How to make an Acai bowl

Acai is a deep purple berry from Brazil which is packed full of antioxidants. It can be bought as frozen fruit pulp or powdered. 

Acai bowls are one of those things that make me envy those living in Australia or California - they seem to have hundreds of cute beachy cafes selling acai bowls served with delicious toppings. It's not something you come across often in England, but luckily there are a few places that have started to offer this luxury - my favourite is The Good Life Eatery.

The best solution is to make your own acai bowl at home. This super simple, mouth-watering recipe requires just fruit (frozen and fresh both work) and acai powder which you can buy at health shops such as Holland & Barratt.

You will need:

2 tbsps acai powder
1/2 cup almond milk
3 chopped up and frozen bananas
1/2 cup fresh berries (I like to mix blueberries, blackberries and raspberries)

Simply blend everything together until smooth, then get creative with the toppings! My favourite toppings include granola, chia seeds, sliced kiwi, strawberries, pomegranite seeds, cacao nibs and goji berries.

Nutribullet

I am not exaggerating when I say that this appliance is life-changing. The Nutribullet is essentially a compact, high-powered blender that not only has an ‘extraction’ blade to make smoothies, soups or bliss balls, but also comes with a ‘milling’ blade that is powerful enough to blitz nuts into butters or make seeds/oats/grains into flour. It is one of the most convenient kitchen gadgets ever created and is also very easy to wash up as it is just two parts, the cup and the powered base. I never worry about it breaking, plus it is small enough to fit in a suitcase! I love it and it is definitely worth investing in one for yourself.

Things I Love About Summer

Travelling

Sand between my toes

The salty scent of the sea

Barbecues in the garden

Clear starry skies

The sound of the ice cream truck

Being tanned

The long, lingering daylight hours

Fresh watermelon

Picnics in Hyde Park

Wavy beach hair

Outdoor concerts and music festivals (I recently went to Wireless Festival!)

Iced coffee

Finding unique seashells

The crashing of the waves

Flip flops

Watching the sun set over the ocean

Lemonade stands

Bright coloured beach towels

Bare feet

Pool parties

More time for reading books

Ditching the gym to exercise outdoors: walking, cycling, swimming, hiking, kayaking, yoga in the park...

What are your favourite things about the summer? Comment below - I'd love to hear from some of you!

How to make "Nana Nice Cream"

You will need:

1 Banana

1 tsp Raw cacao

2 cups Frozen berries

75 ml Almond milk

1 Medjool date

Preparation:

1. Peel the banana, cut it into small pieces and leave in the freezer overnight. 

2. Place all ingredients in the blender and blend until the mixture is smooth and creamy.  

3. Top it with fresh fruits your choice (my favourites include blackberries, mango and passion fruit) and enjoy your delicious and 100% healthy "nana nice-cream"!

Healthy Restaurants in Toronto, Canada

At the end of June, my sister and I flew to Toronto, Canada (read all about my Canadian travels here!) During this trip, I tried out a vast range of healthy restaurants, cafés and juice bars that had been recommended to me by fellow food bloggers, and concluded that two favourite restaurants in Toronto are Fresh and Rawlicious.

Fresh is a modern vegetarian restaurant and juice bar, with four bustling locations in Toronto. Fresh offers a variety of satisfying and energizing food, made from whole, natural ingredients, making the world of vegetarian dining as approachable as possible. The juices are made right before your eyes ans the environment is mellow and friendly. The menu ranges from healthy staples like kale & sweet potato salads and noodle bowls with steamed greens & grilled tempeh, to a nutritious spin on comfort food classics such as vegan burgurs and quinoa-crusted onion rings. The juice bar offers so many varieties, from superfood smoothies to alkalizing green juice to a mint chocolate espresso shake.

Another restaurant which I absolutely loved was Rawlicious, located in Yorkville, where everything on the menu is raw, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free and sugar-free (not to mention delicious too!). My sister, aunt and I started by sharing raw nori rolls, raw spring rolls and cashew butter on flaxseed bread. For the main course, we each had a giant raw Pad Thai. My dessert was a cacao-walnut brownie with vanilla icing, and I couldn't let the meal go by without having a superfood smoothie!

Toronto, Canada

My summer holidays began with a trip to Toronto, Ontario in late June with my sister. This unique city embraces the fact that 49% of its residents were born outside of Canada, turning multiculturalism into the face of Toronto. It is a mecca of delicious food from all over the world, as I was fortunate enough to discover during my visit there! My two favourite restaurants in Toronto were Fresh and Rawlicious - read about them here!

We explored Kensington Market, a colourful neighbourhood that boasts a bohemian mix of vintage shops, record stores, art galleries and hipster cafes. We walked along Dundas West, to the rapidly changing area of Little Portugal, where we picked up a fresh juice at The Goods, and then strolled down Queen Street, browsing the independent fashion boutiques and pausing for a lunch break at Café Bernate.

In terms of culture, The Bata Shoe Museum is every woman’s dream museum especially if you are a shoe-a-holic like myself, showcasing more than 1000 shoes from over 4500 years of history! The exhibition took me on a journey through time, from the days of the Chinese binding their feet, to displaying famous shoes from history and pop culture such as Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Taylor.

We also visited the The Art Gallery of Ontario. The AGO has one of the best collections of work from the Group of Seven, Canada’s emblematic group of landscape painters from the 1920s and 30s, as well as two floors dedicated to contemporary art.

No trip to Toronto would be complete without a jaunt over to Niagara Falls. Only an hour and a half away, it is one of the world's greatest natural wonders. The view can only be described at breathtaking: three waterfalls converge and plummet to the raging river below, which never slows down, the water just keeps rushing with no end. It seemed like a larger-than-life miracle of nature! This day trip also involved a visit to an impressive butterfly house with dozens of exotic species, as well as a stroll through the adorably traditional village of Niagra-on-the-Lake.