Homemade Chai Spice

Every year I feel traumatized by the number of women conditioned to feel excited about enjoying the 35g of sugar that comes in a Starbucks Pumpkin Spiced Latte in the form of a favoured high fructose corn syrup. Pumpkin Spiced is not a season…It’s more like a pumpkin spice cult!

If there is one sure fire way to tear down your health for the day, it is by kicking yourself into fight or flight using caffeine and doubling down on that assault to your body by severely spiking your blood sugar levels.

Whenever you increase the stress on your body you spike the level of cortisol, our stress hormone, in your body because stress causes your adrenal glands to default to building cortisol in preference to building the drip feed of estrogen and progesterone your body needs as a buffer in peri-menopause and to feel like your old self again in full menopause.

Stress turns off your natural hormonal supply and leaves you with weight gain around the middle and anxiety, low libido and a dry vagina. I said what I said!

But, even I get that the cozy spice vibes are delicious, so every year I lean into the flavour to create recipes that will support your midlife hormonal health and you can feel calm, confident and menopausal symptom free.

In fact warming spices are anti-inflammatory for our bodies helping to reduce your symptoms of menopause and support our thyroid health as they take the stress off this important gland to fire up our metabolism and warm us up from the inside out.

Here is my recipe for a Chai Spice that you can add to my recipe for a health promoting Pumpkin Spiced Latte and my Pumpkin Chai Overnight Oats. It also makes a great Chai tea.

Ingredients

2 tsp ground Cardamon
2 tsp ground Allspice
2 tsp ground Nutmeg
2 tsp ground Cloves
6 tsp ground Ginger
4 tsp ground Cinnamon
freshly ground Black Pepper to taste

Instructions

Mix all of the spices together in a jam jar and use liberally in tea and baking.

Pumpkin Chai Overnight Oats

Fall is coming and this usually means a change in schedule with many of us getting busier as our lives and our kids schedules ramp up.

We know from the research that what you eat in perimenopause has a huge impact on how you will feel in your body at this stage of life.

Diets high in protein, fibre and healthy fats, rich with plenty of anti-inflammatory foods are going to reduce and eliminate your menopausal symptoms so you can feel calm, confident and comfortable in your own body as you move towards menopause.

Busy schedules and deeply nourishing nutrition often go head to head in the Fall.

Here is a recipe for a ‘grab and go’ breakfast that is going to free up your mornings whilst ensuring you start your day with a meal that balances your blood sugar level so you are not plagued with hot flashes and supports your thyroid health so your metabolism stays active and your have boundless energy for your day.

These overnight oats are flavoured with my Homemade Chai Spice, a warming blend that supports your thyroid health and boosts your metabolism.

Pumpkin Chai Overnight Oats with Blueberries are jammed full of flavour and anti-inflammatory nutrition to eliminate hip and shoulder aches and pains.

Ingredients
1/3rd cup oats

1 tbsp Hemp seeds

1/3rd cup pumpkin seeds

1/3rd cup pureed or oven baked pumpkin

1/3rd cup fresh or frozen blueberries

1/2tsp Chai spice

2tsp coconut milk

1/3rd cup Hemp Milk

Instructions
Add all ingredients to a jar and place in refrigerator until ready to eat.

Mango Chia Pudding

‘Fibre is a midlife woman best friend,’ is one of my mantras whenever I am talking about womens health and menopause.

Hormone molecules such as estrogen are built with a cholesterol tail and fibre from our diet hooks onto that tail, to drag excess hormone out of our body. This leads to a reduction in our hormonal symptoms during peri-menopause and menopause

New research links increased fibre in the diet to a decrease in depression in peri-menopausal women as fibre also supports the health of our microbiome. Just as in ecosystems and communities, the diversity and health of our microbiome is directly linked to our mood and mental health.

Understand, we are not just alone as ‘us’ ladies, we have an ecosystem inside our gut and the health of this ecosystem directly impacts how happy we feel daily. Feeding our internal garden, improves our mental health as we pass through hormonal change.

Fibre in our diet can also help us to manage our blood sugar levels and keeps us off the sugar roller coaster by delaying the speed at which glucose from our food is dumped into our blood stream. If you are a woman who experiences:

1. Mood swings
2. Weight gain around the middle
3. Energy crashes or exhaustion
4. Waking in the night
5. Increased urination
6. Pre-menstrual symptoms

You may be experiencing blood sugar dysregulation and it is not your hormones at all!

The problem we have is when we arrive at peri-menopause, up to 50% of us will be deficient of fibre in our diet.

No wonder we are being ravaged by hormonal symptoms and feeling deeply uncomfortable on a daily basis! Our body is trying to tell us that it needs help and our support to pass easily through this challenging time.

So, we can go to the store and buy psyllium husks and senna, or we can make it delicious, fun and easy by making simple high fibre recipes, that help to build health in our bodies at midlife.

I was cruising my local grocery store when I saw these two stunning Atauflo mangos, with their price reduced, because they were at peak perfection of ripeness.

Isn’t that crazy! Food is reduced in price because it is perfect for eating?

In the soup we are living in, our food systems are primed for food transportation and mass production, not for food flavour or our health.

I could not pass up these beauties and I knew I had all the ingredients at home to immediately transform them into a delicious breakfast/snack/dessert dish.

Chia seeds are packed with soluble and insoluble fibre, magnesium, our relaxation mineral and anti-inflammatory omega 3 fatty acids. If you do not like the texture of chia seeds, you can blend the ingredients of this recipe to make a ‘pudding’ textured chia pudding.

Coconut milk provides medium chan fatty acids to support our brain health, prevents the sugar in the mangos from flooding quickly into the blood stream and helps to keep us satiated for longer.

A question I always ask myself when I am cooking is… ‘How can I add MORE!’

I added anti-inflammatory and blood sugar balancing spices to add delicious flavour and boost the health building properties of this dish.

This recipe is super easy. It just takes chopping, measuring and stirring to make a delicious, fibre rich, blood sugar balancing treat in your refrigerator.

My tip: When you see a perfectly ripe mango, buy the mango. Even if you sit and eat it in the bath with the juice dripping down your boobies, you are still a winner!

Ingredients

2 perfectly ripe small mangos or 1 perfectly ripe large mango
1/4 cup Chia seeds
1 cup coconut milk
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1 tbsp raw pumpkin seeds
1 tbsp shredded coconut.

Instructions

1. Turn on a podcast you love and start by chopping your mango

2. Put the chopped mango in a large bowl with all of the other ingredients except the pumpkin seeds and shredded coconut.

3. Stir all the ingredients together until they are fully combined

4. Put the pudding mix into a single glass container or portion into smaller containers depending on how you want to eat it.

5. decorate the top of the pudding with the pumpkin seeds and shredded coconut to add more flavour and fibre

6. Store in the refrigerator overnight and the Mango Chia Pudding is ready to eat the next morning.