Vegan Chocolate Avocado Cheesecake

Not a huge fan of these photos but uploading them anyway bc this is a good recipe and tastes and looks better in real life.

This photo is the same as the first but put it in to make the post look a little more fuller fooled ya

I have an international law essay to write and I'm procrastinating so badly. It's 3000 words and worth 50% what am I doing

Awkward, blurry, something on the camera

Lighting = bad and yes that's my floor. It's slightly weathered bc we dropped water on it and its bamboo flooring and you're specifically supposed to not do that whoo

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I feel like this blog is my only outlet. I can't talk to my friends because they just don't get it they also don't have that relationship with their dads.

My mum and sister are also losing their minds in this situation as well so I can't find any comfort there either

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Vegan Chocolate Avocado Cheesecake
                                                                                                    (from The Herb Diaries)
For the Base:

- 2.5 cups of almonds
- 10 medjool dates

- 1-2 tbsp of coconut oil
- Pinch of sea salt

For the Chocolate Layer
- 4 ripe avocados
- 1 cup of coconut oil
- 1.5 - 2 cups of raw cacao (depending how rich you like it)
- Pinch of sea salt
- 1 cup of honey

Method

Pulse the almonds in a blender until roughly chopped, then add in the pitted dates, coconut oil and salt and blend until they form a dough.

Line a cake tin with greaseproof paper and press the dough down evenly into it, then put in the fridge while you make the chocolate layer.

Blend the avocado flesh, coconut oil, cacao powder, salt and honey in a high speed blender until completely smooth - you may have to scrape down the sides a few times. Spoon this mixture over the almond and date base, then place in the freezer for one hour to firm up. After that it can be stored in the fridge.

Nutty & Seedy Toasted Granola

How do you deal with so much when it all happens at the same time? If you look at my last post you will know that my beautiful Father and the sunshine of my life has been diagnosed with Grade 4 brain cancer. The very deadly type which gives you a very limited amount of time left on this earth.

How are we made to handle stuff like this? Why doesn't anyone teach you that? I am overwhelmed and drowning ATM. So many things to do, not enough time. Yet, so much time and not anything to do. 

Your emotions, if you're anything like me, will eventually murder you
They will start to play games with your heartbeat, making it irregular and shaky
They will gnaw at the flesh of your confidence, causing your shoulders to concave and become stubborn
My muscles have grown thin with inactivity, my mind has become idle and my skin dirty from a sooty coating which I can't seem to scrub off
Your body soon begins to run on the colour black until even your emotions are no longer able to inhabit its rotting form

Why would I hate myself even more in this situation? 
Because I'm allowing it to happen
An attempt to reclaim my body seems too exhausting at this point
I don't have that energy to spare 

I'm still unsure of whether the depth of my emotions is a blessing or a curse.

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As absolutely deluded and bizarre as this sounds, I feel like my late grandmother is talking to me in order to protect her son who she can't be there for. I'm crying writing that out. The thing is, I want to protect him more than anyone would want to protect their father. I feel like I have to protect him more so because his mother isn't there to do so. I have to make him feel safe and protected as a son because in his eyes, I'm just his daughter. There's no one higher to him to make him feel loved and protected, I'm the lowest in the hierarchy so I really don't think it has the same impact. I wish my grandmother could be here so she could hold him and tell him he's going to be okay. I know he misses her and wants that. Anyone wants that from their mother. 
Life can be so fucking cruel. 

Nutty and Seedy Toasted Granola 
                                                                                     Makes...a lot
- 1 1/2 cups of rolled oats
- 1/4 cup of sultans
- 1/4 cup mixed seeds (sunflowers, pepitas)
- 1/4 cup pistachios
- 1/4 cup almonds
- 1/4 cup desiccated coconut
- 3 Tb honey

Method
- Mix all dry ingredients together in a bowl. Add honey and mix well. A few clumps here and there won't make a difference - it actually makes the granola better tbh.
- Spread evenly on a baking try lined with greaseproof paper. Place in 180C oven for 5 mins. Whilst still in oven grab a spoon and mix the granola around on a tray to try and turn the oats and nuts. Cook for another 5 mins or until toasted to your liking.

Easy Banana Bread [coming to terms with death]

My life has completely turned upside down since I last wrote on here. My world is broken and my heart is black. The pain that I am experiencing at the moment is indescribable. My darling father/bear/sunbeam/best friend/personal comedian/hugger/ball of goodness has been diagnosed with cancer. Grade 4 Glioblastoma which is an aggressive form of brain cancer. I never thought this would happen to me. It was never supposed to happen and I refuse to believe that it still is. 

How does one deal with this?? Where are the answers? My parents mean everything to me. They are more than parents to me and my family is being tortured right now. I don't know how to feel and although it has already been nearly 2 months since Dad's diagnosis, this still isn't real. 

Sometimes I wake up and I feel a smile spread across my face because it was a joke and a horrible, disgusting, nightmare that I dreamt for far too long. Then reality hits me. It wasn't a nightmare. It was yesterday and the day before and the day before that. And yes, it will still be today, tomorrow and the day after that. And I'm paralysed and I lay there for minutes trying to process that yes this is real and everything was too good to be true. 22 years of pure love, a picturesque childhood and perfect parents who understood my sister and I for who we are; not for who they wanted us to be. We had it too good and if its too good for too long it's going to come to an end. Never ever ever in my wildest dreams would I associate the word cancer with my family. 

Throughout my life I have been the crazy daughter who would be paranoid and obsessed with my parents health. From a very young age the worst possible thing that could ever happen to me was the thought of my parent(s) becoming sick. I wished for my family's health every birthday. I would be on my mum and dads back to go to regular checkups, I monitored what they ate, I made sure that they exercised, I would make sure my mum went for her mammogram appointment every two years, I would warn my Dad about heart attacks; what they felt like and what he should do if he ever had one and I constantly massaged him so he would feel less stressed from work (and therefore less of a chance for the onset of diseases). 

I once made both of them stop drinking hot chai in the morning because I had read that hot beverages can cause throat cancer!!!!

But wow... on December 2nd, 2016 who would have ever anticipated fucking brain cancer!? I missed it by a fucking mile. 

I think that's why I am taking this the hardest out of my mum and sister. The fact that I have had such a paranoia about this for years and that my nightmare is actually materialising itself is the most dumbfounding and unbelievable thing. I still haven't accepted it. I'm still in shock and I can't believe that out of everything it was THIS. The ONE THING I needed. It couldn't have been financial difficulty, a parental divorce or a bad breakup which I could've experienced. I so so so so wish it were one of those instead. I so wish we were homeless, that my parents divorced or I remained single for the rest of my life if it meant that my Dad didn't have cancer. 

I can't even get up to start my day and I lay there numb with emotion. The only thing that gets me out of bed is my Dad and I run to the kitchen to see him sitting there, beaming down at me and commenting on how late I woke up or asking me if I want to watch the next Breaking Bad episode. The grammar in this post is horrible but to be honest I don't really care. My brain is racing at a million trillion miles per millisecond and I am just pouring my feelings out.

My Dad, if you're blessed to meet him in this lifetime, is someone you want to meet. He oozes a zest for life, love and positivity and when you talk to him you ultimately just want to do a running jump and squeeze him. Bc he's cute, bc he has glasses and bc he is soft. Legitimately the only teddy bear you need.

I could make this post even more saddening as it already has been. I can talk more about how I am feeling (what even are feelings anymore though?), how my family is dealing with this or how my Dad is coping. But I don't really want to do that. I want to dedicate this banana bread post to Dad because I made this for him a couple of days before he was officially diagnosed. He loved it and he loves bananas and nuts...cos u know, he's a bear.

Currently he is on a low sugar diet. Doctors tell us to let him eat whatever he wants but we are desperately searching for ways he can suppress the cancer so we can have his light around us for longer. 

I read a quote the other day on a cancer dedicated Instagram page. It said that one of the hardest things to go through in life is the mourning of someone who is still alive. I have never read anything more accurate.

Glioblastoma is deadly, it's a cunt and it's the most fucked up thing to happen to someone you love more than your own existence. Cancer in general is a fucking cunt. 

Easy Banana Bread 

                                                                                  Serves 10 

- 1 cup SR flour

- 1 cup caster sugar

- 50g melted butter

- 1 egg, lightly beaten

- 1 tsp vanilla essence

- 1/4 cup milk

- 1/2 cup mashed banana

Method

Preheat oven to 180C/160C fan-forced. Spray a 7cm-deep, 10 x 20cm (base measurement) loaf pan with oil. Line base and sides with baking paper, 3cm above the rim.

 Sift flour into a large bowl. Stir in sugar. Make a well in the centre. Add butter, egg, vanilla, milk and banana. Stir until just combined.

Pour into prepared pan. Bake for 30-35 minutes or until a skewer inserted into centre comes out clean. Set aside in pan for 10 minutes to cool slightly. 

Serve warm.