Making a meal or a treat doesn’t have to take a lifetime and can be so easy!

YOU NEED

1 x 250gram block of Whittaker’s “Dark Ghana chocolate (broken into pieces and melted in the microwave 30 seconds at a time. Stirring at each interval)

1 cup of something you love for the topping….dried fruit, nuts, candy etc ( I usually use nuts I have crushed but this time I had some left over honeycomb that I had made recently that I just threw into the blender to crush) #Note that most honeycomb contains gelatine if you are avoiding animal products.

YOU DO

Lay a large piece of greaseproof paper onto a tray and place on your bench.

Pour the melted chocolate onto the paper and using the flat side of a spatula gently and quickly spread the chocolate into a thin rectangle. Not too thin or it will be too rich… but you don’t want it paper thin either.

Quickly sprinkle your cup of nuts etc evenly over the top and pop in the fridge to set,

Once set gently break into sections.

Great to serve with coffee at a dinner party 🙂

Servings: I haven’t measured this one.

Time: I don’t have a time on this one but it’s so easy and so quick.

Freezing: Not suitable.

Food just doesn’t have to be hard. Quick, easy, cheap and yum dessert idea. I had an urge to caramelise some peaches but they aren’t in season, so I just grabbed a can from the supermarket last night and they were just lovely. I gave them a go on the BBQ first but I achieved a much deeper colour and caramel cooking them in a pan on the stove top.

YOU NEED 

Some canned peach halves in syrup

#optional – some coconut/ soy yoghurt or ice-cream

YOU DO 

Heat a little oil in a non stick pan. Using a slotted spoon or tongs, gently remove a few peach halves from the can and place in the pan. You don’t want a ton of juices in the pan because they will stew instead of grill. Don’t over fill the pan either. Heat the peaches until they become a lovely charred look and the sugars from the fruit and syrup caramelise.

That’s it!

Serve with coconut yogurt or coconut or soy ice cream. I get my coconut yoghurt from my local organic grocer. It’s a brand called COYO.

Serves: Makes as much as you want.

Time: I didn’t time this but it’s a quick recipe

Freezing: Not suitable.

Note: If you can get fresh peaches, just brush them with some pure maple syrup and them cook them J

I have been playing around with this concept all day.  Toffee apples remind me of my childhood. My favourite part was always the toffee though and I could never get through a whole apple after tackling all that toffee. So I have done bite sized toffee fruits.

I tried melon this morning which was an epic fail. I also tried using brown sugar for the toffee….another epic fail. When I was a professional chef I made loads of toffee but it’s been a while and this is my 1st attempt in years.

Well another trip to the supermarket to get different fruits, 4 wasted cups of organic brown sugar and a lot of pot watching later, I have cracked the jackpot.

They look so beautiful on the platter. It was hard to really capture just how beautiful. They would be a great “petit four” at a dinner party.

YOU NEED

a collection of Medjool dates, giant red grapes, green grapes and strawberries.

4 cups of white castor sugar

1 cup of water

1/2 teaspoon of cream of tartar

1/3-1/4 cup of sesame seeds

YOU DO

Pop the sesame seeds into a small deep dish and place next to your stove top.

Lay out a sheet of baking paper on your bench next to the stove top and the dish of sesame seeds.

Spike all your fruits all with a small bamboo skewer. Be careful now because the more you move them now, the more likely you are to make the whole for the skewer to big and the fruit will drop off.

Bring the sugar and water to the boil in a small pot, until all the sugar has dissolved. Using a wet pastry brush gently brush the sides of the pot.Try not to touch the sugar and water mix with the brush.

Once the sugar mix comes to the boil add the cream of tartar and turn heat down to a low simmer.

Simmer till the toffee becomes “hard crack”. This feels like a millennium. As the toffee gets closer DONT walk away from it. You can tell if its hard crack when you dip a teaspoon into the toffee and then let toffee from the spoon drip into a cup of ice water and when you pull the toffee out of the water it cracks and doesn’t bend. (If you don’t push the toffee to this point it will be extremely chewy and difficult to eat. If you push the toffee too hard though it will start to get too brown and from there will rapidly turn black.) Just keep an eye on it when it starts to colour and turn the heat off as soon as it gets to a “hard crack”. If you think you are close, carefully dip one of your fruits, let it cool and see if the toffee cracks when you bite it.

Once the toffee is ready, dip the fruit into it, one at a time until all of the fruit is covered in toffee. Scrape the excess toffee off from the fruit on the edge of the pot and sip into the sesame seeds. Set aside on the baking paper and repeat process until all your sesame toffee fruits are done and serve.

This is a cheap recipe with only a few ingredients. Just don’t be afraid to tackle toffee. It’s a rewarding outcome. A plateful of glossy, sweet, sesame fruit 🙂

Servings: Varies depending on what fruit you use, what size it is and how much toffee you use before it gets too hard to work with. I ended up with a decent size platter of toffee fruit bites though.

Time: Have not yet timed

Freezing: Not suitable for freezing.

Notes: Caution this is NOT a dish to do with the kids. Toffee is extremely dangerous. At no point dip your finger into the toffee. If a piece of fruit falls in, use a spoon to get it out and discard it.

These have been such a hit with everyone. It is my version of ripple cake that I use to enjoy in childhood. So many of you have made these and enjoyed them. Many of you have made them again and again and posted pictures of your efforts on my Facebook page. It’s quite the thrill for me that you all love this recipe so much and one of the reasons I love it.

YOU NEED

1 packet of Macro Gingernut biscuits (I get these from the health food section of the supermarket)

1/2 can of Ayam Coconut Cream (It’s the only coconut cream that I have found that is thick enough for this kind of dish. I like to pop this in the fridge the night before)

1 tablespoon of agave syrup (I get my agave syrup from health food shops. If you don’t have agave syrup, use the equivalent measurement of icing sugar or pure maple syrup)

3 oranges

#optional some dairy free chocolate for garnish

YOU DO

Open the can of coconut cream and scoop out all the thick stuff (which is most of the can). Put the watery stuff that is left in the can in a container and back in to the fridge to pop through a smoothie or curry another day.

Grate the zest of 2 of the oranges and add that to the coconut cream and the agave syrup to the coconut cream and mix to combine.

Place 1 biscuit on the bench and spread some of the coconut cream mix onto it. Place another biscuit on top. Repeat this until you have 4 biscuits in a stack.

Pick the stack up and hold it between your pointer finger and thumb. Now using a butter knife, spread more coconut cream around all the edges of the stack until it is covered. Put the stack back down and spread some coconut cream mix on the top and set aside. Repeat until you have 4 stacks.

Pop the 4 stacks on a plate and on the fridge for a couple of hours. When you are ready to serve them grate the zest from the 3^rd orange and garnish the top of each stack with the zest and also grate some dairy free chocolate over the top.

Don’t worry if they don’t look perfect. They taste amazing.

Servings: Serves 4.

Time: This all takes me less than 30 mins.

Freezing: Not suitable.

Notes: You can refrigerate the stacks for a lot less or a lot more time. The longer they are in the fridge, the softer the biscuits get. They are lovely either way.

If you make these in hot weather refrigerate the coconut cream for a few hours or overnight before you prepare the stacks.

Don’t worry if you can’t get them looking super neat. The taste is all worth it. Alternatively you can break your biscuits up, mix the cream and all the other ingredients together with the biscuits and place them in 4 small glasses for serving. When I do this I tend to use more biscuits per serve though. Don’t forget to still garnish them generously with grated chocolate and/or orange zest.

# I can NOT recommend a citrus zester enough for recipes like this.

Rhubarb reminds me of my late grandma whom I adored. She and my Pappy use to grow it in their garden that they had for almost 60 years. Grandma would stew it and serve it with mountains of ice cream. Memories of my Grandma are centered around the food she use to make. She use to smell like roses too and would put rose scented soaps in her draw. She had the loveliest soft pink cardigan she use to wear also, so blossom trees in bloom with their beautiful pink buds and the scent of rose remind me of her as does rhubarb, short bread yo yo’s, caramel slice and warm hugs.

The colour of this sorbet and the ingredients are a tribute to a beautiful, kind and loving lady. I miss her every day, all these years later. I wish she was still here to see and share my passion for food.

YOU NEED

275mls of rhubarb juice (approx 2 bunches of rhubarb)

1/8 cup of fresh lime juice

1/2 cup of agave syrup

1/2 cup of water

3/4 teaspoon of rosewater

YOU DO

Bring the water and agave to the boil. Stir well to combine.

Add the rhubarb and lime juice, stir to combine, remove from heat and add the rosewater.

Pop the mixture into a metal tray and place in the freezer for a couple of hours till frozen.

Once frozen it’s still icy so just blend it and pop back in the freezer until it firms up again (approx 45 mins to an hour) and serve.

Apart from the freezing time this is SO fast and SO easy to make.

Servings: Made 2 decent serves or 4 more dainty serves 🙂

 Time: The preparation and cooking time took me less than 20 mins.