INGREDIENTS (Makes 8 biscuits)
200g Oat Flour (oats blitzed in a food processor, or you can buy here: www.realfoodsource.com)
160g Maple Syrup
40g Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Method:
1). Preheat the oven to 160 degrees celcius
2). Mix all the ingredients together
3). Roll into 8 balls and press down into biscuit shapes
TIP: the mixture doesn't run at all in the oven, so make them the shape that you would like them to be
4). Cook for 30 minutes of until the tops are golden brown
Normally this recipe uses heaps of butter, heavy cream and refined sugars, but The Unrefined Bakery have replicated all the fabulous flavours of the traditional version but using only plant-based and far more nutritious ingredients.
Serves 6
INGREDIENTS:
7 Slices of good quality bread (at least a day old)
190g Cacao butter
380g Coconut sugar
35g Cacao powder
115ml Oat milk
1/2 can (200ml) Coconut milk (make sure it's well mixed first)
2 tbsp Rum
A pinch of Cinnamon
Optional toppings: flaked almonds, grated chocolate
METHOD:
1). Place all the ingredients except the bread in a bowl set over a saucepan of simmering water. Stir regularly until they are melted into a chocolatey mixture.
2). Remove the crusts off each slice of bread. Cut each slice into 4 triangular pieces.
3). Pour half of the chocolate mixture into a heatproof oven dish (about 30cm x 20cm or similar).
4). Arrange the bread triangles over the chocolate in overlapping rows (see pic below), then pour on the other half of the chocolate.
5). Put some cling film over the top and pop in the fridge for 24 hours (or if you are super impatient like us at The Unrefined Bakery HQ, at LEAST 3 hours. Note, the longer it is refrigerated the better the end result).
6). Remove the cling film and bake in a pre-heated oven at 180* celsius for 30-35 minutes until the top is crispy and the inside is soft and squidgy.
7). If adding any toppings sprinkle these over the top and leave to stand for 10 mins. Then DIG IN!
This delicious desert goes best with vanilla ice cream or oat milk custard, but it is also lovely just on its own.
Serves 1:
INGREDIENTS:
65g oats
120ml Oat Milk (@oatly barista works best)
1/4 tsp Cinnamon
1 tbsp (15g) Almond Butter
1 tsp Maple Syrup
Optional toppings: frozen berries, pecans, almonds, banana slices, more maple syrup, anything you fancy!
METHOD:
1). Mix the cinnamon, almond butter and about a third of the oat milk together.
2). Add the remaining ingredients and mix until combined.
3). Leave in the fridge overnight night
4). Add your toppings of choice - berries, nuts, banana slices etc
.
Makes 8 cupcakes:
INGREDIENTS:
Cake:
🧁 60g (75ml) Extra Virgin Olive Oil
🧁 80g Ground Almonds
🧁 150g Oat Flour (oats mixed in a blender until a fine flour forms)
🧁 100ml Oat Milk (or milk of choice)
🧁 50g Maple Syrup
🧁 130g Coconut Sugar
🧁 30g Cacao Powder
🧁 1/2 tsp Sea Salt
Icing:
🧁 50g Cacao Butter
🧁 25g Almond Butter (or nut butter of choice)
🧁 25g Cashew Butter (or nut butter of choice)
🧁 120g Maple Syrup
🧁 25g Cacao Powder
🧁 2 tbsp Oat Milk (or milk of choice)
Optional Topping: Handful of Cacao Nibs
METHOD:
1). Preheat the oven to 160 degrees celcius
2). Mix the maple syrup, coconut sugar, olive oil, oat milk together in a bowl.
3). In a separate bowl, mix the oat flour, ground almonds, salt and cacao powder together. Add this to the wet ingredients and mix.
4). Split the mixture into 8 cupcake cases and bake for ~30 minutes (or until a skewer just comes out clean).
5). Whilst the cupcakes are baking, make the icing by melting all the ingredients in a bain marie over a medium heat, stirring regularly until it is a smooth consistency.
6). Put the icing in the fridge to cool for ~ 2 hours (until it is thick enough not to run down the sides of the cupcakes).
7). Once you've taken the cupcakes out the oven and left to cool, spread the icing over the top of each cupcake. If using cacao nibs, sprinkle these on top of the icing.
8). Enjoy! 💚
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Unrefined ingredients are foods which have been minimally processed from their natural state, as opposed to refined ingredients which have been heavily processed.
Examples of unrefined ingredients include fruit, vegetables, nuts, seeds and oats. These types of foods are nutritionally rich and provide the vital vitamins and minerals that our bodies need to function effectively.
Examples of refined ingredients include white flour, white sugar and margarine. These foods have been processed such that that the fibre, vitamins and minerals within the natural food have been removed, leaving little substance the body can use productively – these foods are empty calories.
Refined ingredients are often then added to other refined ingredients along with additives and preservatives, to make ultra-processed foods that are a far cry from the natural foods they started off as. At the worst end of this scale, think cakes made with bleached flours, emulsifiers, chemical flavouring agents and artificial sugars, white bread “dyed” brown to give the perception it’s healthier. The list goes on.
In recent years, we’ve become very dependent on these types of foods and it’s no wonder given how widely available they are…. ultra-processed foods are everywhere. Turning over the packet of many packaged foods will reveal an extensive ingredient list (sometimes 30+ ingredients in one product) full of things you’ve never heard of and which certainly don’t sound like real foods.
If refined foods are so bad for us, why are they everywhere?
Simple. These types of food are a manufacturer’s dream – they are cheap, and addictive.
Many manufactures have created products which are designed to keep us coming back for more, at the expense of our health.
A recent study1 linked ultra-processed foods with addictive-like eating behaviours and even drew parallels between these types of foods and drugs of abuse. The study found similar properties between the two in relation to rapid rate of absorption and high dosage (think how concentrated high fructose corn syrup is!). Which goes some way to explain why we can rarely stop at just one Jaffa Cake.
We are also more likely to need more of a refined food in order to feel full because they lack the fibre of unrefined foods, so they don’t fill us up in the same way. Think how much easier it would be to eat 3 slices of white bread with butter, versus 3 slices of wholemeal toast with peanut butter, despite them containing similar calories?
What do refined ingredients do to our bodies?
Refined ingredients contain little to no nutritional value – none of the vitamins, minerals and antioxidants present in various unrefined ingredients which are vital to maintaining healthy hearts, strong bones, good cognitive function, healthy skin and hair, to name just a few.
As a result, refined ingredients are absorbed by the body much more quickly (as there is little to process) leading to spikes in blood sugar levels which give you lots of energy initially, but then lead to crashes and fatigue later. Frequent increases and decreases in blood sugar like this have been linked with an increased risk of Type 2 Diabetes2.
In addition, several studies have shown that consumption of ultra-processed, refined foods is a leading cause of heart disease, cardiovascular problems, strokes, obesity and various other chronic illnesses. In fact, a recent study3 linked eating 4 or more servings of ultra-processed foods per day to an increased chance of dying of 62% on average.
To visualise this, if a 65 year old male who eats minimal ultra-processed foods has a chance of dying at this precise moment of 2.5%, the same chance of death for a 65 year old male who eats 4 servings of ultra-processed food per day would be 4.05% (2.5% x 1.62).
Of course, eating ultra-processed food every now and again is not going to kill you, but when there are brands like The Unrefined Bakery challenging the toxic culture of ultra-processed food manufacturing, with products that taste just as good, why would you choose refined over unrefined?
For further information, please head over to our website:
http://www.theunrefinedbakery.co.uk
Sources
1 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4334652/
2 https://academic.oup.com/jn/article/145/1/159S/4585783
3 Mortality (5) https://www.bmj.com/content/365/bmj.l1949
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