with Donna Wilson's Bird tape and presents will fit into small brown envelopes that have stamped dates on them.  The whole cabinet has all of a sudden become a play object, although Luka is still too small to notice there is a little surprise every day awaiting him. He'll get bouncy balls and dehydrated fruit instead of chocolate and can play with bubbles and wind-up cars. Nothing big, just symbolic. It's so easy to transform Christmas into consumer megalomania.

For cold winter nights when we need something to warm us up and keep our tummies satisfied for longer, we'll cook meals like this green fried rice. It is delicious and vegan and is quickly prepared if you have some leftover rice. Start by soaking coconut with saffron and cardamom.

Coconut with saffron and cardamom

The aim is to hydrate desiccated coconut so it's not crunchy, but also to mix it with rich flavours of saffron and cardamom.

Seeds of 3 green cardamoms

Around 6 threads of saffron

3 tbsp. desiccated coconut

Around half a cup of water

Soak and mix all the ingredients and leave aside half an hour to an hour. Mix it occasionally so that the colour and aroma of saffron spreads evenly.  

Ingredients:

1 onion, roughly chopped

2 cloves of garlic

Half a thumb of ginger

2 spring onions (if you can find them)

Handful of fresh coriander with stalks

Cup of baby spinach

Cup of cooked edamame (or peas)

2 cups of cooked short grain brown rice

1/2 cup of roast cashews

Lemon

2-3 tbsp. coconut oil or sesame oil

Blend onion, garlic, ginger, spring onion and coriander adding liquid coconut oil to mince everything evenly. Heat a tablespoon of coconut oil and slowly fry the mix. Add salt to taste or very little if children will eat it, too. After 10 minutes increase the flame and add baby spinach, stir couple of minutes finally adding rice and edamame. Don't turn the flame down, just stir-fry. At the end add coconut mixture, grate lemon zest and mix everything thoroughly, frying for a few minutes. Turn the flame off and juice half a lemon over it. Serve warm, sprinkled with roast cashews.

COOKIES FOR RAINY DAYS

After two days at work watching disturbing images from Gaza, I was looking forward to delighting in morning with Luka, painting and playing with a lot of water. I am still so fascinated with the play that spontaneously arises and how every object is potentially a temporary toy. Luka doesn't play with anything for very long, not even with water that seems to be his most favourite activity at the moment. After ten minutes we both had wet feet and his attention drifted onto something else. 

Now that he is having a nap, I can make and share the recipe for rainy day cookies. I had some almond meal left from making almond milk this morning and it's such a pity for it to go to waste. Within 20 minutes I had soft and delicious cookie buttons to enjoy.

Replace rice flour with oat flour or wholewheat. 

 

Ingredients:

1 cup of almond meal (if you make almond milk use it on the same day or alternatively dry it in the oven at 150 degrees; it might take half an hour, just keep stirring it; keep it in a tight-closed jar for a week)

1 cup of rice flour

1 tsp. ground flaxseed 

1/4 cup of almond milk or water

1/4 cup of maple syrup or rice syrup

1/4 cup of coconut oil

1 tsp. Bicarbonate of soda

vanilla to taste or zest of a lemon

Heat the oven to 160 degrees.

Mix flaxseed with almond milk or water and set aside. In a bowl mix flours and bicarbonate of soda, add vanilla, coconut oil, maple syrup and milk with flax seed. Mix well and spoon on greaseproof  baking sheet using teaspoon. Bake for 15 minutes, until slightly golden.

  

HEALTHY SNACKS AND DESSERTS FOR KIDS

Hummus with vegetable crisps

It's not complicated making your own hummus, it also puts you in control how much salt you use and kids will enjoy snacking on it. It's ideal for lunch box. Experiment with the recipe, use peanut or pumpkin seed butter instead of tahini or add fresh spinach or roast pepper to the basic recipe. Play with it.

Ingredients

200gr cooked chickpeas

2-3 tbsp. tahini

2 tbsp. lemon juice

2-3 tbsp. extra virgin olive oil

1 clove of garlic (if kids don't mind it)

Water to incorporate it all

Emit the salt if the kids are small or leave it completely out

Blend all ingredients into a smooth dip.

Heat your oven to 150 degrees.

Use mandoline slicer or potato peeler to thinly slice parsnip, carrot, beetroot or sweet potato - whatever you have at hand. Mix all the vegetables in a bowl, adding very little sea salt, 1-2 tablespoons olive oil and a ground spice to taste (sweet paprika or coriander). Bake in the oven an hour or two, turning them every half an hour and until they crisp up.

Keep it in closed container for a week.

Apples and pears with peanut butter sauce for yum-yum dipping

You can offer it to kids when they fancy something sweet for snack. Use cashew, pumpkin seed or almond butter instead of peanut.

For kids over 1 year.

Sauce:

3 tbsp. peanut butter

3 tbsp. rice syrup

2-3 drops of umeboshi vinegar

Combine all the ingredients, adding water to dilute it. Slice apple or pear and serve.

Roast seeds

Mix pumpkin and sunflower seeds and dry roast until they start popping and browning. Keep it in a jar kids can easily reach. For those younger than a year, ground them in pestle and mortar and add to purees.

Polenta fingers fried with coconut oil and cinnamon

Add half a cup of water and half a cup of coconut milk to a pan (or substitute with almond, rice or oat milk). When it boils, add polenta and stir until cooked. Pour into a small rectangular dish to cool; it should be 1-1.5 cm thick. When it cools down, slice into fingers and fry on each side in coconut milk. Sprinkle with cinnamon and serve warm. Kids will lick their fingers!

Kanten or fruit jelly with agar agar - sugar free

Agar agar is your new gelatine, but it's vegan and full of minerals. When you notice that your kids are hyperactive and are getting anxious at night, this is a marvellous dessert that relaxes the body at the end of the day. This recipe is for a family of 4.

Ingredients:

500 ml freshly pressed apple juice (with no added sugar and definitely not from concentrate)

2 tbsp. agar agar

Blueberries or sliced strawberries, raspberries or blackberries

Pour juice, agar agar and a pinch of salt into a pan, heat until it boils and turn the flame down to simmer. Occasionally stir until agar agar dissolves, it might take between 8 and 10 minutes. Pour over fruit that you placed over a silicone mould. Leave to set for half an hour. Keep it in the fridge for a few days or serve on the day.

Popcorn with gomasio or toasted nori flakes

Pop the corn using coconut oil. Sprinkle gomasio over (ground 12 tbsp of roasted sesame seeds and 1/4 tsp of sea salt; keep it in a jar for a week) Or you can toast a sheet of nori and flake it over popcorn.

MACROBIOTIC OR HEALTHY FOODS FOR KIDS

This article was first published a few months ago in the Serbian magazine SENSA. It is an introduction to my next blog post about healthy snacks and desserts for kids.

I haven't yet met parents who don't consider the health of their children to be of the upmost importance. We all want what's best for our children, but when it comes to nutrition we are often not persistent and find excuses. There is a resistance to new and the unknown. We might curiously read numerous healthy recipes on the Internet but then after a long and tiresome day we prepare beans with sausages for the whole family (Serbian national dish).

I recall my pregnant friends becoming obsessed with healthy food, and professing how they would only give their kids healthy foods and no carbonated drinks or chocolate. I was the same, and I do believe that studying macrobiotics with Simon Brown helped me make healthier choices in the first few months when my baby started to eat solids.

Macrobiotics is often wrongly seen as a system of rigid rules where nothing but brown rice can be eaten. On the contrary, we have moved away from those narrow views. The answer lies in the name itself - you have heard this so many times, macro means big and bios means life. Long life. That's what we want for our kids and ourselves. I will not be defining macrobiotics here, like my teacher Simon Brown says "macrobiotics means different things to different people, but the food and its influence on our physical, mental and emotional health is the epicentre of macrobiotics for all".

Macrobiotic eating includes whole grains, vegetables, plant proteins like legumes and soy products, sea vegetables, pickled vegetables, fermented foods like miso, nuts and seeds, fruits and occasionally fish. I believe that healthy foods need to be tasty and fun, so that our children create positive associations.

WE ARE THE GUARDIANS OF KIDS' HABITS

Children are like sponges; they soak in everything from their environment and instinctively learn through imitating. I have learnt that I can't insist on my child not eating chocolate if I am eating it. It is at the very least two-faced, and kids very quickly notice when there are different rules for us adults! That leads to inevitable comparisons and questions - 'Why are they different from us?' That just additionally undermines the role of parents as their child's first teacher. They are not different from us. We forget how important and responsible we are as role models in their lives.

Simon Brown says "kids have a greater advantage because they don't conceptualise or try to eat according to rules, but they simply get used to certain tastes and form habits". In order to create a link between the foods we eat and the effects they have on us, offer your baby a wide spectrum of healthy whole foods; that is the secret to intuitively knowing what we nutritionally and energetically need. Kids won't crave green leafy vegetables, roasted pumpkin seeds or brown rice later in life if they have never tried it before. Which leads us to...

KEEP ONLY HEALTHY FOODS AT HOME

You know that - if you have chocolate at home, you'll eat it. Imagine how hidden biscuits and chocolates are tickling their fancy, but they can't reach them or they are told they are forbidden. So, fill your home only with healthy foods and snacks that kids can reach whenever they want to. You can't protect them from all the sugary temptations in the world, but you are the master of what is in your kitchen.

Allow kids to choose foods when you go shopping. Do give them a choice - shall we get juicy red apples or sweet cherries, mini green broccoli trees or zucchini magic wands? Make things up, rename foods together. It might be something you'll all remember years later.

This is also one of the ways for kids to create good habits and slowly take responsibility for their own health through the choices they make. "Dismiss the usual belief that kids don't eat vegetables because they don't like it, because that is not true", says macrobiotic counsellor Aine McAteer. "Offer them everything you want and don't have expectations. Pay attention how you talk about healthy food. Avoid situations where you promise your child ice cream if they eat vegetables."

SMILE AT THE TABLE

Food is not an invitation for disciplinary actions. If your child wanders away from the table (something most 2&3year olds often do), don't threaten him, raise your voice or drag him back to the table; that will only create quite a stressful situation for both of you. Keep his plate at the table, you continue with your meal, sometimes gently invite him back and show how much you miss him there. Smile at him. Offer him the food even if the rest of the family has finished. Regardless of how much he eats, it's good. A hungry child will always eat.

Mealtime is a unique opportunity for the whole family to gather and enjoy not only the healthy food, but also spending time together. Tell stories, laugh, share your day, food will be tastier with each mouthful.

LET'S NOURISH OUR KIDS

Kids that haven't started walking yet shouldn't eat any salt; it can be dangerous for their health. Afterwards you can start introducing very small quantities and when they turn 6 they can enjoy the salty food that you eat. Therefore when you cook for the whole family, always put aside a small portion for your kids before you add any salt. Use only unrefined sea salt.

You can prepare grain milk for babies and add some dry roast and ground sesame seed. Use different grains - whole oats, brown rice, and barley, whatever you have at hand.

If your child doesn't like cooked carrots, offer it raw or slightly blanched, cut into strips and serve with dips like hummus or different beans, or you can grate carrots with other vegetables and fruits. Experiment; try all sorts of different methods of cooking and serving. Kids quickly change their minds and nothing is final!

It is important how you present it! Be innovative, use cookie cutters for vegetables or tofu, make blanched or grilled vegetable rolls filled with grains and serve with dips. Let them play with it, food is supposed to be fun.

Include as many wholesome ingredients into your child's diet, that is the best gift you can give them!

ADZUKI BEANS, CHESTNUTS, PUMPKIN AND SWEET POTATO STEW / SPELT ROLLS WITH COCONUT OIL AND SESAME

After another renovation project, two months of hallway cooking on a camping stove, washing dishes in the bathtub - I am back online! In my new kitchen. I am deeply in love with its spaciousness and the fact that it has enough space for every single ingredient - it will be an exciting space to create new projects. It was relaxing being offline for so long, perfect for overall reset. 

Flawless juggling and simple food have marked past months, now I am looking forward to more complex autumnal flavours. I have gathered heaps of inspiration and recipes that I cannot wait to try out. Sarah Britton's recent post on her blog My New Roots for cashew corn chowder with coriander cream is on the top of my list. It is the epitome of autumn and for warming our bodies in ever-shorter days: you can find the recipe here. A book by this phenomenal blogger has arrived and I simply don't know what to make first! The book is full of brilliant photographs taken by her husband and Sara's recipes shine a new light on vegetables. 

This is a truly autumnal recipe, brimming with colours of fallen leaves: pumpkin's ochre flesh, bright orange-red sweet potato, chestnuts resemble cocoa beans and adzuki beans like warm claret. I couldn't capture all the shades on camera, whether because of the dimming light or the way colours fade. You’ll have to trust me that the sweetness of this stew warms and relaxes the body. All you have left to do after the meal is to play - with your child or a favourite book. I must finish reading the elevating "The Storyteller or The Hakawati" by Rabih Alameddine.

ADZUKI BEANS, CHESTNUTS, PUMPKIN AND SWEET POTATO STEW

Ingredients:

1 large onion or 2 medium, cut into half moons

3 cloves of garlic, minced

fresh thyme, preferably lemon thyme

200gr cooked chestnuts

1/2 cup cubed sweet potato

1/2 cup cubed pumpkin  

1 cup cooked adzuki beans (first soaked overnight and cooked with a strip of kombu)

3-4 cups homemade vegetable stock  

1 tsp. kuzu

Caramelise the onion in a teaspoon of olive oil (around 10 minutes), add the garlic and stir for a few minutes. Add the thyme, vegetables and chestnuts, and pour-in the stock and cook 20 minutes. Add the adzuki beans. Dilute the kuzu in a bit of stock and add to the mix. Cook for 5 more minutes and add salt and paper to taste. For a creamier texture, mash chestnuts in a bit of stock and stir it back into the stew.

Serve with fresh spelt rolls with sesame.

SPELT ROLLS WITH COCONUT OIL AND SESAME

 Ingredients:

2/3 cup wholegrain spelt flour

1 1/2 cups white spelt flour

1 cup goats’ milk

pinch of salt and 1 tsp maple syrup or rice syrup

1 tsp dry yeast

1 full tablespoon of coconut oil

black and white sesame seeds

Heat the milk so it's warm, add salt, maple syrup and yeast and let it bubble up (around 15 minutes). Slowly pour it into mixed flours, kneading with your hands; knead for 5 minutes. Let it rest in a warm place 2-3 hours, covered with a tea towel. Melt the coconut oil if it's solid. Flatten the dough to around 1 cm with a rolling pin, brush the whole length with oil,  fold so the oiled sides touch and let it rest for 20 minutes. Repeat the process 3 times. When you flatten the dough for the last time, cut it into equal 10 pieces, knead into balls, place into oiled oven bowl and let the dough rise again (1-2 hours). Brush with an egg yolk and sprinkle sesame seeds.

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees; turn it down to 170 when you put the rolls in. Bake 50 minutes. Serve them warm.