Chocolate and Raspberry Chia Pudding

On my last visit to Sweden just after Easter, I came across a fabulous blog, Zeina's Kitchen (in Swedish). She's not been going for long, but is very talented and her blog won the People's Choice Award in the Food Blog Awards of 2015. The thing that particularly appealed to me then was her recipe for chia pudding, very similar to the one I've been doing, but made with chocolate and raspberries and to a thicker consistency. Not to mention much more attractive than mine. So when my parents came to visit at the end of May, I decided to try this out and I even bought special glasses to serve it in.

Actually they are disposable margharita glasses. But it was rather tasty, especially with some fresh strawberries and kiwi fruit diced on top.

So without further ado, here is the recipe. I doubled the recipe and made one small addition to Zeina's recipe, I added sweetener to the chocolate pudding, as it wasn't quite sweet enough.

Ingredients

7 - 8 portions

12 tbsp chia seeds
8 dl almond milk (sweetened)
4 tsp vanilla extract
4 tsp honey
2 tsp xylitol sweetener
8 tsp cocoa powder
4 dl fresh raspberries
2 kiwi fruits
7 - 8 large strawberries

Method

1. Place 3 tbsp chia seeds in one bowl, and the other 3 tbsp in another.
2. Add 2 dl almond milk to each bowl and stir.
3. Add 1 tsp vanilla extract and 1 tsp honey to each bowl and stir in.
4. Add the xylitol and cocoa powder to one of the bowls and stir through.
5. Measure up the raspberries, place in a deep dish and mash up with a fork, then transfer to the second bowl and stir through.
6. Cover the two bowls with cling film and place in the fridge overnight.
7. Spoon alternate layers of raspberry and chocolate in serving dishes.
8. Peel and dice the kiwi, wash and dice the strawberries and decorate each serving.

It is also possible to use frozen raspberries, the same amount, but they need to be thawed before mashing and mixing in and the amount of chia seeds needs to be increased slightly as they contain more liquid than fresh ones.

The chocolate chia pudding is a lot less than the raspberry chia pudding, so keep that in mind when preparing to serve.

What surprised me was the combination with the fresh fruits on top, that really made a difference I think. We had the first four portions as dessert and the rest I had for breakfast in the following days, which was very nice, but I didn't bother with the fresh fruit then, so not as tasty as the first dessert. I also noticed that the chia pudding with fresh fruit doesn't last as long and towards the end, there was a distinct fermented tinge to it, so I should probably have stuck to a single batch.