An Easy Recipe

I just saw the Rachel Ray acai berry show, and since Rachel Ray has such spectacular recipe ideas, I was a little disappointed that she didn't try to incorporate acai berry juice into a fun recipe. Since then I have tried a number of acai berry juices, which are fine on their own, but I thought that it was time that I try to experiment and see if I could create some interesting acai berry recipes.

The first thing I tried was an acai berry juice marinade on chicken breast. This is just a variation of an orange juice and white pepper marinade I picked up in Nicaragua or the lime juice and soy marinade I had been using for years. I should note that I always marinade for at least six hours as any less time doesn't do much for me.

I start by halving the chicken breasts because I find that being able to cook smaller pieces for less time on the barbeque decreases the chance that I will overcook or dry out the meat. Add all the chicken to a glass bowl, and add cold pressed olive oil, some ground sea salt, ground white pepper, minced garlic, acai berry juice, and lime juice as the citrus flavor. I thought the sour lime would balance the sweetness of the acai berry juice. As it turns out, the chicken turned out quite well, but not quite as good as by normal marinade. I also doubted that very much of the acai goodness made it into the chicken, as most of the sauce is burned off or dripped in the bar-b-q any way.

Surely Rachel Ray would use acai more sensibly! The next recipe I tried was acai frozen yogurt and it was a much bigger success. I added acai berry juice to plain low fat yogurt. I poured the mixture into a screened drainer lined with two layers of cheese cloth. I then left the mixture in the fridge to drip into a bowl for 24 hours. After 24 hours the yogurt was the texture of cream cheese. It was perfect to spread on bagels or crackers at this point.

So once the yogurt and acai berry mixture has been mixed and whipped, put it in a Tupperware and freeze it for a minimum of 6 hours. Once it is frozen to your taste - some people prefer just a chilled version, others like really hard frozen yogurt - serve, and enjoy! This recipe so far is the favorite, and versatile as well. You can use it as a non-frozen bagel spread, or throw it in the freezer for a frozen version perfect for a hot summer day.

Finally, I tried my own version of the old standby, the fruit smoothie. Actually there are a lot of acai berry juice mixes that have a creamy consistency and are called 'smoothies' on the label, but I like to make my smoothies fresh so I get the little bit of ice chips right in the smoothie. I mixed ice, banana, yogurt and acai berry juice in my blender, and blended until smooth. A trick I like to use is to freeze the banana before adding it, which makes the smoothy even creamier. In any event, as predicted, this was pretty delicious.

So my first attempt at acai berry inspired recipes turned out not so bad. I'm happy with two out of three successful recipes for my first attempt. Granted, my acai berry inventions are not nearly as delicious as what I imagine an acai berry recipe from Rachel Ray. I'll keep trying though and perhaps I will eventually come up with some amazing recipes to use this amazing super food in.