Raw Chocolate Banana Berry Tarts

At the markets last week, I was perusing one of my favorite aisles, the speciality baking items. An array of flours like tapioca, garbanzo and quinoa based are in company with cacao chunks, tahitian vanilla paste and pearlescent cake decorations. Always on the quest to find new and interesting flavors for my skinny sweets and treats, my eye caught on a collection of German flavourings. Presented in tiny tubes, I chose the butter-vanilla scent. My first thought was of popcorn when I considered the flavour concoction and I wasn't quite sure how to use the unique treasure.

Spending a leisurely afternoon experimenting with raw baking, I made raw chocolate tarts with a layer of banana and blueberries. Out of curiosity and adventurous baking, I decided to add a few drops on the butter-vanilla flavouring to the chocolate biscuit base of the tarts. The flavouring added a rich complex dimension to the biscuit that enriched the taste to feel more like a traditional sweet and just that bit more special. Of course this ingredient is not essential, you could use a teaspoon of vanilla extract as a replacement, but a few tiny drops make a big difference to the richness of the overall flavour combination.

Raw Chocolate Banana Berry Tarts

Ingredients:

Chocolate Biscuit Base

• 2 cups of almond meal flour
• 3 tablespoons of cacao powder
• 3 tablespoons of Natvia stevia sweetener
• 4 tablespoons of melted coconut oil
• a pinch of Himalayan pink salt, ground
• a few drops of vanilla and butter flavouring or vanilla extract

Fruit Layer

• 1 large banana, sliced
• 1/2 cup of frozen blueberries
• 2 teaspoons of Natvia sweetener (if blueberries are quite tart)

Chocolate Topping

• 1/4 cup of coconut oil, melted
• 2 tablespoons of Natvia sweetener
• 2 tablespoons of cacao powder
• 2 tablespoons of vanilla/chocolate protein powder or coconut flour
• tiny pinch of Himalayan pink salt, ground

Method:

1. Combine all the base ingredients in a bowl and press a tablespoon or so of the mixture in the base of a silicone muffin tray. Pop in the freezer for 10 minutes.
2. In a small dish, heat the blueberries in the microwave for 45 seconds with the stevia to extract the juices.
3. Take out the silicone tray and top the biscuit base with sliced banana. Press the banana slices down with a spoon to fix onto the base. Top with a spoonful of the blueberry mixture.
4. Combine the ingredients for the chocolate topping and whisk together. The stevia granules will slightly sink to the bottom so keep whisking before you put a spoonful on top of the banana and blueberry layer. 
5. I sprinkled a little desiccated coconut onto each before I put back in the freezer for one hour to set.
6. The coconut oil will melt at room temperature so keep in the freezer just before serving. A few minutes out of the freezer and they will be just perfect for eating.