Turkey burger

We survived! Christmas and New Year are behind us- hooray! Our Christmas was 2 days of non stop eating, family, fun and water! We packed up after Boxing day and headed to the beach (hence my quiet blogosphere!) 

beach fro

New Years morning at the beach

'shameless selfie' 

Get in ma belly

 

 We had a wonderful time at the beach, eating fresh fish, shark, abalone and crayfish everyday. It was delicious! Nothing beats fresh seafood!









Anyway! Onto my turkey burger recipe! This is very simple, tasty and full of goodness to nourish your body post Xmas/ New Year festivities.... Perfect for a light dinner, and easily refrigerated for lunch the next day, so go ahead and make a double mix. It has a great mix of protein, carbohydrates and fats to perfectly fill your belly and keep you satisfied. Choose your own salads to go in your burger- anything tastes great (more tips below).

Turkey burger on a sweet potato 'bun' with seasonal salad and tahini dressing

Ingredients-

Turkey burger (makes 2 burgers)
300gms turkey mince
1/2 onion
1 clove of garlic
1 egg
1/2 carrot, grated
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon coriander
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
1/2 teaspoon paprika
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper (optional)
pinch of salt and pepper.
1/2 teaspoon chia seeds ground in mortar a pestle

sesame seeds and poppy seeds to top the burgers.

Feel free to mix up the spices- add extra or omit, depending on your taste.

Sweet potato 'bun'
1 sweet potato, cut into 5mm discs.
1 teaspoon of melted coconut oil to coat

Tahini dressing
1 tablespoon of tahini (sesame paste)
1 teaspoon of lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon of water
sprinkle of cayenne pepper (optional)
Mix all together until well combine. Add more water if too thick.

Method.

Preheat oven to 180'
Coat sweet potato in coconut oil, place on lined oven tray and pop in oven for 40min
Meanwhile, make your turkey burgers-

Turkey burger
In a small pan, cook onion and garlic until soft. Put onion and garlic mix in a large bowl and add all other ingredients. Combine well.
With slightly wet hands, shape into two round burger patties with flat tops
Place on an oven tray lined with baking paper/ silpat mat.
Top with sesame seeds and poppy seeds.
After 20min have gone by on the oven, pop your turkey patties into the oven. At the same time, remove, flip, and return your sweet potato discs to the oven.

Once time is up (20 min) check your patties are cooked through (please adjust depending on your own oven) remove and plate up sweet potato on the bottom followed by salad/veggies of your choice, turkey burger then a big dollop of tahini dressing. Sprinkle with nuts if you like (I used activated pepitas in the picture)

On my burgers I had grilled zucchini (i used the same pan as the onion and garlic was cooked on), tomato, avocado and spinach, but you can put what ever you like (think cucumber, beetroot, or even some sweet mango, avo and mint goes deliciously with spicy foods)
My garden is over flowing with zucchini and tomatoes so they go in everything I eat at the moment!

Enjoy

Clair xx

Sneaky vegetable salad with spiced chicken

Sneaky vegetable salad with spiced chicken
This salad tastes so good, you'll forget that it's packed with vegetables full of delicious nutrient to nourish your body and soul.
Inspired by the veggies I had just picked from my garden and some delicious tahini I had the previous night, I threw them all together and the result was mouth watering!
Freshly picked baby kale, broccoli, beetroot, lemon and spring onion out of my garden, adding in some carrot and pear for sweetness and the tahini for a creamy nutty dressing is delicious.
For all you vegetarians, you can easily omit the chicken, or replace with tofu coated in the same spices. 

Salad

Kale leaves, (baby ones if possible, or else massage leaves until soft, see tip below). If you can't get your hands on kale, baby spinach would suffice. About 1 cup chopped.

1/4 beetroot

1 small carrot

1/4 pear

1/4 head of broccoli, 

1 whole broccoli stem

1 spring onion

1 tablespoon lemon juice

Chicken

1 chicken breast (either whole, or chop it up into bite sized pieces)

1/2 teaspoon cumin

1/4 teaspoon paprika

1/8 teaspoon cayane pepper (omit if you can't handle hot spices)

1/4 teaspoon ground corriander seeds

1 teaspoon coconut flour

salt and pepper to taste

coconut oil for cooking.

Dressing

1 tablespoon Tahini

1/8 teaspoon cayanee pepper

1/4 teaspoon cumin

1/4 teaspoon paprika

1/2 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil

salt and pepper to taste 

Prepare salad

Cut stem off broccoli and put aside, then cut up the head into very small florets. Steam for 2-3 min, remove from steamer, put in bowl of cold water to stop the cooking process. Once cold, drain, and spin in salad spinner to get rid of all the water.

Massage kale leaves with a little lemon juice and salt until they ‘wilt’ and go darker. Massaging kale is important to reduce the bitter taste and soften the leaves. The acid in the lemon helps break down the cell wall in the kale, making it softer and sweeter. This may take up to 5 min, depending on your kale. I used baby kale fresh out of my garden and it was soft and palatable as is.

Chop up kale.

Peal the outer layer off you broccoli stem, much like you do a carrot. The outer stem is fiberous and stringy but the inner flesh is soft, crunchy and delicious. Slice up the stem finely. 

Grate your pear, carrot and beetroot (I use a mandolin with a fine julienne attachment)

Finely slice spring onion.

Toss all your salad ingredients together with lemon juice

Prepare Chicken

Mix spices and coconut flour in a bowl, coat chicken breast in mix.

Heat coconut oil in a pan and cook chicken until golden.

Dressing

Mix spices and olive oil in the tahini paste. 

Plate up salad, top with sliced chicken breast and top with tahini dressing. Sprinkly sesame seed ontop for a bit of glamour ;)

Tip: Cook up twice as much chicken and freeze it for a day when you can't be bothered cooking. It can easily be added to a quick salad or steamed veggies in no time.
Preparation is the key to healthy living, having nutritious foods on hand all the time and you can't fail. 

"Fail to prepare, prepare to fail".

One Nourished Life guest post with sweet-spud and coconut coleslaw recipe

For those who follow my Instagram account, you'll often see me posting pics of food by a lovely friend of mine Jodie. This wonderful lady is a foodie extraordinaire and health yogi and has just had her first book published. She encompasses everything I believe in regarding food, exercise and holistic health and I cannot recommend her book highly enough!

You can buy it HERE or follow her on Instagram HERE or also on Facebook HERE

I asked Jodie to do a guest post for me, so here she is to tell you more about her wonderful book. 

Hi, my name’s Jodie and here’s a little introduction to my book One Nourished Life…

"When friends started suggesting I turn my healthy cooking passion into a book I thought they were crazy! My reaction was always, “But I’m not famous!” Golly, I’m not even a qualified chef or nutritionist. I’m just an everyday person! I work, sleep, and endure the same life stresses and trivialities as much as the next person. My respite from this however, is in my love of food, food that nourishes the body and satisfies the taste buds. Sourcing it, preparing it, cooking it, and of course, eating it!

As a full time gym owner and personal trainer, working in the health and fitness industry has inspired me to take this love of food and use it to complement my efforts in the gym. My passion is to enhance the health outcomes and fitness goals of not just myself but clients too, ensuring optimum nutrition as part of a holistic healthy lifestyle. I gain incredible satisfaction from what I do, helping people to reach their health and fitness goals, but have found the battles of my clients are often only half won. The imperative of diet and quality nutrition often fall by the way side compared to all those hours spent in the gym.

One Nourished Life highlights the ease and simplicity with which nutritious and delicious foods can be incorporated into your everyday life menu. These foods will not only liven up your dinner table and lunch box with new delicious and exciting tastes and textures but will nourish you from the inside-out! Nourishing your body will ignite a new, vibrant lease on life. One which nourishes self, mind, body and soul to permeate a new, healthier way of living."

I’d like to share with you Clair’s favourite recipe! This is just one of my Nourishing recipes:

Food Styling & Photography –

Kate Olsson www.fingerforkknife.com

Kirsty Bryson www.kirstybrysonfoodstylist.com

sweet-spud with coconut coleslaw

Nourish:

This is my DIY version of the much loved festival ‘baked jacket potato’ with healthier flavours that really pack a punch!

Sweet potato is a superior nutrition alternative to the traditional white potato and boasts a lower glycaemic index (gi) and carbohydrate content while containing greater amounts of fibre & vitamin A.

Serves 1

1 whole small sweet potato

½ cup red cabbage, finely shredded

½ cup fennel bulb (or green cabbage), finely shredded

½ cup carrot, grated or noodled

1 tablespoon lemon juice

¼ cup organic coconut cream

1 teaspoon fresh mint leaves, finely chopped

1 small (or ½) clove garlic

1 tablespoon raw almonds, roughly chopped

drizzle of cold pressed extra virgin olive oil

                                     

Pre-heat fan forced oven to 200 degrees. bake whole sweet potato (uncut and skin on) on baking paper lined oven tray for 1-hour.

Meanwhile, throw shredded veg into a mixing bowl and squeeze with lemon juice. Leave to sit while completing the next step.

In a separate bowl, mix coconut cream (tip: shake can well before opening), mint and garlic. Add to veg mix and combine well.

Once cooked, remove sweet potato from oven and cut in half. Top with coleslaw veg mix, sprinkle with almonds and drizzle with olive oil.

Feel free to add your favourite palm size portion of sustainable and organic fish, chicken or meat for added protein!

Nourishing your body from the inside-out will allow you to give more positive energy to your days and enable you to live a One Nourished Life! xx

Green smoothie

A revolution is upon us! A green smoothie revolution!
If you haven't already caught on to the green smoothie craze, you best read on.

I don't know anyone who doesn't like a good smoothie. Fast to make, easy to eat (One handed eating essential for me at the moment as I breastfeed my 2nd child on demand) and so simple to pack in all the goodness you need for a perfect balanced meal.

I always made smoothies, mostly protein smoothies for breakfast, but it was only just recently that I was swayed into adding some big leafy greens to my smoothie for a nutrition hit. It took a while to get my head around adding spinach or kale into my recipe, and since I nearly always used frozen blueberries they always ended up looking like I was drinking brown sludge....
But... you can't taste the spinach... so close your eyes and forget it's there- just enjoy the health benefits that come with adding these super greens to you meal.
Spinach has so many goodies packed into it- it's extremely rich in antioxidants, a rich source of Vit A, Vit C, Vit E, Vit K, magnesium, manganese, folate, betaine, iron, Vit B2, calcium, potassium, Vit B6, folic acid, copper, high protein, phosphorus, zinc, niacin, selenium and omega-3 fatty acids. And breathe, that was a long list.
It has double the fibre of other greens, it's high in beta-carotene which supports heart health, fights cancer and keeps your eyes healthy

My daughter loves her green smoothie, and if I can get all that goodness into her in one meal I'm pretty happy!

So, what else do I pack into my smoothie on a daily basis?
Well, I start with the base recipe-
Almond milk (or whatever fluid you like- water, milk, soy- add as much or as little- eat-it-with-a-spoon consistency or drink it)
1 tblsp chia
1 tblspn flax meal
1 scoop of protein powder (I use unflavoured, but you could use vanilla, banana etc)
1 teaspoon maca powder (optional)
2 cups of spinach (fresh or frozen)

Add in any fruit you like
This recipe I have banana and frozen mango (thanks Coles for stocking it now!)
other favourites are frozen blueberries, raspberries, fresh kiwi, pear- anything your heart desires.
Top with some goji berries, pepitas, walnuts and bees pollen for a bit of crunch factor ;)

Lunch- Cauliflower, chickpea and bacon soup

My freezer is full of soup!! My lovely MIL stocked me up on her yummy pumpkin soup before Jimmy was born. She is a typical farm cook, and makes great hearty food, although not as 'clean' as I would normally eat!!

My yummy cauliflower soup is something I love to whip up on a cold day, and since today was miserable, I made a huge pot- enough for 5 generous meals. So I had one bowl, and I have 4 Tupperware dishes full in my freezer on top of the pumpkin soup! 

Recipe:

1 head of cauliflower, chopped

1 can of chickpeas

4 rashes of shortcut bacon, chopped  

2 onions, diced

3 cloves of garlic, crushed and chopped

3L of the best chicken or vege stock (or 2L if you like it really thick, up to you)

Sauté onion and garlic. Add in bacon and cook until fragrant. Add in cauliflower and chickpeas and cover with stock. Simmer for 30min or until cauliflower soft. 

Blitz with stick mixer until smooth, and serve with cracked pepper to taste.

Lunch! Sweet cacao omelette by The Holistic Ingredient

Delicious sweet omelette, topped with Greek yoghurt and blueberries. Easy, fast lunch!
This lovely lady has a wonderful ebook I suggest you check out and buy!!! http://theholisticingredient.com/a-nourishing-kitchen-ebook/