The Sugar Choice

Main navigation

vegan

Parsnip Soup

By Leave a Comment

As I was ill, I required an easy and healthy recipe with just a few ingredients. I decided to cook a warming soup. In my opinion a chicken soup is the best choice if you are ill. Unfortunately I was not able to cook a deliciously one yet and still searching for the perfect recipe. For this reason I decided on a seasonal soup: parsnip soup.

Für die Suppe werden nur wenige Zutaten benötigt

As parsnips have an intensive aroma, I decided to add some potatoes and flavored it with onions, garlic, salt and pepper.

leckere und einfache Pastinakensuppe

Ingredients for 2 persons:

  • 350 g parsnips
  • 350 g floury potatoes
  • 1 onion
  • 1 garlic clove
  • 1 liter vegetable broth
  • salt
  • pepper
  • oil
  • parsley

Instructions:

  1. Peel and dice the parsnips and the potatoes.
  2. Peel and chop the onion and the garlic clove.
  3. Heat the oil in a pot and fry the onion and the garlic.
  4. Add parsnips, potatoes and vegetable broth. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for approx. 20 minutes.
  5. Blend with a stick blender to a smooth soup. If parsnip soup is too thick, add up to 150 ml of heat water until desired consistency is achieved. Season with salt and pepper, decorate with parsley and serve hot.

Pumpkin-Carrot-Soup with Ginger

By Leave a Comment

If you start clean eating it can be really hard. Many products you will find in the supermarket contain added sugar. Additionally cooking fresh needs time and cooking can be stress for you. I will share my pumpkin-carrot-soup with you to show how easy it is to prepare and cook a healthy meal for four days.

Kürbis-Möhren-Suppe

I always double the recipe. With one of the half I cook a fresh soup, and the other half is stored in the freezer for the next time. If I have not enough time for fresh cooking, I can use the frozen vegetables. The quantity of the recipe is enough for 4 persons. As we are only 2 at home, it last for two days. That means I am preparing the vegetables one time, using half for fresh soup for two days and use the other frozen half later for a two days soup. Fresh and clean cooking can be so easy!

Ingredients for 4 persons:

  • 1200 g butternut-pumpkin (alternative: hokkaido-pumpkin)
  • 500 g carrots
  • 10 g ginger
  • 2 red onions
  • 1,5 liter vegetable broth
  • salt
  • pepper
  • oil

Instructions:

  1. Half the pumpkin and remove the seeds. Peel and dice the butternut-pumpkin and the carrots.
  2. Peel and chop the ginger and the onions.
  3. Heat the oil in a pot and fry the onions and the ginger.
  4. Add pumpkin, carrots and vegetable broth. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for approx. 20 minutes.
  5. Blend with a stick blender to a smooth soup. If soup is too thick, add up to 1/4 liter of heat water until desired consistency is achieved. Season with salt and pepper and serve hot.

 

Gingerbread Energy Balls

By Leave a Comment

Today someone offered me some gingerbread. “Normal” Gingerbread with sugar. I said no, but was thinking of gingerbread whole day. As I wanted to bake some vanilla crescent cookies today, I didn’t have so much time to create a sugar free gingerbread recipe. For this reason I decided to make some gingerbread energy balls.

Lebkuchen Energy Balls

Energy Balls have the advantage that they are easy and fast and you can create any flavor. Together with my cinnamon energy balls, they constitute the perfect duo of christmas energy balls.

Ingredients for 15 gingerbread energy balls:

  • 60 g pecans
  • 60 g (medjool) dates (approx. 3)
  • 1 tsp. white almond butter
  • 10 ml water
  • 2 tsp. gingerbread spice

Ingredients for the topping:

  • 2 tsp. raw cocoa powder / backing cocoa powder

Instructions:

  1. Blend the pecans until they are finally ground.
  2. Pit the dates and puree them with the almond butter and the water.
  3. Add the puree and the gingerbread spice to the ground pecans and blend all ingredients until you get a smooth mixture.
  4. Form balls from the mass and roll them in the cocoa powder. Then move the balls back and forth between your fingers to remove excess powder.
  5. Store the gingerbread energy balls in the fridge and enjoy each ball!

Cinnamon Energy Balls

By Leave a Comment

I LOVE CHRISTMAS! For me, it’s one of the most beautiful times of the year. I really enjoy backing christmas cookies and eat them with a hot cup of tea or coffee at the weekends. As cinnamon is one of my personal christmas tastes, and I ate my last wake-up coffee balls this week, I started christmas backing session with cinnamon energy balls.

 Cinnamon Energy Balls

Ingredients for 15 cinnamon energy balls:

  • 50 g (medjool) dates (approx. 3)
  • 50 g walnuts
  • 25 g ground almonds
  • 2 tsp. white almond butter
  • 2 tsp. raw cocoa powder / backing cocoa powder
  • 3-4 tsp. ground ceylon cinnamon

Ingredients for the topping:

  • 2 tsp. raw cocoa powder / backing cocoa powder
  • 1 tsp. ground ceylon cinnamon

Instructions:

  1. Blend the walnuts until they are finally ground.
  2. Pit the dates, cut them into small pieces, add them to the walnuts and blend them.
  3. Add ground almonds, white almond butter, cocoa powder and ground cinnamon and blend all ingredients until you get a smooth mixture.
  4. Mix the cocoa powder with the ground cinnamon powder for the topping. Form balls from the mass and roll them in the cocoa cinnamon mixture. Then move the balls back and forth between your fingers to remove excess powder.
  5. Store the cinnamon energy balls in the fridge and enjoy them!

Coconut Almond Chocolates

By Leave a Comment

Actually, I wanted to create a bread spread. When I was still consuming sugar, I totally was in love with a coconut almond spread. Unfortunately this cream contains rice syrup powder as well as cane sugar and does not fit my nutritional style anymore. For this reason, I came up with the idea of mixing coconut butter with almond butter to create my own sweet spread. In my dreams this spread tastes exactly the same as the original. I myself always preach that sugar free food cannot be compared with sugar food but of course dreaming is allowed. In fact, it will never taste like the original. This does not mean that sugar free food tastes worse, but it tastes different – even better!

coconut almond chocolates

Indeed the mixed cream tasted good, but unfortunately it was too liquid. I put it in the fridge and after one night its consistency had changed, but unfortunately it was too tight now. I tried to get the cream out of the glass but only small pieces were broken. These pieces tasted so delicious, that I came up with the idea to make chocolates instead. Coconut almond chocolates are the result. They taste fantastic and remind me of white chocolate with coconut flavor. The great thing is that only 5 ingredients are required to make these delicious chocolates. By the way, they are also vegan and gluten-free.

Ingredients for the coconut almond chocolates

Unfortunately, the coconut almond chocolates do not survive at room temperature and soften quickly. For this reason you should eat them directly from the fridge – in the summer a perfect taste!

I used a silicon mold for chocolates. Alternatively an ice cube shape tray or a mini muffin pan should also work, if you use a silicon one. Otherwise it is impossible to get the chocolates out of the pans.

chocolate mold

Ingredients for 15 coconut almond chocolates:

  • 60 g coconut butter
  • 25 g coconut oil
  • 40 g white almond butter
  • 10 g ground tiger nuts
  • 10 g chopped almonds / slivered almonds

Instructions:

  1. Mix coconut butter, coconut oil, white almond butter and ground tiger nuts in a bowl. If ingredients are too hard, place them in a warm water bath until they are liquid.
  2. Add the chopped or slivered almonds into the cream and mix everything.
  3. Fill the cream into the mold for chocolate or an alternative.
  4. Let the chocolate in the fridge for 2 -3 hours. Important: If the ingredients have been heated in the water bath before, allow the cream to get cool before you place the chocolates in the fridge.
  5. Once the cocolates are hard enough, they can be removed from the mold. Store them in the fridge.

coconut almond chocolates

Wake-up Coffee Balls

By Leave a Comment

I love energy balls and I love coffee! Never heard of energy or bliss balls before? Different ingredients (fruits, nuts, raw cocoa, superfoods etc.) are mixed into one mass and shaped into small raw balls. Finally you can roll these balls in a topping and store them in the fridge or even froze them. They remind me of chocolates, are perfect snacks and provide new energy. The great thing about energy balls is that there are many possible combinations. Therefore you can always invent new creations and there are no limits to your imagination. Although energy balls are “healthy” snacks, you should eat them in moderation as they also contain many (healthy) fats.

Back to my coffee love. I was sitting on the couch, drinking my daily coffee and planning my “kitchen experiments” for the weekend. In that moment I came up with the idea of creating energy balls with coffee flavor. Researched the internet, but no recipe was exactly what I was looking for. A new recipe was required and delicious wake-up coffee balls are the result of it.

Some recipes are successful on the first try and meet exactly our imagination. My first try of wake-up balls was delicious but there was no coffee taste. It took many tries, but finally I am satisfied and the energy balls have a perfect coffee taste!

The wake-up coffee balls only consist of 6 ingredients. Always have these ingredients in your kitchen, so you are able to roll a few balls spontaneously.

Wake-Up Coffee Balls Ingredients

The secret of the coffee taste: the dates are soaked in espresso, instant espresso powder is added to the mass and finally the balls are rolled in cocoa and instant espresso powder. This wakes you up!

wake-pp coffee balls: the dates are soaked in espresso

By the way, my wake-up coffee balls taste better and getting more intense from day by day. If you like it even more intensive you can increase the espresso powder. Of course you can also reduce it if you want it more sensitive. But be careful as the coffee taste then also decreases.

wake-up coffee balls / energy balls with coffee flavor

Ingredients for 12 wake-up coffee balls:

  • 50 g (medjool) dates
  • 50 g walnuts
  • 50 g ground almonds
  • 2 tsp. raw cocoa powder / backing cocoa powder
  • 1 tsp. instant espresso powder
  • 40 ml fresh, hot espresso

Ingredients for the topping:

  • 1 tsp. raw cocoa powder / backing cocoa powder
  • 1 tsp. instant espresso powder

Instructions:

  1. Pit the dates and cut them into small pieces. Pour the hot espresso over the dates and let them soak for approx. 45 minutes.
  2. Blend the walnuts until there aren’t any big chunks left. Add ground almonds, cocoa powder and instant espresso powder.
  3. Pick up the dates and put them in the blender. Additionally also add 5 tsp. (15 ml) of the espresso liquid.
  4. Blend all ingredients until you get a smooth mixture.
  5. Mix the cocoa powder with the instant espresso powder. Form balls from the mass and roll them in the cocoa espresso mixture. Then move the balls back and forth between your fingers to remove excess powder.
  6. Store the wake-up coffee balls in the fridge.

wake-up coffee balls