"Thanks Sweetie!"
It melts my heart whenever my son tells me that he likes the food that I made for him.
Thanks to the book, ABC Delicious Feel Good Food by Valli Little, I'm feeling good today! All because I have made a feel-good vegan coconut ice cream that makes my son feel good. Hence, I feel good too!
Quick and Feel Good Vegan Coconut Ice Cream
This is one of quick ice cream recipes found at the just desserts section of this book.
At the beginning of the "Just Desserts" chapter, the book says "Desserts don't have to be a 'no-go' when you're health conscious - you just have to make sure that only good things go into them." Totally agree! I like to be proud of the food that I cooked, baked or made. So I like to use the best quality ingredients to composite my food and be aware of its source and nutritional content.
Is this coconut ice cream a healthy food? I wouldn't vouch to say yes but I won't totally say no! I can safely say that it is an easy ice cream to make and it is really GOOD! Good because it is vegan and eating it means that we are helping to reduce any human impact on our environment! Good because it is refreshing and delicious! Good because it is made of four interesting ingredients...
To make about one liter of coconut ice cream, I need:
One: 2 x 400ml or 3 cans of 270ml coconut milk
Coconut milk is the liquid that comes from the grated fresh of a brown coconut. After settling, the fat rises to the surface to form coconut cream. Despite the slightly difference in their fat content, both are high in saturated fat! So please consume them in caution!Friends and families who know me well enough know that I have this funny love-and-hate relationship with coconut! I love eating food with coconut milk, coconut cream, coconut sugar and coconut water but hate the excessive addition of desiccated or shredded coconut in some food that gives a greasy gritty texture and taste. To me, a little is ok but not too much! I love the creaminess, fragrance and the taste of coconut in my food but hate the fact that it is usually high in saturated fat and it is bad for our heart and body! Thus, I like moderate the content of fat in this coconut ice cream.I want to enjoy coconut ice cream that is creamy like the homemade Ben and Jerry's ice cream that we always eat but not too fatty with too much saturated fat. So I did some calculation and found that if I used half amount of regular coconut milk with 24% fat with half amount of light coconut milk with 16% fat, the total amount of fat in about 1 liter of my coconut ice cream will be about the same as the the homemade Ben and Jerry's ice cream that we always eat! I kind of like this idea. Do you?
Instead of using all regular coconut milk, I'm using half regular and half light coconut milk to make my ice cream.
Surprise! Surprise! The percentage of fat in regular coconut milk, 24% is actually lower than the usual 35% fat in regular cream but both regular coconut milk and cream contains about the same percentage of saturated fat!
Two: 1/2 cup (125ml) Light agave syrup
Like honey, agave syrup is a natural sweetener, made from a species of agave tree. However, it is less sweeter and less viscous than honey and makes a good vegan option. Plus it has a low GI due to its high fructose content and this means I use 25% less agave syrup to replace the same sweetness in white sugar.
Light agave syrup
See here for its beneficial description!
Three: 1 tbsp Arrowroot
Arrowroot is a starch obtained from the rhizomes (rootstock) of tropical plants and is a common and popular gluten free thickening agent used in baking and cooking.
Four: 1 1/2 tsp Vanilla paste or extract
Of course, we know what is vanilla? If you don't, vanilla is a tropical climbing orchid which has fragrant flowers and long pod-like fruit. The fruit is cured and then either used in cooking or processed to extract an essence to add a sweet floral flavor and fragrance into food.
The arrowroot and vanilla paste that I used.
First, I combined the arrowroot into one can of the coconut milk.
Important: Do not boil or over cook the mixture as it will split.
See the arrow in the picture... The rim of oil surfaces is showing that the mixture has thickened.
Remove from heat and set aside to cool. After chilling it in the fridge, the mixture will thicken further.
Transfer mixture into an ice cream machine and churn the ice cream accordingly.
Transfer ice cream into a container and freeze until firm.
Freeze for up to 2 months.
Now back to the question... Can the use of half regular and half light coconut milk makes nice and creamy coconut ice cream? Well see here... I think it is pretty GOOD! Plus the sweetness from the amount of agave syrup added is just right!
Yum!
I can't help to notice that there is a lot of coconut sugar and coconut milk used in the feel good recipes in this book and really like how these ingredients are being used. These are some of what I have seen...
This is so yum!
Spanish Mackerel Cutlets with Coconut Rice - The concept is like nasi lemak!
This BEST chocolate brownies are gluten free and they are made with coconut oil and coconut sugar.
More coconut sugar?
Can't deny that these pretty Moroccan cupcakes with rose petal, rose water, pistachio and coconut are so tastefully made!
I wish that I can eat these for dessert or breakfast!
Coconut crepes with maple ricotta and strawberries - Yum!
Are you hungry for more feel-good food? There are a lot more recipes that uses coconut ingredients like spice egg curry, coconut waffles, mango and turmeric shake, salmon red curry, Thai prawn and noodle soup, Thai red curry with chicken meatball, cauliflower, coconut and lime soup, pot roasted chicken with coconut milk, vegan salted caramel, plum streusel cake and many more!!! Plus, there are many more recipes that uses non-coconut ingredients too! So you can imagine there are so many beautiful food to cook from this book!!!
As this post is specially written to review this book, I'm sorry that I have agreed to the publisher that I can't publish the recipes in this book in this post. However, if you really wish to make this really easy ice cream, please read my post in details, you will see that you can actually do it without a written recipe as I have fully illustrated the process very thoroughly to you. *Hint*
I like this book. Do you? If you like and want it NOW - LOL!, you may wish to know that it is available now at a discounted price of AUD$34.99 before Christmas 2015 in ABC Shops (Original price is AUD$39.99). Due to its heavy weight and massive size, I'm so sorry that I can't giveaway this book. Otherwise I would.
Before ending this post, I like to thank ABC Delicious and Harper Collins Australia for giving me this opportunity to do this review. I like to make a disclaimer here that I'm not paid to do this review and like to share my most honest opinions that I feel about this book.
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This post is linked at Cook and Celebrate: Christmas 2015 hosted by Yen from GoodyFoodies, Diana from The Domestic Goddess Wannabe and Zoe from Bake for Happy Kids at here.
One set per winner. Open to ALL readers. Submission ends on 17 Dec 2015.
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