Here are my favourite 5 mid-winter drinks, I hope you will enjoy. They are:

– Healing Turmeric Tonic
– Mango and Coconut Milk Shake
– For a wonderful Hot Chocolate (log fire imagined)
– Pineapple, lime and fresh mint juice
– 5-minute Mushroom Hot Cacao Latte.

Healing Turmeric Tonic:

This is a tonic to detox and/or recover from a cold. Also relaxing. Serves 2.

ingredients:
1 tablespoon fresh grated turmeric, or 1/2 teasp. ground turmeric. Use fresh if you can get it.
1 tablespoon fresh grated ginger, or 1/2 teasp ground
1 whole lemon juiced (should be about 3 tablespoons or 45 ml juice)
1-2 teasps maple syrup. This is optional. You could also use raw honey or stevia.
1 pinch cayenne pepper (optional, or try cracked black pepper which helps bioavailability of turmeric)
3 cups filtered water.

Recipe:
– In a small saucepan add turmeric, ginger, lemon juice and lemon rind, maple syrup (opt), cayenne (opt) and filtered water. Bring to a simmer, not a boil, over medium heat. Then turn off heat.
– Set a small strainer over mugs and divide the strained tonic. It it tastes too strong, dilute with more hot or warm water.
Any leftover can be kept in fridge for 2-3 days. Reheat until just warm.

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Mango and Coconut Milk Shake – 2 glasses

NB (make your own coconut milk for a shake like this by blending 1 cup of shredded coconut with 2 cups of filrered water for one minute and straining through a fine mesh)

Ingredients:
1 cup mango pieces
1/2 cup of pineapple chunks
1-1/2 cups coconut milk as above
sweetener to taste – a drop of stevia, a little honey or maple syrup.

Recipe:
– Blend together until smooth.

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Fabulous Hot Chocolate (log fire would be good). 2 mugs

ingredients:
3 tablespoons cocoa butter or chopped darkest chocolate
1/4 cup unsweetened cacao, or cocoa powder, sifted
2- 1/2 cups homemade coconut milk, or tin of light coconut milk, or any other milk you prefer. Full fat coconut milk makes a creamier hot chocolate.
1 dash ground cinnamon
1 tsp maca powder (to promote hormone balance, good energy and provides a honeycomb flavour)
1 pinch sea salt
2 tablespoons maple syrup (or substitute stevia or coconut sugar)

Recipe:
– Add 1 inch of water to a medium saucepan and bring to simmer over medium heat.
– Place a pyrex of heatproof bowl on top that rests inside saucepan but does not touch the water.
– Add cocoa butter, sifted cacao powder and 1/2 cup of coconut milk, whisking occasionally to melt until well combined.
– Remove bowl from heat and discard remaining water.
– Transfer melted chocolate mixture to the saucepan, add cinnamon, maca powder, sea salt, maple syrup and remaining coconut milk and whisk to combine. Cook over medium heat until just beginning to bubble.
– Taste and adjust flavour as needed, adding more sweetner to taste, cinnamon for warmth and spiceness, maca for caramel flavour, cacao powder, sifted, for more intense chocolate flavour. More cocoa butter will add more creaminess.

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Pineapple, Lime and Fresh Mint Juice

Ingredients:
2 – 3 cups of pineapple chunks
1 lime, peeled
1/4 cup of fresh mint

Recipe:
– Put all through a juice extractor. Taste and, if desired, sweeten as above in previous recipe.

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5-minute Mushroom Hot Cacao Latte. serves 1

ingredients:
1 tsp mushroom powder (such as Reishi Spores or 10 mushroom blend
1 tsp maple syrup or other sweetener of choice
opt. 1 tsp almond butter
2 tablespoons cacao powder, or unsweetened cocoa powder
1 pinch ground cinnamon
1 pinch sea salt
1 cup dairy-free milk, such as cashew, coconut or almond milk.

Recipe:
– Use a Nutribullet blender if you have it. Add mushroom powder, maple syrup, opt almond butter, cacao powder, cinnamon and sea salt to blender.
– Heat the dairy-free milk until hot and add to the blender. Blend on high for 30 secs to 1 minute, or until frothy and well blended.
– Taste and adjust flavour as needed, adding cinnamon for warmth and more spice, sweetener to taste or more cacao for rich chocolate flavour.
– Serve like this, or top with cinnamon, or cacao powder or coconut whipped cream.

This latte is best when fresh.

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Well, I stopped a little while ago to make us a Hot Chocolate. I feel so replete!! It truly was luxuriously rich and creamy and without any dairy. Even with no log fire!

I hope you will enjoy a treat or two with these drinks.

Mary Anna.