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In the spirit of my periodic tribute to the 2000 movie Chocolat, today I offer readers this divine recipe for Roasted Root Vegetables with Chocolate Glaze. It’s just one in a series of dishes I’ve been developing over the years to imitate the chocolate-themed meal in one of movie history’s great food scenes!
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If you’ve never tried making chia pudding, I’ve got a sweet surprise for you with today’s recipe—Chocolate Mint Chia Pudding. You will be hard pressed to find a quicker or easier dessert to make from scratch. It’s totally delicious, of course, and pretty much guilt free!
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If you have trouble choosing between the pumpkin pie or the chocolate cake on the Thanksgiving dessert table, these vegan and gluten-free Chocolate Glazed Pumpkin Squares will help you satisfy both desires in a few delicious bites! Let me warn you that these are no ordinary cookie bars because they are infinitely rich and moist. A few bites may be just enough. Even so, they qualify as healthy comfort food, in my humble opinion, since they are made with fresh, whole foods.
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As you plan an alluring vegetarian or vegan meal for Valentine’s Day, I invite you to sample this unique Savory Sweet Potato Soup with Mushrooms & Chocolate Swirl! I owe its inspiration to one of my very favorite and utterly charming movies: Chocolat.
In the movie, the main character, Vianne (Juliette Binoche) opens a chocolate shop that is considered too great a temptation in a conservative French village. If you watch the movie, you’ll see amazing delicacies that will have you lusting after chocolate! One of the movie’s more memorable and talked-about scenes features a chocolate-themed luncheon that Vianne hosts for a friend’s birthday in which chocolate sauces accompany every dish. Her menu features a large turkey and a pork roast, though I’ve often wondered what that meal might look like for a vegetarian feast. Today’s sweet and savory soup is my attempt at the first course!
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Today, dear friends and fellow chocolate enthusiasts, I offer you an incredibly delicious gluten-free and vegan chocolate cake with which to tempt your sweetheart on the occasion of Valentine’s Day. When Sacred & Delicious was first published in October 2018, Biblio Reviews wrote this: “The vegan Dark Chocolate Layer Cake was the best vegan cake I have ever made!”
I’ve adapted the book’s large sheet cake recipe to create a smaller cake you can bake in a heart-shaped pan or as a traditional 9-inch layer cake. Yes! A gluten-free and vegan cake that is moist, not overly sweet, and still delicious enough to make having seconds hard to resist. Just ask my husband!
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If you love dark chocolate and want to splurge a little for Valentine’s Day, do I have a treat for you and your beloved—perhaps the fudgiest brownies you’ve ever tasted! From a health perspective, the good news is that these are not outrageously sweet compared to standard fare, even though I’m told they are sufficiently decadent to stir the passions of any chocolate lover.
First, let me acknowledge what may be obvious to many readers: chocolate, fudge, and brownies are not part of ancient Ayurvedic cuisine. Nonetheless, I believe in adding some flexibility to my offerings so that people exploring Ayurveda don’t feel constrained by too much austerity. As one of my Ayurvedic mentors often says,
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When my husband and I married, almost twenty-one years ago, we exchanged pieces of chocolate as part of our wedding ceremony. The event was conducted by my mentor and friend, Diana Vela. At the point when Tom and I fed each other chocolate, Diana spoke these words on our behalf:
“I, Tom, share with you the sweetness of my soul, and may we share in the light and food of life together. I, Lisa, share with you the sweetness of my soul, and may we share in the light and food of life together.”
Although I had always loved chocolate, its sweetness took on a new layer of meaning for me in that sacred moment!
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