Getting-out-of-bed-worthy breakfast muffins

I used to be one of the biggest night owls you can imagine, and while this has remarkably changed in the past years, I’m still not quite the early bird that I would like to be. Though I did discover that I am easily bribed in getting up early – either with the promise of a nice morning run or, even better, with food! Glorious food! And preferably something hassle-free that you only need to take from a tin before you dive right in. Just like these breakfast muffins – loaded with good stuff like carrots, apples, flax seed and wholemeal flour, sweet but not to sweet, and absolutely delicious!

The best part is, these muffins freeze really well, so you can make a batch of them on the weekend and then enjoy them throughout the next week(s)! If you take them from the freezer the night before and place them in your fridge, they will defrost completely until the next morning without drying out. Do you need any more reasons to give these a try? See how easily they are made:

Tofu broccoli stir-fry with peanut sauce

A stir-fry is a perfect dish if you come home late from uni or work and don’t really feel like cooking, but don’t want to stuff yourself with unhealthy take-out either. It only takes about 15 minutes to prepare, and you can use whatever vegetables you have in your fridge. If you know you’re gonna be late one day, you can even cut up the vegetables in the morning, so all you have to do later is to heat your pan or wok and add your veggies of choice. Broccoli and tofu are by far my favourite stir-fry combination, but feel free to use any other vegetables you like! To make this dish even more yummy, I added a simple yet delicious peanut sauce. The ‘secret ingredient’ of the sauce is dark miso paste, which gives it a great, hearty flavour. The peanut sauce also freezes really well, so I usually prepare twice the amount (i.e. using a whole tin of coconut milk instead of just half of it) and freeze the leftovers.

Homemade vegan raspberry coconut ice cream

Best thing first: You don’t need an ice cream maker for this recipe! All you need is a good food processor and just three ingredients to make absolutely delicous (and even healthy!) vegan ice cream. The secret to this is frozen banana – which makes the perfect smooth ice cream base once you blend it. Unlike in baked treats (like cookies and such), where the banana flavour is often very strong, frozen banana works just the other way round: It provides a nice base for a multitude of other flavours without overpowering them. This way you can use frozen banana for many, many different ice cream varieties without always ending up with a banana plus x flavour. For this ice cream I used raspberries and coconut flakes, which makes an amazing combination and is actually super healty – no added sugar, no refined fats or artifical flavours! You can even count this ice cream as one of your ‘five a day’ portions – do I need any more reasons to convince you to giving this a try?

Creamy curry leek soup with apples

Though we are officially approaching summer time, the weather does quite a good job in ignoring this. I am still bundled up in my winter clothes when I’m heading out for my morning run, and the evenings are still way to cold for my liking. Luckily, if you’re not getting enough warmth from the sun, you can easily get some spring feelings with a fresh and spicy soup! The heartyness of leek makes a perfect combination with fresh, sourly apples, and the spicy flavours of curry are truly the icing on the cake of this soup. I used ‘light’ soy cream in this recipe to make it vegan, though you can use any kind of plant (or dairy if you’re non-vegan) cream you like.

Spicy pumpkin soup with ginger and coconut

Winter is the perfect season for a hot, steamy soup waiting for you for lunch or dinner – either at home or in a thermos container at uni. Some universities even offer microwaves for students to heat their packed lunch! This soup is one of my favourites, it has the perfect combination of spicy curry, slightly sweet coconut and hot ginger to really warm you from the inside. It freezes really well and also keeps fresh for a couple of days in the fridge, so I always make one big batch and feast on it for several days. This recipe makes about 4 servings – though you can of course downsize or upsize it to your liking.