In my kitchen - May 2013 (featuring coconut yoghurt and novel chocolate)

I am linking this post in to Celia's monthly In My Kitchen event at Fig Jam and Lime Cordial. 

In my kitchen, there is black quinoa. Last month, you may remember, there was red quinoa. Thus, in my kitchen, there is also a slight surplus of quinoa.

I should do a blind taste test with white, red and black to see if I can pick the difference. With my eyes open, I found this to be denser and slightly crunchier than white or red. It is also less sweet than red, but a bit nuttier than white.

In my kitchen, there is always chocolate. This month, there have been new, small-sized chocolate blocks.

On the top, we have Loving Earth's raw sour cherry and acai dark chocolate. It had 62% cocoa, 10% cherries, and agave as a sweetener. I loved it. The sourness of the cherries was blissful against the slight sweetness of the chocolate, and the cherries themselves provided a texture contrast to the soft raw chocolate. At 45g, it represents very bad value for money, unless you count value in pleasure, and then it was worth every cent of the $5.95 it cost me.

On the bottom, we have Leone's absinthe dark chocolate. Those of you who follow me on Facebook may have seen my reference to this other week. It had 74% cocoa, quite a strong absinthe contribution, and "essences of aromatic herbs and plants". I have to confess I didn't really know what absinthe was when I bought this - basically, anything novel combined with chocolate will draw me in - so I was pleased to discover that it is aniseed based. I was less pleased with the strength of the flavour in this block, and am not sure I will buy it again. Alcohol and I aren't great friends even when the alcohol comes in chocolate form.

In my kitchen, there is coconut yoghurt!

I have been waiting patiently for coconut yoghurt to reach a shop or outlet near me. I found it at a bulk food distributor at my local markets, and whilst it again cost far more than 400g of yoghurt strictly should ($13!), I was eager to try it.

I was hoping for the tart natural flavour of regular yoghurt, so was initially disappointed to find it tasted of coconut, wasn't very tart, and was creamier than I'd like but also not as thick as I'd like (how?). With time, I have come to like it more, and a small amount with frozen berries or atop cereal works very nicely indeed. I am also hoping to use it as a starter for more non-dairy yoghurt experimentation...

In my kitchen, there is an embarrassing box of cereal.

I mean, really. The woman looks like she's having an experience starting with 'o' which I won't sully my blog statistics by mentioning, and the man just looks scary. However, the cereal has dried mango, pineapple, papaya, dates and banana chips, which pretty much makes it snack heaven.

In my kitchen, there are also some snack animals, or snackimals, in snickerdoodle flavour. 

It seems that if I see individual snack sized vegan biscuits, in a flavour I've always wondered about but never tried, my usual apathy for commercial biscuits is replaced by marked enthusiasm. At least until I opened the packet, and discovered that snickerdoodle really just meant cinnamon, and that these need peanut butter to make them worth eating.

In my kitchen, there is harissa, a spice I have wanted to play with for some time.

I am still being cautious, but think harissa and I may get on rather well.

What is happening in your kitchen this month?

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