Zucchini, walnut and cardamom cake by Garlone Bardel

Recipe by Garlone Bardel author of the Yoga CookBook

As promised, every Wednesday we will share with you the great recipes from Garlone Bardel's Yoga Cook Book. For all his recipes, Garlone favors quality ingredients, carefully chosen for their energy.

To make her cake, she put wheat, ghee and whole sugar in its composition. These are samana type foods, the energy located between the heart and the navel and circulating around the waist. These foods are essential to yogic nutrition because they are sattvic, nourishing and balancing. They act on the digestive system and the heart as well as on the respiratory system.

Zucchini is a vyana type food, the force of distribution, which permeates and acts on the whole body. Vyana foods stimulate the expansion of energy, they are those that spread on the ground like squash, melons, watermelons, strawberries, beans…

Cardamom is a sattvic spice, removing excess mucus from the lungs and stomach, which stimulates the digestive fire and brings joy. It increases pitta (fire) and decreases kapha (water) and vata (air).

For 1 cake of 6 slices

In the kitchen: 15 min + 40 min cooking time

• 200g wheat flour
• 5 tbsp melted ghee
• 2 small grated zucchini (150 g)
• 120 g of whole sugar
• 4 tbsp (120 g) white almond puree
• 3 eggs
• 1 tbsp baking soda
• + 1 tsp lemon juice
• 1 tbsp cardamom seeds crushed in a pestle
• 1 tbsp ground cinnamon
• 70 g crushed walnuts

The preparation

Preheat the oven to 180°C (gas mark 6). In a bowl, mix the ghee and sugar with a whisk. Add the grated zucchini, eggs, almond cream, lemon juice and mix everything until you get a smooth dough. In a bowl, mix the flour, bicarbonate, spices and nuts. Add this mixture to the first mixture. Mix everything together then pour the mixture into a round mold (preferably hinged, to make it easier to unmold), previously greased with ghee and floured. Bake for 40 minutes, check the cooking with the blade of a knife, which should come out of the cake moist but clean when it is cooked. This cake can be served as a snack or for breakfast.

You will find all of these wonderful recipes in the book Yoga CookBook by Garlone Gardel, Editions Ulmer.

Photo credit @Thomas Dhellemmes