Candied Pecans

I have been making these pecans for about 2 years now (this year will be the 3rd year I've made them). I was first introduced to them by a roommate of mine from college who was making them as Christmas gifts and I thought this was a genius idea as it's something completely different. The first couple of times I made them I used real white sugar (Shock! Horror!). I have now adapted the recipe so that it is clean and even Paleo friendly. 

Chocolate Sea Salt Caramels

Chocolate, sea salt and caramel are one of my absolute favourite flavour combinations. I have a severe weakness in shops when I see anything with salted caramel on the label! I have come up with these absolutely sinful (not really) chocolate covered salted caramels that would make a great after dinner treat, or even a great Christmas present for someone special. Keep an eye out for an upcoming post I have on Edible Homemade Christmas Gifts. 

Pecan and Raisin Christmas Cake

I have to admit I'm not the biggest fan of Christmas cake, as I find it too dense and I'm not a fan of food with alcohol in it. But I do love the idea of a cake at Christmas, so I thought I would make a clean version that would suit my taste, but still have all the flavours of Christmas with the spices, nuts and dried fruit.

Cooks Academy Celebrates 10 years with Pixels and Palates event

I was invited to the Cooks Academy 10th Birthday celebrations in their school on South William Street in Dublin last night. It was a great event with presentations from Socialmedia.ie on how to grow your followers and Rachel and Brian from Nobó, an Irish dairy free ice cream, spoke about how they have developed from a very small start-up, and from tomorrow, will be available in every SuperValu across Ireland. Allan Dixon who won the competition for the best job in the world for Tourism Australia gave a presentation about Instagram and how to engage users through photos.

Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars with Sea Salt

I remember making some amazing Peanut Butter Squares from the ever-fabulous Nigella Lawson's "How to be a Domestic Goddess" book, which I have to say is one of my favourite cook books. I decided to try and make a healthy version as Nigella's called for copious amounts of icing sugar and dark muscovado sugar. Peanut butter and chocolate are one of my favourite combinations and with the addition of some flaked sea salt you have me sold!

If you aren't a fan of peanut butter (I don't think there are many of you out there though!) feel free to try this with almond butter or any other nut butters. 

Buckwheat Crepes

Crepes are something that I used to associate with having copious amounts of Nutella and sugar with (yes - on the same crepe - the sugar added a nice crunch to the smooth Nutella). However, now that I am trying to eat cleaner and cut down on processed foods, I thought why should I have to miss out on this deliciousness - so I came up with my very own healthy crepe recipe. 

Buckwheat comes from the same family as rhubarb, believe it or not, and it is not considered to be a grain or cereal. It contains no wheat so is technically gluten-free, however you will need to ensure you buy buckwheat flour that is certified gluten-free if you have an allergy to it as cross-contamination can occur if it is processed in the same facility as wheat products. The brand of flour I happened to use (Dove Farms) is not certified as gluten-free so there may be traces of gluten in it. 

Scrumptious Carrot Cake

Apologies for the lack of blogging and recipes lately. I kinda lost my groove there for a little while but don't worry -  I'm back with a delicious recipe for clean carrot cake, icing and all! This cake is full of flavour with all the aromatic spices and the tangy icing. It makes for a great afternoon tea treat or a delightful dessert. 

Perfect Protein Pancakes

After a workout, it is very important to eat a good serving of protein – I aim for about 20-30g but this will differ for everyone depending on your height, weight, intensity of your workout, your goals. It is important to eat protein after a workout in order for your muscles to recover - essentially during a workout what you are doing is tearing your muscles, and protein helps repair them. This is a more interesting (and delicious!) way of getting your protein in, rather than just having a shake or some chicken.

Sunshine Lemon Drizzle Cake

I love a good Lemon Drizzle Cake. What spurred me on to make this was that my Mum had actually bought one from Marks and Spencer's and I thought to myself - I can make a better one that isn't packed full of sugar but still bursting with that zingy lemon flavour. Well, let's just say my Mum will never be buying a lemon drizzle cake from Marks and Spencer's again!

Sweet Saturday Fries

Sweet potatoes are a great alternative to regular white potatoes. They are packed with vitamins and minerals and offer over 400% of your RDA of vitamin A; they also contain more vitamin C and fibre and contain less calories and carbohydrates than regular white potatoes. 

There are so many ways of cooking sweet potatoes but for this recipe I will be making fries; baked not fried! I also made an absolutely delicious garlic "mayo" to go with them.

Eating Breakfast like a King/Queen

Breakfast is the most important meal of the 
day, so important in fact that I have two breakfasts on weekdays. I drink a protein shake or a protein coffee while getting ready for work, and then I eat my proper breakfast when I get into the office, which is usually oatmeal, Greek yoghurt and fruit or something along those lines. I keep a bag of quick oats in my desk drawer that I can just quickly make into oatmeal. I usually bring in some type of fruit to add on top or to have on the side. I am going to share with you some of my favourite breakfasts and show you that you can very easily make a quick breakfast that is healthy.

There are many reasons why eating breakfast is important; firstly, there is scientific evidence that those who eat a healthy balanced breakfast everyday weigh less than those who skip breakfast. Another reason is that it gives you energy for the rest of the day. I try to go by the motto “Breakfast like a King, lunch like a Prince and dine like a Pauper”. I follow this motto loosely and generally try to have a pretty decent breakfast.

Chocolate Chip Blondies

A lot of my treats recently have been 'raw' and since I am a very keen baker, I wanted to share with you some of my baking. I absolutely LOVE blondies and brownies, well actually any kind of cakes and cookies really, but trying to make 'clean' versions can be tricky and takes some experimenting. This recipe has a very strange ingredient as one of the main ingredients, but just go with me on this one... it works and you can't taste them at all once the blondies are baked.

Peach Fro-Yo

I finally got to test out our new ice cream machine and let me tell you it is quite amazing! We had some delicious ripe peaches so I thought I would try making a peach frozen yoghurt. Peaches are one of my favourite summer fruits. 

Foodie Tour of Dublin

Myself and my mum decided to do our own little foodie tour in Dublin this weekend. There have been a few places I have been wanting to try and so we went to a few of them this weekend. Our tour included visiting the market in Temple Bar, lunch in Staple Foods, and fro-yo in Yogism while also visiting some other establishments such as health food stores and a delightful chocolate shop.

Low Carb Granola

I had been wanting to make a low-carb version of granola for a while and have seen a couple of other blogs make it so I thought I would give it a go and this is what I have come up with. When I was putting this recipe together I was thinking what can I replace the oats with to make it low-carb and so I had a look in my pantry and kind of just threw together some ingredients I thought would work and just hoped for the best and as you can see from the photo below it turned out pretty good. It is quite easy to switch up the flavours; you can add any kind of nuts or dried fruit to it you want.

Blueberry Protein Muffins

I have wanted to experiment with making protein muffins for a while and I had some blueberries in the fridge that needed to be used up so I thought why not make blueberry protein muffins. These would make an excellent afternoon snack or even a great on-the-go breakfast. 

Coconut Truffles

Since my original chocolate truffle recipe was such a hit, I decided to make a variation on them with coconut. Think chocolate Bounty Bar kind of flavour. Now I actually don't like Bounty Bars themselves but the Grandma of a friend of mine makes the most awesome coconut balls but they have a ridiculous amount of icing sugar and sweetened condensed milk in them, so that I just had to try and make a clean version of them with some added chocolate - because I am just such a chocolate lover. Everything is better with chocolate!

Caramel Millionaire Squares

Ingredients:

Base

200g dates

135g raw cashews

120g ground almonds

Caramel

150g dates

140g Nuts N More Toffee Crunch Peanut Butter

2 tbsp honey or agave syrup

Chocolate

150g dark chocolate (I used 74% cocoa solids)

Chocolate Truffles

This is my version of healthy chocolate truffles, and if I hadn't told you they were healthy before you tasted them there is no way you would believe me! I have to say I think these may be my best invention yet!

The 3 Day Juice Detox

I have been curious about juice cleanses for a while now and had been humming and hawing about whether I should do it or not. My sister did one back in January and I think that’s where my curiosity began. There is so much hype and talk about juice cleanses both good and bad, but I think unless you have actually experienced it you can’t say one way or the other so that’s why I finally decided to take the plunge and do it!

Photo from Pure Green

'Clean' in Capri

I know I haven’t written a post in a couple of weeks but work has been pretty busy and then I was on holidays with my family for my Dad’s birthday. Myself, my sister and my parents jetted off to the lovely Island of Capri just off the coast of Naples, Italy. It was an amazing trip with lots of delicious food, relaxation, great weather, family time and some great walks with the most spectacular views. It really was breath-taking.

Some of my Favourite Clean Eating Foods Part 2

Following on from my post last week (find last weeks post here), I will continue with some of my favourite clean eating foods. This time it's about foods I use for baking, cooking or as a quick nutritional boost to add to things. 

Chia Seeds

I use chia seeds as a way of adding some fibre and healthy fats into my diet. They also have the added benefit of making you feel fuller for longer as they expand when mixed with liquid. I find them a great addition to porridge or yoghurt. 

They don't really have a taste and you only need to add about 1 tsp to get the benefits. Each tsp is only around 20 calories. If you don't like the texture of seeds, they come in a milled variety which is more of a fine powder. 

Some of my Favourite Clean Eating Foods Part 1

I'm going to share some of favourite clean food finds and how I use them. These are some of the foods I use as a way of keeping my healthy and clean eating in check when I am craving something sweet! I have split this into two separate posts, the first is my treats and the second is some things I like to use in cooking. 

Nut Butters

I have to admit I am a bit of a spread fanatic… my cupboard is full of all different kinds of spreads, some clean and some not clean, but its all about moderation - right? Here is my infamous spread collection... and I am always on the hunt for new spreads so if anyone has any they would like to tell me about please do!

Cinnamon Maple Pecan Butter

I love pecans, and I love cinnamon and I love maple syrup so I thought one day why not combine them all and make a nut butter out of them. Pecans are not the cheapest nuts to buy but are totally worth the expensive price tag. I got mine in Lidl for €2.99 for 200g. Since you will be grinding them in a food processor, you can buy broken pecan pieces rather than halves which may be cheaper as they aren't as aesthetically pleasing as the pretty looking halves.

Asian Pork Lettuce Wraps

We all love wraps and stuffing things in between bread, but if you are trying to eat lighter or low carb, using lettuce as the wrap is a great option. To be honest it's the filling I want to eat and the wrap is just the tool to get it into my mouth, so using lettuce works just great for this. Romaine or Baby Gem lettuce are the best types to use as they hold their shape and form a cup like shape so it holds the filling quite well. 

CleaNutButter Cups

Peanut butter and chocolate have to be one of the best combinations on this planet. I just love the mix of salty and sweet together. I have always wanted to try making my own peanut butter cups and have previously made peanut butter squares but they had copious amounts of icing sugar, and all sorts of other 'bad' things! So this time I tried my hand at making a 'clean' version and with only four ingredients, they could not have been easier. And with no cooking, apart from using a microwave, they are super quick and easy to make!

8 Tips for Clean Eating

I have put together a short list of tips that helped me to eat cleaner and become healthier. I have put the most important tip at the top, as this is key to eating cleaner. Even if you only follow one of these tips - make it the first one!

A good way to start your clean eating regime is to follow a couple of the tips below, adding in a new one each week for 8 weeks, and by the end of 8 weeks you will be eating clean!

8 Tips for Clean Eating:

1.   Cut down on processed foods, if you don’t recognise an ingredient, chances are your body won’t either.

2.   Cook from scratch where possible using fresh, natural ingredients.

An Alternative to Pasta and Fries - Courgette Noodles and Courgette Fries

I have recently begun trying to lower my intake of carbohydrates, particularly processed white carbs. I found this difficult because I love pasta and potato fries so when I came across the idea of using different vegetables in place of these foods, I was very eager to experiment with some recipes. I have played around with a few different ingredients, and so far, my favourite vegetable to use as a carb replacement is the courgette (or zucchini to American folk).  I have made both noodles and fries in this way and both recipes are very quick and easy to make; they really don’t require much more effort than cooking the real thing.

Going Greek

When I began trying to eat cleaner, I was always looking for alternatives to things like cream, mayonnaise, ice cream and other creamy high fat foods. After living in the US for 3 years, I found that Greek Yoghurt was very popular and so easily available, so I gave it a try and I absolutely loved it, I ate it with everything: for breakfast with fruit and cereal, in smoothies, salad dressings, dips, and even as a way to make pasta sauce creamy again! I had found the solution to my love for all things creamy!!

Clean Nutella

I will freely admit to having a very strong liking to a certain chocolate hazelnut spread, but as I am trying to eat cleaner I wanted to see if I could make my own 'clean' version. And if I do say so myself, I think this 'clean' version is pretty awesome and I think it only fair to share the recipe. 

I wish I could say that this photo is of me, but it is just a very cute baby eating Nutella. 

My Quest to Clean

This is my first ever blog, started at the request of some friends (you know who you are) as I seem to be coming up with healthy alternatives to foods that we all love but aren’t exactly great for us. I enjoy cooking, baking and developing new recipes and that is what this blog will be about; my journey to eat as clean as possible and to help others do the same along the way. I am by no means a clean eating freak, and do enjoy foods such as chocolate, cakes and all those delicious things, but I do enjoy experimenting with cooking and baking and finding alternative ways to make a dish healthy and clean.