DUDE. SWEET!

Hurro everyone.

Mondays suck, so here's some pictures of a couple of sweet things I've made recently.

Starting with the fluffy pancake pillows from Isa Does It. I've been dying to try these for ages and I was not disappointed.  Although I did accidently leave out the half cup of water you're meant to add in, so I was wondering why I only got 5 instead of 6.  But actually the thicker texture meant they were even bigger! WIN.  (I've since made them properly and they are just as rad, just a little thinner and larger because the batter spreads out a bit more.)

Instead of maple syrup, I boiled a punnet of blueberries with half a cup of rice syrup for about 10 minutes for a lovely fruity syrup.  The rice syrup meant that it wasn't overly sweet.

And last week was Daddy Alien's birthday so I asked if he would like a cake or cupcakes and he said cupcakes. Then went on to talk about the awesome black forest gateaux that my mum used to make for his birthday years ago. Apparently there were fisticuffs over the last piece of cake!! haha

So taking that as inspiration I made the basic chocolate cupcakes from VCTOTW and modified them a wee bit. I took a pack of cherry pie filling and sieved out the cherries, then reserved 12 for the tops and the rest went into the cake batter.  The topping was just plain vanilla butter cream with the reserved cherries to decorate and the cherry syrup drizzled over, with some choccy sprinkles to finish. 

These went down really well with everyone, but then, who doesn't love a cupcake?!

Hope that makes your Monday a little sweeter. Have a good week everyone. 

Oh and shameless plug - but if you're on Instagram, come follow me for more food pics, make-up and pics of Me Jazzy* (I don't think the button on the right works properly but this blog is way overdue an overhaul anyway!!).  I'm @sal_on_toast if you're into Instagram.

*Jazzy is my cat, you dirty birdie!!

Lotsolove.

Laters
xXx

Thread title courtesy of this awesome piece of ridiculousness.

Oh balls!

Hellooo everyone. Did you have pancakes last Tuesday??? I did, more on that in a minute though.

I'm starting off with last night's dinner. In my mind for weeks I've been dreaming of balls. Ahem, what I mean to say is meatless balls!! That doesn't sound any better does it? Well these are a mixture of tempeh and sage & onion stuffing mix. Sounds gross, tastes like a little ball of heaven! tee hee. Recipe is at the end of the post but I think this recipe has potential to be great just as a way of awesoming up stuffing mix or even flattened into patties and baked for a burger.

I served them with mushroom sauce (thought tomato would be too heavy) and quinoa pasta. Yum.


Dessert was simple. I cut up a nectarine and put it into a foil package with some rice syrup and baked it at 180C for 15 minutes. I served it with a blob of plain soy yoghurt and a wee sprinkle of ground allspice and then poured the fruity syrupy juices from the package over it.

These were some oat crackers I made last week. They're pretty good but I haven't got them exactly right yet. Recipe will follow once they're better.

I made some cookies last week. I played with Dreena Burton's homestyle choc chip cookie recipe by taking out the choc chips, swapping the plain flour for white spelt, swapping 1/4 cup of the flour for cocoa and using rice syrup instead of maple syrup (WAY cheaper!). I also made them smaller, a round tbsp or so each so I got 23 out of the mixture instead of 12! I baked them 8 minutes and they were nice and crispy.

So I mentioned pancake day last week. I prefer the fluffy american style (drop scone) pancakes for breakfast but on pancake day, it's only right to have flat ones. I didn't attempt to flip them, I suck at that! Here is one, ready for a rollin.....

And rolled up with the traditional filling of some lemon juice (bottled - tee hee) and sprinkled with sugar. Yum.

This was dinner one night last week. Oh that pile of horrible looking green mush was broccoli smashed potatoes. An idea I stole off Rachael Ray! But she put in a crap tonne of cheese and cream. I just added a bit of soymilk and salt & pepper and a sprinkle of nooch - they were really really good. Reminded me of when I was little and my mum used to mix mashed swede in with the potatoes so I would eat them! :-)

I feel bad for this lentil soup because he was oh so tasty but I don't think is a way to make a soup made with brown lentils a pretty one! Ugly? Yes. Tasty? Oh yes!

This was dinner on Friday night. I made a basic risotto with some onions and sun-dried tomatoes in and then at the end stirred in a bunch of steamed green veg. It was soooo tasty. I added peas, green beans and broccoli.

Here's that recipe I promised:

Sage & Onion Tempeh Balls
Ingredients:
100g (1/2 a pack) tempeh
1/3 cup (40g) sage & onion stuffing mix (paxo and sainsbury's own are both vegan)
1/2 cup (125ml) boiling water
1/2 a medium onion (about 1/2 cup)
1 tbsp olive oil
Braggs or soy sauce
1/2 tsp dried thyme
Salt & Pepper to taste

Fry Light / cooking oil spray

Method:
Preheat the oven to 200C/400F.

Then start with the tempeh. Cut it up into rough chunks and throw it in a pan (I used a frying pan) and fill it with enough water to just cover the tempeh. Bring to the boil then leave it for 1o minutes.

Meanwhile, mix the stuffing mix with the boiling water and cover with a plate. Set aside for at least 5 minutes.

Once the tempeh is done, remove from the pan and dry out the pan. Add the oil and saute the onions for 5 minutes until just starting to get some colour. Crumble the tempeh up nice and fine and add it to the onions, cook for a good 5 mins or so to get some colour on the tempeh. Then add the thyme and spritz with braggs (about 10-15 sprays) or add a tsp or 2 of soy sauce or tamari. Mix well and then remove from heat and tip into a mixing bowl to cool. Add the stuffing mixture and mash it all together with a fork.

Once cool enough to handle, roll about a heaped tbsp at a time into balls (you should get about 18). Then spray a baking sheet with fry light and put the balls on ready to cook. Spritz the top of them with fry light (optional) and then bake for 15-20 minutes (until lightly browned). Then serve with whatever you like!!

If you make larger balls (hee hee) or patties, you'll probably want to bake them 20-25 mins!

That's all for now aside from saying that I'm on Twitter now (sal_on_toast) - feel free to add me if you're on there, I only have 3 followers! hahaha.

Laterz
xXx

Vegan MoFo: Cauliflower Cheeze....

...soup?

I have this block of strong cheddar sheeze and it's open so I need to use it up. I don't like the texture of it so sandwiches are out and the damn stuff doesn't melt, so it's no good for regular cauli-cheeze. So when I saw Rachel Allen make cauliflower and cheddar soup I thought I'd rip her off!

I made some changes, obviously, but more than just veganising it. She started with a bechamel sauce, added cheese and then boiled the cauliflower in stock and blended it all together.

For mine, I roasted a cauliflower, onion and some garlic first, the put it in cold stock, brought it to the boil and cooked it 5 minutes. Then added a little soymilk, some instant potato granules and my sheeze and blended it.

It was not bad. The taste of the sheeze was pretty strong but it was good. Although I doubt it'll be making a regular appearance Chez Alien! However, if you're a faux cheese lover and you want the recipe, let me know and I'll post it.

I made some breadsticks to go with it. They were awesome.

And brekkie this morning was pancakes and berry syrup, as I didn't have any maple syrup. I made common old pancakes but I added in some cocoa, next time I'd add more, but it was still good. For the syrup, I chucked some frozen fruit, the juice of an orange, a tiny bit of sugar and a dash of cinnamon in a pan and boiled it up, then pushed it through a seive. It was pretty tart, but I liked that with the chocolatey pancakes.

OK, I'm off, it's time for Strictly Come Dancing!!

Laterz
xXx

For Jojo - the soup recipe

Ingredients:
1 head of cauliflower
1 small onion

1-2 fat cloves of garlic

2 cups of veggie stock

1/2 cup soymilk

1/2 cup cheddar sheese
1/4 cup instant potato (optional to thicken the soup)

salt & pepper

Method:
Cut the cauliflower into florets, cut the onion into wedges and roast both in a little bit of olive oil (i use a spray bottle) along with the garlic still in their skins, for about 20 minutes at 180C, until the edges are lightly browned.

Tip the veggies into a pot and add the (cold) stock and a pinch of salt & pepper. Bring to the boil, cover and then simmer for 5 minutes.

Add the sheese, potato granules (it might go a bit lumpy but that's ok) and soymilk and pour into a blender. Blend until completely smooth then check seasoning. Pour back into pan and heat gently if needed.

Put theee lime in theee coconut and call me in the morning!!

So now that all the birthday madness is over I don't have anymore cake baking to do and I can get back on my diet!! I hadn't been to the gym in 2 weeks so body pump on Sunday was a wee bit painful. Especially as she made us do EVIL lunges!

The last birthday in June is my best friend's birthday - we're a week apart and I made her cupcakes. She (unsurprisingly) requested mango & coconut. They were pretty good!!



I forgot to take a pic of dinner but I did us some barbecue baked tofu, garlicky greens and saucy potatoes. I did get a messy shot of the leftover potatoes though before we devoured them. I'm working on getting this recipe perfectly ace, although they're pretty freakin ace already.


Last week I decided to make some of Susan V's ribz. They weren't as good as the first time I made them, they were really chewy so I dunno what I did wrong. They were still tasty though and I used Jack Daniels BBQ sauce on them that the lovely people at JD sent me! (I'll be talking more about those sauces in the near future!) The rice was some cooked brown rice mixed with veggies and a lemon vinaigrette. Jessy asked me in the comments of another post about the lemon vinaigrette - it's pretty easy: juice of a lemon (about 2 tbsp), 1 tbsp oil, 1 tsp dijon mustard, pinch of salt & pepper and whisk!


Yesterday I made some mini meetloafs. I used the recipe from Cozy Inside (love that book!). I halved it like I always do but this time I added in about 1/3 cup of cooked lentils (I had leftovers!) and doubled the spices plus added a few more. It was really good. I also had leftover cheezy sauce from some mac n cheese (that I accidentally deleted the pic of - doh!!) so I had that on some steamed veg. Yum.


I had some sweet potatoes and some coconut milk in the fridge and needed to use them up. I was too lazy to do a full curry with all the grinding spices and crap so I made this one up and it was soooo good. So I'm giving the recipe, even though it was so easy it's a bit sad to put the recipe.

I served it with naan breads. I googled recipes and found one by Anjum Anand - I liked it cuz there was no yeast and also cuz well Anjum is the shiz! Unfortunately, my dough never doubled!! Maybe because I subbed 50% of the white flour for wholewheat? The first one rose really well but the second one was flat like a roti. They were tasty though so I got over it.

Lazy Sweet Potato & Coconut Curry
1/2 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp oil
1 medium onion, diced
2 cloves of garlic, minced
2 cups of sweet potato, diced (about 1 big one - mine were real tiddlers and I used 3!)
1 cup / 250ml veggie stock
2 tsp garam masala
1 plum tomato
1 tsp tomato puree
1/2 cup / 125ml coconut milk
2 tbsp chunky peanut butter
1/2 cup / about 50g frozen peas

To serve:
Finely chopped coriander & mint
Unsweetened dessicated coconut

Method:
Heat the oil in a non-stick pan. Fry the cumin seeds for a minute until fragrant then add the onion. Cook for about 5 minutes, until the onions start to brown then add the garlic and cook for a further minute.

Add the potatoes, stock, garam masala, tomato, the tomato puree and a pinch of salt & pepper and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat, cover and simmer for 15-20 minutes until the potatoes are tender.

Stir in the peanut butter and peas and cook for another 5-10 minutes uncovered. Stir in the coconut milk, check seasoning and then serve scattered with herbs and coconut.


Another meal over the weekend was leftover ribz with mash & mushy peas.

And Saturday's breakfast was pancakes. I was planning to make coconut pancakes with the leftover coconut milk but it was off! boo. So I just used soymilk and sprinkled coconut on the top. I made them wholewheat - I just used my banana pancake recipe but left out the banana and used extra soymilk and some maple syrup. Yummy yum yum yum.

TTFN! I'm off to watch big brother - anyone else into it this year or am I the only saddo in the village??

xXx

let me get a nickelback…

....15 bucks little man, put that shit in ma hand, if that money doesn’t show then you owe me owe me oh! Ma jungle love (yeah!) oh ee oh ee oh. I think I wanna know ya know ya!

Ahem, sorry. Stupidness courtesy of this scene from Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back and because I couldn’t think of anything else with Nickelback in for my post title. I went to see them last night you see, at the Birmingham NIA! They were freaking aaaamazing! I know they get a lot of criticism but suck it haters – I love them and they rocked.

As well as rocking my thong off (hehe that was on some girl’s banner!!) they brought the lead singer of their support act (Black Stone Cherry – also superrad!) on for a cover of AC/DC’s Highway to Hell, which made this AC/DC lovin girl very happy. AND – the very sexy and gorgeous Ryan Peake took the lead vocals for a cover a cover of Kings of Leon’s Use Somebody – another song I love. I forgot to take my camera, damn. But here’s a vid of a similar performance of said KoL track! Hot hottie hot.

Anyway, speaking of pretty pretty things – foodz… We just had another bank holiday here in the UK and I also took yesterday and today off too so it’s been a nice long break. Having said that, I don’t have a right lot of pics for you, but that’s probably a good thing as I’m sure you’re just barely awake after my Nickelback ramblings.

This was dinner one night last week for me & my friend. A while back I made individual cottage pies with the magical combo of normal and sweet potatoes as the topping. I still don't have the filling down but I see it happening soon, so recipe pending tweakage. The topping was definitely still magical though!


Insie shot, with some steamed green veg. Rad.

Dinner friday night. I bought a jar of jerk stir fry paste and cooked up some seitan strips, peppers, mushrooms and peas in it. To go with (yes I stole this idea from VwaV) I made coconut rice (1/2 cup basmati, small (160ml) tin of coconut cream, 1/2 cup water, cook for 10 mins no lid adding more water if needed, after 10 mins turn off heat, put lid on and leave for 5 mins, stir in a tiny pinch of salt and it's good to go and oh so yummy!).

This was pud the day I made the cottage pie above. I wanted to make ice cream but for it to be low fat, so I used yoghurt instead of cream. It was delicious, but a little ice crystally (what, it's a word!) because I was too lazy to dig out the ice cream maker and just shoved it in the freezer instead. hehe. It was still good though and the recipe is below the pic!

Strawberry/Mango Yoghurt Ice Cream
4 tbsp / 1/4 cup sugar
4 tbsp / 1/4 cup water
1 punnet (1.5 cups) strawberries, hulled and halved or quartered
1 mango, cut into rough chunks (or just use extra strawberries!)
1 x 500ml carton of soya yoghurt (2 cups)
125ml / 1/2 cup light soya milk
Maple syrup

Method:
In a pan, heat the sugar and water until the sugar is just dissolved. Set aside.

Throw the strawbs, mango and yoghurt into a blender and whizz. Pour the soymilk through the feed hole and keep whizzing. Add sugar syrup and whizz again. Once smoothe, taste and if it needs to be sweeter, add a tbsp at a time of maple syrup until it's right (I only needed 1 tbsp!).

Pour into ice cream maker and freeze as per instructions. Then put into freezer to set fully.

For a soft serve (totally optional!), pull it out 20-30 mins before you want to serve it and then stick blend it till smooth and easy to scoop.


Brekkie on sunday - wholewheat banana pancakes, with lots of maple syrup! SO good.

This was lunch one day over the weekend. A salad similar to the one I posted a while back, with soba noodles, tofu, avocado and a lime dressing. Really light and tasty.

And this was today's lunch - 3M tofu sarnie (that's maple, miso & mustard!). Really easy to make and delish too. Recipe below pic.

3M Tofu (makes enough for 2 servings)
1/2 pack (about 125g) firm tofu
2 tbsp dark miso (I used barley)
2 tbsp maple syrup
2 tsp grain mustard (I used beer mustard - yum!)
2 tsp dijon mustard
2 tsp water

big pinch black pepper

Method:
Preheat oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas 4.

Drain and press the tofu, then slice into thin squares (or whatever shape you like - they should be about 1/2 cm thick) and place on a baking sheet.

Whisk together the sauce ingredients and then brush the tofu pieces with it. Flip and brush the other side. Be generous but make sure there's enough left for another brushing. Bake for 10 minutes, then flip, baste with the rest of the sauce and bake another 10 minutes.

If you cut the tofu thicker, it'll need longer in the oven.

I put mine on my favourite Burgen bread with vegan mayo, thinly sliced tomato and brocco-sprouts. YUM!

Thank you and good night!! (I wanna be a rock star!)

x

Rain rain go away, come again another day!

I posted a while ago about my banana pancakes that I made that I hadn't quite got right. I've got them right now - they were breakfast yesterday and were soooo yummy. Recipe is below the pic.


Banana Pancakes (makes 4 nice size pancakes / serves 2 people)
1/2 cup / 80g wholemeal plain flour
1/4 cup / 4 tbsp chickpea/gram flour
2 tbsp baking powder
pinch salt
1 large banana
1/2 cup / 125ml non dairy milk
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp vanilla extract (optional)
2 tbsp maple syrup**, plus extra to serve

Method:
Mash the banana and mix all ingredients together in a bowl. It's ok if the banana isn't 100% smoothe and it's also ok if you don't get all the lumps out of the batter - don't overmix it!

Heat up a small, non-stick pan and spray it with a very fine mist of flavourless oil (I use sunflower). You don't have to use the oil but it helps.

It's quite a thick batter so spoon into the pan and spread out with the back of a spoon. Cook for just a few minutes and keep loosening with a spatula, until you can put the spatula all the way under the pancake without it getting stuck. Flip the pancake over and cook until you can remove without it sticking, as before.

Serve with lots-o-maple syrup.

** the amount of maple syrup depends greatly on how sweet your banana is and whether your milk is sweetened. When I first made these, I did it with vanilla soymilk which is very sweet and I didn't need to add any maple syrup. When I made these yesterday, I used my homemade unsweetened soya milk so it need a bit of help. Just taste the batter before you add any sweetener to make up your mind. Also, don't make them too sweet, as they're going to be dredged in maple syrup and will be just sickly!

Yesterday we went to Brighton for the day. I'm told that Brighton is a veggie paradise and I did see a couple of veggie food places, but unfortunately, my omni friends were more interested in beer than vegetarian shoes! :) However, I did have my favourite Yasai Itame in Wagamamas, so I was a happy chick.

The weather sucked though. Driving home the rain was ridiculous and today hasn't been much better. The noise outside my flat is horrid. The rain is absolutely shitting it down and the wind is howling and so all I wanted for dinner was a Sunday roast.

Sunday roasts are a British institution but not something I've bothered with since going veg. But today that all went out the window.

I roasted up some brussels*, potatoes and carrots and served it with some baked tofu, some Paxo sage & onion stuffing balls (vegan - yay!), peas and some bisto gravy (also vegan - double yay!). The tofu I just slathered on a thick layer of marinade made from miso, soy sauce, veggie worcestershire sauce, garlic powder and black pepper and baked it with the veggies for 30 minutes, flipping half way through. It was a great dinner and ready in under an hour - unlike it's omni counterpart would have been!


I'm trying to cut the calories a bit and lose some weight before I'm a bridesmaid this year, but I cannot bear to give up baking altogether! My previous attempts at fat free muffins have pretty much been a bit cack, so I went a surfin and found Susan V's Cinnamon Swirl Muffins. I only made 10 though instead of the 12 it should stretch too, because I like big fat muffins. They are soooo good.

I found this pic on my camera - it was dinner one day last week. I really fancied spag bol - like my mum used to make, but updated to use tofu instead of cow and wholewheat pasta.

And remember last time I said I suck at okara... here's my failure: spelt okara crackers! They smelt good, the dough tasted nice, but the texture is awful. Chewy plywood! argggh. I think they've got potential though and I've got some beans soaking to make tofu tomorrow, so I shall not be beaten yet!

Enjoy what's left of your weekends everyone! :)

Vegan MoFo: What do you do if you see a space man?....

... park in it man!

Rubbish joke courtesy of my R.E teacher when I was 16!

I had a day off today and spent most of it cleaning the flat. It's amazing how long it takes to clean such a small flat! But also tidied up my little area where I have had to start storing stuff. I need this space because as you can see, my 2 teeny cupboards are rammed full:



I should add that I am the only person I know who frequently gets hit on the head by falling spice bottles / nooch tins / cans of veggies! Everyone else I know has very sad, empty looking cupboards. Happiness is a rammed cupboard / fridge in my opinion.

So anyway, there is no room for any more bags of stuff so I bought some storage jars for my little area behind the dining table. The spirally long one is now holding wholewheat spaghetti......


......but used to hold my hair straighteners - I knew I'd never be disciplined enough to put them away after I use them so I found a better use for the box.


But that still isn't enough room for all my crap, so I had to line up the 'essentials' behind the cooker:

Extreme close up....

Since seeing into everyone's freezers was so much fun, I want to see your cupboards too - so I think everyone needs to take pics and post them so I can be nosey!! :)

Onto more interesting stuff - today's food. I had banana wholewheat pancakes, drowned in maple syrup, for brekkie (love days off!) - I haven't got this quite right yet but promise to post the recipe when I do.

For dinner I had to ransack the fridge because I don't have much in until I get to the supermarket tomorrow. I had some leftover blended tomatoes from yesterday's dinner so I made a quick pilaff. It was going to be a quinoa pilaff but I searched and searched and couldn't find any so basmati it was instead.

I baked some tofu with a mustard / agave glaze on. I overcooked it though so it was a bit dry and chewy but the flavour was pretty nice. Needs work but I think it'll be pretty easy to fix so I can post the recipe.

Cooking to: my "mullet rock" playlist!

Lazy Cow

I haven't done very much cooking this weekend, because I have been feeling lazy and just wanted to sit on my arse and watch Alias instead. And my parents took me out for dinner on Saturday. So for now, here are a just a few stored up pics from the week.

Pasta with a cheezy sauce (that's just the white sauce I used for my lasagna in this post) with some sweetcorn added. The salad was a surprise hit! It was just some blanched broccoli and frozen peas, some cherry tomatoes, butter beans and a simple flax oil / cider vinegar dressing with a bit of chilli and salt & pepper. Dress the veggies while they're still warm! yum yum.


This was dinner for me and my best friends, well actually this is the leftovers the next day that I added some mushrooms and seitan to. It was a veggie casserole done overnight in the crockpot and them some quick dumplings done the next day and baked in the oven.

For pudding I made us spiced cookie dough ice cream. I think I got the flavour spot on but I only had light soy milk and a little soya cream so the texture isn't quite there. I definitely want to try this again soon so I can perfect the recipe.

Today's brekkie: pancakes with a simple syrup made by boiling together 1/2 a cup of blackberries, 1/4 cup maple syrup, juice of a mandarin and a grating (tsp or so) of fresh ginger. Then I pushed it through a seive. It makes enough for at least 2 people - so the rest is sitting in my fridge awaiting use.


And today's lunch - minted pea and watercress soup. I was a bit disappointed with myself on this one. It was nice but nothing to write home about and definitely not worthy of posting the recipe. I might give it another go though - I think it's got potential.


I also baked some bread today. It was yummy but I can't take too much credit for it, it was a packet mix. It has inspired me to maybe give making bread a go myself.

And lastly, but not leastly, tonight's dinner. I had a harlequin squash sitting in the fridge a day over it's sell by date! They're pretty things but I got my knife stuck in the bugger trying to cut it up! It was like excalibur trying to get the damn thing out. Anyway I perservered and amazingly managed to not cut myself - and made it into a veggie curry. I was feeling way too lazy to toast and grind spices so I just used ready ground spices, a tin of tomatoes and a mini can of light coconut milk (I love those mini cans!). I served it with jasmine rice that I cooked in my steamer.

I served it as a circle of rice with the curry in the middle because that's how my mum used to dish up curry! :)

Cooking (curry) to: Stevie Wonder - The Definitive Collection

Ooh ooh - this time next week I'll be in cyprus! HUZZAH!