Banana-dark-chocolate-granola from #LifeIsMessyKitchen

I look forward to weekends because when the boy is around the house I can take the time to go back to the kitchen and make recipes that are just a tiny bit more laborious or, even if easy, take a little bit more attention (like checking the oven every 8 minutes).

This weekend I was really excited to try Mayi's Maple syrup-dark-chocolate-banana granola. It was actually relaxing to spend Sunday morning in my pijamas, calmly concentrated in chopping nuts, mixing liquids and then waiting like a child for magic to happen in the oven.

This recipe comes from Mayi Carles and her amazing team's new cooking book: Life is Messy Kitchen. It is full of Mayi's beautiful, funny illustrations and has been fully photographed by Marcela Macias, one of my first-ever "internet" friends who has been with me during hard and happy times. I  first found her travel-blog, 'Diario de una Trotamundos' (bring it back!!), from which she switched to 'The Celebration Girl' which has fully blossomed and inspired her to launch her photography business.* The book is full of mostly vegetarian, some raw, recipes from lunch, to dinner, breakfast, snacks or sauces and is all about making healthy eating fun and delicious.

So, on to the recipe, you will need:

3 cups rolled oats
1/2 cup almonds
1/2 cup pecans
1/2 cup pumpkin seeds
1/2 cup coconut flakes
a pinch of salt
1/4 cup + 1 spoon maple syrup
1/4 cup + 1 spoon coconut oil (melted)
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 ripe bananas (mashed)
1/2 cup dark chocolate (chopped)

What to do: 

Preheat oven to 400 F (~ 200ºC). Chop the almonds (or be lazy and buy them sliced), pecans and cashews. In a large bowl mix the oats, almonds, chopped pecans and cashews, pumpkin seeds, coconut flakes and salt. In a separate bowl, mix the melted coconut oil, maple syrup, vanilla extract and bananas. Next, mix the dry ingredients with the wet until everything is homogenous. Prepare a baking tray with baking paper and spread the granola mixture flat and even. Bake for 25 minutes, checking it at 8 minute intervals where you need to take out the granola and turn it around. Bring it out of the oven and let it cool completely before adding the chocolate and storing into air-tight containers. Voilà, you are ready to enjoy! We've been having it for breakfast and it is delicious. It would make for excellent homemade holiday presents too!

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*I want to make clear that this is not a sponsored post. I jumped at the chance to be one of Mayi's book launch ambassadors because I really admire her work, her happy spirit, her contagious joy and her "nobody-is-going-to-stop-me" attitude.


And I will promote loud and clear any and all work of Marcela, but I am not even sure it is necessary, her photos speak for themselves. If you would like to see a sneak peek of the book, here it is. 

They took away the tree

There was a tree right in front of our window. I loved to see it go through the seasons, from being bare naked during the winter months, to getting the first buds of green sprouts that signaled that better, longer, lighter days were coming, to watching it blossom and flourish during the spring and summer before starting to lose its leaves again.

Last Thursday after I had finally settled Yu in her crib for a nap, I heard this really loud, screeching noise. I thought it was our new neighbors with a drill, they are fixing the house they just bought.

Then I realized the sound came from outside and when I looked through the window I saw.

There was a tractor with a huge saw and they were taking away the tree.

We did not get any notice from city hall informing us this would happen. I don't know if the neighbours did this, I do not know why the tree was taken. Maybe it was sick (it didn't look so), maybe it was tampering with sewage or the foundations of a building.

This makes me so sad. If I had known I would have tied myself to the tree like the girls of Virgin Suicides or Flipped (I really love that last movie).

Why would you take a healthy, happy treee that wasn't harming anyone, "my" tree.... our street looks so sad without it.



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Images via  here and here. 

Mi AIG llegó de Valencia (con horchata!)

 El viernes en la tarde mi esposo tomó el día libre, así es que yo aproveché para dormir un poco más (hemos tenido más de un par de noches difíciles). En cuanto la bebé decidió dormir, me fui yo también derechita a los brazos de Morfeo.

Entre sueños escuché el timbre y me pareció que Mark abría la puerta y firmaba por la recepción de un paquete.

En efecto, cuando desperté estaba ahí una enorme caja de cartón y al ver que había sido enviada desde España (de Valencia, en concreto), supe que sí, que era mi AIG (Amigo Invisible Gastronómico). Muchas gracias Adi, de Dulce y Azucarado.

En ese momento teníamos que salir, pero yo muerta de la curiosidad me fui con todo y caja y aproveche para ir abriendo el paquete en el coche. Fue muy divertido porque Adi empacó todo muy bien.

Como ir destapando una serie de muñecas rusas, dentro de la caja de cartón había un paquete azul en una bolsa de plástico, y dentro del paquete azul una caja de flores rosas y lilas, también envuelta en plástico.  Luego ya, dentro de la caja de flores, los regalitos,  envueltos individualmente!

Cada regalito fue elegido con mucho cuidado, y de verdad que Adi acertó en todo:

-un paquete de concentrado para prepara horchata de chufa
-una latita metálica de búhos llena de mazapán casero de almendras. Estaba delicioso, tanto, que no ha salido en las fotos, nos lo comimos rapidísimo.
-un molde de silicón para formar flores y guías en fondant
-unos moldecitos, también de silicón para cupcakes en forma de tacitas de té.
-un libro de decoración de tartas en fondant.
-auténtica chufa de Valencia
-una carta muy linda donde me enteró de pequeños detalles como que Adi y su esposo comparten la casa con un gato y dos hurones y que colaboran con la sociedad protectora de animales. Además de que también les encanta viajar y cocinar.

Muchísimas gracias por todo, de verdad que me ha hecho mucha ilusión. Me tendré que apurar a preparar auténtica horchata (me recuerda tanto mis días por Barcelona) y algún que otro postre, me has dado la idea de probar un flan con sabor a horchata. Digo que me tendré que apurar porque mi esposo es un goloso y es capaz de tomarse el jarabe tal cual.

A mí me ha tocado enviar un paquete hasta Tenerife, a Cristian del blog Arandabuesa. Si tienen curiosidad de ver lo que he enviado, aquí está su entrada.

De nuevo muchas, muchas gracias a Jess (de Decogalletas) por organizar el intercambio, es genial poder participar cada año en estas iniciativas que demuestran que esto del internet no es un lugar de aislamiento antisocial, sino todo, todo lo contrario.

World Prematurity Day

When our dear daughter was born 6 weeks early, it took us completely by surprise. The hospital bag wasn't ready, we hadn't yet put on the plastic mattress protector on our bed, my mom still had to arrive and I had big plans for washing her clothes and preparing all kinds of food to be frozen. She didn't have socks or a towel and we had no diapers.

All of those things and the ones I don't remember ended up being secondary and not very important (except for my mom, who was able to change her flight and arrive 3 weeks earlier than planned).

But the excellent medical care baby Y. received during the first three weeks of her life was crucial and we will forever be grateful for every neonatologist, pediatrician, nurse, lactation expert and staff member of the hospital where she was born. The support we received, the patience when answering to my endless questions, the knowledge and savoir-faire when it came to her first days is something we can never thank them enough for.

Today is World Prematurity Day. I thought I would share some information, only raising awareness will more babies be saved.

 

For some reason I can not set the infographics to appear larger, but if you follow these links you will be able to read them:  National Premmie Foundation and BioMedCentral

Motherhood: hypocrisy edition

Motherhood has changed me in many deep ways .

One of the aspects that has changed the most in me, hand-in-hand with the fierce will to protect our daughter, is an almost fundamentalism when it comes to food.
 
I've read, I've watched documentaries, I consider myself well-informed. We try to eat healthy food most of the time, but we also love our sugar, our salt, our dairy products, our meat.

We do get organic products whenever possible and we are on a mostly (70%) vegetarian diet. We do not buy pre-cooked or frozen meals and we try to avoid fast food. There is no ketchup in the house (at this moment).

And yet, when it comes to the child I have the tendency to become extreme.

We do not give her products that contain sugar. At some point the health center recommended "baby cookies" but I still refuse to give her those because they contain high fructose syrup. I make all of her food at home, we avoid salt (as her kidneys are still immature and can't process it yet); we do not, except on very rare exceptional situations, get her baby food in pots. I haven't dared to give her ham or other curated meats yet because nitrates are a known carcinogenic factor. She has had some yoghurt and cheese, but in small quantities. I still have trouble getting my head around the new tendencies that say dairy products, and particularly milk, are not the perfect product I was taught (The Harvard school of Public Health and Medical School have excluded dairy products from their daily dietary recommendations). Breaking paradigms is hard.

I know very well I can not protect her from everything, and that very fast she will be exposed to all kinds of risks and dangers. It is life. I can not attempt to keep her pure, perfect and sheltered. And while I have all these strong feelings regarding food, particularly, I sit there with her eating cake while she eats her vegetables, oh the hypocrisy.**

Has motherhood changed you in ways that you did not expect?

**(while at the same time my feeling of self, of who I am, remains intact).
** (I won't be able to do that for long though, because these days she tends to steal whatever it is I am eating. Which I guess is a good thing because she is forcing us to make better choices).

No-sew Twink & Rainbow Brite costumes

Rainbow Brite was always one of my favorite cartoons growing up. I probably still have a doll somewhere at home. I used to love it when I was 5. So when I saw this Twink (Rainbow Brite's white little fluffy helper) costume tutorial, I knew I had to give it a try. It is just, so cute. This is the reason people have babies!

Via PinkSuedeShoes Twink costume tutorial

 Unfortunately the instructions were not as easy as I thought... the "easy" tutorial asked for an actual pattern and a a sewing machine! Really? I was not able to make curtains, and I certainly do not have  the time or concentration to figure out how to sew right now.  But, the post did inspire me to find a way to make this happen.

One of the presents baby Y. received from one of our dear friends is a fluffy, hooded, white vest. I thought it would do the trick, so I tried. Next was getting rainbow- babylegs. I searched all over, but most companies would not ship them to Europe and I didn't find them anywhere in the Netherlands. I didn't give up, though, and I finally found a shop that would send them to us (and provided great customer-service too!).

Next I got some colourful foam sheets and pipecleaners and I was all set. I just made the blue belt, pocket, rainbow and stars for the antennae from the foam, and I attached everything together with double-sided tape and safety-pins.

Of course I wanted to be Rainbow-Brite as well, so I went on and fulfilled a life-long dream of getting bright orange hair and wore a blue-dress. I could have looked for rainbow leg-warmers for my arms and legs, and maybe with some red sneakers or even moon-boots it'd have  looked a lot better, but here we are. A super cute costume with material that I had laying around the house: scissors, tape, cardboard, a red onesie, red socks, a blue dress, and the white vest.

This might be my favorite Halloween (though admitedly not very scary) disguise ever. Did you dress-up this Halloween?