A delicious, healthy and simple pudding that, quite frankly, tastes a lot like chocolate mousse! Just try it and see for yourself. Garnish with some sprouted buckwheat, and add raspberries or blueberries to turn this into an amazing breakfast, or dessert, that everyone in the family will love.
Ingredients:
2 small ripe avocados
1 scoop raw vegan vanilla protein
2 Tbsp homemade almond milk or water
1 tsp vanilla extract
liquid stevia (to taste)
Sprouted dehydrated buckwheat (optional)
Blueberries or Raspberries (optional)
Preparation:
Blend all of the ingredients (except for the buckwheat and blueberries/raspberries) until a smooth consistency is achieved. That’s it! Please note that many people would include cacao in this type of pudding, however, we do not endorse cacao for health reasons (see comment below). We do, however, add some sprouted dehydrated buckwheat and blueberries or raspberries – turning this into a fantastic, energy packed breakfast that any child or adult would absolutely love!
Tips: It is important to use well ripened avocados. If you are using a variable speed blender, start slow and gradually increase to a faster speed. We do not recommend powder stevia for taste reasons. Stick to liquid stevia. Lastly, this is not a recipe we recommend for people with cardiovascular disease, as we prefer that you remain on a low fat diet (avocados are high in fat).
Makes 1-2 servings.
Bon Appétit!
Marc & Christine
Great information! Very consistent with the documentary Rotten on Netflix in the episode about chocolate. Not like that’s the ultimate scientific reference. But it helps to actually see how it’s made and reading what you wrote corresponds exactly to what is exposed in the documentary.
Thanks Karim! I’ve heard about Rotten, especially lately regarding the episode on avocados and the Mexican cartels – the food supply chain can be quite evil.
Could you explain what is unhealthful about cacao powder please.
Cacao is not a health food, although it is unfortunately promoted as one- raw cacao is the latest health craze at the moment. We do not include cacao in any of the recipes on our website for the following reasons:
Cacao beans need to be fermented to become edible, and this process is done under poor conditions, leading to a high concentration of mycotoxins such as aflatoxin- a known carcinogen. Visiting a cacao farm will show you the lack of proper sanitation and the ease of contamination.
Even if produced under tremendous safety guidelines, which is far from the reality, the reported health benefits of raw cacao is just an example of how hype can sometimes overtake science. Cacao is extremely addictive, it is a hallucinogen – the native people did not mistake cacao seeds for food; they added it to their psychedelic plant mixtures and had a party! It was only used in very small quantities and never in the amounts that we are consuming it today. Cacao is a stimulant that is damaging to the kidneys, liver and adrenal glands. Furthermore, almost all cacao tested recently was found to contain dangerous levels of cadmium (a heavy metal).
Breaking it down a little further, cacao is roughly 35% saturated fat and most people do not like the taste of raw cacao so, to compound the issue, they add tons of sugar to it- saturated fat and sugar is not a nutritional profile that we like! But even if you take 100g of a bitter dark chocolate bar (70-85% cacao) with very little sugar added, this bar would contain 605 calories, 400 of which would be fat, and almost 60% of this fat would be SATURATED fat! Cacao powder, on the other hand, has most of the fat removed and would be a better alternative for those who wish to indulge a little.
There are many accounts of individuals that began consuming cacao for health reasons and had to stop within a year or two due to negative side effects. Still, cacao remains an emotional issue for most people and it’s easy to understand why: It is a high fat, highly addictive stimulant, and we want to be told it’s good for us. Of course you may enjoy a small amount of it on some occasions. The issue, however, is that cacao should not be labelled a health food.
What about carob?
Carob is not addictive like cacao, and does not contain the harmful stimulants. However, carob products tend to be very high in sugar and have lots of fat added to them. I’m not saying to never have some fun with these things, just don’t do it too often.