Home made chocolate-banana ice lollies

So, summer is about to end.....(sigh). Next week is "la rentree" and, although we DID finally get a decent summer here in Brussels (after a non-existent spring) it is still incredible how weeks have flown by.

But hey, just because the countdown to another school term (and shorter, cooler days) has begun, it doesn't mean we cannot still enjoy one of our summer time favourites: home made ice lollies.

It started a few years back, when I bought some ice-lollies molds from IKEA, full of good intentions but little else. The molds remained untouched in a drawer in our kitchen until this year, when I found a number of nice looking recipes online and decided to start experimenting.

This summer, I've done from the really easy, virtually no work required lollies made of frozen supermarket-bought smoothies (I know, I know, but sometimes one is really short of time and ideas) to the more elaborate ones. This is a recipe for banana-chocolate ones, which have proved a big success with Bibu. It features the good, old, hard-working banana (is there a house with small children without a bunch of bananas lying somewhere?) and cocoa powder, which is apparently full of antioxidants and a super food. Here we go:

Ingredients (for 6 ice lollies)

• 2 ripe bananas
• 2 tbsp cocoa powder (I used the 100% cocoa powder from Carrefour, but you can even go organic if you prefer, so ensure healthy credentials)
• 4 tbsp natural yogurt
• half a small carton of cream (creme fraiche)
• 1 tsp of sugar (or honey, or agave syrup)

Just put everything into a blender, whiz until  you get a chocolatey, creamy texture and pour into the molds. Put the molds in the freezer for at least 4 hours (best overnight) and then enjoy. They won't make summer any longer, but they will definitely make it sweeter!

Escape to Parc Tenbosch (Ixelles)

So, what do you do when, suddenly, both your children are at home during school holidays (the baby one and also the one you counted on being at the quite expensive hockey one-week stage you signed him up for but that he emphatically refused to go to after three days ?

Well, if you live in the Ixelles/ Uccle area, you escape to Parc Tenbosch for a spot of pic-nic. Obviously.

It's the yummy mummy park par-excellence here in Brussels, I think. Today, though, not a mummy and baby yoga class in sight. It was all very quiet and peaceful. All the loungers were empty, so Bibu and I settled and proceeded to attack our picnic sandwiches while baby Pingu proceeded to attack us (and steal some bites of my sandwich, after having eaten his own appropriate warm baby-meal)

As usual, picnics with two boys tend to last about 6 minutes, just long enough for Bibu to scoff his food as fast as he can and declare that he is ready to go to the playground. So there we went, wallking along the brick road, past the romantic, beautiful wooden benches:

And into the strange red wood chip playground

Parc Tenbosch is incredibly beautiful, definitely one of my favourite parks in the cityl. It's small, but big enough to house a couple of gated playgrounds (the woodchip one and one which is just a sandpit), a tennis, a petanque and a basquetball field, plus all the nice benches and greenery galore. The only thing missing is a toilet, preferably with a nappy changing station. Many other less nice parks in the area have toilets, so it's baffling why such a well maintained park doesn't.

That, and a nice coffee place just across the street is what would make Tenbosch the über-park. In the meantime, though, not to be missed. Boys and mamma very pleased with the bit of fresh air.

Sport camp lunchbox: courgette muffins

So, summer is almost gone (back to school in two weeks already??) but still it's "stage" (sport camp) time for many kids in Brussels. This year; we only signed Bibu up for one week of stage, doing an introduction to hockey in one of the best-known hockey and tennis clubs in the city.

Sport camp means in most cases "packed lunch", as it's not common for warm meals to be provided. I thought, besides the typical ham-and-cheese sandwich and cherry tomatoes combo,  what can I put in Bibu's lunchbox that will be easy to eat, easy to pack and would provide some healthy alternative?

The answer: savoury mufifins!

I'm quite familiar with the traditional sweet muffins. I have a few recipes that use reduced sugar and yogurt and are always a hit with the kids, using chocolate, apple and cinnamon or lemon and honey, among others. When it comes to savoury muffins using vegetables, however, there is much less variety. I scoured page after page of Pinterest to only find a few weird recipes. I was looking for courgette muffins, as I had a couple of those bad boys in the fridge. In the end, I found one recipe that I adapted a bit:

They are easy peasy to make. I made about 16 muffins wit the amounts given. I advise it's best to prepare them the night before, as they need to cool down completely. I also advise to dry a bit the grated courgette in a clean kitchen towel or cheesecloth to avoid the muffins being too soggy inside, as courgettes (and spinach) tend to hold lots of water inside.

Ingredients (for about 16 small muffins)

• 200 gr self-raising flour
• 1 tsp salt
• a couple grinds of black pepper
• 60 gr grated parmesan cheese
• 2 eggs
• 250 ml full fat yogurt (I used a 150 gr pot of soft goat cheese and 100 gr of yogurt, but you can use only yogurt. I imagine ricotta might work just as well)
• 4 tbsp sunflower or olive oil
• 200 gr grated courgette (or cooked spinach, or whatever vegetable you want to use)

Preheat the oven at 180 C and while it gets ready, start preparing the muffins. Mix all dry ingredients in one bowl, mix all wet ingredients in another bowl. Pour the dry onto the wet, ad the courgettes and mix well. Using an ice-cream scoop (it rends the process sooo much easier) put a little bit of the mix onto each muffin form (I used silicone muffin forms for these ones, but you can also line a muffin tin with muffin papers) but don't over fill, as these babies will rise in the oven. Then bake them for about 30' or until they're golden on top.

I tried one -for research purposes of course- and it was delicious. Let's see what happens with the one I put into Bibu's lunchbox this morning.