This Is My Station

Traveling is like flirting with life. It’s like saying, ‘I would stay and love you, but I have to go; this is my station.’ (Lisa St. Aubin de Teran)

The last of my Belgium photographs…

One of the most beautiful churches I’ve seen ever. This is Basilica of the Holy Blood in Bruges, Belgium.

Originally used for flour, Laura says.

What a coincidence!

The original Godiva store!

Jet lagged.
Oh mama!
Haagen-Dazs ice-cream was everywhere in Japan! I bet my Japanese friends and students would love this cafe.

Surprise Cake

The highlight of my Spain experience was meeting Maria. She is one of those people that you instantly fall in love with. The ones you know nothing about but want to spend all day walking with. For the last two days, I have been staying in her home with her, her husband, two children and second cousin. Having recently started following my blog and reading that it was my birthday of late, but I did not have a cake for it because I was up high in the air somewhere, she and her lovely cousin organised this. A surprise cake – which happened to be the most delicious cake I have ever tasted. In the words of Linda Grayson, “there is nothing better than a friend, unless it is a friend with chocolate.” Thank you Maria for showing such selfless love to a complete stranger and for sweetening my year.

Okayama Table Terra

For my little sister, Juri’s birthday, my Japanese parents took us to Okayama Table Terra. And oh my goodness. This place was SO delicious. I could not believe it! I wish I had discovered it earlier.

Terra is two storey and the interior is gorgeous. White chairs and dark wooden tables. Big mirrors, open kitchen, wonderful service and pot plants. Perfect for any occasion. Especially a couple date! EEEE

We had the chef’s choice set menu and it was to die for! WOW! I can’t wait to go back. Is the chef single?! Can I marry him? More details HERE.

Because I can’t fluently understand Japanese, I can’t give you the exact description of each dish, but what I can say is we started with an antipasti plate (featuring zucchini bruschetta), followed by a variety of vegetables served with an anchovy dip, then cold new season cream of potato soup, next delicious eggplant pizzas topped with cheese and mince, next pizza margarita and last but definitely not least (because it was our favorite), a vegetarian zucchini and soy-bean “bolognese”. WOW it was so delicious I wish I could eat it for lunch today. Heck, also dinner.

At Terra, we also had coffee and a little cake. At home, we had tea and a big cake (gluten, dairy and refined-sugar free) – which I made. Recipe HERE. Except for Juri, I doubled this recipe: made two cakes, placed them on top of one another and spread an all-natural raspberry jam in the middle of them. Mama Mia.

My Favorite Healthy Sweet

Raw, vegan, gluten-free and refined-sugar free orange chocolate truffles. Have you tried them yet? Recipe HERE.

Love, Cake and Gyoza

Far from my “home”, family and friends in a country where I cannot manage a simple errand without succumbing to a pathetic pool of tears, I was, and I am, simultaenously surrounded by an infinite source of 愛 (LOVE). Last night, that love came from an Israeli (the country I was taught to hate by my Iranian primary school), a loving Japanese and their adorable son, a global citizen, Oz-kun. How incredibly lucky am I? And what did I do to deserve all this? Thank you Lydon family and thank you, God!

Aki prepared vegetarian curry, one spinach-based, one tomato and yet ANOTHER amazing salad, this one had hemp-seeds and raisins. Oz-kun, Aki and I (but really, mostly Aki) made completely home-made naan and vegan gyoza filled with onion, spinach and quinoa. Last, I made a gluten, dairy and refined-sugar free chocolate raspberry cake adapted from the Petite Kitchen website (recipe after the pictures).

Cake
3 free-range eggs
1/4 cup melted coconut oil
1/3 cup runny honey
1/2 cup of thawed frozen raspberries (fresh even better)
1 1/2 cups of ground almonds
1/2 cup of raw cacao powder
1 tsp pure vanilla essence
1 tsp baking soda

Glaze:
1 block of good-quality dark chocolate, chopped
the creamy top from a can of full-fat coconut milk

Preheat oven to 170C

Place cake ingredients in a food processor and blitz to combine

Pour batter into a greased cake tin and bake for about 30-40 minutes or until done

Let cool completely before glazing.

To prepare the ganache, add the chopped chocolate and coconut cream in to a small saucepan over extremely low heat. Whisk continuously until melted together then immediately remove from heat

Let cool slightly (1-2 min)

Using a spatula, spread deliciousness evenly on  cake, allowing it to drizzle over the edges

Last but not least, decorate with berries and fresh flowers

I Hate Japanese Valentines Days

This isn’t another bitter single-gal post, I promise. Japanese Valentines Days actually sck and in a big way. I’m serious. Well, it sucks for the girls because on V day, it’s the girls and only the girls who are to gift chocolates to the MEN. Yep, the tables turn and in a big way. So all this chocolate, all these fancy boxes with even fancier wrappings, are all for HIM! Lame.

But, in their defence, one month later, on March 14th, the Japanese celebrate/participate in a Japanese only (I think) celebratory day called White Day, which is when men are supposed to give return gifts to the women who had gifted them a month prior. Which, is kind of unfair seeing as you HAVE to give to take…Hehe.

Below are pictures from the chocolate expose of the Tenmaya Department Store in Okayama (floor 6) where there are 100 different varieties of fancy chocolate, including TESTERS. Yes, testers! Go, go, go!

Click HERE for more information.

Avocado chocolate mousse

In my previous post we established that to succeed at health-food blogging one must acquire an adorable child. So, here’s Emma, the cutest one of all promoting my healthy chocolate mousse.

Emma says, well if she could speak, she would say, “have you tried the unusual yet delicious combo that is avocado or as we Japanese say, “abocado” and chocolate?! Here, auntie Anisa presents it in the form of a HEALTHY delectable mousse topped with mixed frozen berries and raw macadamias. I sure digs it.”

Recipe here.

The best orange chocolate cake ever.

THIS THIS THIS is happening again.

Recipe: here

Healthy hot chocolate

The first fall of snow is not only an event, it is a magical event. You go to bed in one kind of a world and wake up in another quite different, and if this is not enchantment then where is it to be found? -J.B Priestley

The first snow is expected next weekend and frankly, I’m excited! She says that now, you say. Well, I don’t care about your opinion. For a literature loving, introvert foodie, winter is, well, SUMMER.

Instead of making my hot chocolates from instant powders (laden with additives and refined sugar) I make my hot cacao (that’s how fancy people say it) using wholesome ingredients. My Iranian taste-buds call for an extra pinch of sumthin’ sumthin’ to enhance the chocolate flavor, but if you prefer a classic taste, simply omit the spices.

1 cup almond milk
2 tsp raw cacao powder*
pinch of cinnamon
some orange zest
1-2 tsp coconut sugar

Simply warm the milk, cacao powder, cinnamon and orange zest in a small pot on medium heat.

Once hot, stir in the coconut sugar and serve.

*Raw cacao powder, dissimilar to processed cocoa powder contains a high concentration of antioxidants. In fact, higher than any other food we now know of today. Moreover,  in addition to calming our nervous systems, and regulating our heart rate, cacao is a feel-good food for it boosts our mood producing phenylalanine – this is the same chemical our bodies produce when we’re in love! No wonder we’re gaga over chocolate!

A healthier self-saucing chocolate pudding

If there’s one thing I’ve learnt from growing up in NZ, it’s that Kiwi women know their shizzle when it comes to producing sweet treats from an oven. In fact, come to think of it, the thing I miss most from my relationship with my ex boyfriend, is his mother’s pavlova (not sure if this says more about me or him). In addition to pavlova, ginger slice, butter cookies and lolly cake, Mrs. Jones OWNED the self-saucing chocolate pudding which she baked with the help of a vintage cook-book for children(this means its easy, you too can do it!), much love and much BUTTER and white flour and sugar. Excuse me while I wash my mouth out with detergent (I joke I joke!).

Last night, I recreated her pudding by switching some of the ingredients for a “healthier” alternative and it worked. Kaori and Taka (my best friends in Japan) approved big time.

Pudding:
1 cup self-rising wholemeal flour (switch for rice flour with 1 tsp baking powder for a GF alternative)
2 tbsp raw cacao powder
1/2 cup soft brown sugar
4 tbsp extra virgin organic coconut oil
1/2 cup almond milk
1 free range egg

Sauce
1 cup soft brown sugar
2 tbsp raw cacao powder
1 1/4 cup of boiling water

Preheat oven to 180C

In a large bowl, mix flour, cacao and sugar

Combine oil, milk and egg in a jug. Slowly add to flour mixture.

Pour this mixture into a greased oven dish. Smooth top.

Sauce time!

Combine sugar and raw cacao powder then sprinkle evenly over batter.

Slowly pour boiling water over the back of a large metal spoon to cover pudding.

Bake for 20-25 minutes – be careful not to overcook it, you don’t want to make cake.

Serve hot with cream, yoghurt, ice-cream or milk of choice.