Coconut flour muffins with blueberries

This summer has been crazy, I have been traveling in and out since April and is funny how we love to travel but then our body feels so much the lack of routine, the switch from one temperature to another, the messy sleep and the long hours inside of a plane.

However I am back and I am feel energised, full of plans and nice ideas that hopefully I'll be able to put in practice in this future year.

With me back at home, the muffin season started again:) :)
I was craving for some muffins but I only had coconut flour at home, so I decided to go for some pure coconut flour muffins.
Cooking only with coconut flour can be tricky, as the coconut flour is really absorbent. Because of this I added lemon juice to the batter to help them to get a bit more moist, and the final result was pretty good I have to say.
I used blueberries as we bought some and they were a really bitter so I just decided to bake them instead, but you can use any other fruit. I am curious to try pear in the next ones!

Ingredients:

• 3/4 cup of coconut flour
• 1/2 tsp of baking soda
• pinch of salt
• 6 eggs (organic preferably) 
• 1/2 cup of coconut oil 
• 1/3 cup of honey (you can add more if you like them sweet)
• 2 Tbsp of lemon juice
• zest of one lemon
• 1/2 cup of blueberries (or other fruit that you prefer) 
• 1 tsp of vanilla extract

Let's do it:

• Pre-heat the oven to 150C
• In a bowl mix all the dry ingredients 
• In other bowl, beat the eggs and add the coconut oil, honey, lemon zest, lemon juice and vanilla extract
• Pour the egg mixture over the dry one and mix well
• Add the blueberries 
• Allow the batter to absorve all the coconut flour, so wait for about 5 minutes
• Scoop the mixture to the muffin tins 
• Bake for 20-25 minutes 

Time of preparation: 10 minutes preparing + 25 minutes baking

Quantity: 12 muffins

I recently got to know this band Kaleo. I don't know much about them, beside the fact that they are from Iceland and they play a indie blues style of music. 

Have a nice day :) 

Paleo granola with activated nuts

Lately we all see home made granola everywhere, in cool cafes, organic shops and there's recipes everywhere so I decided to give a go doing my own version of granola.
In my granola I removed the sugar and grains, reducing the carbohydrates and making it more paleo friendly. As a sugar replacement I added cranberries and dates that naturally makes the granola a bit more sweet. If you like dried apricots you can also use them.

The nuts and seeds were previously activated. You can check my recipe in here http://mymindfulbliss.blogspot.com/2017/06/paleo-muesli-with-activated-nuts.html

The final result was amazing with a granola super tasty and crunchy, without any added sugar and the best part is that it gets much cheaper to do it, instead of buying it n a supermarket over here.

The recipe is pretty easy, however I destroyed it during my first trial because I let it inside the oven too long, so the first batch came out totally roasted. I wasn't aware how sensitive the nuts are to heat.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup of almonds (previously activated)
• 1 cup of cashews (previously activated)
• 1 cup of pumpkin seeds (previously activated)
• 1 cup of sunflower seeds (previously activated)
• 1 cup of flax seeds 
• 1 cup of shredded coconut 
• 1 cup of dried cranberries 
• 8 chopped dates
• 1 cup of coconut chips 
• 2 tsp of vanilla extract 
• 4 tsp of cinnamon powder 
• 1/3 cup of coconut oil 
• pinch of salt

Let's do it:

• Pre-heat the oven to 150C 
• In a cutting boards chop the almonds and cashews with a knife 
• In a bowl mix all the nuts, seeds, cranberries, shredded coconut and coconut chips 
• Add the cinnamon and salt, mix well
• Melt the coconut oil and add it to the mixture as also the vanilla extract
• Stir well 
• In a tray covered with baking sheet, pour the mixture evenly 
• Bake it for 20m, stir and add more minutes if necessary
• Allow the granola to cool down and then keep it in a glass jar

*Note* - The nuts are sensitive to high temperatures, so is better to keep an eye while they are baking to avoid them to get burned. 

*Note* - In case you don't have a way to activate the nuts, or you don't find the reason of why should you do it, you can always use normal nuts. It gets equally tasty. 

Time of Preparation: It takes 20 minutes in the oven. As I usually do a big quantity and I only have one tray, I have to it in batches so it takes me about 1h to cook all the entire granola. 

Today  I leave you one of my favourite bands, The National. I already watched them alive at least two times and if I could, I would watch them again. 

They are from Ohio and is a Indie rock band and all their albums are just amazing and I invite you all to spend a bit of time listening to some of their music in Youtube.

Today I leave you a music from the new album. 

Have a nice day and enjoy the music :)