Love and kindness and chocolate avocado mousse

Things have been busy around here.

I don't often feel rushed or unavailable. I'm not the person to burn the candle at both ends (my inbuilt "off" button requires little encouragement to flick over into prescribed couch and tea time with BBC shows). Perhaps if I did, I might push myself and complete more in my day. But honestly, an evening on the couch watching Jane Austen adaptations feels like a complete success to me.

However it's been a while since I've heard the tales of Fanny Price. February was terribly lively and on top of this, Ben fractured his finger and has required hand surgery. The fact that he injured himself doing a task we both agree was reckless (moving our fridge solo), made him somewhat less of a victim and somewhat more of an imbecile in my mind. I suppose I need less judgement and more grace in these situations. My subsequent adoption of even more management duties of our lives and businesses, along with busying schedules and deadlines (all of which I am happy and lucky to have, this I know) has lead me to feel pulled, spread thin.

There's been more snaps and dramatic sighs and tears than usual, which I attribute most consciously to tiredness. And it will pass, but for the first time in a long while I've had to make the effort to react with love and kindness. To treat my best friend as though he is still my best friend even if we're both stressed and crabby. Usually our lives are pretty cruisy and this is easy for us, so it feels strange to be out of sync. I suppose this is a good test for hopefully future sleep-deprived parenting years...

Last week I made this chocolate avocado mousse as an act of love and pampering for my sweet husband. Watching him try his hardest to clean up and wash dishes breaks my heart and makes me admonish any hasty words. Fanny Price can wait.

Chocolate Avocado Mousse

Serves 2

Ingredients
1 & 1/2 Avocados (medium sized, you can use 2 but I like to leave half for toast purposes)
1/3 cup Raw Cacao
1 - 1 & 1/2 tablespoons runny Honey
1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract (optional)
2 tablespoons Almond Milk, Coconut Cream or Water (I like to use the thick part of a chilled can of coconut milk, like what you use when you make whipped coconut cream but you can use any kind of milk here or even water, it just may be less thick)
A small pinch of Sea Salt

Optional Toppings: toasted nuts and fruit.

Method
1. Add the avocado, cacao, 1 tablespoon of the honey, vanilla and coconut cream to the food processor. Blitz until smooth and taste, then adjust as required (more honey, more cream/milk, etc).
2. Serve straight away or for a more chilled and thick version let it sit in the fridge for an hour or so.

Heidi xo