Chistmas cookies

I made cookies for my friends. Four types: Chocolate chip and Candy Cane, Chocolate, Chocolate Tabasco and Gingerbread cut-out cookies.

Snowman from Asda. It plugs into my laptop.

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!

M&S Vegan List

The list was updated on 3rd December so very up to date. I like the look of the butternut squash samosa. Now just need to find it.

http://health.marksandspencer.com/your-diet-needs/vegan-diets

Go buy yourself a treat.

Random veg, mainly parsnip, curry Soup

Today I made soup with the left over veg in my fridge and I liked it. There is no photo as it was difficult to get an interesting pic.

2 parsnips
1 Carrot
handful of cauliflower
tblsp turmeric
shake chili
tsp cumin
shake dried coriander
water
pepper

It made two bowls of soup. It probably would have been better with curry paste but I didn't have any.

The morning after the night before..

The morning after the Christmas party at our house. Someone's left over tinsel makes a good prop. Scrambled tofu in pita with ketchup, Jack Daniels BBQ sauce and courgette. Pitta was almost the only bread left in the supermarket after people's panic buying when it snowed.

Banana popsicles

It's snowing!! lots. I don't think I will be able to get the train to uni tomorrow.
Here is the chocolate banana popsicle pic. It has white chocolate fudge icing and mocha beans. I advise taking them out of the freezer and leave in the fridge for at least 10 mins so they can thaw out a bit unless you have brave teeth.
I made the boyfriend one and he approved. He said it tasted like ice cream.

End of Veganmofo celebratory meal :)

I made Winter Vegetable Bake. The recipe is on the Pure (margarine brand in the UK) website. Here is the recipe. I added chickpeas to use them up and onion. It surprised me how filling it was! I'm having the last two bites now. Gooey yummyness. It did take me forever though and I need a bit more practice to stop my sauce being lumpy!

I made chocolate banana popsicles for dessert but I don't think I can fit them in. I will have to post that another day.

Veganmofo has been fun but a lot of pressure to post! I found I wanted to spend time reading other people's blogs and making what they made rather than create my own dishes. Perhaps next year I can blog as a mofo fan? I am however proud of my 23 posts (including this one) in a month as it is the most I have ever done in one month. Now to get stupidly overexcited about Christmas food!

The Fridge and The Secret Stash

The food that I have in the fridge and my secret snack stash!

Tropicana orange juice, red pot of smoked tofu, onion, clear box with Japanese sweets, dolmio, left over soya mince, kale, lettuce and indian snack in brown bag.

Peri-peri hot sauce, strawberry jam, housemates peanut butter, floravital, housemates jam, Jack Daniels BBQ sauce.

Goodies mmm

The new way to fondue

I often go with the boyfriend to his mums house for a roast on a Sunday. She has always fed me well for the 4 years and almost a half that I have been going out with her son. This Sunday she surprised us with a do it yourself style meal. She handed me a plate of roast potatoes and Linda McCartney sausages. I went into the dining room to find a little burner in the center of the table and two plates of vegetables. Out of the kitchen she came with a pan of hot oil. We were going to batter our own veg then fry it. She found a recipe for vegan batter online. The result was great fun. For some reason I kept forgetting to put my veg in the batter so made more veg chips than battered veg! I think we were fairly agreed that sweet potato and onion were the best.

Fried, battered broccoli

Veg and bowl of batter

Vegan food in the snow

There has been a lot of snow talk this week in Brighton as the weather forecast suggests it might snow this weekend. Last year the snow caused businesses and schools to close for a few days and the ice left over was very dangerous. This means the council are showing that they are prepared for any sign of snow. Last years snow benefited me though because it meant I got a uni essay deadline extended by a day because I couldn't travel there. I definitely needed that extra day!

I'm just lucky I live near a supermarket this year.

So thinking snow. I found this website today about vegan snow trips.
http://www.veggiesnow.org/index.html

I've never been skiing but I am considering going when I finish my degree to work in a creche for a week or two. This is just at the ideas stage.

Here is a link straight to the desserts recipe page for catering for vegans. They all sound simple and easy to make. They have the cheesecake recipe I mentioned yesterday that I want to try.
http://www.veggiesnow.org/articles/184.html

I'm thinking of making hot banana and chocolate wrap tonight but that means going to the supermarket...

'meat' and two veg

I'm getting busier with uni in the run up to Christmas and deadlines so posts might be shorter. Like this one. This is something I had for tea recently. It looks a bit meaty but it is really smoked tofu, potatoes and kale. I added omega 3 oil, rice vinegar, chilli and garlic powder. Yum Yum.

The health benefits of sponge pudding

I'm justifying the fact that I lived off cake today because of the healthy ingredients (blatantly ignoring the 'healthy in much more moderation' ingredients). I made microwave sponge pudding. I made extra for my housemates (extra brownie points, so it was almost angelic of me to make it and eat it).

It is from the book The cake Scoffer by Ronny. I also want to try the very simple cheesecake recipe as I have struggled to find a simple one.

I used wholemeal flour, black treacle and saltanas. So wholegrain, iron and fruit.

I have asked for Return of the Cake Scoffer for Christmas.

I forgot to mention the emotional health benefits of the pudding. Warm, comforting, easy food to get you to a place where you can study.

Too many bananas = happy low fat banana cake

I'm not a big fruit fan. I do sometimes like to eat bananas but I often buy too many but then don't always remember to eat them until they get a bit too ripe. I often do this on purpose though so that I can make lovely banana treats!

Below are pictures of my all-bran cake that I make often as it is really simple to measure (one mug of this, one mug of that). It is also fairly fail safe so it is possible to experiment. I tried putting a whole banana in the middle of the cake this time and it sunk a bit so I'm not sure if I would do it again. I often eat this cake for breakfast. The recipe is from "So what do you eat?" by Liz Cook. I used half a mug of mashed banana and half of sultanas.

This time I tried freezing half the cake as its just me eating it. The cake texture went a bit strange and the banana went odd. It is better than wasting half of it but it is better fresh.

One final piece of advice. It takes a long time to cook (about 1 hour 15mins). It needs the time to dry out. My advice is to set a timer as its easy to forget about it. Don't leave it for two hours like I did with the last one. Although, it was still edible  and tasty inside the crispy shell.

Sushi house party!

I almost forgot to blog! My housemates and I decided to make sushi! It has taken a while to get all 6 of us together in the house at the same time but it was worth it. We used Clearspring products, which are all vegan and have the Vegan trademark on them.

Seasoning

Smoked tofu and pepper

Asparagus, pepper and avocado

 I would definitely recommend having a sushi party. Healthy and fun food. All my housemates enjoyed the totally vegan meal.

Curry

Tonight I had curry delivered from Planet India in Brighton. I used to walk past it all the time but never got around to trying it. My mum gave It is a purely vegetarian and vegan restaurant that also does take away and delivery. I ordered Ketchoris (yum), cumin rice (yum), mombai potato curry (hmm), tardka dall with a little bit of spinach curry (hmm soupy).
It was spicy. The free poppadoms were very oily.

I wasn't sure about the food but it depends on the sort of curry you like. The potatoes were creamy. I liked the cumin rice but I personally prefer having plain rice with curry and that wasn't an option. The customer service was good. They were friendly and patient when I got the address wrong and had to call them back (I was at a friends house).

I gave the left over tardka dall and cumin rice to my dad and he enjoyed it.

My sister made curry in bulk today. Here is her picture with the food on her pretty plate she painted at a paint pottery cafe with me before she started uni.

1tbs oil
1 large onion, chopped
1-2 garlic cloves, chopped
2tbs curry paste
1/2 cauliflower cooked and broken into chunks
1 can of chickpeas drained
Small tin kidney beans
1 large potatoes, diced
400g chopped tomatoes

Cook the potatoes for about 10 mins, add cauliflower, cook till both soft.
Fry onion and garlic.
Add everything else
Mix all together!
Serve!

Bit of a vague recipe but a good one. You can add pretty much any vegetables, beans or lentils. Lentils take about 20 minutes so add early and add some water or stock.

Some sushi and a pizza

I had a pottering about day. I love wandering about in Brighton. It is such an interesting place. I went out to get thread to sew badges onto a blanket and came back with lots of treats. I went to the market and bought Kale. I went to the health food stall and bought reduced in price pizza bases. I went to the Japanese shop E-Kagen near the station and bought snacks for when I make sushi with my housemates. I will let you know how that goes. I also bought triangle sushi ( I can't remember the Japanese name for it). It is very cleverly packaged so that the nori is separate to the rice so that it doesn't go soggy and with careful unwrapping goes back around the rice easily. The vegan one is marked with a green sticker and has seaweed inside.

My parents brought me round some cheezly melty edam and I bought some smoked tofu, onion and red pepper for my pizza. I gave the boyfriend a bit and he liked it.

I need some recipes to use up some lemony hot peri peri sauce. I don't mind the heat but the lemon is an odd flavour.

Cookie dough from Vegan Cookies Invade your Cookie Jar

I didn't use to be allowed to bake much at my parents as it can be messy. Now that I am living away from home and living with fellow bakers I am getting used to doing it a bit more. Its starting to seem odd if I don't bake each weekend.

This weekend I made Isa Chandra's cookie dough recipe from Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar. It is one sugary recipe. It is sooo yummy and has been enjoyed by the boyfriend and the housemates. I tried it with ice cream as suggested and the sugar high was crazy and it does taste great.

I didn't have enough chocolate chips so chopped up chocolate using my lovely sharp knife.

Sugar and soya milk mixture.

The finished product before I froze little spoonfuls of it. You can have just a tiny nibble and be satisfied.

New products

This is a new bar I found in Julian Graves that is labeled as vegan. I ate it on my commute to uni. It was tasty. Quite sugary. More of a treat than something to sustain you.

For tea I was excited to have a new Linda McCartney product that was labeled as vegan friendly. The vegetarian chilli with potato wedges. I was a bit hungry after the long day at uni but thought I would wait a bit before making it as I thought it would be quick as it is a ready meal style. I was so wrong. I read the packet to find the minimum cooking time was 35 minutes in the oven. It actually still was frozen in the middle after this time and took about an hour. This is probably because I didn't preheat the oven. I'm not a fan of electric ovens. The resulting food was ok but not worth the wait when I was hungry. I added some broccoli for colour and a different taste. I would have it again with more advanced preparation (remembering to preheat the oven).

The Chocolate Banana Rum fun Brownies pictures and sauce recipe

Still haven't found the recipe for the brownies but I do now have pictures and the banana rum sauce recipe.

Here are the pictures:

It has pieces of banana in it which is the bumps and when they are cooked I think they taste a little bit like ice cream

A bit messy but tasty. Tastes good microwaved for 30 odd seconds if you haven''t eaten it all straight away.

To make the banana rum sauce:
one ripe banana
1 or 2 shots of rum
icing sugar to taste
about a teaspoon of ground arrowroot mixed with a little water to form a paste

Equipment
Blender
Small pan

Blend the banana and rum. Add icing sugar. Realise it is too runny. Have a brainwave, put the mixture in a pan and try adding ground arrowroot. Use a low heat and mix until it thickens a bit. Store in the fridge if you want it to last a few days and re-heat if you like. I prefer it warm.

Notes:
When I first added the icing sugar I thought it might thicken it up but it doesn't. More experienced cooks might think that experiment was a bit crazy? It might have worked with less rum?

I'm having the last slice today :)

Sugar high leads to advent calendars

Advent Calendars!! A bit early I know but as someone who has little experience of chocolate advent calendars I get very excited when I see a vegan one. Last month my mum kindly bought me and my sister dairy free advent calendars off of the veganstore website. They had a deal where it was cheaper to buy them early. So it has been sat on my desk for a while now.

Today, to escape the boyfriends loud music and game playing (well that's the excuse I am using) I went to Starbucks to do some reading for uni. For some reason I do concentrate very well when I am in Starbucks on my own despite how busy it is. I've had a Starbucks card for a while now since I found any extras you choose to have are free, when you pay with it. Which means free soya milk which saves you about 35p. I think thats how much it saves but I haven't paid for the soya milk for a while obviously. I thought I would be adventurous and try a syrup. I had a peppermint mocha that was advertised on the menu as one of the suggested christmas drinks. More Christmas!


I thought the peppermint was a little excessive. I could really taste the peppermint and barely taste the coffee and choc. It was enjoyable but I think if I had it again I would ask for just a little bit of peppermint as I saw them put in a few big squirts of the syrup. The syrup is basically sugar and I'm not great with caffeine so I was definitely on a high after that drink.

The Starbucks I went to is part of a Sainsbury's. I read on the UK part of the PPK forum about Sainsbury's doing a vegan advent calendar by choices dairy free chocolate. I'd had the choices caramel chocolates before and they are yum! After Starbucks I couldn't help going on a wander round the shop and came across the advent calendars that have just been put on the shelves in the free-from section of the shop.

So now I have two advent calendars. Is that overdoing it? Well after years of not having chocolate calendars I feel I need to catch up. Well that's my excuse anyway.

Chocolate Banana Rum fun

I had brownie cravings and I had bananas and I wanted to continue the alcohol theme.

The result.
Chocolate and banana brownies with banana and rum topping

Sadly I have lost the non-vegan recipe that I found online and veganised. Hopefully I might find it soon and post the recipe as I would like to make them again.

I will also have to add the photo another day as I am not on my computer.

I've gone back to my parents house to see my sis who is down from her uni for the night and to have a shower in a warm house. Student houses get so cold!!

They got her on soya milk and alcohol

The title is slightly adapted from a Dr. Feelgood song. I saw them with my Dad a while ago.

Students often (not often me) drink a lot of alcohol but it's also great in food! I discovered this by making Beer Battered Tofu from Vegan Brunch by Isa Chandra Moskowitz.

It was yummy and my non-vegan boyfriend (from now on to be referred to as the boyfriend) loved it too. We roughly halved the recipe (I roughly guessed the amount of tofu that I thought me and the boyfriend could eat rather than weighing it to the right amount). It was a fun meal to make together and very messy. I'm sure it is possible to make them without the mess but getting my hands sticky was part of the fun. We had some batter left over so he had the wonderful idea of attempting to make onion bhajis. They were not proper onion bhajis as we didn't add spices and well, I don't think bhajis would normally contain beer. They were tasty though. So if you have any batter left, try slicing up some onion and putting a handful at a time into the batter and mix it around to coat. Try to scoop all the battered slices up with a fork and slowly drop them into the hot oil. It should all stick together as long as you drop it in in one go. I think beer battered baby corn, broccoli and peppers would be good too. I went all out and had the tofu and onions with chips and veg mmmmmm.

Any suggestions for what the boyfriend should be called in posts are welcome. Should I just keep calling him the boyfriend?

listen now, i'm a cow!

 

A cute video. Why do people think it is ok to kill cows for food and clothes but don't feel the same about dogs?

Some more inspiration from Benjamin Zephaniah in chapter 7 of the Vegan Society's make the connection campaign. If you have the time definitely watch all of them!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8EnXs2kn6cQ

 

Me but on a really good day

The title won't make sense at first as I am having a bad day. I have got half way through the uni semester and the panic over the amount of work to do and the organisation of it all is REALLY starting to set in.

I recently found that Berocca (the uni students hangover drink) says on the packaging that it is suitable for vegetarians and vegans. There was also a deal on at the supermarket so I stocked up for me and my sister who started at uni this year. I'm not a big drinker so I'm not sure if it cures hangovers. I am however hoping the advertisement is true and my day will become a good day.

Pizza hut pizza later will also help. Pizza without the cheese of course!

Convenience food

Being vegan does not necessarily mean living off home made salad, soaked chickpeas and rice, although I do like those things. Sometimes I just need some food fast. Sainsbury's have had a 2 for 1 deal on innocent veg pots. Most also had 50p off vouchers on the packaging for next time. Many of these pots are labelled as suitable for vegetarians and vegans. They are a filling and as far as i'm aware healthy meal. I had one today because I needed something quick and filling to help me write up an observation. The only problem I have with them is the packaging. If only they could make them recyclable! They have quirky suggestions on the packaging for ways to reuse the pots but in reality they often smell too much like curry even after a good scrub to be used for many suggestions. So far I have used a pot for our communal money collecting (for loo rolls and cleaning products). I've considered using them for food storage but I don't want everything to taste like curry even if I do love curry. I could maybe use them as flower pots like this glass jar here with my £1.50 flowers.

Mac n Cheese curiosity

I've never actually seen anyone eat mac n cheese. Maybe it isn't very British? I don't know.

I've also never had cheese before and don't like the smell and I'm guessing the taste wouldn't make me feel good either.

So why on earth do I have a fascination with mac n cheese?? It could just be the name.

So I bought some vegan cheese sauce and tried that and just about got through it but it was too cheesy for me and made me feel sick.

Then I searched online and found Happy Herbivore's soy-free mac n cheese. Result! I did make it with soya milk. I added too much turmeric which at first I thought it was a bad thing but then thought it made it better because it looked more like junk food and healthy junk food is never a bad thing. I also added red pepper for colour.

A soup in time saves 9

I went to a Halloween party at a friends house last night. So much fun! I was tired today and therefore dangerous. I managed to bump into a few things and knock over the mop and bucket filled with water all over our kitchen floor. I gave up on studying and decided to try and achieve simpler things so used my day to prep a little food for the week. This means when I properly get into studying tomorrow I will work hard and won't have to spend time trying to find energizing food.

For lunch I had left over cous cous from the night before and had it with chickpeas, sweetcorn, dressing (vinegar and soy sauce) and then half way through added vegan garlic mayonnaise.

There is still some cous cous left for another meal. Cous cous is super simple as you just put some in a bowl, cover with water (roughly one centimeter above the cous cous) and leave for a few minutes. Even simpler when its already had herbs and spices added so instant healthy tasty food.

I also made leek and potato soup. I made a big batch to use up leeks I had bought cheaply. I literally just used potatoes, leeks, stock cube and water. Cooked the potatoes for 10 mins in the stock and water, added the leeks for another 6 minutes then blended. I made enough for 5 cylindrical pots and some in a mug for a bedtime snack tonight. I will freeze most of them and defrost when I need to.

This was what I had for tea. Onion, garlic clove and peppers fried then water, noodles and kidney beans. I also put in ginger powder and peri peri hot sauce. I added a bit too much hot sauce.

It has begun...

 

Happy World Vegan Day!

Happy Halloweeeeen

This is what I had for tea.
Pepper/pumpkin

 ghoulish green Midori and lemonade

 The finished pepper stuffed with cous cous and eaten with salad and Jack Daniels BBQ sauce, which is labeled as Vegan. I left it a little too long whilst I made my ghost costume.

VEGAN MOFO!

I've signed up to vegan mofo (Vegan Month Of Food) for November. The idea is to blog all month about vegan food to spread the word about how great vegan food is. I've had lots of ideas for blog entries but haven't got into the habit of blogging regularly and think vegan mofo will help. It is also an exciting month as it is World Vegan Month. Get ready for November!

Sore Throats and Rainy Days

Its been the first rainy day for ages. I have a sore throat. I have lots of onion to use up where various family members have made things and not checked the fridge! I have onion covered in coriander left over from an Indian meal.
=
Carrot and coriander soup time!

I scanned the internet then came up with whatever I had around. I'm trying it with a bit of ginger after looking at a About.com recipe. Sorry all my measurements are mixed up.

1 tbsp Vegetable oil

Little omega 3 oil if you want

roughly one onion

1lb carrots chopped

1 potato

tsp coriander powder

a little ginger powder

1 ltr water and vegetable stock cube

Fry chopped onion in oil and add chopped carrots and potato.

Add coriander and ginger.

Fry for a bit longer.

Add water and stock cube.

Cook for roughly 20 mins or until soft.

Leave to cool slightly.

Blend and heat again if it has cooled too much.

Season with pepper. (There is already salt from the stock cube)

Tasty but I personally would have less of the stock cube or a reduced salt stock cube next time. My throat feels better and the sun came out. :)

GLASTONBURY!

I was very excited about going to Glastonbury Festival for the first time. I had heard about the atmosphere and was particularly looking forward to the Green fields after reading on forums about the great vegan food. I had also read that there wasn’t much point in cooking food and decided that my bag would be much lighter without pans and gas canisters. I packed a range of vegan snacks. The weather forecast was mainly sunny (surprising for Glastonbury considering its reputation!). I tried to pack food that would last as much of the weekend as possible and give me some kind of nutrients if I didn’t make it to the vegan food.

This is what I packed and how it survived:
Cheerios
Breakfast!
Pitta bread
Survived well, it seems to just dry out rather than go mouldy. In the heat it felt a bit too dry to eat much. I think next time I would buy bread when I arrived.
Packs of Raisins
Attempting to be healthy.
Little packs of juice
Attempting to be healthy. That’s two of my five a day!
Little packs baked beans
It was so hot that they were almost as warm as when cooked.
Pea pods
I had recently been introduced to eating peas in pods at work and loved them, sadly the ones I bought were not as sweet but a good option.
Various fruit bars
Quick calories.
Chocolate
Great! However, it was very hot and it turned into one giant lump that was hard to eat but quite fun to eat.
Crisps
Yum.
Oatcakes
Seeds
Mini sweetcorn tins
Ring pull lids so no need to bring a tin opener.
Small jar of peanut butter and a packet of rice cakes
Since the first year that I went to Reading festival, and my mum suggested I took these, I have never looked back. I could survive on most trips with these apart from when travelling with my boyfriend who is allergic to nuts…

Glastonbury was very hot and sadly I don’t cope very well with heat so I didn’t feel like eating much and brought a lot of the snacks back with me. I did venture to the Green fields and had a lovely pizza called ‘no cheese please’ in the Greenpeace field. I asked for no olives so had red pepper, red onion marmalade and fresh rocket. I enjoyed it in a tiny patch of (glorious, wonderful) shade. I hope to go again as there was way too much to do in just one weekend. I loved the atmosphere and really want to go back to explore more of the Green fields. I felt lovely and calm there. I would bring more junk food as it is only one weekend and when you have that yucky festival feeling (lack of sleep and overdoing things) then junk food is what I need! It would be possible to bring some snacks and buy more healthy food at the festival. The fresh fruit and juice stalls were everywhere and very popular.

Revision/Risotto

Revision time!

I have almost finished my second year. Thankfully! I put a lot of work into handing in the last few assignments. Somehow I had managed to end up with 7000 words left to write at the end of the last term so Easter was pretty busy. I don't know how that happened and will start on all work earlier next year! I will!

Despite all the words I did get to spend a lovely weekend on the coast in Devon with my boyfriend and some friends. The break really helped. We ate lots of chips and mushy peas!

Since handing in all the assignments I have one exam left to do and after the hard slog at Easter I really just want to have a break! I keep reminding myself that it is almost all over but until it is I am surviving by taking breaks from revision to eat yummy food. I must now always have a decaf coffee with a little treat. Before I went to uni my work friend said I would drink coffee all the time but as I rarely used to drink coffee I didn't believe her...at least its still decaf.

I've recently discovered some vegan waffles from a London health food shop which is making the afternoons go quicker. It says on the packet you can heat them in the oven or leave them on top of your coffee till the syrup melts. I was really excited about this so bought a coffee for the train home only to find the top of the cup was too big so had to wait a bit longer. Worth the wait.

I have tried to revise like a full time job so give myself the evenings off. I am using the evenings to cook yummy food to keep me going. Brain food? Today I tried making risotto with a recipe inspired by the recipe on the side of the packet. However, we had no onions and the coop had no onions so we ended up with a very large leek. The recipe also said parmesan but our vegan parmesan but never really got into that so vegan melty mozzarella was all I could find. I added a most of two peppers to add colour, healthiness and flavour. I've never even eaten risotto before so it was a learning curve. It took twice the amount of time it said it should. Tasted really good though!