Lavender Strawberry Ice-Cream Hearts | Raw Vegan Nut-Free

I recently taught a class on using essential oils in cooking, as part of a 2 day Diploma in Organic Essential Oils course that I teach with NHR Organic Oils. 

I have been working with essential oils for about 18 years in my work as a skincare formulator and tutor and teaching this aspect of oils reminded me how much fun they are to use in food; not just the oils but the hydrosols too (Hydrosols are the aromatic distilled waters that occur as a by-product of essential oil distillation). So last night I was feeling creative and wanted to make a fancy new dessert (yes, I love my sweet food!) and decided to indulge my olfactory glands with the addition of some organic essential oils.

Lavender-strawberry ice-cream heart with strawberry, rose & orange salad

Ingredients for the hearts (to make about 4 hearts)

4-5 bananas, sliced and frozen overnight
Large handful of organic strawberries
4-5 drops of organic lavender essential oil*


Ingredients for the strawberry side-salad
1 punnet of organic strawberries
the finely grated zest of half an organic orange
1 tablespoon of organic rosewater*

*only use certified organic essential oils and hydrosols in food

1. Make the ice-cream hearts
Put your frozen banana slices into a food processor and pulse until they become frozen crumbs. Leave for 5 minutes. Pulse again and use a spatula to push down the banana crumbs as they try to creep up the sides. Keeping resting and pulsing until it becomes much softer and then you can turn the power up and let it whip itself into lovely creamy soft-scoop ice-cream.

Now throw in handful of chopped strawberries and your lavender oil and blend until smooth.

Transfer your soft ice-cream to a silicon baking tray that has heart shapes, like this one:

2. Make the strawberry, rose & orange side-salad

Finely chop an entire punnet of juicy organic strawberries. Finely grate the zest of half an orange. Add the zest and strawberries to a bowl and drizzle rosewater over them. Mix well and set aside for a few hours while the ice-cream hearts firm up.


To serve
Add a heart to a shallow bowl or plate and arrange to strawberry salad around the heart in a pretty manner. This is a super-healthy dessert that you can enjoy anytime. I had one for breakfast this morning!

Strawberries are very rich in Vitamin C which is an essential nutrient for collagen production, eat this dessert to get younger by the mouthful.

Enjoy!
xoxo Star

Fragrant Moroccan-Inspired Fruit Salad with Rose

I love this time of year as all the delicious orchard fruits like nectarines, apricots, peaches and cherries are making an appearance. Armed with a kitchen stocked to the rafters with delicious fruits I created this delightful fruit salad with the middle eastern fragrance of orange zest and roses, the decadent caramel sweetness of fresh dates and the mouthgasmic juiciness of pomegranate jewels, nectarines and cherries.

Ingredients (to serve 1 fruitarian as a main meal or 2-4 people as a starter/dessert/snack)
4 ripe juicy nectarines
30 or so sweet ripe cherries
3 fresh fudgy dates
Half of one giant pomegranate (or 1 normal-sized one)
1 UK Tablespoon of organic* 100% natural rosewater
Grated zest of 1 organic** orange

*most rosewater found in shops is fake and made of synthetic chemicals, order organic from a respected aromatherapy supplier such as NHR organic oils to make sure.
**only use organic oranges for zest as they haven;t been coated in wax and/or pesticides

To assemble
Stone the nectarines and slice into little pieces
Stone annd destalk the cherries then chop into halves
Stone and slice the dates into tiny pieces
Break open the pomegranate and remove the little jewels

Place all the fruit in a large mixing bowl and then add the freshly grated zest. Drizzle in the rosewater and give everything a good stir. Set aside in the fridge to let all the flavours combine.

Serve in cute bowls with a sprinkling of grated zest and fresh rose petals if you have them (I lack a garden sadly).

Eat. Enjoy. Swoon.
*mouthgasm*