I love the seasons! There is so much to do and so many different seasonal vegetables and fruits to use. I mostly try to use my own grown vegetables or at least buy local products. Its not only because local organic products are better for my family, my conscious stays clear too.

Kohlrabi and Peas and why its good to grow your own food or buy local

The most important reason for me to use local or homegrown products is that I want a future for my kids, grand kids and the next generations coming.

The CO2 emissions is very low in local products because of the short way from the fields or glass houses to you. I’m growing my own ginger too which is the most easy thing to do and you don’t need a green thumb for being able to grow it ;-).

I don’t have a green thumb but I love my garden

I’m trying to grow my own vegetables for about 4 years and yes its not always a success but I get better with every year and am proud to say that I have grown my own sweet potatoes last year too which is a gardening milestone for me 🙂 .

This year we grow kohlrabi and peas too which have not been ready yet since my family and I live a little higher up on a small mountain. That means that everything gets ready a little bit later than everywhere else in Styria beecause of the temperature difference.

My mother is another excited gardener and contrary to me she is successful and knows what she is doing. She always shares her crop with me. Lately she surprised me with tender kohlrabi which she know I love very much 😉 .

Kohlrabi and Peas! My ultimate childhood dish.

My mother always cooked for us kohlrabi and peas in sour cream sauce when we where young. It was and is one of my all-time favourite dishes. Its a typical Austrian dish too that’s why you get it as a frozen convenience dish in all Austrian supermarkets . But you know how it is: There is nothing better than a dish cooked with a lot of love! Can’t beat that 😉 .

Why did I change that beloved dish when it holds so much memories?

I’m on the whole 30 diet which is in short words explained a diet where you exclude food with gluten, dairy, legumes and some more for 30 days . After these 30 days introduce 1 food group every 5 days. In these 5 days after introducing a food group your body will give you signs if it is ok with it or not.

That is simply the reason why and of course I’m a food experimentalist 😉 .

Kohlrabi and Peas with coconut milk and ginger: How to cook!

The amount of ingredients in my recipe is enough for 2 main dishes or sides 4 sides.

The beginning.

First of all we prepare and measure all the ingredients. That means peel and cut the kohlrabis, mince the onion and the the piece of ginger, pull the peas or measure some frozen peas. Measure the vegetable broth and coconut milk.

After the preparing and measuring take a medium size pan and heat 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil on medium heat.

Adding the vegetables.

Put the kohlrabi, onion and ginger into the pan and cook it on medium heat for 3-5 minutes without colouring.

Now we add the broth, lemon juice and coconut milk. If you have a very thick coconut milk you may add some more as the demanded amount.

Let everything simmer for about 10 minutes and stir occasionally. When the kohlrabi is almost ready to eat add the peas and let everything simmer for another couple of minutes or until the peas are tender.

Thick and creamy.

It is very important for me to have a thick and creamy sauce but some coconut milk brands are thinner and more milk like than others.

If this is the case I mix 1 teaspoon of arrow root starch or corn starch into a small amount of cold water and add this under constant stirring. I let everything boil up once again. The sauce will thicken up everything is perfect.

At last when my beloved Kohlrabi and peas are ready to eat and all the flavours explode in my mouth and I can’t stop eating right from the pan, I add 2 tablespoons of plain coconut yoghurt. The coconut yoghurt gives the dish a mild zesty unique flavour and adds some more creaminess to it.

Participating.

With this recipe Im participating in the AUSTRIAN FOOD BLOG AWARDS 2019 in the category “Aus der Erde auf den Tisch” which means as much as : from the earth right onto the table 😉 .

If you like the recipe or just the like to wish me good luck, leave me a comment. I’d love to read from you ;-).

Love and a lot of organic kohlrabis 😉 Nina

If you tried one of our recipes please tag us on instagram. We are more than happy to share your post in one of our stories!

You may also be interested in my traditional Austrian recipe for a horseradish soup!

Kohlrabi and Peas with coconut milk and ginger- vegan

This is a delicious vegan recipe for kohlrabi with peas. The coconut milk and ginger gives this dish a unique and powerful flavour. It is perfect as a side to meat and fish but also delicious as a main dish on its own.

• 3 kohlrabi (about 700g, peeled and cut into 0.5cm (1/4 inch) stripes)
• 1 kitchen onion (about 200g, finely minced)
• 1 cm ginger (peeled and finely minced)
• 1 tbsp coconut oil
• 1 lemon (juice)
• 250 ml coconut milk (full fat, I use Roi coconut milk)
• 100 ml vegetable broth
• salt and pepper (for seasoning)
• 150 g peas (frozen or fresh)
• 1 tbsp corn starch (optional)
• 2 tbsp plain coconut yoghurt

1. Heat the olive oil in a medium large deep pan on medium heat

   Put the kohlrabi, onion and ginger into the pan and cook for 2-3 minutes without colour

   Add the vegetable soup, coconut milk and lemon juice and cook for another 10 minutes until the kohlrabi stripes are almost done

   Add the peas and season with salt and pepper if neccesary

   Cook for another 5 minutes

   If your dish is already very creamy you don't need the corn starch but if you have a very thin sauce disolve the starch into 3 tbsp of cold water and add it to the dish

   Stir constantly so that there will be no lumbs and bring everything to a boil

   Before serving sitr in the coconut youghurt

   Enjoy

The post Kohlrabi and Peas with coconut milk and ginger appeared first on Two Sisters Living Life.

First of all: I love food photography! There is nothing more relaxing and focusing for me than set up my backdrop and props and manipulate the light as best as possible. Since I’m shooting on my balcony there is quiet some manipulation to do .

You don’t need many things for creating your own backdrop:

• A plywood board 70cm x 100cm x 0,8cm thickness (that’s about 2,3ft x 3,3ft x 5/16”thickness)

• Joint compound and a putty knife, for creating structure

• Tester or sampler size pots of matte wall color paints, you should at least have 3 shades from the same color

• Sponge

• Blending brush

• Matte finish spray

I took my project outside since I did work with joint compound, paint and two kids . Next time I would not work on concrete but rather in the gras. It’s easier to get rid of all the stains.

So how do we start?!?

First we take the joint compound and the putty knife and scoop some of the compound onto the plywood surface and apply it onto the whole surface. There are several different approaches how to apply it. You can apply it in long straight strokes and disrupt everything ever so often so that it still feels organic or you can apply it in criss crosses with more raised textured parts. Be careful you still want to put plates and glasses on it and don’t want everything to be wobbly and shaky.

As I already said I really enjoyed creating my own backdrop. I think one of the benefits was that covering the surface with compound calmed myself as much as being on a weekend vacation without my kids. All moms know what I mean right ?!?

After covering everything with joint compound and adding the first layer of character to our board, we leave it for trying 24 hours.

Here comes the creative part: choosing colours and painting our backdrop

After the Board tried for 24 hours we start with the painting. So far I made 6 boards and yes I painted one only white and it is one of my favourites when it comes to giving my food a light and airy feeling. There is nothing better than a really white background or surface with a concrete structure.

But we wanna talk about colours right? If you want to create a light and bright board there should absolutely be white included. Other great colours which work really well are shades of grey and blue which really lets your food pop . But you know if you feel like it’s a pink kind of day than let’s do a board with pink or maybe her pastel sister who has a nice blush ;-).

Good colour choices are neutral colours, pastel or pale colours. Use cooler colours, they will always let your food stand out. Combine light and dark colours it makes everything more interesting therefore always use some white.

In generally it is fairly easy to apply your colours to the board. Put a small amount from each colour in the middle of your board and blend it through dabbing with your blending brush or sponge but be careful don’t over mix it.

It is good to work from the middle to the outer sides. Above all don’t use too much paint just enough to cover the surface. If you think in the end that there needs to be some highlights here and there? No problem, just go over the spots which you want to be highlighted, again.

Some good advice!

I highlighted one of my dark boards with some simple strokes with the blending brush dabbed in some white colour. There are no boundaries to your imagination so just go for it and maybe it leads you to some very incredible backgrounds or surfaces. Please keep in mind that it is a BACKdrop so not the backdrop or the surface should stand in the spotlight but your food.

Let the board try for 24 hours again. I left them outside, so it just needed half the time to try.

For the finishing I covered it with a layer of matte finishing spray. I put an extra layer on the middle where the food will normally be.

I hope I could encourage you to your next project and if you have kids include them. You will all have a great time. Promised!

We would be very happy if you showed us your work in tagging us @twosisterslivinglife ! There is nothing better than seeing how great others do with something we gave them courage too.

Love Nina

The post DIY How to create a backdrop for food photograpy appeared first on Two Sisters Living Life.

Hello world! Thank you for visiting Antonia and me on our Blog. We hope you will enjoy our first post and all future posts we will share with you. If you like what we do, leave us some kind words in the comments .

Who wasn’t already on at least one diet? Ok, I see. Almost everyone, me included has been on a diet so far. You know in my 38 years I tried many different diets and some were really boring and sometimes extraordinary awful . So about 2 years ago I started to change my habits about food. I was fed up with being on a constant diet and I hated to always forgo dishes I really loved. I’m not on a diet any longer but instead on a journey on finding my own healthy lifestyle for me and my family and this healthy banana bread fits perfectly into it .

So this delicious healthy banana bread is one of my go to recipes when we need something sweet but don’t want to feel guilty with every bite we take.

I’m always searching for a good recipe which really tastes great and not bland. On my weekends you will most definitely find me in my kitchen trying to develop new recipes and yes sometimes my kitchen resembles a battlefield .

This healthy Banana Bread is ready for baking in only 10 minutes and its a one bowl thing. Yes, that’s my kind of recipe . Its the perfect sunday afternoon treat.

So let’s get started. First we need those reeealy ripe bananas, yes the almost dead ones, yes they are black too. But not all bananas just 3. We need the last one for decorating. Mash the 3 bananas with 2 tablespoons of hot water. This way its much easier. After that we put the mashed bananas and all the other ingredients, except the optional ones, into a bowl and give them a good mix. About 2-3 minutes. Instead of mixing them in your Kitchen Aid you could blend everything in a blender. If you think its a little bit to try just add some milk or water.

After everything is combined, there comes the glorious moment where we can add all the optional things to the batter like walnuts, chopped 85%dark chocolate, goji berries or chia seeds or whatever else you like. But keep in mind that it should still be healthy so please no white chocolate drops or m&ms .

Pour the batter into the prepared pan and and put some extra coconut sugar and cinnamon on top. Please don’t go overboard with the sugar just because its a natural sweetener. 1 tablespoon coconut sugar and one teaspoon cinnamon will do the job just fine <3

Put the pan into the preheated oven at 350F° or 170C° and bake for 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. During the baking we can prepare the honey cream cheese glaze. Mix together 1/3 cup cream cheese, 2 tablespoon honey and a pinch of salt and set aside. When the loaf is ready let it cool at room temperature for about 50 minutes. After that transfer the banana bread onto a plate and drizzle it with the glaze.

Have I already told you that I love this recipe? Yes?!? Ok but did you know that this recipe is not only full with good fibres, no the added greek yoghurt enhances the bread with natural proteins too. That means if you are into sports with weights like maybe crossfit this would be good for you too.

Enjoy the banana bread and let me know how you liked it! Tag us with one of our recipes on social media @twosisterslivinglife and get a feature in our story as a thank you!

If you liked this recipe maybe you are interested in our healthy gluten free dutch pancake

Love Nina

No Guilt Healthy Banana Bread

This is the perfect treat for every occasion. It only takes 10 minutes to put this super delicious healthy banana bread made with oats, coconut sugar and greek yoghurt into the oven. Guilt free and the best you can make it a vegan version too.

One Bowl Batter

• 4 very ripe bananas (leave one for decorating)
• 2 cups old fashioned rolled oats
• 2 large eggs
• 1/2 cup greek Yoghurt
• 1/4 cup coconut sugar (or sweetener of choice)
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 2 tbsp coconut Sugar
• 2 tsp cinnamon

*Optional

• 1/4 cup chopped walnuts (optional)
• 1/4 cup chopped dark chocolate (optional)

Honey Cream Cheese Glaze

• 2 tbsp honey
• 1/3 Cup cream cheese (softened)
• 1 pinch salt

1. Preheat oven to 350 F° or 170 C° and lightly crease a 9×5 inch loaf pan and put a baking sheet inside.

   Mash the very ripe bananas with a fork and 2 tbsps of hot water

   Add all ingredients into a blender, safe 1 Banana which we leaf for the decoration, and blend until smooth and well combined

   Pour batter into prepared loaf pan and mix the optional ingredients into the batter

   Decorate with the remaining banana as desired

   Combine the coconut sugar and cinnamon and sprinkle everything on top 

   Bake for 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean

   Let loaf cool completely before transferring it onto a plate

   For The Glaze:

   In a small bowl mix the softened cream cheese, honey and a pinch of salt until smooth

   Pour the glaze over the just barely warm banana bread

   Enjoy

   
   
   

for a vegan version use 2 flaxseed eggs (mix 2 tbsps ground flaxseed meal with 3 tbsp water and lets sit for 15 minutes in the fridge) and instead of the greek yoghurt use a vegan option like vegan coconut yoghurt. Enjoy!

The post Healthy No Guilt Banana Bread appeared first on Two Sisters Living Life.