Saturday 30 August 2008

From The Mediterranean Vegan Kitchen

I've been trying out recipes from my new cookbook, Donna Klein's Mediterranean Vegan Kitchen and I'm quite impressed so far! The tomato-rice soup photographed above was gorgeous, and I'll definitely be making it again! It's a great book for pretty much everybody, from beginners to pros, it uses fairly easy to find ingredients for most of the recipes, and no fake meats etc, just traditional foods that happen to be vegan, so it's also good for any vegans who don't like omni-subs, or if you're cooking for omni guests who are a little freaked out by the whole idea of tofu! I give it a 5/5, and I'll be posting up some more pictures soon, so watch this space!
This here is a variation on the Enraged Penne, I've added a drained can of cannellini beans and some broccoli to make a balanced meal, and used extra-healthy spelt pasta. I thought this was absolutely delicious, but Jay found it a little too spicy. Spice wimp... :P
Last but not least, this isn't from MVK, it's an experimental chilli I made using tamarind and marmite instead of my usual chocolate, cocoa or molasses to add flavour, and it worked quite well indeed. :)

2 tbsp olive oil
1 onion, chopped,
2-3 cloves garlic, crushed
1 can chopped tomatoes
1 cup frozen Vegemince
4 tbsp tomato puree
1 can red kidney beans, or other beans, drained and rinsed
1 tbsp marmite
1 tbsp tamarind paste
1 tsp crushed chillis

-saute onion and garlic in olive oil until transparent

-add tin of chopped tomatoes, vegemince, tomato puree, chilli flakes, tamarind, marmite and curry powders
and bring to the boil,

- add beans, then simmer for 20 mins and serve!

Tuesday 19 August 2008

I've been eating lots of ethnic-inspired food lately...

First up is the mushroom and chickpea curry recipe from the vegan society's new recipe leaflet which I got with my copy of The Vegan magazine. It was gorgeous, yet really simple. I just tried to look for a link for a PDF for it, but seemingly it's not up yet. But seeing as how it's a leaflet they wish to be distributed as widely as possible, I'm sure they won't mind if I copy the recipe(with my commentary and variations in brackets!) on here for my readers!

1 large onion, chopped (I used 2 red onions!)
2 tbsp vegetable ghee, or oil (I used sunflower oil)
2 cloves garlic, crushed (I used 3!)
2 large tomatoes, chopped (I used half a tin of chopped tomatoes instead!)
1 tsp turmeric
1 tsp garam masala
chilli powder, or finely sliced red chilli to taste(I used chilli flakes)
1 420g tin chickpeas, drained and rinsed
500g mushrooms, sliced (I only had a 250g punnet, so that's all I used)
2-3 tbsp coriander leaves, chopped (I used 2 tsp dried coriander leaf instead)

-fry onion in oil over medium heat until soft, then add garlic and tomato
-after 2-3 mins, stir in salt, spices, then add chilli, chickpeas, shrooms, and 2 tbsp water
-simmer with lid on till shrooms are soft(about 10-15 mins)
-mix half the coriander leaves then sprinkle the rest on top before serving. If you prefer more sauce add some tomato puree with a little vegetable stock and adjust the seasoning.



Next up is the tamarind lentils from Veganomicon, served here with coconut rice inspired by Alternative Vegan. This was delicious! It's the first time I've tried cooking with tamarind, but it definitely won't be the last! I planned to eat the leftovers for tomorrow's lunch, but... there weren't any! :P
These things here are rambutan stuffed with pineapple (and they're from a tin, which I bought from Tesco's exotic foods section). I first tried (and fell in love with!) rambutan in Wah Wah's Thai Noodle Bar, when I was in Blackpool. This was the first time I've spotted them available to buy anywhere since, and these tinned ones are absolutely lovely. It's hard to describe rambutan, but do try it, it's delicious!

Saturday 16 August 2008

Cookin' with kale...


Kale seems to be an important part of the vegan diet going by other vegan food bloggers' blogs, but although I've tried it a few times and thought it was okay, I've (shockingly!) never before now cooked with it, because I've rarely seen it available to buy round this neck of the woods, and because I've been quite happy with the other leafy greens in my life, I've never felt particularly inclined to hunt it down.

But when I came across a bag of organic curly kale quite by accident( in Asda; we usually go to Morrisons or Sainsbury's these days) I had to buy it. I made a braised tofu, kale and sundried tomato stew(inspired by the braised seitan, kale, brussels and sundried tomato stew in Veganomicon) pictured here, with roast potatoes, which was quite delicious. The following night I finished the bag of kale by putting it in a tofu, kale and bell pepper balti with quinoa, (not pictured because the photos I took never turned out well, sorry!) I'll definitely be buying kale again. :)

In other (exciting?) news, I got a voucher from Amazon, which I've put towards buying 3 new vegan cookbooks - The Mediiterranean Vegan Kitchen by Donna Klein, Vegan Feasts by Rose Elliot, and Vegan Cooking; Recipes for Beginners by Eva Batt. Their estimated arrival is on Wednesday, so new dishes and reviewscoming soon, watch this space!

Sunday 10 August 2008

Yahoo! Scottish Vegans' potluck goodies...

Here is a large broccoli, sundried tomato and onion eggless tofu quiche, with a litter of baby sundried and tomato quiches! My own recipe mini quiches are one of my potluck staples, so when I made these the night before I just added more ingredients and made a big one for Jay and my dinner while I was at it.

I also made some of Terry's favourite almond cookies from Veganomicon for dessert. :)

Friday 1 August 2008

Apparently my blog is Brillante...

According to Lelly at Lelly's Vegan Kitchen who nominated it!

Ok, so the banner's up and her blog's linked, so what i have to do now is nominate 7 more blogs for the award. And the nominees are, in no particular order...

1 DJ over at Skint Vegan...

2 Jillian at Bitchin' Vegan Kitchen ...

3 Tori at Herbivious...

4 Pamela and Sarah at Punk You!

5 Peggy The Veggie at Vegan Teen Cuisine

6 Kristin at Beans And Greens

7 ...and last but not least, Nancy at Veganica!

I'd better go leave comments on their blogs to tell them! Go check the links out! :D