Tag Archives: vegan

Simple vegan chocolate cake

May 21, 2023nutritioncake, chocolate, veganpetersan

Yoga Kitchen – Simple, healthy, and plant-based

Undoubtedly the easiest vegan cake ever

To make the dark chocolate cake below, you use a dead simple recipe that you can literally get done in an hour. Truly a cake for beginners with no baking experience.
The result is a deeply dark, juicy cake with the bitter flavour of dark chocolate. However, we do not use chocolate for it, but rather raw cocoa.

What ingredients do you need?

It is unimaginably simple. Just 5 ingredients, at least, if you leave out the water.

200 g sieved flour
130 g (or ml) of neutral-tasting oil you can fry with (e.g.: sunflower oil)
70 g sieved (raw) unsweetened cocoa
100 to 180 g whole, unrefined sugar
1 teaspoon of baking powder
500 ml boiling water

About the sugar: The original recipe specified 180 g of whole cane sugar. I reduced that, as I often do, to almost half (100 g), and used coconut blossom sugar. So adjust that according to your preferences.
As for the flour: I used a mixture of semi-whole and white wheat flour. That way, you get still some extra minerals and fibre in the cake.

This is how to prepare it:

It couldn’t be simpler:

Preheat your oven to 180°C (or 170°C for an oven with hot air circulation).
Grease a round baking tin of about 20 to 24 cm with some oil or line the bottom and edges with baking paper.
Mix the 4 dry ingredients flour, cocoa, baking powder and sugar in a bowl.
Then pour in the oil, stirring a little.
Finally, pour in the hot water and mix to a homogeneous, fairly liquid batter.
Pour the batter into the lined tin.
Bake for about 30 minutes at the bottom of your oven.
Let cool and remove from the springform pan.
Garnish with a topping of your choice

An example for a vegan topping:

For a luscious vegan top layer with chocolate and coconut flavouring:

Mix about 100 ml of canned coconut milk (17-23% fat content) with two tablespoons of cocoa and two tablespoons of agave syrup or whole (cane or coconut) sugar.
Spread this chocolate coconut cream on top of the cake.
Garnish with fruit such as berries or banana slices if desired.
Finally, put the cake in the fridge for one and a half to two hours.
Take it out of the fridge 30 minutes before serving.

Simple as that. This vegan cake certainly rivals its traditional counterpart in flavour and is remarkably moist thanks to the water. The texture is somewhat reminiscent of a flan, another archaeological find from my Flemish childhood.
Enjoy!
I found inspiration for this recipe at “The Happy Pear” from Ireland. Their website is full of delicious and healthy vegan recipes.

Do I need butter and eggs to bake cake?

The answer is no, of course.
Traditional cake such as the famous “quatre quarts” from French cuisine, always uses the following ingredients:

White flour
Butter
Eggs
Refined sugar

Okay, cake is not something you eat every day. It’s fun food. But the above list shows that the resulting classic cake is quite a chore for the body to digest as well as metabolise. The white flour, refined sugar and butter are high in calories but very, not to say totally “empty” of nutrients. The eggs provide a lot of cholesterol. We are so conditioned by the traditional pastries of our childhood. The above vegan recipe is very basic and consists of just 5 ingredients.
Opting for vegan pastries is good for your health, the environment and animals. It just takes the courage and initiative to step outside the known paths.

Participate in our cooking classes:

Cooking Workshops

Fruity cinnamon rolls

May 10, 2023nutritionbanana, cinnamon, fruit, veganpetersan

Yoga Kitchen – Simple, healthy, and plant-based

Sophisticated natural sweet

Cinnamon rolls are almost a cliché in the food world. Every fresh bakery or croissant stall has them. They are very easy to prepare purely plant-based. You can find the plant-based versions virtually nowhere on sale. Only at bakeries that already have a pure vegan offering, and there are very few of them. That’s how unwieldy, slow and conservative the food industry is, with its close ties to livestock farming.
We are happy to go ahead and make our own then!
The version below is very basic, gluten-free and consists of just 4 ingredients.
You can also prepare them in a raw version if you have a dehydrator.

What ingredients do you need?

For eight rolls:

Four bananas, ripe but not overripe
40 grams of raisins
150 grams of pitted soft dates such as mazafati or medjoul dates
3 teaspoons of cinnamon
6 tablespoons of water

150 grams of pitted dates, roughly equivalent to 13 to 14 pieces

This is how to prepare them

Mix the dates with the water and cinnamon and grind in food processor or blender to a spreadable date paste
Preheat your oven to 130 to 140°C
Cut the bananas lengthwise into 4 slices
Place them on a sheet of baking paper on a baking tray
Bake them for about 15 to 20 min at 130 to 140°C until they have dried out a little
Spread the date paste on all the banana slices
Distribute the sultanas evenly, one at a time, over the banana slices
Roll one banana slice into a cylinder
Place that roll on a second banana slice and roll into a wider cylinder
Place that thicker roll flat on the baking tray
Repeat for the remaining slices
Bake the rolled bananas for another 15-20 minutes at the same temperature

Important tips for slicing the bananas:

The first time when I tried this recipe, I struggled not to break the bananas into pieces. Hence:

Use a very sharp knife
Lay the bananas flat, i.e. on their sides and cut along in the direction of their natural curve

Tip for making the date paste

In the original recipe, the author indicated to grind the date mixture with a blender. But unless you want to make double the number of cinnamon rolls, I recommend using a food processor with an S-shaped blade. It is very common in recipes to be asked to use a blender, when the amount of ingredients is just way too small not to make a mess, with everything splashing around and you having to scrape the sides of the blender every so often.

Serve the banana rolls the same day, as they don’t keep so well in the fridge.
The result is a beautiful symphony of different tones of sweet with the aroma of cinnamon woven through it.
Enjoy!

Healthy sweet

Be moderate with sweet. In our Western food culture, all attention goes to just two of the five tastes: salty and especially sweet.
Preferably use wholesome sweeteners such as fruit, dried fruit, and only then cereal syrups and sweeteners such as agave or maple syrup and concentrated fruit juices such as apple juice. Coconut blossom sugar is also fine.
If you do opt for cane sugar, take the unrefined version. White, refined sugars like granulated sugar (from beetroot) or white icing sugar are really not done for your health.
In most recipes found in cookbooks, the amount of sugar is usually excessive. From my own experience, you can easily reduce the amount of sweet by half for the same eating pleasure.

Surprising Carrot balls

May 10, 2023nutritioncarrots, raw, snack, veganpetersan

Yoga Kitchen – Simple, healthy, and plant-based

Light and healthy

These carrot balls have a very surprising composition. Usually, these kinds of sweet snacks make use of nuts. But here, no nuts at all! That makes these balls very light.
Moreover, they are completely raw and you are able to prepare them very quickly.

What ingredients do you need?

This will be it for about twenty to twenty-four pieces. All depends on how big you make them.

ca 80 grams of pitted fleshy, soft dates (Medjoul or Mazafati)
120 grams grated carrot
75 grams of sultanas, which you can pre-soak in warm water if necessary
A little sea salt
75 grams of oatmeal
two teaspoons of an allspice mixture
about 20 grams of grated coconut for the finishing touch

This is how to prepare them

First cut the dates into small pieces
Mix all the ingredients excepot for the grated coconut in a bowl and knead intensely until everything sticks together well
Roll balls of the mixture
Pour the grated coconut into a plate and roll each ball in it to coat the outside

And there you are. When I weighed out the 20 grams of coconut according to the original recipe, at first I didn’t believe that amount would be sufficient. But it was right as pie!
These balls store well in the fridge.

Is it preferable to eat raw or cooked food?

There are views on food that assume it is best to eat everything raw, and as little cooked as possible. And there are views to the contrary: that it is best to eat cooked food as much as possible, and avoid raw.
There is no doubt that cooked food is easier to digest than raw food. Raw food costs our intestinal system more energy to digest, leaving relatively less energy available to meet our energy needs. On the other hand, some nutritional value is lost in the cooking process. After all, many essential vitamins and interesting enzymes break down during cooking. In any case, all the more reason to prefer gentle, short cooking processes for vegetables that retain as much nutritional value as possible. Grains and legumes, on the other hand, should be cooked long enough. After all, you don’t eat them primarily for the vitamins, but for the energy, the proteins and minerals.
Personally, I believe the middle ground is golden. Healthy plant-based food can consist of both cooked and raw dishes. And depending on the seasons and your personal energy needs, you can vary the ratio between the two. In the colder winter months, it is best to eat a bit more cooked, and in the warmer period of the year, a bit more raw.

Vegan Coconut Rocks

April 10, 2023nutritionbanana, coconut, sugar, veganpetersan

Yoga Kitchen – Simple, healthy, and plant-based

Tropical sweet

Even without added sugar, you can hit high peaks in terms of sweetness. These super simple soft biscuits, reminiscent of the archetypal coconut rocks, consist of just two to three ingredients.
Banana takes over the role of egg whites as a texturiser. (Whew!)
You have them prepared in no time.

What ingredients do you need?

For twelve pieces:

about 340 g peeled bananas
75 g grated coconut
a pinch of salt
optional: 3 tablespoons of dark chocolate drops

This is how to prepare them:

Preheat the oven to 165 °C.
Mash the bananas finely, with a fork or in a food processor.
Add the coconut and the pinch of salt and mix until homogeneous.
Add the chocolate drops if wanted and mix well.
Place a sheet of baking paper on a baking tray and spoon 12 mounds of the batter onto the paper.
Let bake for 25 to 30 minutes until golden brown.
Let cool for at least an hour before munching them.

Is all sweet equal before the law?

The human species has a distinct preference for sweet taste. Perhaps because our distant ancestors evolutionarily associated sweet taste with energy density.
In the last 50 years, consumption of sweet and sugary foods has increased dramatically. Many people struggle with obesity, and the incidence of diabetes resulting from unbalanced eating habits has never been higher than today.
Should you therefore ban sweet? No. But moderation is the message. And preferably choose wholefood sweet. Fresh dates, bananas or other fresh and dried fruits not only give us their heavenly flavour, but also bring vitamins and minerals. This, unlike crystallised or powdered refined sugar.
A tip: gradually reduce the sweet level of your dishes, until you learn to enjoy the subtle sweetness of sweet vegetables and cooked grains again. Be moderate with fruit, and prefer the whole fruit rather than just the juice.

What is the true cost of imported tropical fruit?

Imported tropical fresh fruits such as bananas, mangoes and coconut products, for example, have a huge carbon footprint due to long-distance transportation. They are also available all year round, whatever the season. Transport by plane – madness for agricultural products – scores the worst, but transport by ship and truck is also wasteful. Rail transport seems to be the most favourable ecologically for food products.
The origin of food products can give an indication of the means of transport used, although as a consumer you can never be sure.
That is why it is better to consume regional or local seasonal fruit, and to keep a limit on tropical fruit coming from very far away.

Three tofu marinades

February 28, 2023nutritionmarinade, plant-based, protein, tofu, veganpetersan

Yoga Kitchen – Simple, healthy, and plant-based

It’s the marinades that make the tofu

Plain, white tofu has virtually no flavour. You can see that as a drawback, or as a positive. Because it allows you to add any flavour to this healthy supplier of plant protein. Moreover, it allows you to add structure to your cooking habits.
If you set aside half an hour at the weekend to dice a large block of white, firm tofu and make a few different marinades, you’ll immediately be set for the week.
Here are three examples of marinades. Besides, there is no brake on your creativity and you can replace these marinades with your own favourite combinations.

Oriental style marinade with peanut butter and sesame oil

This sweet and spicy marinade is excellent with rice or noodle dishes, accompanied by grilled and steamed vegetables.
Ingredients:

200 g firm white tofu
2 tablespoons of peanut butter
one tablespoon of soy sauce (tamari or shoyu)
1 tablespoon of vinegar (e.g. apple cider vinegar)
2 tablespoons maple, rice or agave syrup
Two tablespoons of sesame oil
2 finely chopped garlic cloves
A good chunk of ginger, grated or very finely chopped

Greek style marinade with olive oil and lemon

This fresh and sour marinade is ideally suited as a substitute for feta cheese in salads, but is also very tasty slightly warmed up.
Ingredients:

200 g firm white tofu
2 tablespoons of nutritional or noble yeast flakes
Two tablespoons lemon juice
1 tablespoon of dried oregano
3 tablespoons of olive oil
salt and pepper to taste

Spicy Mexican style marinade with chilli and paprika

A pungent, spicy marinade for lovers of spicy Mexican flavours. Ideally to use in wraps, with beans, vegetables and, for example, slices of fresh avocado. These are best eaten hot, by briefly frying the tofu with the marinade in a pan.
Ingredients:

200 g firm white tofu
3 tablespoons of olive oil
1 tablespoon plain white wine vinegar or apple cider vinegar
1 teaspoon of ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon chilli powder
1 teaspoon garlic powder or two finely chopped or pressed cloves of garlic
sea salt to taste
1 teaspoon paprika powder
1 teaspoon of oregano

This is how to proceed:

Mix all the marinade ingredients in a bowl and stir in the cubed white tofu. Transfer the marinated tofu into glass jars, for instance with a span seal. This marinated tofu will keep for 1 week in the fridge.

Nutritional info: white firm tofu from the brand The Hobbit, per 100g product.

This gives a good indication of the nutritional values for firm tofu. Tofu from other manufacturers may of course differ from these exact values.

Energy	Carbohydrates	Sugars	Fat	Sat. Fat	Protein	Fibre	Salt
503 kJ/120 kcal	2,1 g	0,5 g	6,1 g	1,0 g	13,5 g	1,4 g	0 g

Is fermented tofu better than regular tofu?

Fermented tofu looks like ordinary tofu but has undergone a fermentation process. As a result, the flavour is slightly acid. Two advantages:

the tofu is slightly more digestible
this tofu has a more distinct flavour

In fermentation processes, bacteria grow and produce acids and enzymes. The enzymes trigger the digestion process, the acids provide stability and favourable acidity for the digestion process.
Fermented tofu is ideally suited for cold preparations with tofu, for example as an alternative to animal feta cheese. Great solution if you are vegan yourself or are visiting a friend or relative who does not eat dairy products.

Cocoa peanut butter cookies

February 21, 2023nutritioncocoa, peanut butter, peanuts, veganpetersan

Yoga Kitchen – Simple, healthy, and plant-based

A quick and easy cocoa treat

Biscuits with peanut butter as an ingredient can be found here and there on the internet. I chose this recipe because, except for the sugar present in the (optional) dark chocolate granules, no other sugar is added. It is the banana that provides natural and mineral-rich sweetness. At the same time, the bananas give the soft, cohesive and springy texture to these soft biscuits. This is an example of how bananas can be the perfect egg replacements in sweet recipes.

The ingredients for approx 10 pieces:

220 g peanut butter
280 g ripe, mashed bananas
about two and a half tablespoons of oat flakes
about 35 g unsweetened cocoa powder
a pinch of salt
optional: two tablespoons of dark chocolate granules or drops

This is how to prepare them:

Grind the oat flakes into flour in your blender or food processor.
Mix the oat flakes and cocoa powder well.
Mix the mashed banana and peanut butter in a food processor until they form a homogeneous mixture.
Add the dry mixture to the liquid mixture and mix well.
Finally, spoon the chocolate drops through the mixture.
Set the mixture in the fridge for an hour and a half to stiffen.
Spoon out the batter one spoon at a time and finally roll 10 balls of the biscuit dough between your fingers.
Place the balls on a sheet of baking paper with enough space in between.
You may want to flatten the balls a bit with the back of a spoon.
Bake for a maximum of 10 to 15 minutes (depending on your oven) in a preheated oven of 165°C.
Let the biscuits cool on a wire rack before eating them.

When I first tried this recipe, I was very sceptical when I saw the sticky batter.
Dirty fingers guaranteed! But the result paid off. Soft, springy biscuits with a deep, dark chocolate flavour.
Yet another vegan treat that doesn’t take much time. One hundred per cent vegan baking fun with respect for all creatures of life.

This recipe is a personal interpretation of a recipe from the cookbook “Secrets d’endurance” by Christophe Berg. Highly recommended for anyone who values health. Especially endurance athletes will find themselves appealed by the many inspiring recipes, all with few, but varied and healthy plant-based ingredients. The booklet (in French), by the way, is published by that great publisher La Plage, which has lots of vegan titles in its range.

Heartwarmingly raw

February 9, 2023nutritionbeet root, raw, red beet root, smoothie, veganpetersan

Yoga Kitchen – Simple, healthy, and plant-based

A warming and invigorating smoothie

Some people enter the new year with a headache, indigestion and a hangover.
I chose to enter the freshly new year on January 1st 2023 already very sober and healthy. In the name of my decades-old habit of eating as healthy as possible, I prepared this wonderfully simple raw smoothie with a generous add-on of fresh ginger. And I then slowly spooned it out, savouring each and every bite. And immediately the tone was set!

This is what you need:

The quantities below are meant for one serving.

A juicy, ripe pear. The juicier, the better.
One quarter of a big raw red beetroot.
The juice of half a lemon.
Approximately half a centimetre of a toe of fresh ginger.

Ready in the blink of an eye

Peel the pear, remove the seeds and core and cut into pieces.
Wash the piece of beetroot thoroughly. You can also peel the beetroot thinly if necessary. Next, cut it into pieces.
Press the lemon to extract the juice.
Remove the peel from piece of ginger.
Bring everything into the cup of a strong blender and blend until you get a homogeneous texture.

Done! Pour into a large glass or bowl and enjoy it, slowly and mindfully.

More than just macro and micronutrients

Raw fruits and vegetables are foods with low energy density and high density of nutrients such as minerals, vitamins and all kinds of secondary plant substances.
We in the West have a tendency to stare ourselves completely blind at the chemical composition of food products. Food certainly and surely acts on our bodies in a much more sophisticated and subtle way than you can tell just from the amount of carbohydrates, fats, proteins, minerals and vitamins alone. Other, older food teachings do take into account these subtle effects, which can affect our organs and our whole body system very differently. I am referring here especially to Ayurveda, traditional Chinese nutrition and macrobiotics.
For example, red beetroot is said to have a strengthening effect on the heart and a relaxing effect on the liver. It improves blood quality.
The pear belongs to foods of a sweet-sour earth-wood type. It stimulates blood circulation and has a moistening effect, including on the lungs and throat.
Fresh ginger root is strongly warming, helping us in winter to ward off the cold.
And finally, the strongly sour-tasting lemon juice not only provides precious vitamin C, but also has a cooling effect.

Does modern science contradict traditional nutritional teachings?

Each of the traditional dietary teachings does have its incomprehensible, probably historically and culturally determined, sometimes somewhat warped taboos. For instance, eating raw vegetables is strongly discouraged in Ayurveda. With what we know today about the thermal sensitivity of vitamins and other secondary plant substances, this taboo appears a bit incomprehensible. However, we don’t have to dismiss everything just like that. It is better to look at what findings contemporary nutritional science comes to and whether they can also be compatible with ancient wisdom. Modern food science has the merit of unravelling the material chemical, biochemical and bacteriological phenomena of digestion and absorption and providing keys to optimise them.
The findings of traditional dietary teachings often look at food through an energetic lens. This way, they consider its direct effects on fluid and heat balance of the body. They provide surprising insights and tools to promote the proper functioning of our bodies throughout the seasons in a way that modern science sometimes overlooks.

Energy balls with nuts and dried fruits

October 24, 2022nutritionenergy, fruits, nuts, veganpetersan

Yoga Kitchen – Simple, healthy, and plant-based

Little energy bombs

Dry fruits and nuts belong to the food items with a high energy density.
Firstly, they are very nutritious: they contain many minerals and nuts in particular contain healthy fats. Furthermore, they contain a relatively high amount of energy per unit weight, expressed in calories. You only need to eat a little bit of them to quickly reach a decent calorie intake.
However, calories are only a flawed way of measuring nutritional value. You can read more about that at the end of this post.

In the example below, we combine nuts and dry fruits to create a delicious plant-based snack that you could even eat for breakfast. And all with raw, unprocessed produce, with no added sugars.

What do you need?

The number of balls depends on how big or small you roll them.
You get about a total of 320 grams of finished product with the quantities suggested below.
From this you get about 24 pieces with a diameter of about one and a half centimetres.
Take 80 grams of each of the products listed below:

pitted tamarind paste
cashew nuts or white almonds
grated coconut
raisins

The tamarind is also called the Indian date. The fruit is also well known in South America and the rest of Southeast Asia. The seeds of the tamarind are rock hard, and these have to be removed. Look carefully on the packaging to make sure you have the pitted version. The pulp of tamarind is sold in packets of about 150g to 200g in Asian and Indian shops. Tamarind has a pleasant, fresh sour-sweet flavour.

This is how you make the energy balls:

Cut the tamarind paste into smaller pieces with a sharp knife. Remove any remaining seeds.
Add the nuts to the bowl of a food processor and pulse them to a fine, granular powder.
Add the grated coconut and pulse a few more times.
Set the finely ground nut and coconut mixture aside.
Now add the tamarind and sultanas to the bowl of the food processor and pulse them finely.
Continue to grind the tamarind and sultanas until a sticky mass with a doughy consistency forms.
Then knead the fruit mixture and nut-coconut mixture together well with your fingers.
Roll balls of approximately equal size between your fingers and hands.
The balls will keep for a full week in a sealed container in the fridge.

Kneading is solid work for fingers and hands! You’ll get muscular forearms!

Take the above recipe as a general model for this kind of healthy snack.
You can make your own combinations from the following ingredients:

Nuts such as: walnuts, pecans, almonds, cashews, hazelnuts …
Whole grains such as: buckwheat, oat flakes or other cereal flakes …
Dried fruits such as: sultanas, cranberries, plums, apricots, figs, dates …
Spices such as: pepper, cinnamon, nutmeg, cardamom …

Use your creativity and be guided by your tastes and what you have available.
Preferably buy organically grown ingredients in bulk, which further saves packaging waste and is often cheaper.

Approximate nutritional value of these energy balls, per 100g of product:

Energy	Carbohydrates	Sugars	Fat	Sat. Fat	Protein	Fibre	Salt
459,5 kcal	48,6 g	29,8 g	28,7 g	15,3 g	8,5 g	10,8 g	0,032 g

Calorie counting, does it make sense?

The energy value of a food product, expressed in calories, is a theoretically calculated amount of energy that would be released if you were to burn the food product completely to ashes in a closed vessel and then measure how much heat energy is released in the process.
But of course, we humans are not a closed vessel, nor do we burn our food completely to ashes!
Further, the energy from our food acts on our organs in a much more complex way than just heat energy.
As an example, to 1000 kcal steamed cauliflower, your body will react completely differently than to 1000 kcal smarties or some other criminally unhealthy candy.
Furthermore, eating 1000 kcal of food of any kind does not mean that your body will also absorb 1000 kcal of it. Some of your food will digest, some will not. Also depending on what your individual digestive system can handle. Indeed, a lot depends on the condition and diversity of your gut flora.

So calories are very, very relative as a measure of one’s nutritional intake and give little or no relevant information.
They are only useful if you already have a varied and balanced diet.
In the following cases, with a balanced diet, it may possibly make temporary sense to monitor and adjust your calorie intake:

If your weight is really too low and you need to gain weight for health reasons.
If your weight is really too high and you need to lose weight for health reasons.
Or if you want to build muscle or lose fat in a controlled way as part of a strength training programme (body-building).

In these cases, it comes down to eliminating excess or deficiency in nutrition by ajusting portions. Or by changing the ratios between carbohydrates, fats and protein and thus creating a better balance.

What is the right portion size for a meal?

It is a misconception to think that you have to eat your stomach full.
It is sometimes said in Ayurvedic health teachings that you should scoop up a volume of food the size of your two fists per meal on your plate. That makes sense somewhere. After all, our stomach is a very elastic organ. The more we eat, the more the stomach stretches. The bad news is that once stretched, it retains its larger volume, making it easier to eat just a little too much next time. So it becomes a vicious cycle in the long run.
A golden tip for better digestion and health: Chew as long as possible before swallowing.

Beans spread

October 13, 2022nutritionbeans, legumes, plant-based, veganpetersan

Yoga Kitchen – Simple, healthy and plant-based

When beans become spreadable

As a child, I had an aversion to beans. They were white beans, often in an uninspiring tomato sauce, from cans. Fortunately, we didn’t eat them very often.
Things are different now! I eat beans pretty much every day in one or other form.
Beans are an essential ingredient in healthy plant-based cooking.
They contain relatively high amounts of vegetable protein as well as a lot of fibre and useful minerals.

There are countless different varieties, many of them local. In recent years, I have been quite a fan of the multiform and multicoloured Greek beans.
For the recipe below, you can actually use any kind of bean.
I like to start from dry beans. These are very inexpensive in terms of price and you can buy them in bulk.
That’s immediately a lot less packaging waste.

For almost a kilo of bean paste you will need:

200 g dried beans
One large carrot
A medium-sized onion
40 g dried tomatoes
One clove of garlic (optional)
Savory, two teaspoons to one tablespoon
Some seaweed, e.g. a tablespoon of dried sea lettuce
One teaspoon of the following herbs or spices:
- Thyme
- Origano
- fennel seed
- paprika powder
- turmeric (optional)

Turmeric gives your bean spread a warmer colour. Turmeric is a spice with a very respectable health reputation; among other things, it has anti-inflammatory properties. Savory is a herb that will improve the digestibility of the cooked beans.
You can of course adapt the suggested spice and herbs mix. Give your creativity full rein.

Preparation

Soak the dry beans in water for 24 hrs. They will swell and come to life.
Chop up the dried tomatoes and soak them in a little water too

This is how to cook the beans

Pour away the soaking water from the beans and briefly rinse them under the tap. Drain briefly.
Cook the beans until tender. This is best done in a pressure cooker:

Fully submerge the beans in water (+ 2 to 3 cm) and put the pan under fire. Do not add any salt!
Bring the water to the boil. Depending on the type of bean, white foam will rise to the surface.
Remove the foam with a skimmer until almost no foam rises to the top anymore.
Add 1 teaspoon of savory and 1 teaspoon of dried seaweed (sea lettuce or some other seaweed).
Now close the pressure cooker, bring under pressure and boil for about 45 minutes.
Turn off the heat after the cooking time and slowly let the pressure release.

This is how to prepare the vegetables

Bring a little water to the boil in a pan, sprinkle in the herbs of your choice (e.g. cumin seeds, thyme, oregano, fennel seeds …).
Add the finely chopped onion and garlic and allow to glaze a little.
Next, add the finely chopped peeled carrot and the soaked tomatoes, the latter along with their soaking water.
Let everything continue to simmer together with the lid on for about 3 to 4 minutes.
Turn off the heat and leave to cool down a little.

This is how to mix everything into bean puree

Bring the stewed vegetables into a food processor.
Add the cooked and cooled beans. Keep some of the cooking liquid aside.
Add two generous tablespoons of sesame paste (tahini).
Mix, first on low, then on high speed until you get a spreadable, puree-like texture.
Taste and add extra black pepper, paprika powder and a generous amount of turmeric if necessary or desired.
Divide the bean spread between two jars of approx 500ml capacity, close them hermetically.
The bean puree will keep for a week in the fridge.

If the mixture turns out too dry, add a few tablespoons of the beans’ cooking liquid until the consistency feels right to you..
It’s important to cook the beans without salt.
When you cook beans in salted water, their skin hardens, so they tend to take up to twice as long to cook until soft.
In the above recipe, you basically don’t need to add extra salt. After all, most dried tomatoes are salty on their own. That is why we also include the soaking water of the tomatoes in the recipe.
If you doubt whether your dried tomatoes are already salty or not, taste the soaking water before adding them.

The endless variety of legumes

If you do some browsing in organic shops and Asian food supermarkets, you almost fall over backwards with the sheer variety of shapes and colours of beans and lentils. What a far cry from the monotonous “white beans in tomato sauce”. The Greek and Italian regional varieties are particularly striking.
When you eat a combination of a grain and legumes (beans or pulses) every day, that in itself is a solid daily base to meet your protein needs.
If you are an intense athlete, do heavy physical work or dislike legumes, then the more concentrated plant-based protein sources such as tofu, tempeh and seitan are recommended to secure your protein intake.

Are legumes easily digestible?

As with any new type of food food you add to your menu for the first time, it may take a few weeks for your gut flora to adjust. Some flatulence may occur at first.
It is true that legumes, and beans in particular, are coated with certain substances that inhibit premature germination of the bean. These are the famous lectins. These indeed inhibit the digestibility of legumes.
Therefore, use a few simple techniques to virtually eliminate those substances:

Soak the legumes for at least one night and pour away the soaking water.
Scoop away the foam that rises to the top at the start of cooking.
Cook the beans and lentils long enough until they are really well cooked.
Chew! Chew the beans and lentils long enough before swallowing

For beans, the cooking time will be easily an hour and 15 minutes to as much as an hour and a half in a regular pan. With a pressure cooker, you reduce cooking time to 35 to 45 minutes. A little experimentation pays off!

Can you eat legumes raw?

You can sprout both lentils and beans for a few days in a sprouting jar or sprouting machine. First leave them under water for 24 h, then rinse and keep them moist. Change the water once or twice a day and rinse the sprouts under running water each time.
Sprouted beans and lentils are delicious in salads.

Vegan panna cotta

September 12, 2022nutritioncoconut, cream, panna cotta, veganpetersan

Yoga Kitchen – Simple, healthy and plant-based

Coconut and co

You can make a purely vegan version of just about anything. Italian cuisine, for example, is rich in all kinds of dairy desserts based on cream and fresh cheese. Did you know that you can also make them using purely plant-based ingredients?
You can make vegan dairy-style desserts using the following alternatives:

soy products such as tofu, silken tofu or soy cream
Nuts, such as almonds and cashews
Coconut

Here is a super simple alternative for a fresh and light Italian-style dessert: the classic panna cotta. If you translate that, it means “cooked cream”. We make this vegan version using coconut milk and soy cream.

To give the dessert a firm and at the same time soft texture, we use agar-agar.
Agar-agar is very well known in vegan and vegetarian cuisine and the perfect alternative to gelatine.
Agar-agar is extracted from red seaweeds.
Gelatine is no more or no less than melted and processed bone and offal from dead mammals.
I know immediately which of the two I prefer. And do you?

What you need for this vegan panna cotta

One 400ml can of coconut milk
One brick packet of soy cream of which you will need 75 ml
Two tablespoons of agave syrup or rice syrup
A teaspoon of agar-agar powder
300 to 400 grams of fresh or frozen fruit for the top layer
Some grated coconut for the decoration

Read more below about the different coconut products on the market so you can purchase the right items for this recipe.

How to prepare

Bring the coconut milk, agar-agar and soy cream together in a saucepan and put under heat
Gently bring the mixture to the boil, stirring constantly
Continue to boil for 2 to 3 minutes and keep on stirring
Remove from the heat and divide evenly among 4 or more glasses
Let cool completely. If during cooling you notice that the mixture loses its homogeneity and starts to layer, stir occasionally with a whisk
Cool in the fridge for a few hours
Before serving, puree the fruit into a coulis and pour it over the panna cottas
Scatter some grated coconut over the top

In this example, we used raspberries. You could just as well use strawberries, kiwis or mangoes. Fresh or frozen fruit is best. On the other hand, you can also use rehydrated (soaked) dry fruit, for example dried mango or dried apricots.
So enjoy this italian style vegan panna cotta!

What type of coconut product should you choose?

I myself have struggled for a long time to see clearly through all these coconut products available.
There are many to be found on the market.
Here are the main ones:

Milks and creams

Coconut water: the watery juice of the coconut to which people attribute many health benefits
Coconut milk: made from the white flesh of the coconut with added water. The fat content may vary. For this recipe, use a coconut milk with 17-20% fat. Other versions can have up to 30% fat and are easier to whip into a firmer whipped cream texture. Not necessary for this recipe!
Liquid coconut cream: with a higher coconut and fat content compared to the milk. Fresh coconut meat is used, but no water is added.
Solid coconut cream: (creamed coconut) which is even more concentrated than liquid coconut cream and is sold in block form, like a bar of soap. It is made from the flesh of dried coconuts.

The oil

Coconut oil: it is only the fat from the flesh of the coconut. This fat, although saturated, is very healthy and has a cooling effect on the body.
- Extra virgin coconut oil: it is pure and still has the typical taste and smell of coconut.
- Deodorised coconut oil: it is the result of a treatment or transformation process and has a neutral taste.

Flour and sugar

Coconut flour: once the coconut oil has been extracted from the coconut flesh, the remaining pulp can be ground into coconut flour.
Coconut blossom sugar: a full-flavoured, mineral-rich sugar that is made from the nectar of coconut blossoms.

I hope you can now see a bit more clearly.

Why is animal dairy unsuitable for many people?

Dairy products are unsuitable for the majority of the world’s human population, who experience moderate to severe digestive problems as a result. The result is abdominal pain, bloating of the intestine and sometimes diarrhoea. This phenomenon is called “lactose intolerance”. It is the so-called milk sugar or lactose that most people cannot digest, or cannot digest sufficiently. The phenomenon is described as an aberration, a deviation from a norm, but that is not at all true. It is part of the cultural myth surrounding milk.

It is the northernmost peoples who, over the course of history, had apparently adapted to digesting milk. That makes them something of an exception. That exception was then considered to be the norm after the Second World War.
But apart from that, about 80% of the world’s population is unable to digest the lactose in milk and milk products such as cheese. Being lactose intolerant is therefore not a disease, but simply the most normal thing in the world.

Why is deodorized coconut oil often cheaper than pure, undeodorized coconut oil?

Seems paradoxical, doesn’t it? The deodorized coconut oil undergoes an extra treatment, and still it is cheaper than the pure “extra virgin” coconut oil.
For the virgin coconut oil, only the better, fresh coconuts are used.
However, the deodorisation process also allows the use of coconuts of inferior quality. When the coconuts are harvested, the farmers pile them up in anticipation of processing. In the tropical climate, some of the nuts soon start to turn mouldy, which creates an unpleasant smell. With the deodorisation process (heating with steam), not only does the typical sweetish coconut smell disappear, but also the unpleasant odours of the mouldy nuts.

Undoubtedly the easiest vegan cake ever

What ingredients do you need?

This is how to prepare it:

An example for a vegan topping:

Do I need butter and eggs to bake cake?

Participate in our cooking classes:

Read more about plant-based nutrition and health:

Read more about yoga and yoga classes in Schaerbeek:

Sophisticated natural sweet

What ingredients do you need?

This is how to prepare them

Important tips for slicing the bananas:

Tip for making the date paste

Healthy sweet

Read more about plant-based nutrition and health:

Read more about yoga and yoga classes in Schaerbeek:

Light and healthy

What ingredients do you need?

This is how to prepare them

Is it preferable to eat raw or cooked food?

Read more about plant-based nutrition and health:

Read more about yoga and yoga classes in Schaerbeek:

Tropical sweet

What ingredients do you need?

This is how to prepare them:

Is all sweet equal before the law?

What is the true cost of imported tropical fruit?

Read more about plant-based nutrition and health:

Read more about yoga and yoga classes in Schaerbeek:

It’s the marinades that make the tofu

Oriental style marinade with peanut butter and sesame oil

Greek style marinade with olive oil and lemon

Spicy Mexican style marinade with chilli and paprika

This is how to proceed:

Nutritional info: white firm tofu from the brand The Hobbit, per 100g product.

Is fermented tofu better than regular tofu?

Read more about plant-based nutrition and health:

Read more about yoga and yoga classes in Schaerbeek:

A quick and easy cocoa treat

The ingredients for approx 10 pieces:

This is how to prepare them:

Read more about plant-based nutrition and health:

Read more about yoga and yoga classes in Schaerbeek:

A warming and invigorating smoothie

This is what you need:

Ready in the blink of an eye

More than just macro and micronutrients

Does modern science contradict traditional nutritional teachings?

Read more about plant-based nutrition and health:

Read more about yoga and yoga classes in Schaerbeek:

Little energy bombs

What do you need?

This is how you make the energy balls:

Approximate nutritional value of these energy balls, per 100g of product:

Calorie counting, does it make sense?

What is the right portion size for a meal?

Read more about plant-based nutrition and health:

Read more about yoga and yoga classes in Schaerbeek:

When beans become spreadable

For almost a kilo of bean paste you will need:

Preparation

This is how to cook the beans

This is how to prepare the vegetables

This is how to mix everything into bean puree

The endless variety of legumes

Are legumes easily digestible?

Can you eat legumes raw?

Coconut and co

What you need for this vegan panna cotta

How to prepare

What type of coconut product should you choose?

Milks and creams

The oil

Flour and sugar

Why is animal dairy unsuitable for many people?

Why is deodorized coconut oil often cheaper than pure, undeodorized coconut oil?