Mini Me

Look at me posting after only 8 days' break!! hehe. It's a mini post from me today, because honestly, I really haven't cooked all that much this last week. I've been out for dinner a couple of times and instead of having the girls over here we went to Em's and she cooked - wonders will never cease!! :-)

So I'll start with the other day's lunch, roasted cherry tomato soup. This had a trip hit of tomatoes because I also added some tinned (well boxed actually) and some sun-dried toms. Recipe is at the end of the post. It was yummy.


Brunch today - I had some tofu leftover from the brownies that are coming up in a minute! So I made tofu omelettes from vegan brunch. I halved the recipe and the other half of the omelette batter is in the fridge for tomorrow morning. Once I spread out the batter I chucked on some chopped up sun dried tomatoes, spring onions, sweetcorn and a couple of rings of jarred jalapenos. Then flipped it to cook the second side. Then I flipped it back and sprinkled it with black pepper, dried oregano and grated on some cheezly mozz, then stuck it under the grill for a minute to melt. Soooooo delicious.

I said brownies.... I made these on Tuesday night to take to Em's for pudding. The recipe is from Vegan Cookies .... for the chocolate brownies and I added 1/3 cup of walnuts and 2 packets (50g total) of white chocolate buttons broken up. I cooked them for just the very minimum amount of time so they would be super fudgy and delicous and they were - best vegan brownies I've ever made!! SO EFFING GOOD. I must admit, when I first bought this book I was underwhelmed with it, but I've now made a few things and everything has been so tasty that I've really grown to love the book.

Dinner the other night, tacos! I sauteed a couple of spring onions and a clove of garlic and added a cup of sainsbury's frozen veggie mince (they didn't have any Linda McCartney, but this one is pretty much the same!). I added half a box of chopped tomatoes, a green chilli, some mild pepperdew peppers (I didn't have any red or yellow peppers!) and some cumin, coriander, oregano and paprika. I also grated about half a courgette in finely, then left it to reduce down. It was easy, nice and not too spicy. It made enough to fill about 6 taco shells, so I had leftovers. I had some salsa in the fridge so I topped it with that, some shredded lettuce and some soya yoghurt. Oh and some chopped, fresh coriander.

All ready to munch....

Close up of the taco filling...

Ready for assembling...

And here's the recipe for the soup:

Ingredients:
1 cup cherry tomatoes

2 fat cloves of garlic

olive oil

1 small onion

1/3 cup white wine

2 cups veggie stock

1/2 box (about 1/2 - 3/4 cup) chopped tomatoes in juice

4 sun-dried tomatoes*

1 tsp paprika

1/2 tsp dried oregano

1/2 tsp dried thyme

1/2 tsp dried rosemary

pinch of sugar or splenda

Salt & pepper to taste

Method:
Put the cherry tomatoes and garlic on a baking sheet and drizzle on a little bit of oil then bake at 200C/400F for 20 minutes.

Saute the onion over medium high in a tbsp or so of olive oil, with a good pinch of salt, for 5 minutes until starting to soften but not too coloured.

Once the tomatoes and garlic are done, pop the garlic out of the papery skins and set aside. Don't bother taking the skin off the tomatoes.

Back to the onions! Add the wine the pan and let it bubble off for a couple of minutes. Then add all the other ingredients and bring to the boil. Reduce heat and leave to simmer for 15 minutes.

Then pour into a blend and blend till smooth.

I served mine with a small blob of soya yoghurt on top, just to look poncey but it's not essential.

* I used sun-dried tomtoes packed in oil and just gave them a good shake off of the excess oil and then chopped them roughly. If you use dried ones, just chuck them into the soup when you add the stock and they'll reconstitute as you cook it.

Laterz
xXx

Singin' in the Rain

Helloooo,

Can you believe it's already August? You wouldn't think it if you looked out the window though, the Great British Summer - gotta love it, eh! Although yesterday it was actually pretty sunny, but I was ill so spent most of my day on the couch watching episodes of Huff and Jeremy Kyle! haha.

Well I am in the final week of my diet. I'm not calling it a cleanse because I've been rubbish at eating raw stuff, aside from juice & smoothies for brekkie with salad for lunch. I am gonna weight and measure myself friday to see if I've lost any weight (cross your fingers people!!). So here are some eats from the last week....

Dinner on Sunday for me and my friends. I made lasagna, got it all ready then finished it off and stuck it in the oven when we got back from the gym. I used gluten free (corn) lasagne sheets, sauteed up some veggies, made a tomato sauce and a tofu layer. I was gonna make tofu ricotta but I was way too lazy to dig out Veganomicon. So I just threw a packet of thawed cauldron plain tofu (250g) into the blender, along with the water it came in, added 1/3 cup of cashews, a couple of tbsp of soymilk and a pinch of salt & pepper and blended it super smooth. So it wasn't really like tofu ricotta, just a lovely smooth creamy sauce. It rocked.

The top was a sauce I made out of 1 cup (250ml) of soymilk, mixed with 3 level tbsp of cornflour, a tsp of paprika and a pinch of salt & pepper. Then I boiled it stirring constantly until it went really thick and then added a tbsp of tahini and 2 tbsp of nooch and checked seasoning. It made a perfect cheezy topping. The whole thing then got baked for 30 minutes and went with some steamed greens and a True Blood marathon! :)

I also had my best friends round last Thursday (and again tonight!) and I made the chickpea sensation patties from ED&BV, but I didn't get a photo! They were not bad but did fall apart a wee bit. Maybe because I subbed gluten free breadcrumbs for the oats, to keep them gluten free? But anyway, I cooked WAY too much brown rice for these so had loads leftover. Some went into....

Rice salad, just rice, veggies lemon juice and an avocado and some salt & pepper. Easy but yummy.

This was breakfast on Sunday. I really was craving porridge, but as oats aren't gluten free, I decided to use up the leftover brown rice. I just cooked 3/4 cup of cooked brown rice in 1 cup of soymilk, with a tsp of arrowroot for 15 minutes (arrowroot added last 5 minutes) until thick. Then I added some agave and some Dark Chocolate Dreams (gluten free and no refined sugar - woop!!). This was SO good. I got some of the White Chocolate Wonderful in my swap and I found the Dark Chocolate Dreams in Sainsburys (I did a massive SQUEEEEE when I saw it and had to stop myself buying 6 jars of it!). I just wish they sold more flavours in the UK!! Get on it PB&Co!!

As well as brown rice leftover from the patties, I had leftover chickpeas. YAY - this means Punk Rock Chickpea Gravey from VWAV. I had it with mashed butternut squash/sweet potato, peas and some awesome tofu. I just dipped it in cornflour, then (gluten free / low sodium) soy sauce, then in Orgran's Gluten Free crumbs (these have come in really handy lately!). Then I baked them at 200C for about 20 minutes. Yum.

One night I really couldn't think of what to have for dinner. I haven't had many tofu scrambles lately, I used to always have them on a Saturday but it's rare that I fancy them lately. But I had this for dinner one night and it was awesome. Baked sweet potatoes with a scramble - I threw all the the veggies in right at the end (except the onion) so they were crunchy and awesome! Topped with an avocado tossed in lemon juice and a dollop of low fat hummus. Tasty good.

I got this idea from Jessy's eggplant parm! I just dipped two pieces of aubergine in cornflour, then soymilk then the Orgran crumbs mixed with some nooch. Then fried it in a little cooking spray. To go with, I made a rice mixture with veggies and some more nooch and tahini. I stuff this into a big fat tomato and baked it for 20 minutes at 180C/350F. Delicious!! SOOOOO delicious.

That's it for the food - but something I'm excited to share.... my newest ink!! I have been dying to post this since the 6th of June when I got it done, but I only had a bloody, just taken pic and kept forgetting to get my friend to take a better one.

This was my 30th birthday present from my best friends. I wanted a fairy sitting on a sunflower. I wanted the sunflower to represent the vegan society logo, but I wanted it prettier than that logo (which is a bit boring), I wanted it to be a realistic sunflower. When I discussed it with my artist, we agreed the stem would be too long if she was sitting on top of it, so this is what she came up with. I just showed her 2 pics of fairies, one of the sort of style I liked and one with the wings I liked. For colours, I just said greens and blonde hair please. I was in love with her sketch but the finished article was even more awesome than I hoped for.

A close-up. I wish I could get you a better close-up because the detail's she's put in the face is awesome. She has green eyeshadow and pink lipstick - she is one hot (vegan) fairy!! Plus these pics do not do the colours justice but you get the idea!

Laterz

xXx

It came to me, I think they call it an epiphany – man that’s a big word!

This is my 100th blog post! YAY.

Had a great weekend (Maz has the pictures on her camera so I can't post any till next time), despite sleeping for 2 nights on the world's most uncomfortable sofa bed, horrid food and Thin Lizzy sucking ass! We shared a chalet (with no shower – I had to wash my hair in the bath with a jug – ick!) with 4 fellas, who’s idea of hilarity was to play Orville singing I Wish I could Fly at 9am on Saturday morning, when I was hungover.

AND - I fell over, I used to fall over a lot when I was younger, after a beer or two. But this time, I wasn't even drunk! Someone who was drunk spilt beer and I slipped in it and smacked down on my knee - I have a lovely colourful bruise there now, but at least I amused the group of lads singing "she fell over she fell over" at me - aren't boys original!!

I also got lots of “why would you choose to be vegan”, “carrots are alive as well you know” and “how do you milk a soybean” …. type questions – the soybean milking question was pretty amusing though.

The only vegan food option on site (the Ghetto!!) was chips and crisps; typical. Luckily I took soya milk and cocoa pops and of course... cupcakes and cookies.

VCTOtW basic chocolate cupcakes, with my new peanut butter frosting – which rocks socks!! I was wingin it, but recipe on the way – more on that in a bit though!


This is what happens to your cuppies when you travel in the Venga Bus for 4 hours! :( Still, as my dad says - all goes down the same hole - we are eloquent in my family, eh!!


And cookies – these earned me a few “wait, you made these..... yourself?”, “these are vegan?”, “they don’t have tofu in do they?” …… etc questions, I think they were impressed! Dreena’s recipe again because it really is the best CC cookie recipe I’ve tried so far.

Onto other info, I’ve started writing a cook zine! Basically, I wanted to put together some recipes for my family and friends (as sort of an extra stocking filler for chrimbo), giving them ideas for easy, healthy vegan dishes.

I often hear from my family & friends that they are stuck for what to cook me and they don’t know where to start looking. So this zine is aimed at friends & families of veggies / vegans who are not sure what to cook for them and are stumped by ingredients they’ve never heard of in recipes they Google. All the dishes will be easy to make and I’m also avoiding using any ‘weirdo vegan ingredients’ – ie, anything that is difficult to find or requires a trip to a specialist shop / website.

Once it’s done, it’ll be a free PDF for anyone that wants it – more info on that when it’s done. Some of the recipes will be ones I’ve posted before on the blog but there’s a few new ones I’m working on too, going in there.

One will hopefully be a variation on this recipe that I ripped off from my new Favourite American TV chef, Giada De Laurentiis, because it was awesome – just needs some tweakage! (I spent about 2 hours watching videos on the Food Network website when I got home Sunday and I really like her and her "ya gotta have parmesan.." - even if I don't agree! I’m ‘borrowing’ another recipe off her when my friends come for dinner this week.)

Oh and the PB frosting recipe will be in there too, once I figure out measurements.

I had some leftover so I did a pepper too, as I only had one big mutha tomato. It didn't work as well, as I didn't think to pre-cook it, which peppers need. Served with roasted brussels, which I know looked burnt - they were perfect.

The point of the post title though (aside from listening to too much Bowling for Soup) – I finally got my white bean & sweetcorn soup right. HURRAH! I’ve been tinkering with this for ages and this about the 6th attempt. I just could figure out what was wrong with it – I tried adding potatoes, soya cream, soya yoghurt, changing the herbs, upping the beans, lowering the beans…. and it was still off!

But today it hit me – almost literally because of my stupidly over-filled cupboards. When I went to make the soup, I found I had only got one can of sweetcorn left and I’d eaten half of it for dinner! Dammit. But I did have a can of creamed style sweetcorn – GENIUS!

So here it is, I’m happy at last!!

Creamy White Bean & Sweetcorn Soup
Ingredients:
1 tsp olive oil
1 onion
2 fat cloves of garlic
1½ (generous) cups / 350g cooked cannellini beans
3 cups / 750ml veggie stock (I used 3 cups water + 2 stock cubes)
A couple of sprigs of thyme
1 can (418g) creamed style sweetcorn
½ - 1 small can of sweetcorn (optional)
Salt & pepper to taste

Method:
Over a medium / low heat, sauté the onion in the olive oil with a pinch of salt for a few minutes, until starting to look translucent. Add the garlic and just cook for a minute or so, so you don’t burn the garlic. Add the beans, stock, thyme and a good pinch of pepper. Throw the herbs in whole, the leaves will fall of the stems and you just need to fish the stalks out before you blend the soup. I don’t add salt because my stock cubes are salted and also, I cooked the beans in veggie stock so it doesn’t need it. If this isn’t the case, add a good pinch now.

Bring to the boil and then reduce to a simmer. Cover and cook for 25 minutes.

Take off the heat and blend the soup (I do mine with an immersion blender, in a jug, in 2 or 3 batches). Pour back into the pot, add the creamed sweetcorn & regular sweetcorn if using and stir through. Check seasoning and enjoy with crusty bread. Yum.

Cooking to: Incubus – Light Grenades

This was today's dinner, balsamic roasted cherry tomatoes (awesome!), yummy breaded seitan, sweetcorn and smashed taters! Rad.

I have some erm, experimental muffins in the oven right now – they smell good, let’s hope they don’t suck!! I'll tell ya next time.

I'm off to finish putting up my chrimbo tree! :-)

Just a quickie

Tonight I made Veganyumyum's super fast tomato & cream basil pasta (sans the basil - stupid supermarket ran out). A few people have blogged / porned this lately and I am just going to back up everything they have said - it's freaking gorgeous. I recommend you head on over right now and write down the recipe!!

I’m working on a new recipe – cranberry orange cornbread. This has definite potential but it is not right yet. I think the spelt flour and oat bran I added had a detrimental effect on the texture and it needs to be more orangey and more spicy! So I am going to give this another go at the weekend with some amends. Hopefully I’ll get it right next time and will post the recipe.

But to tide you over, here is a pic of attempt no. 1, hot out of the oven spread with some pure soya:

All going well, tomorrow I will have a recipe for a chocolate cake to post!!