Yoghurt with dried fruit, nuts and seeds

I was away for the winter holidays, which explains my absence, but there’s always the indispensable Kaja with her little digs at poor innocent Jacek. Over to her:

“Last Fat Thursday inspired me to make a healthy dessert. But if you think I was planning to eat it instead of a doughnut like all the other health-food fanatics, think again. Of course I’d reckoned on being positively stuffed with doughnuts that day (I should explain that I get plied with sweets on no special occasion at all. Some people don’t need Fat Thursday for that. Recently my colleagues were even instructed to feed me cake like meat being pushed through a mincer… Jacek, I have to admit the meringue was delicious).

But back to Fat Thursday. My rule is that I don’t buy myself things like that. If someone offers me one (or forces it on me), I put up a fight – how could I possibly? My diet! It’s unhealthy! Then I can eat it in peace, because my fellow eaters still think I’m the one who watches what she eats (I didn’t want any, did I? They made me!). And since I have two hours of classes at the gym on Thursdays anyway, I was ready for the onslaught of rich treats.

Come morning, though, it turned out my request that nobody bring any to work had been respected (Jacek was in Kraków). Nobody brought a thing… At home, meanwhile, we’re busy spreading the gospel of gender equality. Equal rights mean that, in a fine show of solidarity, neither of us does anything. So, in solidarity, neither of us bought a doughnut either. My last hope was that someone at the gym might at least force one on me. Nobody did. I ended Fat Thursday burning calories I hadn’t even consumed…

So by Friday I felt my reserves of fat and sugar had sunk so low that… well, I simply had to eat something sweet! A healthy something, alas, because it was no longer Fat Thursday, when you can stuff yourself with doughnuts and faworki, those crisp pastry twists. So I made this delicious, healthy yoghurt with dried fruit, nuts and seeds. Perfect for a mid-morning or afternoon snack.”

At a glance: 

Preparation time: 5 minutes

Serves: one (the one who didn’t get a single doughnut or pastry twist, or the one who ate so many that she now has to taper off her blood sugar supply gradually to avoid sending her system into shock)

Calories: after Fat Thursday your body won’t even register a dessert this light.

Ingredients for yoghurt with dried fruit, nuts and seeds?

• two tablespoons: flaked almonds, goji berries, sunflower seeds and pumpkin seeds
• 4 dates
• 200 g plain yoghurt
• two tablespoons of maple syrup
• fresh lemon zest

Method (for yoghurt?):

Put all the seeds and dried fruit in a frying pan and toast until golden brown but not burnt (watch out, the pumpkin seeds sometimes like to go flying across the kitchen).

Meanwhile, wash the lemon thoroughly and grate the zest (only the yellow outer layer, none of the white pith, which makes the dish bitter). Mix the yoghurt and zest in a small bowl, scatter the contents of the pan on top and drizzle with maple syrup.

All done! Enjoy!