Raw Strawberries & Cream Ice Cream Cake

Raw Strawberries & Cream Ice Cream Cake

Raw Strawberries & Ice Cream Cake

 

Even though Strawberry season is supposed to run until the end of February in New Zealand, there don’t seem to be many strawberries in the stores now so I thought I’d better hurry up and post this raw strawberries & cream ice cream cake recipe! That said, you could easily use frozen strawberries for this recipe or if you’re not a strawberry fan, raspberries would work really well too.

This recipe started out as a raw cheesecake, but as it’s been so hot over the past few weeks we kept eating it while still frozen, and I realised it was actually a pretty amazing strawberry ice cream cake! Of course, minus all the dairy, eggs and refined sugar. So it’s entirely up to you how you eat this raw dessert cake and what you choose to call it.

It has a base of cashew nuts which need to be soaked for a minimum of 2 hours beforehand (see notes at the bottom for more about soaking nuts), but that’s about the hardest part to this recipe. You’ll need a food processor to blend the ingredients for the “biscuit” base, which is made largely from almonds, coconut and dates. Ideally you’ll also need a high speed blender for the strawberries & cream filling, however, if you have a really good food processor I think you would get a good result with that too. The main thing is ensuring the filling ingredients are blended finely enough so that you don’t have chunks of cashews and strawberries throughout.

 

Raw Strawberries & Ice Cream Cake

 

To decorate this strawberry ice cream cake I made a raw strawberry sauce by simply blending fresh raw strawberries with a little pure maple syrup (see the note at bottom on how to choose a good maple syrup). If you have lovely sweet strawberries by all means leave out the maple syrup! Be generous as you pour this raw strawberry sauce over the cake and let it drizzle down the sides, then top with more freshly sliced strawberries. If it isn’t strawberry season when you’re making this then you could easily decorate it with freeze dried strawberries and edible flowers instead.

If you decide to eat this as a frozen dessert, keep in mind once you decorate it you can’t easily freeze it again as the fresh strawberries on top will turn very icy and the freeze dried ones will go soggy. That said, you’re probably not going to need to re-freeze it as it’s likely to be eaten well before then!

I hope you give this saucy little ice cream cake a try, and if you post any of your creations to Instagram or Facebook I would love to see them, tag me @swoon.food #swoonfood. Enjoy!

 

Any questions or comments about this raw strawberries & cream cheesecake?

Ask me in the comments below, I love to hear from you!

 

Raw Strawberries & Ice Cream Cake

 

Raw Strawberries & Cream Ice Cream Cake

Makes:  1 x 8″ cake (or 12 mini cheesecakes)
Prep time: 40 minutes  Soaking time: 2-4 hours  Chill time: 1 hour

Base

1/2 cup desiccated coconut
1/2 cup raw almonds
pinch pink himalayan salt
6 medjool dates, pitted
1 Tbsp coconut oil, gently melted (see note below)

Vanilla Cream Filling

1 cup cashews, soaked
1/2 cup nut milk or coconut milk
1/4 cup pure maple syrup
1/2 vanilla pod, scraped (or 1/2 tsp vanilla powder)
pinch himalayan pink salt
1/4 cup coconut oil, gently melted (see note below)

Strawberry Filling

1 cup cashews, soaked
2 Tbsp coconut milk
1 1/2 cups fresh strawberries, washed & hulled
3 Tbsp pure maple syrup
pinch himalayan pink salt
1/2 cup coconut oil, melted (see note below)

Start by soaking the cashew nuts. Place 2 cups of raw cashew nuts in a bowl, cover with filtered water and leave to stand for 2-4 hours. Drain off the water and rinse the cashews well.

Line an 8 inch springform tin with either non-stick paper or cling film (or for mini’s a 12 hole standard muffin pan).

To make the base, first gently melt the coconut oil by placing it in a heat proof bowl set over a pan of steaming water with the heat turned off (see note below). You might like to melt all the quantities of coconut oil together at this point and measure them out as required.  Place the desiccated coconut, almonds and salt into a food processor and blend until the mixture resembles chunky crumbs. Add the medjool dates (ensuring you have removed the pitts!) and blend until they are well combined. Test the mixture by pressing between your fingers, if it doesn’t stick together add another date. Lastly add the melted coconut oil while the motor is running. Press the mixture into the lined 8″ tin (or if making mini’s, a spoonful of mixture into the bottom of each muffin hole). Place the tin in the fridge to chill.

To make the vanilla cream layer first gently melt your coconut oil if you haven’t already. Place the 1 cup measure of soaked and drained cashews into a high speed blender (e.g. Vitamix/Blendtec) along with the nut or coconut milk, maple syrup, vanilla and sea salt. Blend until smooth, you may need to use your blender stirring stick to ensure it’s evenly blended. This should blend really easily but if you do find it taking a little longer make sure you don’t over heat (i.e.cook!) the mixture as the blender blades can create a lot of heat. If it starts to feel warm place the jug in the fridge for 10 minutes or so. When the mixture is smooth add the melted coconut oil gradually through the top while the blender is running. Pour the vanilla mixture into the 8″ tin (or divide between the muffin holes) and smooth the top. Place back in the fridge to chill while you make the strawberry layer.

To make the strawberry layer, gently melt your coconut oil if you haven’t already. Place the 1 cup measure of soaked and drained cashews into a high speed blender (e.g. Vitamix/Blendtec) along with the strawberries, milk, maple syrup and salt and blend until smooth. You may need to use your blender stirring stick to ensure it’s evenly blended. This should blend really easily but as above, if you do find it taking a little longer make sure you don’t over heat (i.e.cook!) the mixture as the blender blades can create a lot of heat. If it starts to feel warm place the jug in the fridge for 10 minutes or so. When the mixture is smooth add the melted coconut oil gradually through the top while the blender is running. Gently pour the strawberry mixture on top of the vanilla layer and use a spoon to swirl the two together. Cover the top with cling film and place the strawberry ice cream cake in the freezer to set, approximately 1 hour.

To make the fresh strawberry sauce, place the strawberries and pure maple syrup into the blender and blend until smooth.

To serve, remove the cheesecake from the tin and peel off the paper or cling film. Place on a serving plate, drizzle with strawberry sauce and decorate with freshly slice strawberries. This ice cream cake will keep 1 month in the freezer if well sealed, and once defrosted it will keep in the fridge for up to 5 days in a sealed container.

 

Raw Strawberries & Ice Cream Cake

 

Note on activating nuts: activating is the process of soaking nuts (or seeds) in water to remove the natural inhibitor enzymes on their skins to make them more digestible. The cashews in the cheesecake filling of this recipe are therefore activated. If you also wanted to activate the cashews and almonds in the base for this recipe they would need to be soaked and then dried. Ideally this would be in a dehydrator at 41ºC for 1 1/2 – 2 days, or in an oven on the lowest fan bake setting with the door ajar for about a day. The aim is to keep the nuts below 41ºC so the nutrients remain unaffected by heat and the food still deemed raw.

Note on melting raw ingredients: to ensure ingredients remain in their raw form and their nutrients fully intact, they must not be heated above 41º. When melting raw coconut oil or raw cacao butter, do so by placing the bowl of ingredients over a pot of steaming water with the heat turned off. This should ensure the ingredients do not heat above 41ºC.

Note on choosing coconut oil: it is important which type of coconut oil you choose. A lot of the cheaper coconut oils are heat or chemical processed which destroys the inherent nutrients that have made coconut oil so popular recently. Look for ‘cold pressed, extra virgin, organic’ or ‘unrefined raw’ coconut oil. Even though it may cost a little more, it is WAY better for you. Coconut oil contains high quantities of lauric acid which has anti-bacterial, anti-fungal, anti-viral and anti-inflammatory properties. It boosts your immune system and metabolism, lowers blood pressure and helps with the absorption of minerals. Even though coconut oil is a saturated fat, it is considered a ‘heathier’ fat because lauric acid is a medium chain fatty acid. This means it’s easily digestible and processed by your body in the same way as carbohydrates, as a direct source of energy.

Note on choosing maple syrup: make sure you get the real deal! There are quite a few maple syrups out there that are just maple flavoured sugar syrup, full of additives and often high fructose corn syrup. Pure maple syrup lists only “pure maple syrup” under ingredients and is made by a natural process of extracting the sap from maple trees, evaporating off excess water and filtering to remove impurities. Pure maple syrup is an unrefined sugar and has a lower glycemic index than refined sugar. It contains minerals and antioxidants such as calcium, potassium, iron, manganese and zinc, unlike refined sugar which contains none. Maple syrup is still a form of sugar however, so while it is better choice than refined sugar it is still best used in moderation. Feel free to use less in this recipe if it suits your tastes and if you do decrease the amount of maple syrup, replace the quantity you leave out with an equal amount of coconut milk.

 

Raw Strawberries & Cream Ice Cream Cake

 

Home Made “Cherry Ripe” Bars

Home Made “Cherry Ripe” Bars

Homemade Cherry Ripe Bars

 

I discovered the amazing combination of sour cherries and dark chocolate after trying Green & Black’s organic cherry chocolate. Cherry chocolate is not something I would have normally chosen as I used to associate preserved cherries with the fluorescent glacé ones that went into christmas cakes. Luckily the sour cherries in Green & Black’s are nothing of the sort, they’re a dark crimson colour and have a wonderful tart flavour (for a raw version of this sour cherry chocolate click here).

Recently I was excited to find some dried cherries in our local whole foods store and I immediately thought I have to make something with these! To me, the ingredient that sings out to be combined with sour cherries and dark chocolate is moist coconut, aka a Cherry Ripe bars!

So I thought it would be fun to make a healthy version of the classic Cadbury “Cherry Ripe” bar, that’s dairy, refined sugar, preservative and additive free.

I found two great dried cherry options, ROAR organic dried sour cherries and Ceres organics apple sweetened dried cherries. For the recipe below I went with the ROAR version as they were super sour and I liked the contrast, but either would work well.

After a couple of recipe attempts which resulted in not enough chocolate, too much chocolate, too wet filling, wrong colour filling… too much taste testing… I finally came up with the winning combination!

The best thing about these “Cherry Ripe” bars is they contain no gluten, dairy, refined sugar, additives or preservatives, and while they are definitely less sweet that the original, I think they taste much better!

If you can’t find sour cherries in your local food store, simply substitute for extra dried cranberries and vice versa.

These homemade cherry ripe bars will keep well in the fridge for a couple of weeks and freeze well. Enjoy!

 

For more cherry slice recipes check out this Dark Chocolate Cherry Ripe Slice or these Raw Cacao & Brazil Nut Hemp Slice with Sour Cherries.

Home Made “Cherry Ripe” Bars

Serves: makes approximately 16 bars
Prep time: 30 minutes Chilling time: 30 minutes

1 cup of desiccated coconut
2 Tbsp coconut oil, liquid form
3 Tbsp pure maple syrup
1 tsp freeze dried raspberry powder
1/2 cup dried sour cherries
1/4 cup dried cranberries (apple sweetened)
pinch of himalayan pink salt
200g dark chocolate (70%, dairy free)
Freeze dried raspberries for decoration

Line a small tin (I used 18cm x 30cm) with baking paper.
Melt the dark chocolate by placing it in a heat proof bowl set over a pan of boiling water. Ensure the bowl doesn’t touch the water to avoid overheating the chocolate.
If using really dried cherries such as ROAR, start by soaking them in warm water for 10 minutes or so until they plump up. Then pour off the water and drain well.
Place all the remaining ingredients including the cherries in a food processor and blend until well combined. The mixture should be slightly sticky and hold together when pressed. If too wet, add a little more dried coconut.
Spread half the melted chocolate over the bottom of the lined tin and place in the fridge or freezer to set – approximately 5-10 minutes. Once the chocolate is just firm to touch remove from the fridge and spread the cherry mixture over evenly. Press down well. Pour the remaining chocolate on top and spread evenly with a spoon or palate knife.
Sprinkle over crushed freeze dried raspberries to decorate and return the slice to the fridge to set, approximately 10-20 minutes. When the chocolate is firm, remove from the fridge and slice into bars using a hot, dry knife.
Store in a sealed container in  the fridge.

 

 

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