No work = brunch

How exciting! No work this week!

I was in London on Saturday so on the way back home I made a special diversion out to Brixton just for cupcakes. There are no pictures of the cupcakes as I couldn't wait to sample them all so they don't look as pretty now. I bought 4: cola, cookies and cream, strawberry chocolate and rhubarb crumble. I think my favourite was the cola cupcake as I really didn't expect it to actually taste like cola but it did.

It was at Ms Cupcake's that I found The (all day) Breakfast Scoffer cookbook.

It's a great little book. For only £1.50 you get lots of simple recipes. I already have The Cake Scoffer, The  Salad Scoffer and The Return of the Cake Scoffer and knew that they were great.

I have a week off work which meant that I didn't have to get up early and I didn't have to quickly shovel down some porridge before I left the house. I had time to try a new recipe. So this morning I got to try out Vegan Eggy Bread. I tested it on the non-vegan boyfriend and he said it was surprisingly similar to the real thing. He suggested that it needed to be a bit gooier in the middle. I think I could achieve that next time by soaking the bread in the mixture, rather than spreading it on the top, and frying it with a bit more oil and a higher temperature so it cooks the outside quickly and doesn't dry out the inside. I ate mine with baked beans.

I love how simple the recipes from these books are so that you can tinker with them easily to make them a bit your own. Just like the microwave sponge pudding that I often make from the cake scoffer book.

Vegan Frappuccinos!

Starbucks have new frappuccinos and after an internet search it appears that most of them are vegan. Quarrygirl posted about the change to the method of making frappuccinos in America which has recently moved over to the UK too. The guidance I have seen online suggests you make sure that you check they are making the new frappuccinos as the old ones were not vegan. They previously had a premade base with dairy in it. The light frappuccinos are not vegan and there are issues with the caramel.

"White Mocha and Carmel SAUCE are not vegan (the caramel SYRUP is vegan, just make sure to request, no caramel SAUCE on your soy, no whip, caramel frap)"

My housemate works at Starbucks and I've heard that the new pink jug for the soya milk has caused much excitement :)

Make sure you visit starbucks before the 22nd May as they are doing a half price frappuccino deal between 3-5pm each day. I will be going at some point this week.

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.