Only Recipes, by Alessandra Zecchini ©

I like to use lavender for dessert, but the flavour has to be delicate, not too overwhelming.  Ingredients:  one small bunch of Lavender 3 tbsp caster sugar 1x400ml can coconut cream + same amount in boiling water to rinse the can 1 tsp agar agar to serve: blackberries and lavender Pick the lavender from the garden and make sure it is clean, or rinse lightly and pat dry with a clean tea towel. Put in a container and cover with the caster sugar. Put a lid on and leave for 2-3 days. The sugar will absorb the aroma of the flowers.   Place the coconut cream in a pot, fill the can with the same amount of boiling water to rinse it and add into the pot. Remove the flowers from the sugar (it will be crumbly and moist) and add it to the mixture. Add a tsp of agar agar and bring to the boil stirring constantly. You can add a few petals of lavender if you like, but don't overdo it - not everyone likes to find 'bits' in such a smooth puddin...

A super easy and quick recipe for purple blackcurrant and coconut macaroons! My husband loves coconut macaroons, and I often make them if I have some leftover egg whites.  I just made a meringue base with egg white and more or less the same amount of icing sugar (this time I had 2 eggs whites). To add interest I included one tbs of  Fresh As  Blackcurrant powder. The colour was very pretty! Then I folded in some dried coconut, enough to make them 'spoonable' over a baking tray, lined with the  Lynette's baking sheet  I won form blogger  Zo . Nice to use a baking sheet that can be recycled over and over again! I Baked at 100 C for an hour or so and then I let them dry with the oven door open. They aren't pretty, but they are nice, and gluten free too :-).  Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini  ©

Almost cake-pops because they look like cake-pops, but they are not made from cake! In fact these are Cape Gooseberries (therefore I am calling them Cape-pops :-)), dipped in dark chocolate. I left some plain, while I rolled the others in shredded coconut, ground pistachio nuts, and  plum powder  (my new discovery, I talked about it already in  here ). I let them set first at room temperature and then, because it was a warm day, in the fridge. These are gluten free too! But more to come... I had melted far too much chocolate for the Cape gooseberries, so I made a pie which, I must say, came out better than I had anticipated. But sometimes new discoveries are born out of chance, or leftovers! I had a few sheets of filo pastry left, I placed them into a 23 cm pie dish lined with baking paper, leaving the corners to spill out. I peeled and cut four pears and placed the slices over the pastry, then drizzled the lot with Frangelico liqueur....

Sunday morning Colleen and Charles brought us a bag of fresh coconuts. Of course I had to ask Charles to show me how to open them, and it was easier that I thought (just look at the pictures below). We didn't have any straws so I let the coconut water drip into a glass (getting about three full glasses for each coconut!). We all loved the coconut water, especially if we left the coconut in the fridge: fresh and chilled coconut water! After drinking the water I got the boys to break the coconuts for me: Dad was good at breaking them, and Max at scraping out the flesh. When we were in Niue Charles and Colleen came for dinner. Of course I made pasta, but I also made a variety of dishes with the fresh coconuts they brought me the day before. A tomato and coconut salad with cannellini beans, spring onions and olives, dressed with olive oil, lemon juice and sea salt flakes. Coconut rice (just boil the rice with coconut pieces in it, fantastic!), cocon...

For the cape gooseberries I got the idea from my Italian blogger friends, surprised that I can grow them in my garden. Apparently in Europe they are really expensive, and you only buy them to decorate important cakes, and to coat them with chocolate. Usually I coat dried apricots with chocolate, my kids love them, especially the boy: he wants them for his birthday party! Sometimes when I make chocolate apricots I also roll some in shredded coconut, and then use the left over coconut to clean up the chocolate bowl, making little coconut chocolates. It is all very easy, and in no time I have a tray full of sweet treats! For the cape gooseberries I pulled back the outer "lanterns" that cover the berries and held them in place with a paper clip, so that they didn't get into the chocolate. And for chocolate I used Whittaker's Dark Ghana (my little boy prefers really dark chocolate!) True Vegan Dark chocolate works well too. Photos and Recipes by Ales...

My husband loves coconut cookies and cakes and macaroons... anything to do with coconut. The other day I mentioned to him that I wanted to make some of those fashionable French style macaroons that you see everywhere here in NZ now. But when I said the word 'macaroons' he immediately thought of coconut macaroon type cookies, and he was quite excited. The I showed him a picture and he bacame skeptical about the pretty pink and pastel green things I wanted to make. "Have they got coconut?" "Ehm... no.... almonds...." In his opinion this made no sense at all: he wanted to bite into something coconutty!!! So I made some chocolate and coconut cookies instead, (I will post about them later on), and these cupcakes, and called them coconut macaroons cupcakes. Roses from my garden to decorate and... could not decide which background was better for the photo: Blue or white? So I put both photos in. What do you think? Coconut Macaroon Cupcakes For the cupcakes 3 eggs 1...

A break from Xmas decorations, and on to cookies... although even these could be a nice homemade present... Ingredients 100 g dark chocolate 50 g butter 50 g sugar 1 egg 80 g self-rising flour 80 g shredded coconut, plus more to dust Makes 20 biscuits Preheat the oven at 160°C. Melt the chocolate with the butter. Add the sugar, egg, flour and shredded coconut. You will get a very oily cookie dough. With a teaspoon shape 20 small balls, which should be each about the size of a walnut. Roll the balls shredded coconut and then place them onto an oven tray lined with baking paper, making sure that you leave some space in between, as the cookies will flatten during baking. Bake for 20 minutes. Let the cookies cool completely on the baking tray before lifting them. Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©