Blondies have more fun

I had some more okara to use up (and no room in the freezer for anymore) so I figured if it worked well in brownies, why not blondies too! And it worked, they are yummy!!

I based it on the recipe for the brownies but I made them maple syrup & walnut flavour.

Low Fat Maple & Walnut Blondies
Dry Ingredients:
½ cup / 80g plain flour
½ cup / 80g wholewheat flour
½ cup (packed) / 90g light muscovado sugar
1/3 cup / 35g cornflour
1¼ tsp baking soda
¼ tsp baking powder
½ tsp salt
¼ tsp cinnamon
½ cup / 50g walnuts (measured before breaking up)
Wet Ingredients:
½ cup /120g cup wet okara
½ cup /125ml unsweetened non-dairy milk
½ cup /125ml soya yoghurt
¼ cup /4 tbsp maple syrup
2 tbsp flavourless oil
1 tsp vinegar
1½ tsp vanilla extract

Method:
Preheat oven to 180C / 350F.

Mix the dry ingredients in a large bowl. Break up the walnuts into chunks and mix well to get them coated with the dry ingredients (and stop them from sinking)

Whisk together the wet ingredients together and pour into the dry. Mix well and pour into an 8x8 glass dish, lightly greased.

Bake for 25 minutes. A knife won't come out clean because 25 minutes won't cook these through. You can cook them for longer if you like a bit less squidge!

Leave them to cool in the dish for at least 10 minutes before you cut them. I cut them into 12, but you could do 16 if you want smaller ones.

I don't bother to turn them out, just keep them in the dish and cover it with clingfilm - they keep well in the fridge!

Fresh from the oven.....

Cooking to: Nickelback - Black Horse (been waiting for this album for ages!)

I'm now off to pack my slutty tops and frost my cupcakes (pix next time!) ready for Hard Rock Hell this weekend. YAY!

Have a great weekend everyone.

Can I get some fries with that shake shake booty?

Next weekend, I'll be away getting what's left of my braincells destroyed by heavy metal, but this weekend I had absolutely nothing to do aside from get my nails done and watch a lot of 80s films! It was awesome.

What I love about 80s films, aside from them being cheesey beyond belief and getting away with it - is the music. 80s films had the greatest, pour some sugar on me, anthems ever as their theme songs - let me tell ya - there was a lot of spatula-karaoke going on in this flat this weekend! I watched Mannequin, Lost boys, Back to the Future, Splash, Wildcats, Ghostbusters, Cocktail, The Breakfast Club, Mystic Pizza and St Elmo's Fire. I rock.

I started the weekend off with a bang on Fridy night - chicken style seitan that I breaded and fried until it was crispy good! Served with baked fries, barbecue sauce and posh mushy peas (which I almost always make with soy yoghurt instead of tofu). I'm gonna post my ingredients for the seitan as soon as I get the cooking method 100% right. I think I know how to fix it so next time - fingers crossed!


A dinner of tofu scramble and potato cakes, made extra awesome by adding some reggae reggae sauce to the scramble. I'm loving that stuff (I found the Love Apple one in the supermarket too - YAY!).

I made soymilk today and used the foam to put on top of my coffee! :)

I used some of my seitan to make taco filling - along with some mushrooms, kidney beans, tomatoes, onion, peppers, cumin, oregano and lots of chipolte paste! YUMMMM! I found some taco shells that have a flat bottom so they're supposed to stand up; they don't. But I managed to balance them together just long enough to get a picture.

Today for lunch I breaded some of the seitan in a mixture of matzo meal (finely ground in a spice grinder) with some salt and some chicken seasoning and baked it for 25 minutes, then had it in a wrap. I got the inspiration from a wrap I used to love at the pub, in my pregan days.

Before rolling - with pickles, tomato and chipolte mayo!

And lastly, I made some muffins today. My new recipe and they worked as well!! Baking mojo is back baby!! At least I hope it is, cuz I have some baking to do before going to Hard Rock Hell on Thursday! ;-) Recipe for Oaty Bran Muffins follows:

Oaty Bran Muffins
Dry Ingredients:

½ cup / 70g oat bran

½ cup / 60g oats (I used jumbo oat flakes)

½ cup / 80g wholemeal flour

½ cup / 80g plain flour

½ cup / 100g sugar

1 tsp baking soda

½ tsp baking powder

½ tsp allspice

¼ salt

½ cup / 60g dried cranberries (you could sub for whatever dried fruit you like though)

Wet Ingredients:

1 cup / 250ml non-dairy milk

1 tsp vinegar

½ cup / 125ml soya yoghurt

¼ cup / 55g vegan margarine, melted

1 tbsp maple syrup

1 tsp vanilla extract

Method:

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

Whisk together the milk and vinegar and leave to curdle.

Mix together the dry ingredients and make sure the cranberries are well coated in dry ingredients (this stops them sinking to the bottom of the muffins).

Whisk all the other wet ingredients into the milk/vinegar mixture. Pour into the dry and mix until just combined.

Lightly grease a 12 hole muffin tin (or line with paper cases) and divide the mixture between the 12 cavities.

Bake for 25 minutes, or until a skewer just comes out clean. Leave to cool in the tin for 5-10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack until cool.

Inside shot of the muffins...

Cooking to: 80s goodness!

I ain't 'fraid of no ghost.

Ooh mama, too hot, too spiceee? hot hot!

I was hoping to have some low fat baked goods to share with you but instead I had two, no make that 3, baking failures this week. Much to the disappointment of my best friends who had to make do with skanky biscuits out the biccie jar for pudding on Tuesday!

My muffins went wrong and so did some cookies and both went in the bin - baked goods have to be seriously pants to go in the bin in this household so that tells you how epicly (word??) I failed!! I had another go at the muffins with some tweaks and they're still not right, however they're at least edible - just not postworthy!

I was walking round the supermarket last week and I found a bottle of Reggae Reggae Sauce. Now I didn't know much about this stuff, except that subway do a really gross looking sandwich (that I LOVE the advert for! Hence post title) with it in and I think the guy who invented it was on Dragons' Den. Anyways, it is a sauce that is a cross between barbecue and jerk seasoning and it is GOOD! Plus it's vegan. So I basted some thick wodges of tofu with it and baked it along with some roasted veg (and a salad made of the last of the cherry tomatoes) and it was seriously rockin!! Hot hot!

Today I had this great idea to make some VCON chickpea cutlets, but I didn't have any chickpeas. And my copy of VCON is at work cuz someone is copying recipes. So I decided to wing it with some sweetcorn patties - with some Reggae Reggae sauce in them! They are not quite right but I think they have potential so I'll post the recipe when I get it right.

I served them with some maple & ginger roasted carrots, peas and some white bean mash (AWESOME stuff).


This soup was inspired by my current love of Jerk spice. It is black bean, brown rice & sweet potato soup with a big kick from jerk seasoning. It's not very photogenic I know, but it is super warming and filling (and ace with crusty bread). I still think it needs tweaking though so I'm holding off posting the recipe for now.

I had to take a pic of this.... I decided to use my soymilk maker to make some rice milk. I used basmati and it said not to soak the rice, but I dunno! I had a heck of a job unscrewing the filter and when I finally managed to, I saw why. The rice had formed a big solid block! hahaha. The rice milk kind of sucked too.

Sometimes I have days when I forget that I'm a 29 year old woman and feel like a teenager again. Like yesterday, when the car battery died and my Dad had to come over, jumpstart Jeff and take me to quickfit (where he paid for a new battery before I could get my wallet out). Love him for that cuz I'm broke!!

And I'm not feeling any more grown up cuz tonight, all I really wanted to do was watch daft films and eat cookies. I saw Becks' post about Dreena Burton's cookies and they looked so good that I had to make them too. With my baking failures this week, I've been feeling a bit like I've lost my mojo, but hurrah - a success. Unfortunately not my recipe but these are damn good cookies, nonetheless. I just wish I wasn't dieting so I could pig the whole friggin batch instead of just one!!

Baking cookies to: Random cheesy choons that I found on my iPod but I can't stop shakin' my booty and singing this song into my spatula!

Oh and I nearly forgot - Happy Thanksgiving American bloggers & bloggettes! xXx

Aww shucks...

I got nominated for a cute Butterfly award (must not mention grammar must not mention grammar must ….), by the lovely Jeni Treehugger and by the awesome Guava. I love both their blogs and both of these were a Vegan MoFo find for me, as I think I was for them! Gotta love that mofo! Big big thank you, ladies! :)

I love butterflies as well – me and mum have a bit of a fixation about them and I have one tattooed on my foot – because my nan loved them and oh it’s a long story I won’t bore you with, sufficed to say I love them.

Oh and as usual I’m behind the times!! And pretty much everyone I want to nominate either nominated me or has already posted about this or I’ve seen them nominated.

So as I’m a rebel I’m gonna ignore the RULEZ* and I’m just gonna give a shout out to the blogs that I love. If I haven’t mentioned you – I’m sorry, it’s just that I have a memory like a sieve!

These ladies make me laugh, inspire me and make me hungry by posting awesome food porn. I never cease to be amazed at the originality and humour and awesome recipes I get from food blogs and since going vegan, the blogosphere has really helped me never look back!

If you haven’t already been nominated for this (I think you probably all have) then consider yourself tagged:

Jessy – happyveganface
River – Wing It Vegan

Jeni Treehugger – Heathen Vegan
For the Love of Guava
Mandee - Cupcake Kitteh
LindyLoo – Yeah, That “Vegan” Shit
Celine – Have Cake, Will Travel

Allularpunk – Awesome.Vegan.Rad
Georgia – Lady’s Vegan Kitchen
Becks – I Am Not a Rabbit

I will probably be editing this list because there are others, I KNOW I’ve forgotten – that’s what I get for not having a blogroll; maybe it’s time I get on that!!

*The rules are supposed to be….
1) post about the award

2) link back to the person that nominated you

3) place the award on your sidebar and then choose 10 blogs that you think are really cool, link to them, contact each person and talk about why you think their blogs are cool.

It's all Greek to me

I finally got around to making tofu. Actually this was my second attempt, the first was a big fat failure. This one worked really well.

The texture is strange, it is somewhere between regular and silken tofu. Very soft - and the taste reminds me of what I remember cottage cheese to taste like. It split down the middle when I turned it out of the mould.


I baked some (that I didn't get a photo of) but I overcooked it and it was a bit yuk. When trying to decide what to do with the other half, all that kept popping into my mind was feta! I know there are a few recipes out there for tofu feta but I was too lazy to look one up so I just doused it in a bit of olive oil, white wine vinegar, oregano and salt & pepper and left it over night.

Then I made a greek salad with it. The supermarket has started doing pick and mix tomatoes and I got yellow, orange and red cherry tomatoes - they were so pretty and sooooo tasty....

I added some chunky cucumber, finely chopped red pepper, my tofu feta and shallot and a simple red wine vinagrette. Oh and lots of fresh mint. The rather unphotogenic stuff next to it was some brown rice and lentils, cooked together in veggie stock with some peas added and a bit of red wine vinegar. Ugly but tasty.

This week, my copy of Sarah Kramer's Garden of Vegan arrived. I was flipping through and as soon as I saw the recipe for the Bodacious Barley & Bean Soup (AKA the best soup EVER), I knew it had to be mine. Oh yes, it had to be mine! So I made it and wow! My friend was round at the time and when she tasted it, took the recipe straight away to make it when she got home.

To go with it I made some more soda bread. I'm still working on getting the recipe right though so I can post it.

Wonky Donkey

This weekend gone was my Dad's birthday and we went out for a lovely Italian meal, then back to their house for cake. He asked for a black forest style gateaux, just like Mum always used to make him. Except now cake making duties have been passed to me which means the double cream has been 86'd and replaced with chocolate frosting.

I put cherry buttercream in between the layers, along with cherry pie filling. The cherries could really do with being fresh ones for the top as these ones were a bit saucy and it was totally wonky (despite my cack-handed frosting job) as one side rose higher than the other on one of the cakes! Mum's cakes were always perfect looking and I still don't know how she did it but she used to pick the whole thing up, once covered in cream and roll it in chocolate flakes!!

But anyhoo - as retarded as my version looked, it tasted seriously ace.

I doubled the basic chocolate cupcake recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World. The buttercream was simple buttercream with some of the sauce from the cherry pie filling mixed in. The chocolate frosting I didn't weigh but it was pretty much the same as I used for this cake, but with a bit less liquid, so it was a bit firmer.


Inside shot.... the flash washed out the pretty pink colour of the icing!!


The next morning I got up and baked ginger muffins and some pancakes for everyone for brekkie. My dad decided to make a fairy cake with a muffin and the leftover cherry pie filling. I thought it was awesome so I took a pic of it!

Sexual Chocolate.....

SEXUAL CHOCOLATE!!! (I been watching Coming to America!! hehe)

My okara experiment actually worked! Hurraaaahhh. I made brownies and what's more - they are low fat!

Low Fat Okara Brownies
Dry Ingredients:
1/2 cup / 80g plain flour
1/2 cup / 80g wholewheat flour
3/4 cup / 150g sugar
1/3 cup (scant) / 30g cocoa powder
1+1/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt

Wet Ingredients:
1/2 / 120g cup wet okara*
3/4 cup / 185ml unsweetened non-dairy milk
1/2 cup / 125ml soya yoghurt
2 tbsp flavourless oil
1 tsp vinegar
1 tsp vanilla extract

3tbsp ish / 30g chocolate chips

Method:
Preheat oven to 180C / 350F.

Mix the dry ingredients in a large bowl, make sure to seive the cocoa powder so you don't get skanky lumps!

Whisk together the wet ingredients together and pour into the dry. Mix well and pour into an 8x8 glass dish, lightly greased. Sprinkle over the chocolate chips and bake for 25 minutes. A knife won't come out clean because 25 minutes won't cook these through. But I like them them super squidgy and fugdgy. You can cook them for longer if you like a bit less squidge!

Leave them to cool in the dish until they're cool enough to cut. I just leave them cut in the glass dish rather than turn them out - but mainly cuz I'm lazy!

*I say wet okara but I like to leave it in the filter inside the machine once I've poured out the soymilk, just until the filter is cool enough to remove. that way the extra liquid is removed and it's a bit firmer than if you empty it straight away. If you don't do this - the weight of the okara won't be the same for this recipe.


Cooking to: The Scorpions - Crazy World

And here are some bonus pics of my friend Emma's gorgeous little pooch Maddie. She brought her over to the flat in the week so we could have dinner and watch Supernatural. Isn't she gorgeous!!

She like attention so I think she was jealous that Dean was getting it all..... :)