St. Patty and Peppermint Meet

Because it's a holiday, of sorts, it's definitely time to celebrate again. This time, I made a Peppermint Patty Ice-Cream with Vanilla Chocolate Sauce. I wanted to make something more economical (rather than the pricey cashews or young coconuts), so here's what I came up with...

Peppermint Almond Ice-Cream

1/2 can of organic coconut milk (see note below)

1 cup of soaked almonds (germinated overnight)

small handful of mild greens (to give a green color, you could use a green superfood too)

a few drops of pure peppermint extract (however strong you like it) and a few drops of pure vanilla essence

1/4 - 1/2 cup of raw honey (depending how sweet you like it)

2 TB of liquid coconut oil

Add all the ingredients, except the coconut oil, and blend in your Vita-Mix or high speed blender. Once blended, add the liquid coconut oil slowly. You may need to add a little nut milk, coconut milk, or water to thin it out a wee bit. Then put it in your ice-cream maker till it's done. Garnish with Vanilla Chocolate Sauce and raw cacao bits (which I forgot to adorn it with).

Vanilla Chocolate Sauce

1-2 TB of maple syrup or raw agave nectar

Several drops of vanilla

About 1 tsp of organic cocoa or carob powder

I thoroughly enjoyed it, but I must say...there's absolutely no way you can enjoy the "ice-cream" without the Vanilla Chocolate Sauce, it just would not taste right at all. The texture is a bit different than, say a cashew or macadamia and young coconut base, not completely silky smooth, but it's fun to have variety. ;0)

Today I got pinched by Anne-Marie because I wasn't wearing green, she was gracious enough to pinch lightly. I was going to go out for a morning jog and I was going to change when I got in...so now I'm in green. During the noon hour here, I went around and decorated any available family member with green four-leaf clover stickers. They have to have green somewhere on them, or there was a danger of pinching. Thankfully, I saved them from such a threat. I'm so proud of G and G (short for Grandma and Grandpa), they're wearing green in full force. They're so great. I gave them some of my extra green smoothie this morning. Grandma pushed her empty cup away and said, "That was SO good, thank-you!" She's so sweet.

Here's what I put in my Green Smoothie today (which ended up being a very pale green, but still, nonetheless, green, lol): celery, broccoli, bananas, sesame seeds, frozen fruit pieces, and water.

A note on canned coconut milk: Coconut milk is actually the only canned product that can be nutritionally recommended because it's not very heat sensitive and is a very stable product. It's not "raw", but is most certainly healthy. Nonetheless, if you're more comfortable with the raw version, make your own coconut milk, which is actually quite easily done. But if you do decide to use canned coconut milk once in a while, make sure it's organic and says "pure" or "whole" on it, not "lite". Do not buy Coconut Cream, this is different and inferior). There. That's my two-bits on canned coconut milk.