Yoga, Health, and Wellness Articles + Recipes

I love mushrooms. LOVE! All kinds of mushrooms, but especially those I can pick myself from woods. In Estonia, we have a lot of forests, and unless the area is marked as private property, we are allowed to forage for whatever you like, as long as you act responsibly and do not leave any rubbish behind. I know that this is not the case all over the world, so I consider myself extremely lucky. For this year, the season of fresh mushrooms is, unfortunately, over, but simple button mushrooms work just perfectly for this recipe.

Eggplant is one of my all-time favorite vegetables. Added to curries, baked to moussaka, in baba ganoush or filled with all kinds of things from goats cheese to vegetables. Bring it on! I love it in any shape or form! Today I am sharing one of my favorite eggplant recipes with you. The recipe is vegan, but it is loaded with protein – both chickpeas and peanut butter help out here, and the spices add a nice kick too. Not all people love eggplant.

I have had a problem for a few months already, but it is one of those good problems – how to eat all the beautiful produce I get?! In Estonia summers are rather short, which means that most of the crop is at its best at the same time – zucchini, tomatoes, cucumber, kale, you name it! And, even if I have my rooftop garden, my mother’s garden and my grandmother's garden, I still also like to go to the farmers market too, because, well, I love going to the market to look at the abundance of produce. I do need to hold myself back with shopping, though. I really really hate throwing away food and always try to eat everything from root to leaf, so I always try to make the most of everything I have. Oh, I wish I could somehow spread the harvest over the whole year! But I can’t, so this time of year my 5 portions of fruit and vegetables a day is easily 15 or 20 portions of fruit and veggies, and everything else has to wait until I run out (although I do miss lentils and pasta already).

Pumpkin pesto? Most of you probably think I am nuts since surely pesto is made out of basil, right? Well – yes, and I LOVE traditional pesto, but since I have grandparents who grow pumpkins and there always seems to be too many of them I need to get creative, and I promise you, pumpkin pesto is the next big thing! If possible, then I always recommend choosing smaller pumpkins, since they tend to have more flavor. My favorite is Hokkaido, which in addition to being ultra-tasty is also extremely high in protein. Just as the traditional pesto, my pumpkin pesto contains parmesan cheese. My diet is strongly plant-focused, but I am not vegan or even vegetarian, so I go for parmesan in this recipe, but if you prefer a vegan option, it can be substituted with nutritional yeast.

The autumn is slowly sneaking in here in Estonia, and for me, it always means some changes on my menu. I still love salads, but instead of leafy greens that are main heroes in my summer salads, they are now a little heartier. Hence barley in today’s delicious bowlful. Barley is somewhat a national food for us Estonians, or at least it used to be. It is traditionally cooked with potatoes and pork, and then lightly mashed to something called ‘Mulgipuder.’ Mulgipuder is often served with crispy fried pork fat (greaves in English, I think) and sour cream. I don’t even remember when was the last time I had it, but now thinking about it I just started graving it… Especially the leftovers heated up on a frying pan, so it turns nice and crispy… mmm! Talking about Estonian kitchens, it is traditionally a cross between German (sausages and sauerkraut) and Russian (potatoes, a lot of meat, soups) but today leaning more towards the clean Scandinavian kitchens. So here was a sneak peek to Estonian cuisine.

Today’s recipe is entirely free from refined sugar, but I promise than nobody will miss anything. The banana adds just enough sweetness, and the darker your bananas are, the sweeter they will be. Since I really hate food waste, I sometimes deliberately pick out the darkest bananas from the market, bring them home, slice and store them in the freezer to be used in smoothies, banana bread and in these little muffins. Sometimes I come home with a full box of bananas because they look so sad on the counter and otherwise they would be just thrown out in the evening. So I sometimes think about myself as a banana savior. Since I love overripe bananas it is a very simple saving job for me, so win-win. In addition to being sugar-free these little nuggets here are also wheat-free and if you choose gluten free oats even gluten-free. Preparing these muffins could not be any easier, and the most time-consuming part is swirling in the peanut butter on top of the muffins. For me, these extra swirls are 100% worth the effort, but you can skip this to save an extra 5 minutes of your time.

Truffles are usually heavy on cream, butter and maybe even some extra sugar in addition to chocolate that is already sweet on its own. But not these truffles! My truffles are as delicious and creamy as their unhealthy brothers are, but at the same time, completely vegan and I would even go as far as calling them healthy! Of course, they are only healthy if consumed in reasonable amounts and not all 20 of them in one sitting ☺. For me, they are just rich enough that 1 or 2 after a meal with a nice cup of tea are just sufficient to satisfy my sweet cravings. A bonus is that they only require two ingredients + whatever you choose to coat them with. Can you guess what the components are? The first one is a no-brainer – dark chocolate just has to be involved when talking about truffles. The darker, the better, I always prefer 80%, but you can test with different ones to find your favorite. The other ingredient is my old favorite – avocado! Avocado is just such a versatile fruit – it is good both in savory and sweet dishes and gives everything a luscious creaminess. Just try to find the one that is just ripe – soft enough, but not overly ripe yet. A small trick on how to find the best avocado – choose the one that is soft to the touch, but if you remove the stem, you can still see the bright green color. Chocolate Avocado Truffles

I love all the fresh summer food and the feeling of picking fresh herbs straight from my balcony. I live in the middle of the city, in Estonia, but I am fortunate to have a huge balcony, so I grow all kinds of edible plants myself - fresh lettuce, parsley, peas, dill, basil, and even courgettes and tomatoes. I promise you – it is worth your time because they taste so much better than store-bought veggies and are always extra fresh. This year my basil is going strong, and I have already made several patches of pesto and used the leaves in at least 30 spring rolls. Today I a sharing a recipe that features asparagus with lemon-basil crumb, but the same crumb would also work very well with cauliflower.

It is so simple to pick up a jar of hummus from a store. But it is almost as simple to prepare hummus yourself and know exactly what has been added. You can do everything from scratch, including soaking and boiling the chickpeas, but I usually don’t feel this is necessary. The chickpeas from a jar, especially if I choose an organic brand, do it for me, but in case you do have extra time you can soak the chickpeas overnight and then boil until tender. It makes sense for me to cook your own chickpeas if you need a lot of them, so I sometimes do this for bigger parties, but if I am just hungry for a quick beet hummus I prefer having it in 5 minutes instead of the next day! However, I do prefer to roast the beetroots at home. I do this quite often anyway, so I usually have leftovers for hummus too.

These type of cakes are often called vegan cheesecakes, but I call these cakes strawberry cakes, because that’s what they are. The preparation of the cake is relatively simple, but you need to be patient because you need to wait for the cashews to soak and then the cake to set. You also need a very good blender to get the consistency nice and smooth. Once you have the cake ready, you can just keep this in the freezer and thaw it whenever you have unexpected guests or merely overwhelming feeling that you want something sweet. And as far as the sweets go – for the cake it is healthy too! Vegan Summer Strawberry Cheese Cake

There must be thousands of banana bread recipes out there in the world, but I still feel the need to share another one. I have been looking for a good plant-based recipe for a long time, but all the recipes I found always contained a load of added sugar or preparing a flax egg or something third I didn’t like, so I figured out that I don’t follow any recipes and figure out my own recipe instead. This is not the first time I just decide to wing it, and I must admit that I am not very good at following other peoples’ recipes anyway. Even if I choose to follow a recipe, I still somehow manage to switch up half the ingredients and change all the amounts. This is also, why I decided to get blogging years ago, to keep track of the recipes that work for me – with all the changes I always made I wasn’t able to remember anymore which changes I had made and which ones actually worked. Because not all the changes work, especially when baking. Back to winging it – this doesn’t necessarily always work either.

Have you ever met somebody who does not like chocolate? I remember meeting one girl who was not fond of it years ago, but this is also the only time I have seen anybody who does not like it. As a general rule, every dessert that has chocolate in it vanishes from the table within minutes. Chocolate in itself is not unhealthy at all. Having a little square of dark chocolate a day even has proven health benefits. However, the chocolate really needs to be dark to be healthy. Most of the chocolate bars, loaded with sugar and different additives, do not qualify as healthy. I usually choose the chocolate that contains at least 75%, sometimes even more than 90% of cocoa! The chocolate mousse, usually, is full of everything unhealthy – heavy cream and white sugar. But here is good news – the recipe I share with you today only contains ingredients good for you and I let you be the judge of the taste, but in my humble opinion, it is just perfect.

Sometimes the simplest meals are the best, and this bowl full of goodness is a perfect example. The recipe is even simpler to prepare when you have cooked your soba noodles in advance. I often cook a larger batch of chickpeas, lentils, or rice over the weekend and then use throughout the week for my meals. I would never consider cooking pasta in advance, because pasta cooked yesterday…. well, it is just not very nice. Soba noodles, on the other hand, work very well cooled down and in fact, I sometimes deliberately cook soba in advance for chilled salads on hot summer days. It is important not to overcook the soba and mix it with a drop of oil, so the noodles would not stick together. For this recipe, however, you do not need to chill the noodles – they are just as good warm.

If you ever need to change somebody’s opinion about cauliflower, then this is the recipe for it. It is crispy, spicy, sticky, and delicious. Of course, you can adjust the spiciness level according to your taste, but I love the spice, and I have listed the amounts of chili I used. The sauce is one of the things that makes the dish enjoyable and gives it a lot of flavor, but the most essential part is the crispy-battered cauliflower itself. The secret in the batter is vodka! Don’t worry, there will be no alcohol left after frying, but it gives the batter extra crispiness that can stand the sauce and will not be soaked within 5 minutes. In fact, since I had some leftovers the last time I cooked this dish, then I had it for breakfast the next day, and it was still crispy in some parts, even after standing in the fridge overnight. I always love to serve steamed rice with this cauliflower, but it is also good on its own as a snack. Crispy Cauliflower in a Sweet & Spicy Sauce

I challenge you to find a simpler recipe than this cucumber soup! With a beautiful summery weather spending long hours in the kitchen is not my idea of a good time. I’d rather spend it out enjoying the sun, hiking, cycling, doing yoga or just reading a good book. At the same time, I refuse to lower my food standards just because I don’t want to spend too much time cooking. And this is precisely the type of recipe that is quick, seasonal, healthy and super delicious! Just perfect for warm weather. As a bonus, it is also light on calories, so you don’t need to feel guilty having a dessert after! I always like to decorate my food, but this is, of course, not required. If you don’t feel like playing around with balling avocado, slicing cucumber super thinly or organizing edible flowers neatly, this is absolutely fine, but I still recommend to cube up some cucumber for some texture.

Today’s recipe is Asian inspired, but I couldn’t point a finger to an specific country, and I didn’t use any other recipe for a basis. Instead, I just opened the fridge door, found some beautiful mushrooms and my meal pretty much started to develop itself. It often happens to me that I just get creative based on the ingredients I have at hand. A tiny bit from here, something from there, soy sauce and chili make everything tasty anyway, and just like that, a beautiful meal is ready in no time and struggle. This system of mine usually works out nicely, and often the recipes turn out so good that I feel the urge to share them with others. The mushroom dish I share with you today is one of my favorites lately. Since I first made it a few weeks ago, I have cooked it for two more times. Once using champignons so I can peacefully say that they are good in this recipe too, but my personal preference is still shitakes since they have a little more bite and chew to them. The crispiness of the mushrooms is really enjoyable with the slightly sweet and spicy sauce, but as always if crispiness meets sauce – have the people waiting for the food and not the other way around – otherwise the meal will still be delicious, but you will lose the texture. Gorgeously Sticky Asian Mushrooms

I have to admit that my love for kale is growing every day! It is delicious plain straight from the garden (did you know that you can even grow kale on your window sill!?), in salads, roasted to crispy deliciously healthy chips or sautéed – just bring it on and I love it. I did not imagine that I could love these dark green leaves so much as a kid, but I am fortunate to have a rather healthy palate these days. Of course, this also has a lot to do with habits. Somebody who is used to have a hot dog for breakfast, burger for lunch and pizza for dinner would most probably not love this salad immediately, but it is possible to train your taste buds to like healthier foods. Just start with a few healthier choices and soon you realize that salads are actually delicious and real food that you cooked yourself is always better for you than take-out! Cheaper too! Talking about this salad warm Kale & Chickpea Salad recipe here – this is a real 15-minute meal that doesn’t require any cooking skills or fancy equipment and the ingredient list is relatively short.

My recipes are usually very straightforward and quick, only containing a few ingredients and not many steps. For me, the current recipe categorizes under simple recipes too, but it does require quite many steps, especially if you also decide to prepare your own sauce and haven’t precooked the lentils in advance. I usually cook a large batch of lentils, chickpeas or beans over the weekend and then use them during the week in different recipes – it is an excellent way to save time during the busy working week and always prefer cooking my own legumes over the canned versions. Talking about the canned versions, this recipe uses quite an unusual ingredient that is canned because it is difficult if not even impossible to get fresh one outside of Asia. I am talking about the king of fruits – jackfruit! Jackfruit is a huge fruit mostly grown in South-East Asia, and I fell in love with it in Asia.

Winter is the time of the year we tend to stay inside more compared to warmer periods. Staying inside often also means moving less and at the same time, winter dishes tend to be heavier. Good food is my passion, no question about it, but staying fit and healthy is something I am passionate about as well. This means that I always try to figure out smarter recipes that taste amazing but are good for me. It´s all about balance and the recipe I am going to share with you today is a perfect example of healthy food that definitely does not lack flavor! These little red parcels here are perfect as a side dish or even a vegetarian main. They look awesome on the dinner table and are rather healthy and balanced due to the protein in the quinoa. Red Onions with Quinoa Filling