merry christmas

Sol and I have enjoyed fresh mango followed by a golden toasted slice of panettone for breakfast over the past few mornings. Panettone is a sweet bread, rich with butter and eggs and studded with sultanas and candied citrus peel. Originating in Milan it is traditionally prepared to celebrate Christmas. My earliest memory of panettone is as a child at my nana's house.

My nan worked as a dressmaker all her life and in the factory where she worked throughout my childhood, many of the women she worked with were Italian or Greek. My brother and I enjoyed going with my nan on some weekends to visit her work friends where we were treated to warm and generous European hospitality (ie. much fussing over because my nan's friends loved children and many treats of home made biscuits and cakes). At Christmas time my nana would bring home gifts from these women of traditional Christmas foods such as panettone.

Having a young family of my own, I am keen to create some of our own Christmas traditions. Our cut + paste tree is shaping up to be one, as is making panforte. What traditions do you enjoy with your family? Or perhaps there are some from other cultures that you admire, I'd love to hear. Creating and honouring tradition makes life richer, brings deeper meaning to our celebrations and acknowledges history and ancestry.

Speaking of my young family, River had his last day of Prep today. I was as emotional as I was on his first day, completely unprepared for the heart swelling farewell to his beautiful teacher and the acknowledgment of all the wonderful ways he has grown this year in mind and heart.

In place of a list today, I have one special link...

My friend and mentor Samantha Gowing, who is a therapeutic chef with a flair for delicious food as medicine, launched her first ebook today. Filled with recipes, remedies and wonderful stories from Sam's life and kitchen, 'The Healing Feeling' represents 12 years of her experience and knowledge. It is a wonderful resource whether you are just starting out making better food choices or whether you are well underway on the real food journey.

The title of Sam's book speaks to me because from where I sit we could all do with some healing in one form or another, and if there's one need that is a growing one for many people it is nutritional healing. So, a big congratulations Sam on putting your heart, soul and wisdom into this beautiful book I know it will be valuable and life changing for many people.

Life is different when we are well nourished. We have more energy, more mental clarity, emotional balance and connection with the earth and the people we love.

On that note, I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and look forward to seeing you back here in 2013. I've decided to make this my last post for 2012 and savour each moment of the days between now and the New Year giving my full attention to my real life family and friends. Thank you my online friends for reading my blog this year, for your comments and friendship and being part of the wholefood movement. Here's to more people joining us on the wholefood path next year.

Peace and Joy to all.

Nikki xx

strong bread

In Byron Bay on Australia’s east coast it doesn’t need to be Christmas to enjoy the delightful panforte made by talented artisan bakers Faith and Sally. I spend winter in Byron with my family and I always return to Victoria with Faith and Sally’s panforte, that they make year round, for my nan who then slices it wafer thin to make it last to go with as many cups of tea as possible.

Panforte originates in Italy and literally translates to ‘strong bread’, a specialty in the region of Siena it is also known as Siena Cake. It dates back to the thirteenth century and there are a number of stories to be found about the origins of panforte. One being that farmers for the Convent Montecellesci made panforte as a tribute to the nuns.

This Christmas I’ve experimented and made my own as gifts for friends and family. Nan tells me it is as good as Faith and Sally’s. I’m not convinced about that but I am happy with the spicy, nutty, fruity, chocolatey result!

This recipe is gluten free and was inspired by the recipe in ‘More gorgeous gluten free’ by Carole Hofflin. The recipe is very flexible, you can substitute any number of the ingredients. Carole’s recipe calls for 300g of mixed peel, I’m not a fan of mixed peel so I left it out and added dates and cranberries. Switch the walnuts for pecans. And so on.

Panforte

400g whole almonds, blanched

250g walnuts, roughly chopped

250g raisins

250g currants

250g dried figs, chopped

100g dried cranberries

100g glace ginger, chopped

150g dried dates, chopped

300g dark chocolate, chopped

100g brown rice flour

100g almond meal

3 tspns cocoa powder

2 tspns ground cinnamon

1 tspn white pepper

1 tspn ground nutmeg

1 tspn ground coriander seeds

300g honey

100g raw or brown sugar

30ml water

Pre-heat oven to 160C degrees.

Into a large bowl place walnuts, dried fruits, rice flour, almond meal, spices, cocoa and chocolate.

Mix all ingredients well.

Toast the almonds and while still hot add the to the mixture.

Place the water, honey, and sugar into a saucepan and gently bring to a boil, stirring until sugar dissolves and taking care not to burn.

Pour the sugar syrup over the fruit and nut mix and stir quickly and thoroughly.

Tip mixture into a lined (bottom and sides) lamington tray.

Using the back of a wooden spoon press the mix evenly into the tray.

Bake for 35 minutes.

Remove from oven and cool completely before removing from the tray.

Cut into rectangles or triangles and store in an airtight container. It will keep for several weeks.

Optional: dust with pure icing sugar. Enjoy!

the gift of a day

I gave my friend a gift today. It wasn’t a gift I could wrap and it didn’t cost any money. It was, the gift of a day. A precious gift of time to herself and I felt so joyous to give it.

My friend is a mum raising her four-year-old daughter on her own. To any mother, time to themselves is a rare and fleeting commodity to a mother flying solo with their children it is even more elusive. So, a whole day for my friend to be, think and feel as she wanted. No questions to answer, socks to be found, stories to be told, games to be played. Just her own thoughts to be had. Uninterrupted.

I love giving gifts and I got so much out of this one because I understood how much it meant. Even when during the day the children squabbled and Sol cried and my friend’s daughter asked, ‘Can you do something about the crying?’ I just smiled to myself and thought of my friend and I felt so happy.

My point of sharing this is not to say ‘how good am I?!’ rather to take a moment to shine a light on the incredible work parents do, the energy it takes to parent and to the importance of supporting each other to do it – especially those parents doing it on their own.

Each day really is a gift. Christmas drawing closer, the coming together of family and friends is causing me to feel reflective and immensely grateful for the gift of each day, for the gift of children, my own and other people’s, and for family and friends.

Surprise a friend with a gift of a day or a gift of a meal. Not because they're sick, or they have an appointment, or they're grieving, or just had a baby. Just because.

Happy gift giving.