Sonoma Spelt Maple and Almond Breakfast Muesli

I have long been on a quest for the perfect muesli, and after eating this fabulous example I'm left wondering if I've found it! I stumbled on this accidentally on a recent trip to Sydney. It was lurking in a rather humid and murky health food shop in Randwick. I was immediately intrigued. But vaguely disconcerted by the $14 price tag, for the 500gm bag.

It sounded great. Had a wonderful ingredient list full of recognisable stuff! Oats, spelt, maple syrup, almonds, raisins, sunflower oil, vanilla. Wow. All actual foods. All low GI ingredients. I must be in heaven. Made by an artisanal bakery, Sonoma, in Sydney. I've had their breads before in fancy restaurants and been very impressed.

So how is it? It smells fantastic- full of warm, caramelly aromas- such a shame blogs aren't scratch and sniff

Not stingy with the nuts either

I was lucky the week or so I was eating this (and I think their serving size of 125gm is just crazy, I would have eaten half that- making it almost cheap) in that I had an abundance of figs and blueberries to have on my muesli, making it even more delicious.

Life imitating art, or at least packaging

I'm looking forward to stocking up on more of this on a future trip to Sydney, and also checking out their Honey Spice Muesli.

Couscous and Vegetable Soup

It's heading into autumn in Australia, so this post is about a soup I last made a few months ago now. Actually I've been making this soup regularly for over 10 years. I usually tweak it a bit, but it always smells fragrant and fabulous. I've tried it as a Quinoa and Vegetable Soup, but it wasn't as good, so I think I'll stick with using couscous. 

I've always made this with regular couscous, but have recently discovered that it has a medium GI of 61-65. Israeli pearl couscous is lower GI (52), so I'll have to try it with that next time. I've only used pearl couscous once, it was quite a few years ago, and don't remember liking it very well, but it should be fine in a soup, where it is more a textural component.

Couscous and Vegetable Soup

Looks like I used a kumara this time as well

2 tblsp olive oil

1 onion, chopped

2 chicken breast fillets, cut into 1cm pieces

2 cinnamon sticks

1/2 tsp ground cardamon

1/2 tsp paprika

2 tblsp tomato paste

425gm can diced tomatoes

1.5L hot chicken stock

1 carrot, peeled and chopped

1 zucchini, chopped

4 yellow button squash, quartered

90gm (1/2 cup) couscous

2 tblsp coarsley chopped coriander

Heat olive oil in a large saucepan, add onion and cook over low heat until soft, then add chicken and cook a further 3 minutes. Add cinnamon sticks, cardamon and paprika and stir over low heat for 3 minutes until fragment.

Add tomato paste, tomato and chicken stock and season to taste. Bring to a simmer, cover and cook over low heat for 10 minutes.

Add carrots, cook for  5 minutes, then add zucchini and squash and cook a further 10 minutes, or until vegetables are just tender. Gradually pour in couscous and cook, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes. Remove cinnamon sticks and serve in warm soup bowls sprinkled with coriander.

Serves 6

Notes

Adapted from a recipe in Australian Gourmet Traveller August 1997

The original recipe includes 1/4 tsp chili powder with the other spices. My family don't like chili heat, so I've never added it, but I'm sure it would be nice.

I love pumpkin, so often add a chunk of that with the carrots.

The quinoa wasn't awful in the soup, but there just wasn't as much compared to the couscous and it changed it somehow. It might be worth trialling adding more quinoa.

Cross posted from Soup, Soup, Glorious Soup

Poiscamole

I've made this delicious dip several times now. It's always tasty, and always slightly different. I've made it with thawed frozen peas, or cooked peas, which changes the texture and consistency of the final result somewhat. Uncooked peas give a slightly drier result.

The recipe is from the wonderful Clotilde Dusoulier's amazing Chocolate and Zucchini blog.

Peas are a wonderful, delicious, low GI (48) vegetable.

Poiscamole

300 gm frozen peas ( raw or cooked)
A bunch of coriander, washed, dried, leaves plucked (as much as you want, I love corainder  and usually use a decent sized bunch)
2 tblsp nut butter (almond butter or ABC, almond brazil cashew, butter)
1 clove garlic, chopped
2 tsp sweet chilli sauce
salt to taste

Place peas, coriander, nut butter, garlic, sweet chili sauce and salt in a food processor.

Whizz to desired consistency (I like leaving mine a bit chunky).

Can easily be made the day before you need it. Keeps well in the fridge for a couple of days.

Notes
The original inspiration is here. I'm very excited because I managed to find a packet of the Dr Karg Seeded Spelt that Clotilde has with her Peacamole on a recent trip to Sydney. I'll have to make another batch soon. She calls hers Peacamole, but I prefer the name Poiscamole.

The first few times I made it I just used it in fairly traditional ways, as a dip with crackers or crudites. Which was delicious of course. Last time I tried a few new uses as well. Instead of pesto, on pasta for a simple dinner.

With a pasta salad for a work lunch.

All delicious. It's so versatile!

Be Natural Cashew, Almond, Hazelnut and Coconut

I always get excited when I see a new cereal proudly proclaiming it's low GI status. I'm much more of a cereal for breakfast gal than a toast for gal breakfast. I'm often quite happy to eat the one cereal for years, but I will certainly try a new one (there is always the hope for the next best thing).

So I was quite excited to spy the new Be Natural range lurking on the supermarket shelves. Recycled packaging, a promise to support Landcare. All very good and responsible corporate citizenship designed to appeal to people like me.

But what of the cereal itself? Flakes made from five whole grains (wheat, oats, triticale, barley and rye,  indeed whole grain cereals make up 49% of the ingredients), mixed with  cashew, almond, hazelnut, coconut, and clusters made from linseed, pepita (pumpkin seed), and amaranth (a newish food to me, a grain touted for it's high protein content). It all sounds Frightfully Good For You, but is it?

It is Low GI. This is proudly proclaimed on the front of the pack, but I can't find the actual GI rating amongst the maze of fine print all over the sides of the pack. It is hidden on the website. 54. So just sneaking in as Low GI, but still low GI all the same. The ingredients are all recognisable food substances. There are no numbers. Which is fabulous.

Given that there's a fair amount (11%) of nuts in the cereal it isn't exactly low energy. 1790kJ per 100 gram, with 13.4gm of fat per 100gm. It is quite low in sodium (190mg per 100gm), and one serve provides only 4% of an average recommended daily intake.

But how does it taste? Well, it's ok. I'm not the greatest fan of flake type cereals, corn flakes for instance. And the flakes here a bit cardboardy. The clusters are quite tasty by themselves, but there's  not quite enough of them to drown out the cardboard quality coming from the flakes.

It is quite edible when smothered with blueberry and banana- but then what isn't?

I will probably try the apple version of this cereal at some stage, and they have a low GI mixed grain porridge that I will try when the weather turns cooler- which can't be too far away, I'm already noticing some red and yellow highlights to the trees.

Oops, Figs

I probably should have checked the GI of figs before I bought a whole tray. But I didn't.

There's a lot of figs in a whole tray

Turns out fresh figs have not been tested for GI level. Dried figs have a medium GI of 61. Most fruits seem to have a higher GI when fresh than when died, so I presume that figs are higher than 61, and so high GI. Ooops. But they are sooo delicious. And in season for such a short time. And I haven't bought a tray in a few years.

All perfectly justifiable really. They are good for the disposition of course, and that can use a bit of help most days. Figs are also frightfully good for you- with lots of fibre, calcium and antioxidants. They're probably just a bit high GI.

Chia Seeds

What is it with Bolivia these days? Seems all the hot foods are from Bolivia- not a country that we usually think about all that often in Australia. Quinoa was everywhere in 2010. And now we have chia seeds for 2011. A few months ago I'd never heard of chia seeds, and then suddenly they were everywhere in the blogosphere. Understandably I was keen to get my hands on some, and give them a go. Imagine my surprise when I found some in my small town supermarket on a quiet Sunday morning! Such great excitement. But then I had to work out what to do with them.

First to work out what they are.  Chia are the seeds of a flowering plant (Salvia Hispanica), which not surprisingly is commonly known as Chia. It is native to central and southern Mexico and Guatemala. My packet were grown in Bolivia, but Wiki says that Australia was the worlds biggest producer of chia in 2008.

So what do you do with it? I started off rather unadventurously with sprinkling it on salads with some sesame seeds, and also on my morning cereal with my breakfast boost. It wasn't bad, but not wowing me either.

I'm starting to see chia added to more products about the place too. A smoothie at Energize- banana and strawberry smoothie with LSA (Linseed/Sunflower/Almond) and (optional extra) chia. It was slightly gritty, but I suspect that was from the LSA rather than the Chia.

And today I bought a loaf of Wholemeal Chia bread at Baker's Delight (their website doesn't mention the GI value of this loaf, but one of my favourite information sources GI News gives the white chia bread a medium GI rating of 63). They had both a Wholemeal Chia loaf, as well as a White Chia loaf. I hadn't seen them before.

Wholemeal bread isn't my favourite type of bread, by any stretch. I'd much prefer a multi-grain normally.  This one is ok. The crust has a fine crackle/crunch to it that is vaguely disconcerting.

And why is there all the current buzz about Chia? There are a lot of purported health benefits. It is a good source of omega 3 fatty acid, fibre and many micronutrients- calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, manganese, copper, iron, molybdenum, niacin, and zinc. Chia is mucilaginous (it makes a mucusy substance when in contact with liquid), which is postulated to help slow digestion of carbohydrates, and so may help lower the GI of food. I'll be experimenting further with chia- the chia gel sounds intriguing, if not vaguely gross as a concept, and sprouting chia sounds like fun.

Lychees- almost Low GI

I recently discovered fresh lychees for the first time! One of those great moments of serendipity. Shopping with my son, for some reason he was keen to buy some lychees- he wanted to try them. Of courese he didn't like them for some reason. Lychees would seem a kids favourite- sweet, mildly flavoured jelly like fruit- what's not to like?

Lychees are almost low GI (GI value 57, which is medium GI, whereas low GI is <55). They have lots of health benefits besides their delicious taste. High in Vitamin C (just 9 would supply an adults daily requirement), trace elements and cancer fighting compounds.

Canned lychees tend to be packed in sugar syrup and are high GI, and so to be avoided. Another reason to tuck into the simple beauty of the fresh fruit.

And just a quick google for lychee recipes provides a wealth of cocktail recipes! They definitely look to be worth exploring.