Baobab And Lemon Buckwheat Brittle

You can treat this as a granola or just a good old fashioned snack. But however you treat it, treat it well, because this stuff is great. The flavour is kind of like lemon yogurt and the buckwheat gives the whole thing a wonderful crunch. There’s no oil in this recipe so the mixture has the opportunity to really crisp up (oil doesn’t dehydrate so keeps things a little soft), which is why I’ve called it a brittle. Unlike the traditional brittle candy though, this is not made with tonnes of sugar.

The crunch of the brittle combined with the occasional chewy bite of goji is so good.

This isn’t super sweet which is good, because it’s incredibly more-ish. A handful of this with a cup of tea when you’re having a morning energy dip is just the ticket.

I absolutely love baobab which has a tart and tangy flavour (hot tip: It’s great mixed in with muesli and mylk to give a yogurty flavour). It’s a wonderful fruit which is usually eaten in a dry powdered form. Baobab is super high in vitamin c (10 times more so than oranges! what!) and bursting with other nutrients like dietary fibre, calcium, iron and potassium. It’s also rich in antioxidants, is a natural prebiotic (food for probiotics!) and it’s an adaptogen so it can help balance out your stress and anxiety levels. Amazing right? And that’s not even the half of it. Go and have a read.

While it’s not essential to sprout your buckwheat, I highly recommend it. Not only does sprouting buckwheat increase its levels of proteins, fats, essential amino acids, B vitamins and certain enzymes, but it also breaks down phytic acid (known as an antinutrient, which sounds so evil!), making it easier to absorb certain nutrients. Sprouting also decreases enzyme inhibitors which means you’ll be able to digest it more easily. So sprout away my friends!

All you need to do is soak your buckwheat in water (preferably filtered) for 8-12 hours, then give them a good rinse, pop them in a sieve over a bowl covered with a tea towel and rinse them every few hours (not during the night though!). They’ll develop a goo which is normal. After about one and a half to two days you’ll see little tails sprouting out of the buckwheat. This is the moment you’ve been waiting for. The longer you let them sprout the more bitter they will become, so a tiny little tail is enough, but if you over-sprout I wouldn’t worry too much. (Have a look at the photo above for optimum tail length!)

The process is super simple and only a few ingredients are required. First we make a kind of sweet, tangy, lemony paste, then we stir in the buckwheat and gojis and finally we dehydrate the mixture until it becomes perfectly crisp,

Ingredients

2 cups raw sprouted buckwheat (this amounts to around 1 cup before soaking. If you sprout too much, you can simply dehydrate the extra buckwheat on a separate tray and sprinkle over your food for a crunchy boost of nutrients)

5 tablespoons maple syrup

5 tablespoons desiccated coconut

3 tablespoon coconut flour

4 tablespoons baobab powder

pinch vanilla

zest of 1 lemon

Juice of 1 lemon

pinch salt

1/2 cup goji berries

Method

1. Prepare a dehydrator tray and cover with a non-stick sheet.

2. Rinse your buckwheat well, but don’t worry if it still feels a tiny bit gooey. Set aside.

3. Add all other ingredients except gojis to a mixing bowl and mix well. You should have a kind of paste.

4. Stir in your buckwheat and goji berries and mix really well until everything is coated with your mixture.

5. Depending on how wet/dry your buckwheat is and how juicy your lemon is, you may need to add a little water to get things going here. A few tablespoons should do it.

6. You’ll have to kind of smear everything together and use a bit of elbow grease.

7. Transfer the mixture to your dehydrator tray and do your best to spread it all out fairly evenly across your non-stick sheets. You can break it up after it’s dehydrated so keep it reasonably clumpy.

8. Dehydrate at 115°F/46°C for around 24 hours. To check it’s done, take a piece out of the dehydrator and leave it to cool for a minute. The final result should be super crunchy.

9. Once completely cool, store in a jar or airtight container and snack away or crumble over breakfast or desserts!