Home Made Raw Vit C Powder

If you have not gotten into the land of dehydrators.. seriously time to think about giving it a go! When something says its 'raw' it means it hasn't been heated above 40 degrees. Once foods are heated they begin to lose their nutrients, So dehydrators are magic ESPECIALLY if you wan't to make your own powdered supplements! ehydrators you can find for a pretty good price. I got mine off Catch of the Day for $49. I originally bought it for my mum and dad...and they liked it so much that she bought a bigger one...and then gave this back to me. 

am yet to make my own 'mean green' mix but am thinking I'll do it once the remaining oranges are out of the dehydrator tomorrow. You know you go to the super market or the health shop and buy spirulina powder or green smoothie powder??? Well you can make it at home and for a quarter of the price! It's the same with this Vitamin C.

The gut only has capability of absorbing so much at a time. So when ever you see a product that is claiming to have the vitamin c content of 1 million oranges in ONE tablet - it's a marketing gimmick. Your body can only absorb so much at a time and then you wee the rest out. So when possible, always try and make it yourself because you will get a bigger benefit from it as you won't be taxing your digestive tract as well. Seriously... imagine your gut being hit with 20 oranges! Poor bloody thing!

We will use this beautiful dehydrated orange in SO many things! In Smoothies in the morning, in brownies (Jaffa sweet potato brownies....ummmm I think that's happening this weekend FO' SHO') salad dressings... you name it! Even to just flavour some water for mini man. OMG you know what this is awesome in? Sparkling mineral water! Like fizzy orange goodness with no sugar or arse added. The possibilities are endless!

So yes. I decided to make my own. We always seem to get sick going from summer to autumn... or from winter to spring. Always when the weather changes. So this is perfect for this time of year given there is about 8 days left of winter. (I'm actually ugly crying right now and not on the inside)

This is super simple. I'm not even going to write a recipe below because thats stupid. It's oranges and a dehydrator. So instead of doing a recipe, I am just going to tell you what to do here.

​First of all, make sure they're organic oranges! This Vit C powder is the orange skin AND the orange flesh. So since you will be consuming the skin it is seriously important that you only choose organic oranges. Now when you are peeling oranges to make this, its a bit fickle. You need to get the skin, but not the white bit underneath. The white of the orange is extremely bitter and while your powder will still be good for you... it will taste like arse. So be careful, take your time and just peel the orange off and leave the white behind. Once you've peeled all the skin off, cut the white bits off the orange and discard them. You'll be left with beautifully juicy orange flesh. Cut them thin. The thinner you cut them the quicker they will dehydrate. Layer them out in the dehydrator with the flesh toward the bottom of the dehydrator and the peel toward the top of the dehydrator. You can do as many oranges as you have room for in the dehydrator you have. I managed 5 oranges in mine. 

Don't set the temperature above 40 otherwise it starts to destroy the nutrients. ​

You just leave it until it is dry enough to process into a powder. The skin will dry first and the flesh will take a little bit longer. You can always turn the skin to powder first and then do the orange once thats completely dry. ​

In terms of turning it into a powder... there are a couple of ways. If you have a mortar and pestle... that's the best way. I sadly have misplaced mine. And by misplaced I mean dropped and smashed on the floor. So I did mine in my Nutri Ninja. It didn't give me as smooth of a powder as usual... but its still good and tiny. This picture makes the granules look bigger than they are because I zoomed in. ​

So seriously give it a go!​

COPY CODE SNIPPET

To do the mean green mix, you dehydrate kale, spinach etc... all beautiful green things and then do the same thing to turn it into a powder. I will attempt that next so I'll keep you posted once I've done it! 

Happy dehydrating and if you do give it a go - let me know what you think and tell me how yours went! 

Peace love and vitamin C to you all xx

As you can see here, this one has a bit of white on it. I discarded it. I tried it before I got rid of it and I'm glad I did... in a weird way. It was SO bitter! My god. Would have completely ruined my mix!

Quinoa Porridge

Oats are definitely over rated and I personally think they taste like chalk and feel like cardboard when you eat them. I'm not saying I've ever eaten chalk... but I just think that if chalk had a taste... it would be oats. Bleh, Horrid.

Quinoa porridge is SO amazingly simple and delicious. My son will pretty much eat anything... he's pretty good... but when it comes to this porridge... he HOOVERS it! Like seriously. Gone in a flash. He's 2.5 and I swear when there is something he likes, he eats quicker than I do...and more of it.

I've tried a few quinoa porridges in my time and some of them I have found respulsive admittedly. I'd hate to name the particular restaurant I'm talking about that serves it... but they should seriously contemplate taking it off the menu IMMEDIATELY! But who knows - maybe you'll hate my Quinoa porridge and I'm just too picky!..... hahah jokes. There's no way. Cause this Quinoa Porridge is a rock star.  

Quinoa can be a fickle bitch in some peoples digestion...and is kind of a paleo grey area. Some people say you can eat it... and some say you can't. I always air on the side of caution... however I have done many tests after re introducing it to my diet and it doesn't seem to affect me. In saying that - when I eat quinoa in this form (not as pasta) I ALWAYS sprout it! And I think that's a good lesson for anyone who has digestive issues to learn. IF you are going to eat grains or legumes, always always always sprout them! Sprouting breaks down the saponins and makes the nutrients more bio available. This means your digestion isn't working as hard to break down the food mass to get to the nutrients because its already kind of 'half digested' when you eat it. You can learn how to sprout your Quinoa HERE . It's super easy and the health benefits are endless. 

I always do a larger batch than what the recipe is for below, and this is because I like to have it on hand sometimes for the week! Some peoples recipe calls for adding fruits and such, but I have kept this plain so you can keep it in the fridge, and then every day add something new to it to change the flavour. Today we had Raspberries, Cacao Nibs and Chia Seeds (You can sprout those too!) , Tomorrow I plan on mashing a banana and mixing it through with some slivered Almonds. So good!

I use the Macro Organic Tri Colour Quinoa - Different colours of produce mean different nutrients which is why I get this one. 

So enjoy this recipe! It's definitely a crowd pleaser. I would love to hear your experiences and what you think in the comments! Happy Cooking :) 

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RECIPE

Serves - 3 - 

Time 45 m

What you will need: 

1 Cup Sprouted Quinoa 

2 Cups Almond Milk (Or coconut milk) 

1 Vanilla Bean , scraped. 

1/2 Teaspoon Cinnamon 

Manuka Honey to serve. 

Toppings of your choice. 

What to do: 

In a Saucepan, place your sprouted Quinoa and your milk of choice. 

Bring to a simmer over medium low heat and stir occasionally.  

Add your Cinnamon and Vanilla Bean .

Simmer until the milk is almost absorbed, but there is still a little bit of liquid left.  

I'm being serious when I say - That's it. There's nothing else apart from serve with your topping of choice and enjoy!  

Don't add the Manuka while cooking though as the heat will destroy the benefits of the Honey, instead only add the honey as you are serving, once the porridge has cooled enough to be edible.  The little blessings we call Bee's work way too hard to have us ruin their honey!

Spicy Tomato, Mushroom and Basil Quinoa Pasta

As we near the end of winter, I find myself cooking as much comfort food as possible before the hot weather begins. To me, comfort food screams PASTA! Probably why I've blogged two pasta recipes in the same week. 

When I originally found out I was celiac.... I think I literally mourned the loss of normal pasta. That's not even joke. I was genuinely upset! That's quite amusing now that I look back on the time, because I found Quinoa pasta and I reckon without doubt it is soooo much more yummy! It has a sweeter flavour to it and I find it has a nice bite if its cooked properly. 

It has been so long since I've enjoyed a bolognese, and that was another thing I was really sad about when I stopped eating meat. Bolognese sauce. My god. That stuff goes good with everything. When I was younger and just moved out of home, I used to batch cook bolognese like it was going out of fashion. Sometimes I would cook that much of it that I'd run out of pasta. So I would use the sauce as a dip. Seems weird... but it will actually rock your world without word of a lie! Cucumber in particular is amazing! Especially if you cut a cucumber in half length ways and scoop out the seeds. It's like a little bolognese boat! Really good! Anyway! I'm getting off topic!

When the meat vanished from my life, I started to really search into how I can make delicious pasta sauces and to my amazement, there are SO many combinations you can do and so many amazing vibrant ways that you can flavour olive oil that makes pasta delicious! 

Once again, if you aren't good with Quinoa, then Sub for a different type of spaghetti like Zoodles. ORRRRR there is this brand of 'spaghetti' in the health food aisle at woollies ( I think the brand is slendier ) and the pasta is made out of Konjac which is a root vegetable. Keto lovers rejoice because its only 10 calories per serve which means it is SUPER low carb!

So on with it today (this is the second time I've written this recipe blog because the first time I accidentally deleted it) I really do hope you enjoy this recipe. It is one of my families faves!

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RECIPE

What you will need:

1/2 Pack Organic Quinoa Pasta (or Pasta of choice... NO GLUTEN...naughty naughty)

Good Quality Olive Oil on hand

4 Organic Tomatoes Quartered

1 Field Mushroom cut Chunky.

6-7 Fresh Basil Leaves chopped (dried just simply won't do)

Chilli Flakes

1 Small Onion diced

2 Cloves Organic AUSTRALIAN Garlic (2 cloves to me is like a bulb)

1/2 tablespoon Ghee

What to do:

Heat your pan and melt your half tablespoon of ghee

Saute your onion until translucent. I know you normally add Garlic here, but adding it at the end means it isn't as heat treated which keeps some of the benefits intact. 

While the Onion is cooking, put your water for your pasta in the pot and bring to a boil. Don't forget to season the water!

Once the onion is translucent, add your diced tomatoes and mushrooms. Sauté until the tomatoes are starting to break up. Add a little bit of water to deglaze the bottom of the pan if the food starts to catch. 

Once your water is boiling, add the pasta. 

To your sauce, add your chili flakes. Let cook for a few minutes to wake up the chilli. 

Add Garlic. Let cook for a couple of minutes and then turn off the heat. 

Once the heat is turned off, mix through the basil and add your olive oil. Enough to make it a sauce.

Once pasta is cooked, using tongs lift the pasta from the water and place in the pan of sauce. Don't worry about getting all the water off the pasta as the starch will combine with the oil and make the sauce a bit thicker and glossy.

eason with Salt & Pepper

Toss and Serve!