Raw Chocolate Muffin Recipe using Coconut Oil

Once again a big thank you to Amy from Coconut Health and Healing for popping past the blog and telling us all about the amazing benefits of introducing coconut oil in to our lives last week. If you missed the post you can read about it here.

As promised, I have Amy's divine sounding recipe for Raw Chocolate Muffins which I am most definitely keen to try out in our home.

 

Not only is this recipe sugar free, but it is also gluten free too. Not many kids turn their noses up at chocolate based items, so I am sure this recipe will be a hit in the lunchbox later on this week when school resumes in most parts of Australia.

You'll Need:

·         3 eggs

·         2 tablespoons of coconut oil, melted

·         30 drops of liquid stevia or ¼ teaspoon powdered stevia.

·         ¼ cup sifted coconut flour

·         ¼ teaspoon baking powder (gluten free)

·         ½ cup raw cacao nibs

Method:

1.      Preheat oven to 180 degrees

2.     Blend together eggs, coconut oil, stevia and salt.

3.     Combine coconut flour with baking powder and whisk into batter until there are no lumps.

4.     Fold through raw cacao nibs.

5.     Scoop batter into 4 cupcake holders (for larger cupcakes) or 6 (for smaller ones).

6.     Bake for 15-20 mins depending on size.

7.     Cool on a wire rack .

Already a fan of Coconut Oil? What recipes or what do you like to cook using this amazing ingredient in your home? I would love you to share away...

Everything you wanted to know about Coconut Oil

One of the biggest buzz words around diet and well being at the moment is definitely Coconut Oil. But if you are anything like me - you have no idea what it is, how to use it and what makes it so darn good according to every model, celebrity and Tom, Dick and Harry!

It seems that a few of my readers are also interested in learning a little bit more about it, so I have the lovely Amy from Coconut Health and Healing here to tell us all a little bit more about this magical ingredient!

Hi Everyone, my name is Amy and I’m here to tell you why coconut oil is AMAZING!!

 

Nearly 50 percent of the fat in coconut oil is of a type rarely found in nature called lauric acid, a "miracle" compound because of its unique health promoting properties. Your body converts lauric acid into monolaurin, which has anti-viral, anti-bacterial and anti-protozoa properties. Coconut oil is high in “good “ saturated fat. A fat that our bodies need. There are medium-chain saturated fatty acids (like those in coconut oil) and long-chain saturated fat (like those in meat).  The medium chain saturated fatty acids are stored into your body as energy not fat! So you’re burning energy off at a faster rate which is great for weight loss.

 

Here’s why you should introduce this product into your life:

• Prevents heart disease 

• Kills diseases causing bacteria, viruses and fungi 

• Weight loss 

• Boosts your energy and increases your metabolism 

• Enhances the immune system

• Balances blood sugar and controls diabetes

• Creates radiant skin

• Helps reduce sugar cravings

• Supports healthy thyroid function

• Kills sugar cravings

• Fills you up

The amazing uses:

Cooking - Use in replacement of your cooking oil. Coconut oil is the only oil that isn’t damaged by heat.

Smoothies - It'll thicken them up and make them taste even more delicious.

Makeup remover - I use coconut oil to remove my eye makeup every night!

Hair mask - Cover your hair in the oil and leave in overnight for a truly nourishing treatment without the oily residue. Best hair conditioner in the world!

Body moisturiser - Lather it over your whole body. You skin will become amazingly soft.

Supplement – I take 3 tablespoons everyday by the spoon or I have it in my green or lemon tea. Yum!!!!

Is coconut oil solid or liquid?

Coconut oil is a solid a room temperature but will change to liquid if the temperature rises above 25 degrees. If you want to use it solid, keep it in the fridge. If you would like to use it as a liquid, spoon out as much as you need and put in a saucepan over hot plates.

What type should we buy?

Look for coconut oil that is organic, unrefined, undeodorised, and cold pressed. Stay clear of the plain and refined coconut oils which are the cheaper coconut oils. They are made from copra (dried coconut kernel) rather than fresh coconut meat. I sell the Niulife extra virgin coconut oil through my blog, as I believe it’s the best one on the market.

 

How much should we consume?

Body Weight (kg)	Tablespoons of Coconut Oil
79+	4
68	3.5
57	3
45	2.5
34	2
23	1.5

I will be back on the blog later this week with scrumptious treat recipe using the oil. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me via my Facebook Page or email me at Amy@coconuthealthandhealing.com.

Thank you so much Amy, it seems that there are just so many diverse ways that this clever little product can positively impact our lives. One of my resolutions this year is better health and cleaner eating, so I am definitely keen to introduce this in to my home and life!

 

If you are interested in purchasing the Oil or just learning more about the benefits, please head on over to the Coconut Health and Healing Page and try it out for yourself. I look forward to sharing Amy's amazing recipe with you later on this week.

Stoxbox Giveaway Enter Here

 

If you missed out on seeing the amazing Stoxbox in action, be sure to check out the blog post from yesterday. 

 

Once again a big thank you to Stoxbox for offering up a set of 3 Stoxbox for one of you very lucky readers to take home.

 

Entry to this competition is by Rafflecopter, please note terms and conditions and good luck!!!

 

a Rafflecopter giveaway  

 

 

Terms & Conditions

- The giveaway will be hosted by Rafflecopter and is open to Australian residents only
- The announcement of the lucky winner will be made right here on the Utterly Organised blog
- The lucky winner will have 5 days to contact Utterly Organised and claim their prize
- Failure to claim prize within designated period will result in another winner being drawn
- Entrants must like the Utterly Organised Facebook Page
- Any questions on the competition can be directed to utterlyorganised@gmail.com

 

 

Organise your Tights, Stockings & Leggings with Stoxbox

I live in dresses and tunics all year round (so much easier than co-ordinating a top and a bottom I find), but because I live in Melbourne (where it is cool more often than not), I live in and adore my tights and leggings.

 

Tights, stockings and leggings are one of the things that I have always struggled to organise and keep in a nice neat order, so I was immediately excited when I came across this ingenious invention - the Stoxbox.

 

 

The Stoxbox is a clever little invention that not only allows you to store and organise your patterned tights, leggings and co, but it cleverly displays them too which means less time fumbling through 1000 pairs in the morning to find the pair that you want.

 

Before......

 

And After...

 

The amazing thing about the before picture above and the after picture, is that the before drawer which was stuffed to the brim with tights ahoy only had 15 pairs, whereas the after draw actually contains 30 pairs of tights in the Stoxbox - amazing!!

 

The Stoxbox is now available to purchase through David Jones stores across Australia for $14.95, or you can take advantage of a special offer to buy a set of three for $39.00. They will soon also be available to purchase online over at the Stoxbox website, stay tuned for that if you don't have a DJ's store handy.

 

If you are dying to give these a try for yourself, the great news is that Stoxbox have kindly offered my readers the chance to win a set of 3 right here on the blog. The competition will be open tomorrow, so don't forget to pop back then for your chance to enter.

 

Right now I'm off to try and make some sense of my own drawer of tights (which looks very much like the before picture I must admit) and see just how many I need to order to tame my collection....

Melt and Mix Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe

Call me lazy, but I detest recipes that involve creaming, sometimes it just seems too hard to get the mixmaster out - am I alone here?! Therefore melt and mix recipes are my friend, so easy and quick to whip up and not a set of beaters or Kitchen Aid in sight.

Chocolate Chip Cookies (and let's face it, anything with chocolate in it) are something that we cannot get enough of in our house. But until now, I make these very rarely due to the effort. That was why I was super excited when I stumbled across a melt and mix cookie recipe that was just too good not to share, especially with school going back in a few short weeks.

 

You'll Need:

• 125g Butter
• 1/4 Cup Peanut Butter (I used crunchy)
• 1 Cup Brown Sugar
• 1 Beaten Egg
• 3/4 Cup Plain Flour
• 3/4 Cup Self Raising Flour
• 1/2 Cup Rolled Oats (see it is not all bad in this recipe!)
• 1 Cup Chocolate Chips

Method:

1. Combine butter and peanut butter in a saucepan until melted and combined. Pop in a large bowl until cooled down (approx 5 minutes)
2. Add sugar and egg and stir until combined
3. Sift flours over the top of mixture and add oats and chocolate bits and stir to combine
4. Roll up in to balls (I made mine approx 1Tbs each ball) and flatten with fork or spatula slightly
5. Bake at 180c for 10 - 12 minutes until golden
6. Enjoy with a cuppa and your favourite mag - well we can all dream!!

Notes:

• If using these for lunch-boxes, omit the peanut butter
• You could also add fruit such as sultanas or apricot pieces if you wish
• Just try and stop at one - I dare you!!

Hope you enjoy these as much as we did. Are you too a fan of melt and mix recipes?

10 Apps to help you stay Organised!

Hands up if one of your goals this year is to be a teeny bit more organised? Yup me too.

 

Because we now live in a time where mobile or smart phones are used so much, I thought that it would be only fitting to have a post that features the top 10 apps to help you remain on the straight and narrow when it comes to staying organised.

I am delighted to have Brian Jensen from Dell pop along to give us some suggestions, because I must admit I am still new to the 'smart phone' scene having only owned one for a few short months now. Brian has a real passion for learning and writing about all things technology, so you know his advice on the top apps is going to be spot on!

If you have some more apps that you simply love and that have rocked your world, I would love to hear all about them.

Managing life can be stressful when you get busy. It can be even trickier if you are trying to manage multiple schedules at once for you and your spouse or your entire family. There are lots of tools that can be used in order to help you keep track of everything going on. It can all be right in the palm of your hand. Here is a list of ten of the best apps that will help you stay organised.

Astrid: While basic, this app helps you make a to-do list and mark things off as they are completed. This list can be shared with many devices through the cloud. It can also be used on the android system.

Todoist: This app is a bit more intricate as it allows more tasks to be scheduled and prioritised. Tasks can be broken down into subtasks and can also be selected to be highlighted if they are more important. Also, tasks can be viewed a day at a time or a week at a time. Plug-ins are also available for most browsers and even Outlook email.

Remember The Milk: This app allows you to customise your to-do list with locations, time limits, and updates when the task is completed. These features allow you to keep all your information all on one pc and then view it on your phone or other device.

Checkmark: Using your GPA coordinates on your device’s tracking signal, different to-do lists will pop up when it sees you are close to a familiar place. You can create customised lists for each location such as work, school, or home. This way you can keep your tasks organised in a helpful way.

Schedule Planner Pro: For those who love and need a very detailed app, this is the one for you. Not only does this sync to your Google or Apple calendars, but it also categorises the task according to the information you put in when creating the task.

Wunderlist: This task is very much like the other ones, but there is one great benefit. Adding tasks is easy and can even be done by sending an email to yourself since syncing this app to your email is so easy.

reQall: The King of all task apps is this one right here. It can help you manage all sorts of tasks aside from task lists such as shopping lists, setting appointments, and leaving voice or text notes. It will send you reminders via texts, emails, instant message, or by voice.

Timewerks: Aimed at independent contractors, this organisational app has the ability to have multiple active stopwatches, the ability to export data, and ways to customise rates per task. This can help you stay organised on the job to make billing easier.

A Personal Assistant: When you have a lot of online accounts that need tracking, this is the app for you. After inputting all your accounts and their information, it will always remember them and let you access the accounts without entering the information again. Use a master itinerary to manage your finances with transactions and balances.

Lockbox: If you have a hard time keeping track of passwords, this app will take care of that. Input your personal information into the app and it will remember it all for you. It is encrypted and needs certain information to access, so not anyone who picks up your phone will have access to this sensitive information.

What are your favourite apps for staying organised?

A big thank you to Brian from Dell for being a fabulous guest blogger, I will be definitely checking out some of the above and would love you to tell me all about any others that I should be checking out...

Brodie's Elephant Themed 1st Birthday Party

Well in the craziness that was Christmas and December in general, I just realised that I haven't had a chance to blog about Mr B's 1st birthday party. It was such a special day, so it would be remiss of me not to share it with you all....

 

 

The Theme

I decided pretty early on in the piece that I wanted to use elephants as the theme for Mr B's birthday party, as I wanted to stick with something 'cute' while I could. I know full well that in a few short years that it will be all about trucks, dinosaurs and other 'boyish' themes so this year we had the Peter Rabbit christening and the Elephant 1st birthday.

 

I was so fortunate that Karen from Be Design Solutions was just brilliant when it came to designing the printed material. I simply gave her a few ideas on designs that I liked, set the colour scheme of white, aqua and red and away she went and the results were just divine....

 

 

  

 

What we Ate

 

As Candy and Dessert Buffets is what I do, I couldn't resist having a Dessert buffet for the Event.

 

I tried not to go too overboard with the lollies and stuck to just a few jars with some of our favourites - all matching the colour scheme of course!

One of the best things that I decided to do for the party was not make the cake!! I had such a strong feeling that in the lead up to the Event I would be busy with other Events for clients. This proved to be a very wise decision in the end as I took on a last minute client event that fell on the same day!!

 

I engaged the services of the truly amazing Lick the Bowl who created an absolute cake masterpiece that matched the printed design to a tee.

 

Lick the Bowl also created the amazing Cake Pops, Cookies and Push Pops all to match.

One of the biggest talking points of the day were the divine macarons from Bespoke Occasions.

 

Even though I did have some help from some fabulous suppliers, I did have to pull the apron out and whip up a few things myself. Instead of the traditional 'frog in the pond', I made elephant in the swamp' and did a two layer jelly with chocolate elephants that I made.

 

I also made my favourite (and super easy) chocolate mousse recipe and whipped up some dips with my trusty Thermomix.

There were other treats such as teddy racing cars (not as easy to make as they look!!), popcorn, fruit kebabs, personalised chocolate bars and a cheese platter.

What we Drank

On a second table, I set up my drink dispensers with my fruit punch recipe and a little water in the other one.

I also had Juice drinks that were covered in stickers in the matching printed material.

What we Did

Apart from eat, I set up a few little activities to keep the kidlets amused. I set up trestle tables so that the kids could colour in and do join the dots on elephant themed sheets of paper (that I downloaded from the internet). This was such a simple and cheap activity, but the kids absolutely loved it.

 

We also set up a small jumping castle that we received as a gift (it was an absolute disaster as we pierced it right before our first guest arrived and seemed to spend most of the party trying to repeatedly repair it!). We also set up play tents and tunnels too.

 

The Day

The day was forecast to rain, so I was a bit worried about setting everything up outside. Despite the forecast, it turned out to be a beautiful sunny day and the birthday boy and his guests all seemed to enjoy the day.

 

I am a little bit sad that my little man is already one, as I know this year is going to fly by just as quick as the first year did. It is time almost to get planning for the 2nd birthday party - which I might add is not going to be quite as big as this one... famous last words!!!

 

 

Once again a BIG thank you to Be Design Solutions, Lick the Bowl, Bespoke Occasions and also Haven Lifestyle Photography for the simply amazing images of the day.

If you are in Melbourne and would like me to give you a hand planning your own party masterpiece, please contact me or feel free to follow my Events Facebook page - I would love to help you out!!

My New Years Resolutions for 2013

Well 2012 is officially over, can you believe it?!

Do you like to write yourself a set of resolutions or goals for the New Year? Or do you just head in to the New Year full of energy and you find the act of writing or coming up with resolutions a waste of time?!

 

Last year was the first year that I haven't really thought about any resolutions or goals in a long time. Mainly because when the New Year rolled around, I was more focused on managing to survive on 3 hours of sleep with a baby only a few weeks old, rather than setting myself any goals or resolutions.

 

Here are a few that I am setting myself for 2013.....

 

1. Stop Biting my Nails!!

 

Yes it is disgusting and a very, very bad habit but I am a chronic nail biter. I have managed to kick the habit once or twice in my lifetime, but it has always been short lived. I truly hope that 2013 is the year that I can kick it for good, how I would love beautifully manicured fingers!!

 

2. Get Healthy!

 

I am not going to be setting myself a goal of loosing so many kilograms (although 3 would be nice!), instead 2013 is going to be around feeling and being much healthier.

 

I am in a pretty good exercise routine at the moment, I just need to focus on better and cleaner eating.

 

3. House Project Competition

 

In 2013 my major house projects will focus on Mr B.

 

Towards the middle or the end of 2013, I would like to transform Mr B's nursery (if you missed seeing this, you can read about it here) in to more of a little boys room and change the colour scheme too. I have many ideas around this, so it is probably going to take me the first half of the year to organise my inspiration and ideas!!

 

At the start of this year, I would like to work on a little playroom area that I have started for Mr B, but have not had time to finish it off. With Christmas and B's birthday so close, we have had a real toy injection in to our house that needs to be organised before it gets out of control.

 

These two projects are my main goals around the home for the year, though I am sure that there will be a few more creep in as the year progresses. I just cannot help myself!!!!

 

4. Continue Building my Events Business

 

For those of you that don't know, I also run an Event Hire and Styling Business in Melbourne that I started up in August this year. Since I stated this little venture, I have loved every single crazy minute of it.

 

I am just in the process of re-branding my business and building a website and I truly hope to have an even more successful year doing what I love in 2013.

 

So that's it, I am not being too hard on myself for the New Year just focusing on a few projects and overall being happy, healthy and very grateful for my life, friends and family.

 

What about you? What are your resolutions or goals for the New Year? I would love to hear what you are hoping to achieve this year.