Something About Penguins

Leaving, actually

2008-10-25T19:10:00.003+11:00

It seems a strange time to say this, after abandoning this blog for so long and recently getting back into it. But I'm going to have to leave this blog, and we've started a new one. For reasons that I won't go into, I no longer feel safe posting on this blog. There are some people reading it who make me feel like my privacy is being violated. (Don't worry, if I don't know you in real life, then it isn't you.)

I won't post the link here, but I'll comment on the blogs of people who have commented on this blog recently, and on the blogs of anyone who comments on this blog. So if you have been reading our blog, but not commenting, and you want to keep reading (my self-esteem says there probably isn't anyone, but we can all dare to dream) I'd love it if you said hello here, and let us know that you are reading.

A return and cinnamon buns

2008-10-13T16:31:00.003+11:00

Wow, it's been ages since either of us posted. I guess we've both been busy, me with my HSC and Coppe with finishing a Bachelor's Degree and starting a Master's... Also, I haven't really felt like cooking anything lately. Stress? Probably. It's also hard to cook when you haven't got your own kitchen and your family are all carnivores.

So I apologise for neglecting this blog. Hopefully some people will still be around to read it.

I'm thinking of making it invite-only, but we'll see.

Anyway, I'm on holidays at the moment (well I was, my exams start in a few days) and I finally felt like baking something today. So I made Cinnamon buns. This sort of bread is a favourite of mine, through I don't get to eat them much. Just some nice sweet bread, with some spices, maybe some fruit, and, if I'm feeling decadent, some gooey sickly-sweet icing.

I chose a different recipe this time. One that could be made in a bread-machine (I have a tight schedule of procrastination to maintain) and was simple in terms of ingredients. I found this recipe on Recipezaar. It's not vegan, but was pretty easy to convert.

I just replaced the one egg with a few spoons of soy yogurt, and the butter with dairy-free butter.

The dough was really nice to work with, all soft, fluffy and pale. I think the bread maker really improved it compared to my last attempt... I can't beat a machine when it comes to kneading and rising. They baked in 20mins for me, but they were almost touching the top of the oven, so.

I would say this is one of the easiest, and tastiest bread recipes I have ever made. The icing is so simple, and even odd-shaped blobs with a spoon decorate the buns up nicely. They're also really tasty!

Walnut-Pecan Custart Caramel Chocolate Slice Ice Cream

2008-05-11T16:42:00.004+10:00

Yes, it is a long name.

This is basically a failed baking attempt that turned out surprisingly delicious.

One day when I was in Holland, I decided that I wanted to make a slice. I had brought over a new square silicone pan and I wanted to use it. Also, I couldn't find a recipe I wanted to use so I made it up. I made a walnut-pecan crust based on a recipe in The Joy of Vegan Baking. I then blended together silken tofu and some vanilla custard. I then made caramel sauce based on the recipe from A Vegan Ice-Cream Paradise. I put the caramel sauce over the crust. Then I poured in the custard. I refrigerated this overnight. Unfortunately it had not set.

Figuring that I may as well continue regardless, I tried to spread out some melted fair-trade chocolate over the top. This didn't really work. The chocolate sunk into the custard and made swirly patterns.

We then tried to eat some but it didn't really work, because the custard had not set at all (funny, that).

So I had a flash of brilliance and froze it! It took hours of frequent whisking, but the end result was so good.

Seriously. This stuff was delicious. It had chunks of walnut-pecan crust and chocolate, and the caramel sort of mixed with the custard. It was smooth, gooey and so so tasty.

Like most homemade ice-cream, it got a little hard in the freezer but that's unavoidable. We just had to leave it to sit for a while.

I'd say this was best on the night it became ice-cream, as it hadn't been able to freeze solid yet.

Focacce and Mint-Onion Pita Bread

2008-05-10T23:58:00.005+10:00

One of my favourite things to do is make bread. Kneading dough is lots of fun and bread that rises properly makes me feel all competent. It's easy to steal the credit off yeast.

Anyways, Adele brought over V'Con and I've been meaning to give the rosemary focaccia recipe a try, so I made a focacce.

It came out really well. The recipe does need an infusion of flavour to really come out well, so I used every Italian herb I could get my hands on, some olives and sundried tomatoes.

I used plain bread flour, which makes it really light and airy.

Another recipe I've been working with recently is a mint-onion pita bread recipe. It's pretty simple. Stir together some mint leaves, coriander, cumin, oil and chopped onion. You can use any pita bread recipe you want. Just divide the dough into balls, roll them out and spread the mint mixture over it.

We're Still Alive!

2008-05-08T04:56:00.003+10:00

We haven't posted in ages, we're sorry! Adele spent most of April in Holland and we sort of lost track of the fact that we aren't the only people in the world.

We did make tons of stuff, though. Adele made the most delicious pecan walnut slice ice cream and I mastered focaccia. So yeah, that and more is coming up!

A new book, cupcakes and cup-a-cakes

2008-03-31T18:51:00.004+11:00

A couple of days ago I found a giant package on the table in the kitchen. It was wrapped in bubble wrap, and looked pretty worse for wear. Intrigued, I looked closer. It was for me!

Luckily it survived the shipping, because the box was pretty dented. It's pretty cool: The Professional Pastry Chef by Bo Friberg. It's massively huge and heavy.

Coppe is such a good boyfriend.

Then today I found another package on the table in the kitchen. Yet again, for me! I opened it and found a set of cup-a-cakes! I couldn't help but giggle. They are so useless and yet so wonderful.

So obviously I had to use them, because they're so cute. I made a coffee spice cake from the book, the one cake recipe that happened to be vegan. I replaced most of the cup of oil with apple puree, and the raisins with chocolate chips. They're sort of healthy...

I think they turned out pretty well. Not sure I cooked them long enough... I was guessing because the recipe was for a full cake. But the one I tried tasted nice. I made a mocha ganache for the top - a bit too sweet for my liking, I added too much icing sugar. So I sprinkled some cinnamon over some, to offset the sweetness. It's only a little bit anyway, and the cakes themselves don't have much sugar.

5 Facts

2008-03-25T00:54:00.005+11:00

Amid all the Easter baking (I have something new in the oven again right now), we got tagged for a meme by Vegan Dad (mostly, I suspect, because he was afraid of tagging Isa!). Still, woo! Our first meme.

Anyway, the idea is to share 5 new things about yourself. Here I go.

1. I am a linguistics geek. Syntax is hot. I study it and I'm involved in proper linguistic research (I was asked for this last year, which is very cool, because I don't even have a Bachelor's degree yet). So yes, I do 'speriments. WITH KIDS.

2. I love politics and I am an active member of the Young Greens. I'm the chairman of the Utrecht group. We do a lot of fun stuff. We're planning something involving penguin suits and green paint at the moment.

3. I draw flowers and penguins during classes. Here's a drawing of a penguin chasing a butterfly:

4. I have a British accent. I went to a bilingual high school, where half my classes were in English, and I've gone on to study English. Because of this and because of talking to Adele frequently, all traces of Dutchness have been completely eroded away. It's kinda weird.

5. I wear apple stickers on my hands. I don't know why, I've done it for years. I think it's pretty.

I'm going to tag (in alphabetical order): Bonnie, Chelsea and Josh, Mihl, Cristy and Paul (and Lily) and Romina.

Easter III: A White Easter

2008-03-24T19:52:00.006+11:00

I was making pear pancakes yesterday when it started snowing outside. It's been cold and semi-snowing for a couple of days now, but, this time, they were big flecks of snow that would stay on the ground. I took a couple of very dark arty photos of the snow falling and I went out this morning to take some in the light. This is one of the dark shots. I think it's pretty.

This is a shot of my street. I love the way the cosy, mismatched, old Dutch houses of my town fit so snugly into a snowy cityscape.

And a picture of the garden.

Last but not least, the pancakes!

Caramel Vanilla Cheesecake

2008-03-24T15:11:00.004+11:00

It was my birthday a few days ago, so I made my traditional cheesecake. I'm supposed to be writing an essay, so I'll be brief. It was delicious.

I used the chocolate cheesecake recipe from The Joy of Vegan Baking, or at least tried to. I didn't buy enough cream cheese, so I sort of made it up myself. Just threw together a packet of organic silken tofu, two tubs of vegan cream cheese (I used one Tofutti and one Soy King), sugar, almond extract and vanilla bean paste.

The crust was a chocolate shortcrust. I then covered it with this absolutely sinfully delicious caramel sauce from A Vegan Ice Cream Paradise.

The vanilla taste could have come through more, I think. The flecks of vanilla bean looked nice, but they weren't all that strong. Just a nice subtle note. The caramel sauce went with it really well.

I just ate the last piece and I wish I had more. :(

Easter II: Truffles

2008-03-23T22:56:00.007+11:00

I've been meaning to make truffles ever since I found this recipe and since they somewhat resemble chocolate eggs, I did.

Also, these baked goods were for taking over to my parents' to celebrate Easter and my little brother is incredibly fond of chocolate.

It's a very simple recipe. Melt some chocolate (1 lb. or 450 g for 50 truffles) and blend 3/4 cup of cashews with 3/4 cup of cold water to make a cashew cream. Fold the cashew cream into the melted chocolate and refrigerate for 2 hours.

Make little balls out of the mixture and roll them in powdered sugar, cocoa powder, coconut or chopped hazelnuts. Store in the fridge. I halved the recipe and this is how they turned out:

Here's a close-up. They're very rich and chocolatey. My favourites were the coconut ones, because they soften the richness of it a little bit.

Easter I: Mini Apple Pies

2008-03-23T02:42:00.007+11:00

It's Easter! This weekend we remember that, 2000 years ago, Jesus turned eggs into chocolate to feed the people at Cana, but then hid them in all in the backyard (sneaky bastard). So yeah, I made mini apple pies!

I adapted a recipe off a Dutch apple pie blog for the dough, adding cinnamon and chopped hazelnuts. For the filling, I mixed apple, pear and raisins with cinnamon, nutmeg and cardamom. The dough especially turned out really well. It is the best apple pie dough I've ever had.

Mini Apple Pies (makes 3):

Dough
150 g whole wheat flour
100 g non-dairy butter
80 g dark brown sugar
1 tsp baking powder
a dash of salt
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 cup chopped hazelnuts

Filling
1 apple
1 pear
1 tsp lemon juice
2 tbsp dark brown sugar
2 tbsp raisins
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp cardamom

Pre-heat the oven to 175 C and grease your mini pie tins. For the dough, sift together flour, spices, baking powder and sugar. Cut in butter. Knead it into a crumbly dough with your fingers. Refrigerate.

For the filling, core, quarter and slice the apple and pear. Make the slices fairly thin. Mix with lemon juice. Add sugar, raisins and spices. Stir.

Reserve 2/5ths of the dough. Use the rest to line the tins. Spoon in the filling. Use the remainder of the dough to make swanky lattices for the tops (I didn't do this, because I made my crusts pretty thick, but it's pretty easy).

Bake for 20 minutes.

I'll leave you with a close-up of one of the apple pies. I'm really proud of them. They look so cute and they're soooo tasty!

This will be the first in a short series of posts on Easter food. One will be a review of a new product I found in the supermarket today and the other more tasty stuff. Happy Easter!

Ginger Walnut Coconut Carrot Birthday Cake

2008-03-16T22:20:00.006+11:00

I had my birthday last week and, with a friend of mine, I made a cake that I think was quite awesome. It's the carrot cake from Vegan with a Vengeance.

The recipe is online here.

I used walnuts instead of macademias and made an icing out of coconut milk, coconut and icing sugar. We spread the icing on the top and bottom layer and then sprinkled some coconut over the cake.

It was really tasty and I would definitely recommend it as a birthday cake. It's easy to cut and work with. Also, ginger! It tastes like laundry detergent on its own, but like condensed goodness in this cake.

I got some good presents, including this awesome Green & Black's chocolate egg.

In the end, I only really had one slice of my own cake (friends and family devoured the rest pretty quickly), but it was gooood.

The Story of the Vegan Streaker

2008-03-12T18:08:00.002+11:00

This is a snippet of crazy Dutch news that I thought would be interesting. A couple of weeks ago, a vegan activist in a thong streaked through a popular TV show. The presenter, a gay comedian who often makes a show of flirting with younger men for comic effect, told him to stay put and then proceeded to take him on his lap and try to tear off his thong. It was quite funny, I have to admit.

Here's the clip. He basically runs in shouting "Meat is Murder! Stop Animal Suffering!" Paul de Leeuw, the comedian, tells him to stay put while he finishes his phone call and then the thong-tearing occurs (somewhere around 2:00, in the last 30 seconds).

The streaker actually filed a complaint about harassment as a result, basically leading him to be completely torn up by the media. It's a sad story, in a way, because he means well and he's just giving mainstream society a convenient angle from which to dismiss his beliefs.

So yeah, for those of you tempted by the idea of a black thong and some hastily scribbled slogans, resist the urge. For the animals.

Muesli Bars

2008-03-08T09:58:00.005+11:00

Long time no post. I haven't made anything worth posting for ages. Cooking just seems like too much effort at the moment. I did, however, make these muesli bars last week. (It's only taken me a week to post them!)

They're tasty, but not entirely healthy. I'd try to find a way replace some of the sugar next time. I prefer my muesli without a layer of sticky sweetness.

To Americans, these would be granola bars, I think.

I can't remember where I got the recipe from, so if I've inadvertently stolen your recipe, please say so and I'll credit you.

Recipe:
2 cups oats
1/4 cup sunflower seeds
1/4 cup pepitas
1 cup almonds (I used flakes, because I had them)
1/2 ground flax
1/4 cup brown sugar (or less)
1/2 cup golden syrup and/or treacle
1 tsp butter
1 tsp vanilla
180g dried fruit, chopped (I used cranberries, sultanas and dates)

Line a 22cm baking tin. Preheat oven to 180C. Toast seeds, almonds and oats for 15mins in oven.

Combine syrup, sugar, butter and vanilla in a saucepan and cook until sugar is dissolved.

Mix oats and seeds into sugar, add dried fruit and flax.

Lower oven to 180C. Press mixture into tin and bake for 25mins. Allow to cool completely, then cut into bars.

Roasted Pumpkin & Bulgur Croquettes

2008-03-03T02:47:00.005+11:00

I watch McDonald's Kitchen semi-frequently, a Dutch vegetarian cooking show. The chef, who has the cutest English accent, was doing a Lebanese themed episode the other day and this was one of the recipes on it.

I have no idea what the dish is called, but "croquettes" sounds fancy enough to me. They are essentially croquettes of roasted pumpkin, bulgur and onion. If you want to go for something a bit more authentic, I suggest Lebanese Pumpkin Things. My personal preference, however, has to be Rockin' Pumpkiny Things.

On the show, these were just deep fried briefly, but I didn't want to do that so I baked them and they came out fine. The roasted pumpkin is sweet and savoury, while the bulgur adds a nice nutty flavour.

Roasted Pumpkin & Bulgur Croquettes (makes about 8):

250 g pumpkin, peeled and cubed
salt and pepper
dash of oil
2 onions, chopped
1/2 cup bulgur, cooked
1/2 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp cinnamon

Pre-heat oven to 180. Combine the pumpkin with the oil and salt and pepper in a baking dish and roast the pumpkin for about 25 minutes.

In the meantime, sauté some onions in a pan.

Allow the pumpkin to cool a bit, then blend until smooth. Stir in ginger and cinnamon. Mix in the onions and bulgur.

Shape into croquettes with your fingers. Put them on a baking tray and bake for 15 minutes.

I suggest serving it with a nice hummus and some pita bread.

Survey 2!

2008-02-21T20:26:00.004+11:00

Liz rocks and so do her surveys, so when she posted a new one, we had to jump on the bandwagon and fill it in.

1. If you have to choose between locally grown or organic, which do you usually choose?
A: I don't really have a choice, I pick up whatever I can. Australia is very poor in organic, and "Australian made" could mean two time zones away.

C: Depends. I go for organic if it has been produced in Europe (this is mostly France, Spain or Italy). Otherwise, I go for local.

2. Favourite way to prepare potatoes:
A: Oven-baked potatoes with mixed herbs.

C: Oven-baked potatoes with cumin and rosemary.

3. Do you press your tofu before preparing/cooking it (if you eat soy)?
A: Generally not. I mostly use the pre-marinated stuff or use it blended.

C: Yep, usually. It just has a better texture. Also, I like the confused reaction on people's faces when they go "what are you doing?" and you get to respond "what do you think I'm doing? I'm pressing tofu." Most of the people around me can barely identify tofu and it's fun weirding them out.

4. Name your favorite recipe that is a tradition in your family:
A: We don't really have traditional recipes... My mum cooks, but rarely anything that takes time or effort. She doesn't bake. My Grandmother makes Christmas pudding (a recipe from her mother), but it doesn't really work vegan, so we'll have to come up with our own.

C: My family can't really cook as such, but my grandmother has a rocking pannekoeken (pan-size Dutch pancakes) recipe that comes close to being a tradition.

5. Any food allergies?
A: Alcohol and onion give me a mild headache, but nothing serious.

C: Nope.

6. When you want to go to a fancy dinner, where do you go?
A: Dunno... I'm not used to the whole fancy restaurant lark. I tend to panic if the mains cost more than $12. I guess Mamma Mia's in Vianen is nice. So's the Green Gourmet in Newtown, but much less swanky.

C: I think De Kas in Amsterdam or Kop van 't Land in Dordrecht. I haven't been to either yet, but they look fancy and are supposed to be really good.

7. When you have a cold, what do you crave?
A: Food. And sleep. Also television.

C: I actually have a pretty bad throat ache right now and a bit of a cold. I currently crave lots of fresh fruit. Also, bed and being unconscious in some way.

8. What kind of water do you drink? (Filtered, spring, tap, etc.)
A: Tap. Australian water tastes nice. Buying water wrapped in environment-destroying plastic, at exorbitant prices, does not seem like a good idea to me. Children's teeth especially are getting worse for the first time in decades, due to drinking bottled water. You need fluoride!

C: Tap. I'm addicted to tap water and drink a couple of half-liter bottles of the stuff a day. Dutch tap water is the cleanest in Europe.

9. Name a flavor of soda you'd love to see:
A: I don't particularly like soft drink myself. I don't drink it, so making a flavour for me would not be business savvy for the companies.

C: I don't drink soda, but I would love to see munchkin-tofu flavoured soda. I imagine it would be sweet, but somewhat bitter.

10. If the recipes you ate as a child were compiled into a cookbook, what would the title be?
A: Various Dead Animals on Rice: Sometimes Pasta with Tomato Sauce.

C: Vegetables Smothered in a Sauce of Some Description.

11. If you were allowed to grow one food that can't grow in your climate, what would it be?
A: I think adding another failed crop to my household's rather enviable list of failed crops would be cruelty to plants.

C: Bananas. I don't buy bananas, because they're grown so far away. I miss them a lot. Same goes for oranges. I did actually use a banana (for the first time in months) to make pancakes a couple of days ago, but I shouldn't have and I felt all guilty.

12. Favorite type of mushroom?
A: Swiss Brown. They're so cute when you cut them in half! I imagine they're the sort of mushrooms that gnomes and pixies would sit under.

C: Porcini, purely because it's called "squirrel bread" in Dutch.

13. Most frustrating part of your kitchen?
A: The lack of bench space and all the mess. People leave their rubbish everywhere. Neither my brother nor my father have mastered the art of putting stuff in dishwashers. Mum has too many gadgets that she OMGMUSTHAVEONTHEBENCH. Plus, the trolley we have for extra bench space is covered with notes, building samples, toys and other assorted detritus.

C: I have no freezer and no oven. I have to go visit my parents to do baking.

14. Last food you burned?
A: I can't really remember... Ooh, fruit bread. I put it in the oven and started reading blogs...bad idea. It was like a lump of coal. Still tasty if you cut an inch off the crust, though.

C: Toast, I think, but it was a while ago. I forget about my food failures quickly, though, fortunately.

15. Usual response to a veg*n's favorite question, "But where do you get your protein?":
A: I don't actually get this question a lot, thankfully. Most people I know seem to have realised that beans are protein, at least.

C: I do get this question sometimes. I would love to be able to say "Grass!," which is by far my favourite answer, but I'm usually too cowardly to say that and patiently explain that, actually, a variety of dishes can serve as a complete, reliable source of protein.

16. If you were baking your own birthday cake today, what flavor would it be?
A: I will in fact be making my birthday cake soon. Cheesecake! Probably lemon.

C: A coconut carrot cake, I think. I will also be making my birthday cake soon.

17. Favourite brand of chocolate chips?
A: Woolworths homebrand cooking chocolate. I haven't found vegan chocolate chips yet...

C: You can't really get chocolate chips in Holland, for some reason. My favourite brand to chop into chips is Green & Black's Dark Chocolate.

18. You have $200 of your tax return reserved for Williams Sonoma - What do you buy?
A: I regrettably would not be able to buy anything. They don't ship outside the states. Damn America-centrism. In an ideal world where Williams Sonoma stopped ignoring the rest of the world and shipped outside of America, I'd replace my whole kitchen.

C: I would probably let Adele decide, since she's Williams Sonoma-obsessed. I think she'd get much more of a rush out of it than I would.

19. Do you plan your menus in advance? Any tips to share?
A: Very rarely. I might have an idea of what I'll make, but we buy enough food that I don't need to limit myself like that (advantage of living in a family of 4, all with different food preferences). Often it will also depend on how lazy I'm feeling. One tip I'd give is: freeze leftovers in ziplock bags. It's so easy to just heat up one portion when you're tired and don't want to cook.

C: Most of the time, because I get a random bag of organic vegetables from a local organic shop every week. By buying it like that, it stays affordable, but it also means I always pretty much know what I'll be making for most of the week.

20. You have 3 minutes before you have to leave the house and you're starving- What do you eat?
A: I would also grab fruit. Maybe a banana.

C: I'd grab whatever I have in terms of fresh fruit. Probably, that would be an apple or two or a pear.

21. If Martha Stewart, Paula Deen, and Rachel Ray got into a fight, who would win and how?
A: I have never seen any of these people (only heard of them) so I honestly couldn't say.

C: I don't know the other two, but Martha Stewart has done time, so she would knock both out with her prison knuckle dusters, spelling "LOVE" and "2COOK."

22. If you eat oatmeal, what do you add to it before serving?
A: Linseed, mostly. A bit of black treacle if I'm feeling extravagant.

C: A bit of brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and raisins.

23. If you got to travel to one country and learn all the traditional dishes there, where would you go (ignore commitments in your current place of residence)?
A: India.

C: India.

24. Favourite late night snack?
A: Hmm... that's a tricky one. I'd have to say ice cream.

C: Soy ice cream and fresh fruit.

25. Favourite springtime food?
A: Pancakes, because that's when Coppe's here.

C: Spring is usually still quite cold here. Roasted vegetables.

26. Favorite food-related magazine?
A: I don't read any... most are too meaty.

C: I don't really read any either. Too expensive to get one regularly.

27. Which do you prefer: shoyu, tamari, conventional soy sauce, or Bragg's Aminos?
A: Japanese soy sauce. It's lower in salt that other versions.

C: I haven't had the good fortune of trying anything other than conventional soy sauce.

28. What vegetable or fruit do you dislike the most?
A: Celery. That stuff is truly foul. Seriously.

C: I like all vegetables and all fruits (even celery)!

29. Name a holiday food you look forward to all year long:
A: Pepernoten!

C: Christmas pudding. We make it together every year when Adele is over for Christmas.

30. If you could convert anyone to veganism with your magic wand, who would you convert?
A: Richard Dawkins. Then he'd be perfect.

C: Noam Chomsky, then he'd be perfect.

Triple Chocolate Chip Biscuits

2008-02-21T19:34:00.006+11:00

I've found vegan white chocolate! It's an organic rice milk white chocolate made by BonVita. They also make plain rice milk chocolate. White chocolate has always been my favourite, though. Having discovered all these chocolates, I decide to put them to good use and make triple chocolate biscuits. For the dark chocolate, I got some of my favourite stuff, 70% Green & Black's.

To turn them into chocolate chips, I chopped them all up. Here's a shot of my mound of chocolate.

I adapted a recipe Adele looked up for me for the biscuits. I simply replaced the egg with 1/4 cup of soy yoghurt and 1/4 cup of soy milk. I also turned the 1 1/4 cup of sugar listed into a 1/4 cup. The biscuits were very nice and plenty sweet, so I don't think you need it at all.

I used all whole wheat flour. This was tasty, but I think I could make the biscuits prettier with plain flour. So I'd like to try that next time.

Triple Chocolate Chip Biscuits (makes 9 large ones or about double for small ones):

1/2 cup and 1 tbsp (125 g) of plant-based butter
1 1/4 cup of all-purpose flour
1/4 cup of brown sugar
1/4 cup of soy yoghurt, preferably vanilla-flavoured
1/4 cup of soy milk
1 tsp of vanilla essence
1 tsp of baking powder
1/2 cup chopped white chocolate
1/2 cup chopped milk chocolate
1/2 cup chopped dark chocolate

Pre-heat your oven to 180 C. Beat together butter, sugar, soy yoghurt, soy milk and vanilla essence. Sift together flour and baking powder. Add to the butter and sugar mixture and fold in chocolate.

Drop on a baking sheet in tablespoons or teaspoons, depending on how big you want them. Leave a generous amount of space between the spoonfuls.

Bake for 10-15 mins. Allow to cool until the chocolate has become solid again.

Caramelised Witlof and Walnut Salad

2008-02-21T19:20:00.006+11:00

Witlof is one of the trademark vegetables of traditional Dutch cooking. This is what it looks like:

It is also known as chicory. It is usually used in casseroles, but my favourite way of preparing it is caramelising it and serving it with some walnuts. Walnuts and witlof really go well together. It seems to be one of those natural combinations.

Caramelised Witlof and Walnut Salad (serves 1):

1/4 cup powdered sugar
2 tbsp plant-based butter
3 heads of witlof
1/2 cup of walnut
some lettuce leaves
1 tbsp fresh parsley
salt and pepper, to taste

Take off the base of the witlof and cut out the hard core. Sauté the leaves in the butter and sugar for 8-10 minutes or until caramelised. Stir in some parsley and add salt and pepper to taste.

Serve with walnuts and lettuce leaves. I used iceberg lettuce, but use whatever takes your fancy.

Pannekoeken and a Puppy

2008-02-19T19:36:00.005+11:00

I made pannekoeken yesterday. I'm sure I've talked about them before. They're Dutch pancakes, and they're basically thick crêpes.

The batter is really easy. Blend some soy milk and a banana together and mix with flour until it has the consistency of tomato soup. Ladle into a pan. Tilt the pan so it spreads all over. Fry for a couple of minutes, flip once dry on top and fry for just a bit more.

Dust with powdered sugar and eat!

Also, here's a puppy. They're running around my parents' house at the moment.

Appalling Dinners

2008-02-17T21:44:00.003+11:00

My parents are currently renovating the bathroom, so we've had builders in and out of the house for weeks. And one of the builders for some reason turned off the storage freezer (I don't know why we have two... my parents buy too much food). This basically means that tons of food melted and needed to be eaten. My parents have been cooking meat with disgusting gusto...

...and I've been eating frozen leftovers and package vegetables. Tonight I had leftover Thai takeaway tofu, leftover pasta and frozen peas and corn. It was surprisingly edible, but quite appalling.

So yeah, that's why I've not posted.

In other news, PM Rudd apologised to the Stolen Generations of Australia. Well overdue, and a fantastic gesture from an incoming government. If you aren't familiar with Australian history, then you should know that successive governments committed a genocide against Aborigines from the late 1800s to the early 1970s. It's an appalling piece of history and the effects are reverberating in Aboriginal communities today. John Howard, in his 11 years in office, did all he could to avoid that simple word - sorry. But now it has been said, and hopefully we can all move forward, and close the gap between indigenous Australians and the rest of us.

Kohlrabi Adventures

2008-02-13T20:20:00.007+11:00

Yesterday, I came to face to face with a kohlrabi. I had no idea what to do it, having never cooked with it or eaten it before.

It looks weird too.

See?

I started looking for kohlrabi recipes. There aren't really many. I did find a warning on Fatfree Vegan Kitchen to cut it deep when peeling (the fibrous skin isn't nice). Also, apparently, they're very nice raw.

So, I went back to my kohlrabi, eyeing it suspiciously, peeled off a bit of skin with a knife and cut off a small chunk. After studying this small piece of greenish white vegetable for a bit more, I popped it in my mouth.

So.

It is tasty. Surprisingly, it's really tasty. It's like raw cauliflower apple. I decided then my dinner was going to be a salad.

This is my first attempt at a kohlrabi salad.

Kohlrabi Salad (serves 1):

1 small kohlrabi, peeled well and cut in small chunks
1/4 of an apple, cubed
1/2 a carrot, quartered and cut in small slices
1/2 a parsnip, cubed
1/2 a red onion, finely chopped

For the dressing, I added a little dash of Tofunaise with salt and pepper. Not much, though.

It was tasty, but I'm still thinking about what I could do to take it to the next level. In the meantime, at least now you know what to do with kohlrabi.

Cherry Clafoutis

2008-02-11T16:44:00.001+11:00

Sorry for not posting for ages. About half a day after my last post, I came down with a bad case of gastroenteritis. So, after being curled up on my bed in pain for a few days, I had to go back to school. Which wasn't actually too bad, just not the best way to get over a stomach bug. I didn't feel like eating (I don't think I ate for four days) and even looking at food blogs made me feel sick.

But I'm better now, and school is actually enjoyable again. I've made the giant peanut butter cookies from V'con, which were predictably delicious. Unfortunately I took them to school and they were eaten before I could take a photo. Another win for vegan junk food.

Yesterday, I was getting bored of writing study notes, and mum suggested that we go to my aunt's for dinner. Naturally, as I am a shamelessly self-promoting vegan, I offered to make dessert. On a whim, I decided to make clafoutis. I've never made it before, nor eaten it.... so this was a stab in the dark.

Luckily, a tasty one. (all the good looking ones got eaten, so I apologise for the slightly wild looking cake)

I used the pound cake recipe from V'con, then spooned it into tartlette cases, then poked some canned sour cherries into the top. Next time I'd halve the cake recipe and replace half the flour with ground almonds, to take them up to the next level.

I overfilled the cases slightly, so I'd warn anyone trying this: this batter rises. Seriously. It rises lots.

They were still delicious. They were so light and delicate, with the cherries adding a tart/sweet burst of juiciness. Both my mother and aunt lavished them with praises. They taste best warmed up a little in the microwave.

You've all probably got Veganomicon by now, so I won't type up the recipe. It just goes to show how versatile the recipes are, though.

Vegetable Love: Cauliflower Couscous with Basil Leaves and Avocado

2008-02-11T01:57:00.001+11:00

SusanV, off the famous Fatfree Vegan Kitchen, is hosting a Valentine's Day Vegetable Dish Contest. The idea is to make a healthy, low-fat dish, because, well, ultimately it is much more romantic to eat good food, feel good and to live long together. Also, vegetables = sexy.

Valentine's Day is one of the more frustrating things in a long-distance relationship. It doesn't feel as intimate or satisfying when you can't see the smile on the other's face.* So, this is partly also an attempt to make that feel more immediate. Had you been here, this is one of the things I would have made you.

It is a salad of cauliflower couscous with herbs, avocado and a simple dressing. It is light and healthful. The raw cauliflower is almost creamy, especially with the small chunks of avocado, and I think it complements the fragrant basil and parsley leaves really well. Anyway, here's the recipe. Oh and sorry about the imprecise measurements, I tend to make my dressings in splashes and dashes.

Cauliflower Couscous (serves 1):

1/4 head of cauliflower, in florets
3 tbsp basil leaves, chopped
3 tbsp parsley leaves, chopped
1/3 cup watercress, chopped (pick off the leaves and discard the base of the stems)
1/3 cup of avocado, cut in small chunks

a splash of sunflower oil
a dash of vinegar
a dash of salt
a dash of pepper
a dash of coriander
a dash of thyme

Blend the cauliflower, until almost fine-grained. Mix in the basil, parsley, watercress and avocado. In a small bowl, combine the vinegar and spices. Add the oil and stir. Before serving, drizzle the vinegar over the couscous and toss for 1 minute. Garnish with basil leaves.

*I know, webcams. Poetic licence, people!

Muesli Muffins

2008-02-10T03:27:00.000+11:00

I've been wanting to make muesli muffins recently, so I was hunting around for a good recipe. After a bit of fiddling, I've settled on the one below, my adaptation of a muesli bread off Baking Bites.

I used my own home-made muesli: an organic seven grain, nut and seed-filled mix with a few raisins added in. (*looks smug* My muesli has more grains than your muesli.)

I subbed applesauce for the egg, used whole wheat flour and took out the sugar. I know, I know, that makes it sound way too healthy to be nice, but the raisins keep it sweet and they're actually really tasty.

I'm planning to try them with whole wheat spelt flour and some dried apple and apricot.

Muesli Muffins (makes 6 large muffins):

1 cup muesli
2 cups whole wheat flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/3 cup applesauce (I used lightly sweetened cinnamon applesauce, you could use unsweetened instead and add 1 tsp of cinnamon and a bit of sugar)
1 1/2 cup soy milk
2 tbsp vegetable oil
1/2 cup raisins

Pre-heat the oven to 180 C. Combine the muesli, flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir together the applesauce, soy milk and oil. Add the flour mixture and be careful not to overmix. Fold in the raisins. Spoon a couple of tablespoons of mixture into each muffin cup and bake for 25 minutes.

Petits Pains à l'Ail et au Persil

2008-02-10T03:14:00.000+11:00

Fanny, off foodbeam, put up these beautiful little garlic breads a while ago. Then, someone off some vegan blog made them as well and I realised I had to make these. I've forgotten what blog that was, but thank you, mystery vegan blog person!

These suit me perfectly. They involve bread and kneading dough, herbed butter and, most important of all, a long and pretentiously swanky French name.

Essentially, you make a fairly simple bread dough and put in layers of parsley-y garlicky butter.

The only real change I made was using whole wheat flour. They'd be a bit lighter with plain, but I don't think it makes much of a difference.

They're exceptionally easy to veganise, very tasty and the recipe is versatile too. You could easily imagine these with a light pesto or even a vegetable filling.

Eating with the Rabbits

2008-02-07T07:20:00.000+11:00

I discovered this blog today. It's another member of the Dutch Vegan Family (although the only other Dutch vegan blog I really know is vegalicious).

So yeah, go check it out. It will be appearing in our bookmarks section when I update it.

Also, tell me about any other Dutch vegan blog (or any worthwhile v*gan one, really) you know. Remember, we invented clogs, the precursor of the modern vegan shoe!

Mediterranean Olive Bread

2008-02-06T03:58:00.000+11:00

This is our favourite recipe from The Joy of Vegan Baking, hands down. We made it three to four times when Adele was here.

It's a quickbread with sundried tomatoes and olives. We also added some flax seeds (though the recipe already has some ground flax seed in it) and we turned them into muffins!

They are really flavourful and will grace any Italian meal. They've become one of our staple savoury treats.

Photo

2008-01-29T08:56:00.000+11:00

When Adele was here, we did our best to take a good photo of us to grace the blog.

Here it is:

It'll be up in the side bar soon.

Also, because Adele has been feeling sad, here's a penguin in a bed:

Mini Cinnamon Donuts

2008-01-29T05:09:00.001+11:00

Well, I'm back in Australia. I arrived Monday morning, tired, hungry and homesick. My parents' house is currently a building site, as they are renovating the bathroom (we've all had to use one small ensuite bathroom for years, because the other shower was rotting the house). It's not a nice place to come back to.

I miss Coppe and my family in Holland a lot. I miss the country, our house, and the food. I'm going back in April, but at this stage it feels unbelievably far away. Hopefully it will get better once I go back to school.

It is so hot here. I felt like I was in an oven the moment I got off the plane. And it wasn't even a particularly hot day. It is 5am in the morning now - I haven't been able to sleep for a few hours, thanks to jet-lag - and it is still 23C. With the window open. Also, very humid. It will be a while before I reacclimatise to this weather.

This is something I made a few weeks ago, out of a sudden desire to eat myself into obesity (maybe?). But they are so tasty. And not all that unhealthy compared to commercial versions. Naturally I made them in my tiny cupcake pan. So... cinnamon donuts!

I used the Jelly Donut Cupcakes recipe from Vegonomicon, but left off the jam. I then brushed them with melted butter and rolled them in cinnamon sugar. Healthy! They smell like heaven freshly made. Coppe's brother (a committed omnivore) liked them, and they were all eaten pretty quickly, so I consider this a win for vegan junk food.

Mini Cinnamon Donuts (adapted from Vegonomicon):

1 cup soy milk
1 tsp vinegar
2 tbsp cornstarch
1 1/2 cups plain flour
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/3 cup unflavoured oil (I used sunflower)
1/4 cup sugar (I decreased significantly)
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbsp non-dairy butter, melted
~1 cup cinnamon sugar

Preheat oven to 180C. Mix soy milk, vinegar and cornstarch into a small bowl and set aside. Grease three mini 6-cup muffin pans.

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and nutmeg. In a small bowl, mix together cornstarch mixture, oil, sugar and vanilla. Add to flour, and stir until just combined.

Fill the mini muffin pans to the top, or slightly below (tiny things don't seem to collapse, thankfully). Bake for 10mins, checking after about 7mins just in case. They may need to go longer.

Melt butter in a shallow bowl. Add the cinnamon sugar to another shallow bowl. With a pastry brush, brush butter onto a donut, then roll it in the sugar. Repeat.

Ciabatta Bread with Sundried Tomatoes and Black Olives

2008-01-28T18:49:00.000+11:00

Adele left on Saturday night and in my restlessness I've turned to working through the things we haven't blogged about yet.

I'm pretty nervous about everything I have coming up now (Adele being here stopped me from worrying). I do two studies and it's a lot of work. Next term I'll have six courses. A lot of it will be fun, but it's also going to be challenging.

This is a ciabatta bread with sundried tomatoes and black olives. I made it for us and to serve my friends at a dinner party.

It's from a book called Bread by Christine Ingram and Jennie Shapter. We added sundried tomatoes and some chopped black olives. Sundried tomatoes in oil are best, because otherwise the salt will affect the taste of the bread.

It was very nice and also great for turning into garlic bread (Pre-heat oven to 200 C. Blend together 1/4-1/2 cup of olive oil and 2 cloves of garlic, spread the garlic paste over slices of the bread and bake for 10-20 minutes).

Mini Chocolate Cupcakes

2008-01-23T01:19:00.000+11:00

Well, my stay in Holland is nearly over. It has gone really quickly. I feel like we've hardly had any time together, with so much work to do and Coppe away so often. But I have enjoyed myself immensely.

In a couple of days, I'll be back home in Australia desperately trying to finish all the homework I accidentally left behind before I go back to school. It's the big one, this year. Year 12. I've already technically started; it began in fourth term of last year. But I actually feel like a year 12 student now that I've really got into my major projects. It's quite exciting, but also very difficult. I probably won't have much time for baking this year (though I'm going to try).

We made these on New Year's Eve. They are the chocolate cake from The Joy of Vegan Baking, but tiny. I topped them with Amaretto syrup icing, which unfortunately separated... still tasted delicious, though.

They were tasty and adorable but a bit... bland. I'm noticing a trend in the recipes in that book - they're nice and they work reliably, they just don't offer much in the way of big tastes. I would definitely increase the amount of cocoa powder considerably next time. Also, I think they really need the icing. A ganache would also work, if it was flavoured with a little alcohol or essence.

I still prefer the Post Punk Kitchen's chocolate cake, even if the amounts do need to be altered.

A Vegan Guide to London

2008-01-23T01:17:00.000+11:00

Sorry!

We haven't posted in a while. We've been pretty caught up in each other.

We've done plenty of baking and blogworthy things, but I'm going to start off with the tale of our adventures in a foul and mystical land called England (just kidding, England is sunny and wonderful, really).

Yeah, so anyway, we went to London. London rocks. Especially for those of you who feel veganfriendliness-deprived.

So this is a short overview of the places to see.

1) 222 Veggie Vegan. Great little vegan restaurant in South Kensington. Get the tube to West Brompton and you're pretty much there. Try their organic cereal coffee and the baked plantain.

2) Camden Town. Go to Camden Town, especially to Camden Lock. It is a sprawling market that seems to spill over into every nook and cranny. There are arts and crafts stalls, corset stalls, vegan shoe stalls and all sorts of little food places, including the very veganfriendly Ha Ha Veggie Bar.

Go to Braintree, a hemp clothes shop (I got myself a shiny new hemp bag there), and don't miss the inSpiral lounge, veganfriendly organic café (with free internet) by day and alternative electronica lounge by night.

We ate at Gilgamesh, a really over the top Mesopotamian-themed restaurant. It's reasonably veganfriendly for an omni place and they have the swankiest bathrooms I've ever seen.

3) Beatroot. A vegetarian takeaway place in Soho. It's right off the Berwick Street Markets, a fruit and veg market, and has tons of vegan options. Their carrot cake was really good.

4) Fresh and Wild. We went to one in Camden Town, but there's also one in Soho. They are reasonably big organic shops, with lots of products for vegans.

Places we didn't get to go to but came highly recommended were Manna, in Primrose Hill, and Café Spice, near the Tower of London.

Gingerbread Scone Cupcakes

2008-01-02T02:48:00.001+11:00

Happy new year!

One of the presents that I gave to Coppe (and maybe a bit to myself, secretly) is The Joy of Vegan Baking by Colleen Patrick-Goudreau. It's pretty good so far. The recipes seem straight forward but sometimes use ingredients that may only be easy to find in the USA. Though I find that with most American cookbooks, including VWaV and V'Con. The pictures look tasty and there is a good variety of recipes. It's also useful that measurements are given in both weight and cups/spoons.

We tried the Gingerbread Scones. Coppe gave me a set of tiny baking ware, so it seemed obvious that we should make tiny muffins. They were so cute! I wanted to gobble them all up.

And we did. They were really tasty, as well as looking good. They were moist and spicy, with a slightly crunchy crust. We ate 2/3 of the batch in one day. That's the unfortunate thing about tiny muffins - it's so easy to keep popping them into your mouth that by the time you decide to stop, you've eaten them all.

I like the book, I would recommend it, especially to people who aren't confident about veganising recipes. Patrick-Goudreau explains very clearly the purpose of certain steps, and gives detailed instructions about how to create things like condensed milk.

Christmas Brunch

2007-12-25T02:50:00.001+11:00

We celebrated Christmas with my parents last Saturday (because they were going on holiday for two weeks the next day) and we assumed cooking duties. This is because a) my parents are really open to veganism and b) they can't cook (mum and dad, if you're reading this, I'm talking about a different mum and dad).

Anyway, we broke out the traditional Christmas foods. I made a stollen, originally German but also Dutch, and Adele made mince pies and scones. We chucked in a salad to pretend that the meal was at least in some way healthful and also made some sweet spreads.

Those nasty little Christmas elves must have been on our side, because everything turned out the way we planned it.

The stollen was picture perfect and the almond paste filling came out just the way it should. I made a special little one without dried fruits for my brother and, according to him, it was "seriously tasty stuff."

The mince pies were also very pretty and properly boozy. We watched McDonald's Kitchen on Dutch TV yesterday (a vegetarian cooking show) and he was making the same thing. Adele's looked better. So yeah, in your face, Mr. Vegetarian! Vegans > you.

Here's the salad. It was mixed salad greens with toasted nuts and chickpeas. The dressing was raspberry vinegar with walnut oil and was rather unimpressive. It was the only thing I would have wanted to improve on.

We also tried some recipes from Veganomicomoconicom. I got it for Adele (and me, secretly) for Christmas. We made the Not-tella and the Pumpkin Cranberry Scones. Unsurprisingly, they rocked. They really did. We put most of the Not-tella in a jar as a present to my Nutella-addicted brother.

These were really tasty. The cranberries add a sweet-tart touch that complements the pumpkin. The crumb was properly sconey, which we hadn't found in vegan recipes so far. Make them. If you have Veganomicon, of course. Otherwise, buy it and then make them.

At the end of the day, though, it was all about the Christmas spirit.

Cinnamon Buns

2007-12-25T02:27:00.000+11:00

Yay! I'm in the Netherlands again. Coppe and I have been having a good time sleeping in, watching bad television and cooking. We're both sick, though, as my hayfever started to play up at Bangkok airport and Coppe has a cold. I now have the cold as well. At least we are back together again.

The weather has been just beautiful, everything covered in frost. All the trees are pure white.

Unfortunately Coppe has had to go to university and work a few times, so I've had a couple of days at home on my own. The obvious thing to do is cook.

I've been wanting to make cinnamon buns for weeks but just never managed to find the time in Australia. I'm glad I finally made them, because they're really tasty. All buttery and spicy. I probably didn't layer the cinnamon on strongly enough, though.

I used this recipe, posted by Tartlette. I substituted cornstarch mixture for the egg and used dairy-free milk and butter.

Adele is coming!

2007-12-18T17:44:00.001+11:00

Adele is coming to Holland. I'm all nervous and excited. I spent all of yesterday preparing. I made her fudge off Bjorked Off! (I made it vanilla rum) and a lemon tart with cranberry coulis. I also made her a special batch of muesli, with all the nuts, seeds and dried fruits I don't buy for myself because they're expensive.

No pictures or anything yet, because she gets first dibs.

Dutch Apple Pie

2007-12-14T20:56:00.000+11:00

Apple pie is Dutch originally (probably) and the ability to make one is a highly valued skill here. The quality of your apple pie determines where you end up in life.

Mine is, obviously, very good. This means I get to go to uni and people let me cut in front of them at the supermarket. My apple pie is just that famous.

Anyway, it is loosely based on this recipe off a Dutch apple pie blog. Yes, we have blogs devoted to apple pies.

Apple Pie (makes one):

125 g margarine
300 g whole wheat flour
180 g sugar
1/4 cup soy milk
5 apples, cored, quartered and sliced
juice of a lemon
50 g pecans, chopped
50 g almonds, chopped
spices!
a dash of rum

Cut the margarine into the flour and 100 g of the sugar. Add the soy milk. Knead together. Put 3/5 of the dough into a pie shape. Stab with a fork. Leave in the fridge for about 30 minutes.

Combine spices, apples, lemon juice, pecans, almonds and rum. Stir well. It helps to blend it a little bit, to get a nice mushy consistency.

Spread into the pie shape. Make a lattice of the remaining dough.

Bake at 180 C for 45 minutes.

Soy Ice Cream

2007-12-12T11:27:00.000+11:00

Soy ice cream has found its way to Holland!

Today, I discovered a little nondescript tub of vanilla soy ice cream in the supermarket (and a chocolate one, woo! choices!). Before this, my only sources were one flavour of expensive imported Tofutti or an ice cream maker, neither of which I can afford.

I declare tomorrow a day of ice cream testing!

Fruit Flan Tartlets

2007-12-10T16:13:00.000+11:00

I love tarts. I don't much like eating them, in most cases, but I really love to make them. There's nothing better for wowing sceptical omnivores than a delicate, highly decorated little tart.

Vegan shortcrust seems to be particularly short as well, very crisp. I have been complimented on this by a few omnivores, so this seems to be a desired quality. If it is, then I don't see why people use butter...

In these, I used a shortcrust recipe with added sugar which makes it more like a pâte sucrée in some ways. It isn't technically, because the proportions are slightly different, but that's irrelevant. You shouldn't fill them until a few hours before serving (mine went slightly soft because I had to make them the night before for school).

They are filled with the same custard recipe I used for the vanilla slices only I added extra vanilla and some Triple Sec. I used blueberries and strawberries to top them, but that's personal preference. I think they look better with more than one fruit on them. I used blackberry jam with a dash of Triple Sec to glaze, which turned out really nice.

Fruit Flan Tartlets:

Pastry: (adapted from Best-Ever Pastry Cookbook by Catharine Atkinson, which is actually quite good as it has a long, illustrated section on technique and basic recipes, but has too much meat :( - also, cheap)

225 g plain flour
pinch of salt
a bit of icing sugar
150g chilled butter, diced
1 egg-replacer egg dissolved in soymilk (I used Orgran)
2 tbsp chilled water

Sift flour, salt and sugar into the bowl of a blender. Process for a few seconds. Scatter over the butter and process a few seconds more, until it resembles fine breadcrumbs.

Tip mixture into a bowl and add the water, and mix in gently. Lightly kneed for a few seconds, then put in a zip-lock bag and refrigerate for 30mins.

To roll out, I use a marble pastry board, a wooden rolling pin and a round biscuit cutter. Grease a 12-cup muffin tin and four extra ones (look, I didn't make the recipe. It doesn't fit muffin tins exactly.) Lightly flour the board and the rolling pin. Do not flour the pastry. Split the pastry and roll out, rolling in one direction then rotating the pastry, until it is of desired thickness. Not too thin, not too thick. Use the biscuit cutter to cut circles, then ease them gently into the muffin cups.

Preheat oven to 180C. Line muffin tins with baking paper/silicone cupcake liners and fill with baking beans/weights. Bake blind for 5-8mins, until the cases are slightly firm. Remove the fillings and bake for another few minutes, until the cases are lightly browned.

Set aside.

Custard: Make one recipe.

A few hours before serving, fill each tartlet case with the custard, then arrange the fruit as desired. Warm ~3 tbsp of jam in the microwave, then stir in ~1 tbsp of liqueur. Use a pastry brush to glaze. Refrigerate until serving.

An Abundance of Cake

2007-12-09T01:28:00.000+11:00

I swear the blogosphere is trying to get us all chubby. There are so many tasty looking cakes and pies out there at the moment.

Here are a couple of good ones:
Chocolate Orange Cake off Fatfree Vegan Kitchen
Perfect Gingerbread off No Whey, José!
Swedish Tea Ring off Vegan Dad
No Bake Peanut Butter Chocolate Pie off have cake, will travel!

I also discovered this cute little Dutch blog dedicated just to apple pie recipes.

Anyway, on to the point of the post, which is to share another Dutch St. Nicholas tradition.

For the 5th of December, I made a big batch of pepernoten and left a little bag of them in the shoes of my housemate and of my family. They were all accompanied by short poems.

Traditionally, rhyming poems accompany St. Nicholas gifts. It's an opportunity to tease your family members about their flaws and problems and vent years of suppressed bitterness.

Also, in the weeks approaching St. Nicholas, from the time St. Nicholas arrives in the country (this happens late November in an official ceremony, yes, we have an official St. Nicholas), children leave out their shoes at night for them to be filled with pepernoten, marzipan or chocolate.

This was my version of it and it was a lot of fun surprising people with baked goods. I can see why people thought of this in the first place.

Aloo Parathas

2007-12-03T06:51:00.000+11:00

Spotted this on VeganYumYum this morning and, along with everyone else in the world, went "Indian! I shall go to great lengths to prepare this dish. Hand me my spatula!"

So yeah.

I cheated and made them with whole wheat flour instead of fancy Indian flour, but they still came out well. They're really easy to make too.

In other news, if you have the time or if you are so inclined, check out the Semicircular Vegan (because everything is just better when it is almost a circle).

The rest of my time has been spent browsing Etsy.

I want, need, a duct tape wallet with a pig on it.

Edit to add: I know the photo is dark, but that is because I live in The Perpetual Dark right now. It was actually taken an hour or two after noon.

VeganMoFo: A Day in the Life of Me - Peanut Sauce

2007-12-01T06:28:00.000+11:00

This is our last VeganMoFo post. We managed to post at least 30 times. Not every day, but we did kinda make it. Go us!

Anyway, I had organic peanuts left over. Obviously, this means: peanut sauce!

I roasted them for 15 minutes at 160 C and ground them to a fine paste, taking a minute to scoff at those who use peanut butter in their peanut sauce.

I then heated curry paste and a bit of coconut milk in a frying pan, while stirring, for a couple of minutes. Adding the ground peanuts, a bit of dark brown sugar and the rest of the coconut milk, you can then bring it to a boil, set it aside, and add it to sautéed vegetables.

I had it with green cabbage, broccoli, carrot and eggplant over brown rice.

VeganMoFo: A Day in the Life of Me - More Speculaas

2007-11-30T20:28:00.000+11:00

So, I was experimenting with speculaas recipes this weekend. They were good, but I wanted to combine them and use the best of both. So, I did, adding my own little touch.

The result: the perfect speculaas biscuits.

They're heart-shaped, because I was in the kind of mood where you want to make everything heart-shaped (everyone has these, right?).

Speculaas (makes a lot):

150 g whole wheat flour
50 g almond meal
75 g dark brown sugar
25 g vanilla sugar
100 g margarine
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ginger
1 tsp allspice
1 tsp nutmeg
dash of salt
1 tsp baking powder
2 tbsp soy milk
2 tbsp slivered almonds

Cream together margarine and sugar. In a separate bowl, mix flour, almond meal, baking powder, slivered almonds, salt and spices. Combine with the margarine mixture. Add soy milk and knead into a sticky dough.

Refrigerate for an hour.

Pre-heat oven to 200 C. Now, you need to roll these out really thin. Thankfully, Adele has a great trick for this.

Adele's Baking Tip*:

Put the dough between two sheets of baking paper and roll out with a dough pin. You can then lift the upper sheet and cut out shapes. When you're finished, just put the bottom sheet on a baking tray and place it in the oven.

These go for 4 1/2 - 5 minutes in my oven, but that's when they're really thin and my oven has been pre-heated plenty. In any case, watch them closely.

Leave them to cool for a while. It takes about half a day for the spices to develop properly.

Note: one of these advantages of this dough is that you can also use it to make pepernoten. Instead of cutting out shapes, just roll the dough into little balls and heat for a bit longer.

* A penguin in a pink tutu comes to her in her dreams and shares these.

VeganMoFo: A Day in the Life of Me

2007-11-30T20:22:00.000+11:00

It's the last day of VeganMoFo (awww), so I figured I'd do something special.

So, today I'll be posting what I eat.

This is for breakfast:

It's my home-made muesli. It contains rolled oats, pumpkin seeds, poppy seeds, flax seeds, sesame seeds and buckwheat. I had it in a big bowl with soy milk with a pear, which are in season here right now, a mandarin and an apple.

VeganMoFo: Produce!

2007-11-28T19:19:00.000+11:00

There is a program at my local organic shop that allows you to get a package of produce weekly. I figured I'd give it a try, since it's a good way of getting local, seasonal and organic produce for cheap and I'd like to make the switch to all-organic. Also, it seems fun to have to cook with what I'm given.

I got my first package yesterday.

I have: a green cabbage, an eggplant, carrots, pears and peanuts. I'm not overwhelmed by the amounts (there are only a couple of pears, for instance, that won't last me more than a day or two), but I'll see how far I get. It's nice reading the tags anyway and knowing it comes from local organic farmers.

Also, it was really cheap, so I didn't expect it to be that full.

Last night, I used it to make a carrot, eggplant and broccoli thing to go over my whole wheat spaghetti. I usually chuck in a lot of veggies and I still had plenty left after, so maybe this will last me a while.

So, how many of your veggies do you get organic? Is it expensive?

VeganMoFo: By popular demand...

2007-11-27T18:59:00.000+11:00

Patchy horse biscuits.

I don't have a photo, unfortunately. I didn't photograph them before they were taken to school and they all got scoffed. Better a day after being made, I think. Tasty and omnivore-teenager friendly.

VeganMoFo: Speculaas

2007-11-27T18:32:00.000+11:00

This is a blog of love and Dutch biscuits, primarily, and today we get both! Yay!

So, I discovered Seitan Is My Motor the other day and it had a speculaas recipe up. For those of you who don't know what speculaas is (and you should), it is a thin, crunchy and spicy Dutch/Belgian/German* biscuit.

My version had less fancy ingredients because I didn't have them, but they were nice. I didn't wait for the spices to develop like I should have, though, because my mother felt they were too tasty to let live.

Anyway, they were proclaimed "very tasty" and my mother got me the ingredients to make more the same day.

This time, I tried a different recipe.

This dough was a bit easier to roll out into really thin biscuits and I loved how they came out. Because they were so thin, they were really crisp and light.

Next time, I want to experiment with a bit of almond meal and some slivered almonds.

*It sleeps around. A lot.

VeganMoFo: Curried Pita Bread

2007-11-27T00:56:00.000+11:00

This was more an idea than a recipe, but it turned out really well. I added some curry paste to my pita bread dough. It came out really nice and spicy.

VeganMoFo: Banana Custard with Rum Raisins

2007-11-26T18:40:00.000+11:00

Inspired by this recipe off Vegan Visitor and my love of rum raisins. Also, banana!

Banana Custard (serves 1):

2 bananas
1 cup soy milk
1 tbsp cornstarch
1/4 cup sugar (I used brown sugar, but I think the colour would be nicer with white)
1 tsp vanilla essence
1/3 cup raisins
1 tbsp rum

Combine rum and raisins. Warm briefly in the microwave. Cover and let stand for 30 minutes. Pre-heat the oven to 200 C.

Blend the rest of the ingredients together. Stir in the rum raisins. Put in custard ramekins.

Boil some water. Get an oven tray with raised sides. Put the ramekins in and fill the tray with boiling water until about 2/3rds of the way up. Put the tray in the oven and bake like this, bain marie, for 40-45 minutes.

VeganMoFo: Vanilla Slices

2007-11-26T18:20:00.001+11:00

Vanilla Slices are the quintessential Australian pasty. (Though they are surprisingly similar to a traditional Dutch pasty, and probably some other ones as well.) They are also something that I had never tried as an omnivore/vegetarian, and was unlikely to find a vegan version unless I made it myself.

So I did.

They were originally a little tough (the recipe book said to let them soften in the fridge...) but after I iced them and a day in the fridge, they are delicious. Everyone who's had one seems to like them as well.

Vanilla Slice (recipe adapted from Family Circle's Biscuits and Slices):

2 sheets puff pastry

Bake both puff pastry sheets as per directions. (I hope I don't have to spell it out).

Custard:
1/4 cup Orgran Custard Powder
1/4 cup caster sugar
1 cup firm silken tofu
1 1/2 cups soy milk
1/2 tsp vanilla essence

Blend custard powder, sugar and tofu in a blender, then transfer to a heavy based pan. Gradually stir in the soy milk and stir constantly over medium heat until it boils. Continue boiling the custard for some time, it should be very thick. Sloppy peaks would be nice, but it will thicken when cooled.

Place plastic wrap on the top the custard when it has stopped steaming, then leave in the fridge until completely cool.

Place one sheet of puff pastry on a board/tray, and spread the custard over it. Top with other pastry sheet. I then iced mine with some left over raspberry icing from the freezer, but passionfruit icing is traditional.

Don't try to cut it until the next day. It's not pretty.

VeganMoFo: Survey!

2007-11-25T19:52:00.000+11:00

We're probably the last people to do this, but it's a cool survey and our answers are really very interesting.

1. Favourite non-dairy milk?

So Good Essential and Alpro Soya.

2. What are the top 3 dishes/recipes you are planning to cook?

Broccoli & Mushroom Salad
Speculaas
Vanilla slice

3. Topping of choice for popcorn?

Neither of us likes popcorn that much...

4. Most disastrous recipe/meal failure?

A Lemon Tart that turned out a bit black and had ran all over the tin. I didn't have enough crust and I thought it would be fine to just cover half the tin.

5. Favourite pickled item?

Artichoke hearts.

6. How do you organize your recipes?

We have a little book that we write out good recipes in.

7. Compost, trash, or garbage disposal?

Compost.

8. If you were stranded on an island and could only bring 3 foods…what would they be (don’t worry about how you’ll cook them)?

Lentils, potatoes and carrots.

9. Fondest food memory from your childhood?

Eating my grandmother's pancakes.

10. Favourite vegan ice cream?

Turtle Mountain Purely Decadent.

11. Most loved kitchen appliance?

Oven.

12. Spice/herb you would die without?

Coppe: Cumin
Adele: Basil

13. Cookbook you have owned for the longest time?

Le Cordon Bleu Home Collection Chocolate, all completely unvegan and I never tried a recipe. We've actually decided we should make some recipes out of this now.

14. Favourite flavor of jam/jelly?

Strawberry! We don't eat jelly; we're vegan. *shakes head*

15. Favourite vegan recipe to serve to an omni friend?

Chocolate cake!

16. Seitan, tofu, or tempeh?

Coppe: Tofu!
Adele: Tofu for versatility, tempeh for edibility.

17. Favorite meal to cook (or time of day to cook)?

Coppe: Breakfast.
Adele: Dessert.

18. What is sitting on top of your refrigerator?

Coppe: My stove.
Adele: Probably some old, dusty toy guns belonging to my brother.

19. Name 3 items in your freezer without looking.

I don't have a freezer.

20. What’s on your grocery list?

Nothing!

21. Favourite grocery store?

I usually go to the Albert Heijn, but if I had the money I'd go to this little organic shop in Amsterdam.

22. Name a recipe you’d love to veganize, but haven’t yet.

Stroopwafels.

23. Food blog you read the most (besides Isa’s because I know you check it everyday). Or maybe the top 3?

Baking Bites, Fatfree Vegan Kitchen, Cake Maker to the Stars.

24. Favourite vegan candy/chocolate?

Gingersnaps.

25. Most extravagant food item purchased lately?

Curry paste.

26. How did you get so pretty?

Adele: I was born this way, and despite my best efforts...
Coppe: It's a long story involving a leprechaun, a pot of gold and a lot of regrets.

VeganMoFo: Pumpkin Custard Parfait

2007-11-23T03:06:00.001+11:00

The Happy Herbivore had a pretty little parfait up and I'm easily distracted by photos of tasty food, so I had to make this.

I didn't have any banana pudding, though. I replaced this with Pumpkin Custard off Vegan Visitor.

The texture of the custard really surprised me pleasantly. I'll be using this a recipe as a basis for further experimentation.

VeganMoFo: Brown Rice Risotto with Spinach, Mushrooms and Chickpeas

2007-11-23T02:52:00.000+11:00

I wanted to make risotto because it's fancy and you can say it in an obnoxiously pretentious way.

I was swayed by this recipe off Vegan Visitor, because it used pumpkin and mushroom and I wanted to use both.

Then I decided to use the pumpkin for something else and I saw I had the wrong kind of mushrooms. I also didn't have any arborio rice. My version ended up looking very little like the original recipe (I also insisted on using brown rice - I was told brown rice didn't work in a risotto, ha!), so I've written it out below.

Brown Rice Risotto (serves 1):

1/2 cup brown rice
handful of mushrooms
two handfuls of spinach
1/3 cup chickpeas, cooked
3 tbsp dry sherry
2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
3-5 cups of water
1 tsp rosemary
1/3 tsp salt
fresh basil leaves and parsley, as garnish

Sauté the garlic in oil briefly. Add mushrooms and spinach. Sauté for 5 minutes or until spinach is wilted. Add sherry and sauté until the alcohol has evaporated. Add rice. Sauté for one minute. Add a cup of water. Stir until the liquid has been absorbed. Add another cup of water. Repeat until the rice is tender.

Add salt, rosemary and chickpeas. Sauté for another minute. Garnish with basil and parsley. Serve.

VeganMoFo: Chocolate Chip Biscuits

2007-11-21T19:37:00.001+11:00

I have to do a speech tomorrow for school, so naturally I'm bribing my classmates.* These are from Vegan With a Vengeance.

*It's not technically bribing. Officially I'm using them in my speech as an example of what altruism isn't.

They seem tasty.

I don't think I made enough, though. But it isn't too bad, there are always some people scared of vegan food. I think it's better to bring too few and have people wanting more, than to make too many and have to force them on people.

1 Million

2007-11-20T19:17:00.000+11:00

1 million animals are slaughtered for food every hour, in the US alone.

That's 10 billion a year.

I don't even know how to deal with those numbers.

(from Ball, M. (2006) "Living and Working in Defense of Animals," in In Defense of Animals: The Second Wave, ed. by Peter Singer. 181-186.)

VeganMoFo: Fennel Seed Pita Bread

2007-11-20T09:24:00.000+11:00

Although I made this recipe up on the fly, it came out really well. It's a variation on pita bread. They're crisp, spicy pieces of bread with an overtone of fennel.

I stuffed some of them with spinach, pumpkin, mushrooms, chickpeas and corn. I think it's better with stuffing, though they don't need it.

Fennel Seed Pita Bread (makes about 10 pieces):

2 cups of flour
1 cup of water
1/2 tsp of salt
1 tsp of instant yeast
dash of oil
1 tsp turmeric
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp coriander
dash of cayenne pepper
1 tsp of fennel seeds

Sift the flour, salt, spices and yeast together. Add water and oil. Knead for about 10 minutes into a supple dough. Cover with a tea towel and leave to rise for about an hour.

Punch back the dough and, on a floured surface, cut it into 10 pieces. Roll each piece out into a circle. Put them on a greased tray and spread some oil over the top. If you want to stuff some of them, sauté your mixture and spoon a little bit onto a circle of dough. You can then either fold it in on itself, top with another piece of dough or whatever shape strikes your fancy. Make three shallow cuts in every piece, cover with greased tin foil and let stand for 20 minutes.

Pre-heat the oven to 200 C. Bake for 15-20 minutes.

VeganMoFo: The Story of Us

2007-11-19T06:05:00.001+11:00

Since Adele's kitchen broke and I've been in Brussels for most of the weekend, we haven't had opportunity to put up any shiny new foodstuffs.

That does mean, however, that we have some space to tell the story of how we went vegan.

The most awesomest thing about it is that we went vegan together. We decided to together, planned it together and cooked our first intentionally vegan meals together.

When we met, Coppe had been a vegetarian for a little bit more than three years. Adele was an evil carnivore (she ate babies).

Babies:

You can tell the sense of impending doom from the baby on the left's face. The other two babies, in the meantime, are busy falling in love. But yeah, Adele soon put an end to that. Poor babies.

Coppe:

So yeah, I was a vegetarian. I never liked meat and, even as a child, I always tried to think of ways of avoiding eating it. The thought of an animal dying for my food always made me a bit sick. The shift seemed hard to me, though. Partly because my parents didn't really know what to do with it and partly because I didn't have a good role model.

Eventually, I refused to eat meat more and more and I gained the ability to think, and between the ages of 12 and 14, I gradually went vegetarian.

From the outset, veganism seemed like the logical next step. I saw that it was better and I felt guilty about not being vegan. I told myself I'd do it when I'd go to uni, but, in that situation, it seemed too hard to me, for some reason. One thing that didn't help was that I didn't know how to cook at all. I was reliant on my parents for that and they basically told me that it seemed very complicated to them (something I don't blame them for that much).

Anyway, I then met Adele (yay!). I converted her to vegetarianism pretty quickly, through an elaborate scheme of tofu letter bombs, baby rehab and emotional blackmail.

Adele:

I mostly never thought about vegetarianism in relation to myself. It was not something that I saw myself doing for a long time. My family was not a very veg*n friendly place, my dad would often make disparaging remarks about anyone who abstained from meat for ethical reasons - mostly culminating in "everyone who lives differently to me is stupid"-type rhetoric. Meat was something we just ate in my family, and frequently. I think my experience of my mother's vegetables also put me off a bit (she's not actually a bad cook, just very overworked and underappreciated).

I did always like animals, though, and was brought up in an environmentally-minded household. The first real conversation Coppe and I had was actually about the environmental harms of meat and farming in general, I seem to remember. So I was quite open to it once it was introduced to me.

My defining moment was an ordinary evening, where dad had brought home greasy chips and dead chicken because either mum wasn't there or didn't want to cook. I really like hot chips, and usually liked chicken too. But that night, I was hit with an absolute feeling of disgust when I smelt the chicken. I couldn't eat it. It just seemed horrible, depraved even. From that point on I started becoming vegetarian. I can't remember if it was immediate or gradual, but that is the moment that I remember as being the beginning of my veg*nism.

Veganism seemed the logical next step, once we got over the cultural vegan-health panic. Nowadays I'm very vocal and unashamed vegan. People make stupid remarks, but I'm always up for giving a lecture.

Us:

We went vegan last Christmas, when we had 6 weeks together.

It was the first time we ran a household together and, pretty quickly, we decided to try soy milk, we cut out eggs and had a serious look at what else we needed to change to become vegan. After a couple of weeks, we were vegans.

It was a bit of a gradual transition, though. About a month after the end of those 6 weeks, we'd both made all the changes permanent (Adele was faster).

We've now both been vegan for about 9 months. We haven't found it difficult at all, but we have discovered an amazing world of vegan foodery and we just cook together more and more (when we have the chance, obviously).

VeganMoFo: I have no kitchen

2007-11-18T19:32:00.001+11:00

Alas, my kitchen (actually not mine) broke. The main hotplate on the stove stopped working a few months ago, so we've been having to use the little one. Well, up until today. Today the little one apparently wouldn't turn off, so my parents turned off the power to the kitchen. So I have no stove or oven.

Woe is me.

VeganMoFo: Chocolate Bread

2007-11-16T21:30:00.000+11:00

I made the Chocolate Bread off The Village Vegan yesterday. I added glacée fruit, diced apricot and a dash of rum. My rising times were a bit erratic because of my busy schedule, but it came out well.

I'd like to turn this into a presentable little brioche boule someday, though. This time, you're just going to get pictures of the slices.

This is our sixteenth VeganMoFo post this month, so we're over halfway there and right on track. I hope we can keep this up!

Also: go check out Vegan Visitor, it's quite sparkly.

VeganMoFo: St. Nicholas Hedgehog Slices

2007-11-15T18:38:00.000+11:00

Speculaas is a Dutch biscuit that comes with St. Nicholas. They're spicy and crisp, like a bigger and better version of pepernoten. Also, unlike pepernoten, the idea is to eat them, not throw them at people.

Adele used them to improve upon a traditional hedgehog slice recipe. You can use biscuits of any kind to replace them, if you don't have any speculaas.

Now, remember, the hedgehog will cry if you don't make these! If you can't read hedgehogs, it's saying: "Why won't you make these? Don't you love me?"

Also, it doesn't involve any baking. Anyway, on to the recipe.

St. Nicholas Hedgehog Slices (adapted from Family Circle's Biscuits and Slices):

250g speculaas biscuits, finely crushed
1/2 cup desiccated coconut
1 cup pecans, roughly chopped
1 tbsp cocoa powder
100g dark chocolate, chopped
80g dairy-free butter
1 tbsp golden syrup
1/4 cup soy yoghurt, or silken firm tofu

Line a 30 x 20cm baking tin. Combine biscuit crumbs, coconut, pecans and cocoa, and mix together well. Combine chocolate, butter and syrup in a microwave-safe bowl, then microwave for 15 second intervals until melted. Make sure to stir between intervals because the chocolate will hold its shape.

Pour melted ingredients and yoghurt into the biscuit mixture. Stir everything until well combined. Press evenly into tin. Refrigerate 30mins or until set.

Eat them and know you've made a little hedgehog very happy!

Blog Readability

2007-11-14T19:17:00.000+11:00

Apparently, all of our readers are intellectuals (go you!).

What is ironic, though, is that we're both not even at the postgraduate stage of our education yet.

(through two peas, no pod)

Edit: Okay, now I'm going to be obsessively checking this after every post. This one, in fact, put us up to:

From now on, we would like to be addressed as Herr and Frau Professor. Thank you.

VeganMoFo: Schiacciata

2007-11-14T05:32:00.000+11:00

Make this. 1) It has a fancy Italian name and 2) you get to stab it with a fork.

It's a Tuscan flatbread with a salty, herby crust. You use a fork to make indentations that symbolise the planting of seeds in the soil and to celebrate the future harvest. *

Schiacciata (makes 1 large bread, adapted from Bread by Christine Ingram and Jennie Shapter):

3 cups of flour (or 350 g)
1 cup of water (200 ml)
dash of salt
2 tbsp olive oil
a packet of instant yeast
herbs (I added basil and parsley leaves)

Combine the dry ingredients. Make a well and add the oil and water. Knead for about 10 minutes, adding water if it is too dry, until you get a supple dough. Leave to rise in a warm place for an hour.

Pre-heat the oven to 200 C. Punch back the dough and knead for a couple of minutes. Roll it out into a rectangular shape, spread with olive oil and leave to rise for 20 minutes on a greased baking tray. Cover with greased foil.

Spread over more olive oil and sprinkle over herbs and salt. Leave to rise for 10 more minutes.

Bake for about 30 minutes or until browned on top.

It's best enjoyed in quite small slices.

* Not actually true, but it sounds nice. The holes are there to give the gas that builds up in the bread while rising in the oven a way out, which will help it rise more. This is why a lot of breads have cuts across the top. Always do this to your bread. If it has risen a lot, make shallow cuts, but if it hasn't risen much, make deep cuts.

VeganMoFo: Pumpkin Coconut Salad

2007-11-13T00:57:00.000+11:00

Another salad I thought up. It combines a subtle and sweet coconut flavour with bite-size pieces of pumpkin. It's probably seasonal in some way.

Pumpkin Coconut Salad (serves 1):

a few handfuls of assorted lettuce leaves
1/2 cup pumpkin, cubed and cooked
1/2 cup moong dal, cooked
1/3 cup coconut milk
1 tbsp oil
1 tsp vinegar
a dash of cayenne pepper
a dash of coriander
a dash of salt
1 tbsp coconut
coconut, as garnish

Combine vinegar and salt. Stir. Add cayenne pepper and coriander. Add oil, coconut milk and coconut. Pour about half over the lettuce leaves. Reserve around 1 tbsp and mix the rest with the pumpkin. Combine the remaining tbsp with the moong dal.

Arrange the pumpkin cubes in the centre of a bed of lettuce leaves. Spoon the moong dal around it. Garnish with coconut.

VeganMoFo: Can This Recipe Be Saved?

2007-11-11T21:54:00.000+11:00

SusanV put up a contest 10 days ago. It's a recipe for Thai Pumpkin Croquettes, and the idea is to come up with a good substitute for the pumpkin. There's also this shiny graphic.

So, I donned my 50s housewife apron and started experimenting. The croquettes are a really nice combination of soy sauce, green beans, basil and Thai curry paste (I actually managed to find the Thai Kitchen curry paste here!). I thought of adding coconut milk first, because I think it complements the rest of the ingredients without overshadowing them, but I don't have vital wheat gluten (impossible to find here) to compensate for the loss of stickiness.

Then I realised I had some Thai moong dal. So I tried it and I was pleasantly surprised by the result.

Thai Moong Dal Croquettes (makes about 10):

4 ounces or about 3/4 cup green beans
1/3 cup fresh basil leaves
1/2 cup moong dal, cooked
1 1/2 tbsp soy sauce
1 1/2 tsp curry paste
1 tsp lime zest
1 tsp brown sugar
dash of pepper
1 tbsp cornstarch

Pre-heat oven to 180 C. Coarsely blend together basil leaves and green beans. Combine with the other ingredients in a bowl. Line a baking tray with baking paper and smoothe into patties on the tray. Bake for 15-20 minutes, flip and bake for another 15-20 minutes.

VeganMoFo: My soymilk... it's not pink

2007-11-11T15:59:00.000+11:00

I bought some strawberry soymilk... and it isn't pink! I feel cheated. It's just not right. It's tasty, though.

See? It's an abomination.

VeganMoFo: Fall Salad with Toasted Nuts

2007-11-10T02:29:00.000+11:00

This is the second in, hopefully, a longer series of simple, pretty, seasonal salads. This one layers a mix of roasted hazelnut, walnut and pine nut over a light, colourful bed of all sorts of leaves. I wanted to call it a Forest Floor Salad, but Adele pointed out that this was too pretentious (which, of course, it is, that is exactly why I liked it).

Fall Salad with Toasted Nuts (serves 1):

Salad Leaves
a handful of Romaine lettuce leaves
a handful of Swiss Chard leaves
a handful of Lolla Rosso leaves (you can use whatever type of lettuce you have on hand)
a handful of watercress
1 apple
1 pear
a few sprigs of parsley
a few basil leaves
a few fennel fronds

Tear the lettuce leaves, watercress, parsley and basil into small pieces. Peel the apple and the pear (save the peel!). Tear the peel into small pieces and sprinkle about half of them over the leaves.

Toasted Nuts
a handful of pine nuts
a handful of walnuts, crumbled lightly
a handful of hazelnuts, halved
dash of oil

Sauté the nuts in the oil for 3-5 minutes. They should be toasted by then. For a really even roast, you could do them all separately, but the difference isn't that big. Watch the pine nuts. They're the first to burn.

Dressing
1 tsp lemon juice
1 tbsp olive oil
a dash of salt
a dash of pepper
1/4 tsp lemon zest

Combine the lemon juice, lemon zest, salt and pepper. Stir and add the oil. Reserve about 1 tsp and pour the remainder over the salad. Toss the toasted nuts through the reserved tsp and arrange on top of the salad leaves.

VeganMoFo: Two Types of Biscuit

2007-11-09T14:33:00.001+11:00

In a random outburst of altruistic baking, I made biscuits for one of my classes. (Maybe not so altruistic, as I was required to bring food and I didn't have anything else.) So I made spice biscuits with coffee filling and lemon jam drops.

Anyway, they turned out very well. Both biscuits were ridiculously easy to make and didn't call for any tricky ingredients. The spice biscuits were better after a night in the fridge than fresh - they were initially a bit hard. I think the jam drops could have had less oil, I'd replace half with apple purée next time.

(awful picture)

Spice Biscuits (adapted from here)

170 g plain self-raising flour
pinch of salt
70 g dairy-free butter
3/4 tsp baking soda
1 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp cardamom (or more)
70 g sugar
115 g golden syrup
coffee flavoured icing (I used some leftover stuff I had frozen...)

Preheat oven to 160C.

Whisk flour and salt together in a bowl, then cut in butter with a knife, or your fingers. Add baking soda and spices, then mix together. Add the golden syrup and stir together with a spoon (a whisk will get too clogged).

Line a baking tray with a silicone sheet or baking paper. Make the mixture into balls approximately 2-3cm in diameter. Press them lightly onto the baking tray, flattening them.

Bake for about 15 mins then allow to cool.

When cool, spread the underside of a biscuit with coffee icing, and stick another one on top.

The jam drop recipe I adapted from here, only I added about 1 tsp of grated lemon rind and 1 tsp of lemon juice. I then made indentations in the top, and dropped in some blackcurrant (I think) jam. I'd replace half the oil with apple purée next time, but they are very nice as is.

VeganMoFo: Tiny Chocolate Chip Thumbprint Pepernoten

2007-11-08T00:52:00.000+11:00

It is the month of November and that means the St. Nicholas season is approaching. This is a Dutch feast that celebrates the arrival, early November, of a bearded bishop in a dress called St. Nicholas. He arrives in a steamboat from Spain (he lives in Spain the the rest of the year). He rides in on a white horse, accompanied by his black slaves. The slaves pelt people with lollies and biscuits and give handfuls of it to little children.

In the following weeks, St. Nicholas and his servants go around the houses, filling the shoes of children with more sweet stuff. Then, on the 5th of December, St. Nicholas delivers presents to the good kids and carries the bad kids off to Spain with him in a large sack (after hitting them with twigs).

So yeah.

Pepernoten are the biscuits the servants (called Zwarte Pieten*) traditionally give out. They're like a spicy shortbread. Their taste is similar to gingerbread biscuits. They're all over the country, even before the St. Nicholas festivities have started, and they're often vegan. This is a small variation on the recipe.

I should warn you. This recipe is messy and involves lots of picking tasty dough off your fingers.

The Recipe (makes about 100):

1 1/2 cups flour
1 cup margarine
3/4 cup dark brown sugar
2 tbsp soy milk
1 tsp baking powder
1 tbsp various spices (cinnamon, nutmeg, mace, cloves, cardamom, ginger, anise and allspice all go well, whatever you choose, just make sure to layer them on heavily)
dash of salt
chocolate chips (optional)

Pre-heat the oven to 160 C. Combine the flour, baking powder, sugar, salt and spices. Cut in the butter and crumb together. Add the milk (and yes, it is only 2 tablespoons). Grease a baking sheet. Measure out 1 teaspoon of dough and drop it onto the baking sheet. This should make you roughly a 100 little balls. Make sure to keep them about an inch away from each other. Press a chocolate chip into each little ball of dough.

Bake for around 15 minutes and let cool.

* "Black Johns," Piet is a generic Dutch name.

VeganMoFo: Banana Bread!

2007-11-07T18:38:00.000+11:00

I love stuffing things with banana. It is probably my favourite fruit for cakes. It works well in every cake and should be present in large quantities (I could probably save myself a lot of work by just eating bananas).

Anyway, I'm easily influenced and a bit whimsical, so when I spotted this banana bread recipe on The Village Vegan, I decided to make it right away (after, of course, singing the rum song for a while*).

I added pecans and raisins and it rocked. I would have liked the rum flavour to be a bit more pronounced, but it definitely didn't need it.

So... blogsters and blogettes, what's your favourite cake food?

* The rum song goes like this: "Rum, rum, rum, rum, etc.**"
** Rum.

VeganMoFo: White Pizza with Spinach, Mushroom and Roma Tomatoes

2007-11-05T06:21:00.000+11:00

Today, I made a White Pizza with Spinach, Mushrooms, based on this recipe off No Whey, José!. I used my own pizza crust and added mushrooms, but otherwise it was pretty much the same.

White Pizza was new to me, but I liked it a lot. It makes the crust all nice and garlicky. The recipe is simple, but you end up combining a lot of flavours. I really like this blog (also, they're such a cute couple!).

I make my own pizza quite frequently. I love being busy with dough and the satisfaction of making something that looks quite complicated from scratch. It makes me feel all smarmy.

If you want to make your own pizza dough, here are some tips to help you get started:

1) Start with a simple recipe. Get used to the feel of well-kneaded dough. It is often described as "satiny," but I find this description a bit too snooty. Fabric doesn't really mean anything to me when applied to dough. You want to get to a dough that you can knead without flouring your hands, essentially.

This the basic recipe I use for one crust:

1 1/4 cup plain flour
1/3 cup plus 1 tbsp water
1 tsp instant yeast
splash of oil
dash of salt

2) Start with plain flour instead of wholemeal. Wholemeal flour is healthier and richer, but it's also a bit heavier and that makes kneading trickier. For a nice, supple dough, I find plain flour is a bit easier.

Combine flour, yeast and salt in a bowl. Add water and oil. Mix with a spoon at first, then flour your hands and start kneading. Add some water if it's too dry.

3) Go easy on the water. 1/3 cup plus 1 tbsp is the minimum amount, because it's easier to add extra water to flour then the other way around. You can still knead dough that's too dry, but sticky dough will get messy.

Press your palm into the dough, fold the top of the dough into the centre. Press down and rotate the dough 45 degrees. Rinse and repeat until you have a supple dough that you can knead without flouring your hands.

4) Put the dough in a bowl and cover with a tea towel. Leave to rise for an hour in a warm place. A little trick I use is to pre-heat the oven to 100 C for about 5-10 minutes, then turn it off a couple of minutes before I finish kneading. When I'm done, I leave the bowl in the oven. If kept closed, the heat in there should be more than enough to get you a beautifully risen piece of dough. I put some fresh basil leaves in mine and it came out all puffy, warm and wonderfully herby.

Punch back the dough and knead a bit more. Flour a surface and a rolling pin. Roll out the dough, brush with oil, top and pop up in the oven.

Call round your friends and family, show them your pizza, dismiss their compliments with self-effacing modesty and eat it, all by yourself.

VeganMoFo: Apple Crumb Cake Quickbread

2007-11-05T03:01:00.000+11:00

I work in an omni restaurant and I was looking for something to make for the rest of the staff. I really enjoy working there, mostly because they're a lot of fun.

I found a great little recipe for an apple crumble cake on The Student Stomach a while ago.

It's crumbly, spicy and not too sugary. It's sophisticated. It's not some blunt gooey chocolate cake, wandering in off the street (God knows who's been icing it). This cake has class.

It definitely won over the people at work. I'd like to try it with pumpkin instead of apple and I'd like to add more spices, but it really is a wonderful cake.

Next time I need a simple, elegant dessert, I'll bring out this piece of crumbly cinnamony goodness.

VeganMoFo: Pumpkin Scones

2007-11-04T23:42:00.000+11:00

Scones rock and pumpkin is pretty okay too, so when I spotted this recipe on Vegan Dad and then found fresh butternut pumpkin at the supermarket (this is rare here), I was convinced the gods were telling me to make pumpkin scones.

It makes sense. At the end of a day of listening to people whinge in prayers, what you really need is a sip of tea and a jammed scone.

I had three with a hazelnut salad and a quasi-Chai latté (I don't actually know what kind of tea this was).

Go try them! They're also quite healthy.

I picked up some stuff for SusanV's challenge. I already have something planned for that, so you should see that come by some time soon.

My other recipe for the week comes from No Whey, José!. It's their White Pizza with Spinach and Roma Tomatoes. I love pizza and I'll be making this soon. In fact, I just finished kneading the dough.

I stumbled upon their blog yesterday and it is really shiny. Go check it out!

VeganMoFo: Chocolate Coconut Birthday Cake

2007-11-03T23:20:00.000+11:00

Just got home from a friend's 17th birthday party. I feel so sick. Too much junk-food.

At least the birthday cake I made was a success. Her family are Indian vegetarians, and therefore do not eat eggs. This would usually mean no cake. Hence, where I come in. Also, I wanted to eat cake because cake is tasty.

This cake was fabulous. Gooey and chocolaty with a streak of coconut cake in the middle.

So as my contribution to VeganMoFo, I'm going to give a few pointers on getting small-minded omnivorous teenagers to eat tasty vegan food.

1. Presentation is the most important thing ever. It has to look better than the omnivorous alternative to be considered equal. A bit like how women have to work harder to gain the same recognition for their work as men.

2. Perseverance. The first few times you cook something, very few people will touch it. That's okay, even though it hurts. After a while people will get used to the idea of food without cruelty and may even enjoy what you make.

3. If all fails, be secure in the knowledge that you'll probably outlive them. :)

Technorati

2007-11-03T20:19:00.000+11:00

I've created a Technorati Profile for the blog. The username is LentilPenguins.

In the meantime: Pumpkin Scones.

Also: I need to see this film.

VeganMoFo: Herb-Roasted Brussels Sprouts

2007-11-03T04:05:00.000+11:00

Today was the first time in a while that I have had time to cook, so I decided to get rid of all of the vegetables that have been cluttering up my fridge.

I had some potatoes, brussels sprouts and a pumpkin that needed using.

This is a relatively simple side dish that does do something interesting with the flavour of the vegetable.

The Recipe (serves 2):

1/2 cup of brussels sprouts
1 tbsp oil
1 clove of garlic, finely chopped
half an onion, chopped
2 tsp oregano

Pre-heat oven to 175 C. Cut the bottoms off the brussels sprouts, remove the outer leaves and quarter. Mix with oil, garlic, onion and oregano in a baking dish and roast for 10-12 minutes.

My potatoes turned into a side of spicy fries and my pumpkin grew up to become a Pumpkin Chickpea Curry.

VeganMoFo: Pear Winter Salad

2007-11-03T01:15:00.000+11:00

R.'s best friend (R. is my housemate) is learning to play guitar. R. is a pretty mean guitar player and drummer, so he is teaching him how to. This means practice. The result: PAIN in my ears.

So I needed a simple, soothing winter salad.

The Recipe (serves 1):

1 pear
a handful of watercress, tough stems removed
a handful of rocket leaves, chopped coarsely
a handful of lettuce leaves, chopped coarsely
2 tbsp hazelnuts, chopped coarsely (I just halve them)
1/4 cup chickpeas
juice of half a lemon
1/2 tsp fennel seeds
dash of salt
2 tbsp oil

Mix the watercress, rocket and lettuce leaves in a bowl. Crisp up with ice water if needed. Toss through the hazelnuts and chickpeas.

Put the salt and lemon juice in a bowl and stir. Add the fennel seeds. Add oil and mix.

Core the pear and cut lengthwise into strips. Toss through the dressing. Take out the pears and set aside.

Combine dressing and salad and toss. Serve and arrange the pear slices on top.

VeganMoFo

2007-11-03T00:42:00.000+11:00

This month is VeganMoFo, the Vegan Month of Food. It is an initiative by Isa over at The Post Punk Kitchen. The idea is to blog about vegan food once a day throughout November and we're going to give it a try.

Here's the awesome graphic off Don't Eat Off The Sidewalk.

Some of the blogs that are participating:
B36 Kitchen
Don't Eat Off The Sidewalk!
Get Sconed!

Going Label Crazy

2007-11-01T23:28:00.000+11:00

two peas, no pod has a post up about ecotarianism. Although their definition is much more comprehensive, in short, an ecotarian is someone who strives to make the most ethical and sustainable choice in every instance.

I like this label a lot. People tend to assume that because I'm vegan, everything I buy is organic and fair trade (it's the stage of stupid questions after "OMG!? Do you still eat steak?" and "What if you had diabetes?" or "Can calves drink cow's milk?").

I do try to buy mostly organic and local products, but it doesn't necessarily come with the territory. I'd love to be able to make a distinction like this.

It could also be a good way to get away from the recent flurry of excessive labelling (think swegan, flexitarian, pollotarian, pescetarian and librarian).

I'm going ecotarian.

Rum Raisin Brown Rice with Roasted Pumpkin, Parsnip, Apple and Fennel

2007-10-30T08:02:00.000+11:00

I was cooking in an unfamiliar kitchen a while ago, rooting around for something to make the brown rice I was preparing more interesting with. I settled on currants and this recipe is what my mind extrapolated out of that experience.

Also, rum.

The brown rice becomes sweet and flavourful, providing a nice contrast with the spicy kick of the roasted vegetables. It's really filling too!

The Recipe (serves 2):

Rum Raisin Brown Rice

1/4 cup raisins
1 tbsp rum
1 cup brown rice
2 1/2 cups water
1 tbsp lemon juice
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp allspice
1 tsp ginger
1 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp vanilla extract

Pour the rum over the raisins and heat briefly in the microwave until warm. Cover and soak for 30 minutes.

Mix water, lemon juice and vanilla extract in a pan. Rinse and clean the rice and add to the pan with spices and raisins. Stir briefly.

Bring to a gentle simmer and cook for 45-50 minutes, or until the rice is tender.

Roasted Pumpkin, Parsnip, Apple and Fennel

1/4 of a medium pumpkin
1 parsnip
1/2 of a fennel bulb
1 apple
2 tbsp sunflower oil
1 tbsp lemon juice
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ginger
1 tsp allspice
1 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp fennel seeds
1 tsp coriander
1 tsp cumin
a dash of cayenne pepper

Pre-heat oven to 200 C. Peel, core and cube the pumpkin. Cube the parsnip. Combine in a baking dish with oil, lemon juice and spices. Mix through. Set a timer for 45 minutes.

In the meantime, remove fennel stems and the bottom of the bulb. Cube. With 25 minutes left on the timer, add the fennel to the baking dish.

Quarter the apple, core and cube. With 12 minutes left on the timer, add the apple.

Remember to turn the vegetables every now and again with a spatula.

Serve on a bed of rum raisin brown rice.

Fennel and Celeriac Soup

2007-10-29T00:01:00.000+11:00

I got some fennel seeds from a little shop I know in Amsterdam yesterday, so for lunch today, I made the Fennel and Celeriac Soup off vegalicious.

I didn't grind the fennel seeds and the smell of them roasting in the pan was very nice. It smells like what Willy Wonka would do with liquorice.

I replaced the stock and white wine with water and added rosemary. It turned out very well. It's a hearty soup, but with a sweet fennel flavour. The fennel seeds in particular really help accentuate that flavour.

It's a simple soup, but it is aromatic and flavourful. It tastes like it should be complicated.

Peanut Butter Biscuits and Coffee Walnut Cake

2007-10-28T19:34:00.000+11:00

I worked most of today. I got home at about 5pm... and decided to bake biscuits and a cake.

The biscuits are from Vegan With A Vengeance. (You should really buy that book!)

I made half a batch of the Gigantoid Peanut Butter thingies, and added an handful of chopped cooking chocolate. They are tasty.

I also made a cake, because the one that mum tried to make failed spectacularly and she had to make a cake for a work colleague. It was this recipe from Delia Online, that I butchered until it was vegan a few months ago. It is a very tasty cake.

I didn't make the syrup, and I substituted 1/2 cup of vanilla soy yoghurt and 1 flax meal egg for the eggs. I made up the icing recipe... It has no recipe. I just kept adding stuff until it was right. I tried to make some piping decorations, and they looked really swanky, but they blobbed a bit because the icing got a bit soft.

Veganism vs. Vegetarianism

2007-10-28T12:16:00.000+11:00

Bazu, from Where's the Revolution?, invites her readers to rip into a recent article off Slate. Here's my contribution.

The article, "Vegans vs. Vegetarians: What Kind of Diet Is Best for the Environment?" by Brendan I. Koerner, argues that being a vegan probably isn't any better for the environment than being a vegetarian because 1) a Cornell University study suggests that a marginally omnivorous is more efficient than a vegan one and 2) Americans like their steaks?

In an ingenious display of incompetence, this Cornell paper actually turns out to refute the underlying thread of Koerner's argument.

Why? Well, amazingly, the study doesn't actually look at veganism.

What it does do is compare vegetarian diets with omnivorous ones in food production in the State of New York. The authors conclude that a low-fat vegetarian diet is the most efficient one, but that the difference with a responsible omnivorous diet isn't big (the vegetarian diet uses 3/4ths of the land). Some vegetarian diets actually needed more land, and more high-quality land in particular. The cautiously omnivorous diet was also able to outproduce all the other diets, because it could use a lot of low-quality land.

In the end, the study only suggests that dairy farming isn't always better than meat farming.

In contrast, the difference between both an omnivorous and a vegetarian diet and a vegan diet is much more pronounced (see, for instance, Eshel & Martin 2006)*.

Koerner's need to confirm his own beliefs apparently overrides his critical reading skills, and somehow I doubt he'll seriously address the inconsistencies in them.

*Koerner links this study too, but doesn't seem to have, um, read it.

(Where's the Revolution?: time to rip Slate a new one... again)

The Perfect Pancake and Some Other Recipes

2007-10-23T02:54:00.000+10:00

My last post had a recipe for Dutch Pancakes with Apple Pie Filling. I was really pleased with the filling, but I've been experimenting with a better recipe for the pancakes themselves.

I'm quite proud of the result. It really is very nice.

The recipe:

2 cups soy milk
1/2 tbsp lemon juice
1/4 cup apple sauce
1 banana
1/4 cup soy yoghurt
1 cup wholemeal flour
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp cinnamon
plant-based butter, for frying

Add the lemon juice to the soy milk and let stand for a couple of minutes. Blend the banana, soy yoghurt and apple sauce with the milk. Add vanilla extract. In a different bowl, combine flour and cinnamon. Add the milk mixture to the flour and combine.

Heat some butter in a pan and pour 2 ladlefuls of batter into the pan and fry until dry on top. Flip carefully and fry for another 2 minutes.

I really like the lemony vanilla smell that subtly fills the kitchen as you make this. It doesn't disappoint either. You don't need to serve these with anything. They're delicious plain as well. Go make them!

My recipes for the week (I stumbled upon vegalicious today, it's definitely worth having a look at if you haven't heard of it before):
Tofu and Vegetable Cacciatore on Roasted Spaghetti Squash off Fatfree Vegan Kitchen
Gourmet Fennel and Celery Soup off vegalicious

In other news, we've updated the blogroll and improved the lay-out a bit. The place is starting to look like a proper blog!

Dutch Pancakes with Apple Pie Filling

2007-10-20T18:51:00.000+10:00

A friend of mine recently asked me for a vegan pancake recipe. There are many, but most of them are what I see as American-style pancakes. Dutch pancakes are pansize and a lot thinner, like a crêpe, but slightly thicker and less snooty.

You can just get the pre-made pancake mix and substitute bananas for the eggs and soy milk for the milk to make vegan Dutch pancakes, but I have an obsession with making things myself and recipe names that sound shiny.

I wanted to use apples, because apple pancakes are a traditional variation on the basic recipe and because they feature heavily in traditional Dutch baking. Apple pie is also a staple of Dutch baking.

This is what I came up with:

Pancakes:

1 ½ cup wholemeal flour
2 ½ cup soy milk
⅓ cup apple sauce
1 tsp vanilla extract

Combine ingredients and mix well. Heat oil in a pan and use a ladle to pour in enough batter to cover the surface of the pan. Turn after about 5 minutes, or when the surface stops bubbling, and cook for another 2 to 3 minutes. Keep warm in the oven and serve with apple pie filling. The recipe makes 4 to 5 pancakes.

Apple Pie Filling:

2 apples, cored and sliced
1 tbsp raisins
½ lemon
½ tbsp brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp allspice
1 tsp ginger

Mix the juice of half the lemon with the apple slices and add the raisins, sugar and spices. Mix through. Sauté for 5 minutes, or until the apple slices are browned and tender. Keep warm in the oven or allow to cool to room temperature, and spread on top of the pancakes.

Edit: I've added a more flavourful pancake recipe for this here.

Apple Mulberry Crumble

2007-10-20T14:54:00.000+10:00

Mmmmm, crumble. Tasty, cinnamon flavoured apple and juicy purple mulberries topped with crunchy, buttery crumble.

Recipe:

700 g canned apple pie fruit with cinnamon
300 g frozen mulberries
3/4 cup plain flour (I used mostly wholemeal)
1/2 cup loosely packed brown sugar
90 g dairy-free butter
1/2 cup rolled oats
a handful of slivered almonds

Preheat oven to 200C. Spoon the apple and mulberries into a 6-cup baking pan. Stir well to combine.

Put the flour, sugar and butter in a blender, and pulse until it resembles bread crumbs. Pour into a bowl, and stir in the oats and almonds. Sprinkle the mixture over the apple and mulberries.

Bake for 25-30mins, or until lightly browned on top.

I also made lemon and poppy seed muffins from Vegan With A Vengeance. They are nice but a tad bland. I'd replace some of the rice milk with lemon juice next time.

Mulberry Muffins

2007-10-20T14:19:00.002+10:00

I made these muffins last week. They are more like cupcakes than muffins, as the latter implies a degree of healthyness. These are not healthy. Delicious, though.

I've personally never experienced vegan cakes being too dense (as so many people seem to think they are), but they can be a bit crumbly. This is true for these muffins, which is not a bad thing in this case. Eat over a plate.

Mulberry Muffins (adapted from the Blueberry Muffins recipe in 500 Cupcakes by Fergal Connolly)

125 g sugar
1 tbsp lemon zest
265 g plain flour (I used a mixture of wholemeal and white plain flour)
1 tbsp baking powder
1/2 cup vanilla soy yoghurt
225 ml soy/rice milk
115 g dairy-free butter, melted
1 tsp vanilla essence
225 g fresh mulberries

Preheat oven to 200C. Line a 12-cup muffin tin. I used silicone muffin cups, but I think paper liners would be better for these as they are very delicate.

In a large bowl, whisk together the sugar, lemon zest, flour and baking powder.

In a small bowl, whisk together the soy yoghurt, soy milk, dairy-free butter and vanilla. Add to dry ingredients and whisk until just combined (there should be streaks of flour). Fold in the mulberries, taking care not to turn the batter pink.

Spoon into the muffin cups - a plastic Chinese soup spoon is ideal for this. Bake for approximately 20 minutes. Remove from the oven and transfer to a cooling rack.

They are best when hot, but remain tasty with time. Storing them in a container in the fridge isn't a good idea, as they go a bit soggy. Try just on a plate covered with a tea towel.

Cauliflower in a Cashew Sauce

2007-10-18T09:37:00.000+10:00

Spotted this recipe while browsing Vegan Dad a couple of days ago and I immediately knew I had to make it.

Cauliflower is one of Adele's favourite vegetables and she is also particularly fond of cashews, and I try to master recipes I know she'll enjoy too. On top of that, it looked really tasty.

Finally, it gave me an excuse to buy some Yofu.

Yofu!

I love this stuff. It's pretty much the only soy yoghurt available here, but that's okay, because it rocks. It is the tastiest of them all.

Anyway, on to the recipe. I made some minor changes, putting some extra whole cashews I had left over in the mixture after blending and leaving out the garam masala (I didn't have any). I also added some chunks of tofu (as per Vegan Dad's recommendation), sautéing them for about 5 minutes first and then cooking them with the cauliflower and mushrooms for the last 2 minutes.

The tofu chunks were probably my favourite part of the meal. They were very crispy and flavourful and, particularly in combination with the sweet raisins and tender, creamy cauliflower, they really complemented the rest of the dish.

The whole cashews were a good addition too. They made the sauce just that little bit more cashewy.

I'm definitely making this again. Thanks Vegan Dad!

Shiny Happy Hummus

2007-10-17T06:51:00.000+10:00

I admit to being a complete Fatfree Vegan Kitchen fanboy. Susan's recipes are inventive, healthy and sooo tasty...

Her Mini Crustless Tofu Quiches in particular are amazing. I'm envious of her photography skills (everything looks fresh and delicious on that blog).

Anyway, I've been meaning to try one of her hummus recipes. I make hummus just about every week and it's one of the things I use to show sceptics how tasty vegan food can be.

So, today, I made Shiny Happy Hummus. If only for the name, I had to make this. It adds carrots to her basic hummus recipe, giving it a depth of flavour (and shiny orange colour) that is really worth trying.

I'd definitely recommend making the full, spiced up recipe. The paprika, ginger and cayenne layered over the almost sweet carrots add a nice kick to an otherwise light hummus.

I had it with carrot, capsicum and cucumber sticks, but it works on bread or with a salad as well.

Tomorrow, I'll be trying the Cauliflower in a Cashew Sauce recipe I mentioned earlier.

Pizza and Some Recipes

2007-10-16T03:23:00.000+10:00

Today, I made Red Lentil & Rice Patties off Albion Cooks. I used brown rice and de Puy lentils and added tahini, which really came through well in the burger. It was really nice, even though I failed to persuade it to stay together, but it wasn't particularly photogenic.

I made this the night before. It's Asparagus and Lentil Whole Wheat Pizza. It uses a tomato sauce made from fresh cherry tomatoes which surprised me pleasantly.

For this week, I'm hoping to try these two at least:
Apple Crumble Cake Quickbread off The Student Stomach
Cauliflower in a Cashew Sauce off Vegan Dad

How Societies Evolved: Part I

2007-10-15T18:30:00.000+10:00

Recently, I've been reading Human Societies by Patrick Nolan and Gerhard Lenski. It is one of those books that confirms what you know, but puts it in a context that is surprising and illuminating. This is the start to an overview of the salient points of their theory.

Human societies have been around for some 100,000 years and it is strange to think that for the majority of that time they were very simple, hunter-gatherer societies. Modern societies are a very recent development.

(San Bushmen, Kalahari Desert, Namibia, photo by Mark Read, taken from China Frontier)

So, what did those societies look like?

They were small, about 50 people to a tribe. They needed to be small, because they were nomadic and survived off the food they could forage and hunt, which wasn't a lot.

This suggests a sparsity of food and a picture of famine and hardship. Surprisingly, though, this may not have been true at all. Marshall Sahlins, in Stone Age Economics, works out that people in hunter-gatherer societies would need to spend about 6 hours a day gathering food to live comfortably. That is less than some of their modern counterparts and definitely an improvement on some of the classes that were to follow in stratified societies. The lower classes in agrarian and horticultural societies, for example, arguably led much tougher lives, even up until only a few centuries ago.

There doesn't seem to have been much specialisation in these societies. Because they were nomadic, possessions would have been of limited use and the ability to mobilise everyone in harsher times would have been vital. Set roles and stark inequalities would have been detrimental to their survival. Even priests may not have enjoyed much special status.

A lack of materialism also creates a relative lack of warfare. War is costly and people especially are a valuable resource. These tribes had little incentive to fight each other. It still happened, of course, and you can imagine that it is still attractive when, for instance, changes in climate force the hunting and gathering grounds of two tribes together, but it was far less frequent than in later societies.

(Cave paintings at Lascaux, France)

These were some of the most egalitarian societies mankind has ever seen. In fact, they've been called the first communist societies. They were also amazingly peaceful.

I can definitely see the attraction in instilling them with a utopian quality, but I think it's somewhat naive as well. These societies needed stifling taboos on promiscuity to keep population in check and it's unrealistic to think there would have been no division of labour. They may have generally been peaceful, but that was because there was little to gain from fighting and, even despite that, we do see some quite violent tribes. A small, but significant, proportion of these societies practised slavery.

These societies did have the potential within them to evolve into more unequal and violent societies. The distribution of roles between genders, men primarily active as hunters and women as gatherers, for instance, even if not as pronounced as it's often made out to be, eventually developed into the patriarchal structures we see today.

There's no question that particularly the first of these were uniquely egalitarian and remarkably attuned to the environment around them, though.

So, how then did these evolve to eventually become the violent and heavily stratified societies of Mesopotomia and Old Testament Israel?

That's up in Part II.

Mulberries!

2007-10-15T17:17:00.000+10:00

Last Sunday afternoon, after working from 7.30am, I went mulberry picking. One of our friends from up the road has a huge mulberry tree and is basically begging people to take mulberries... so I now have enough to last a small African nation some years. This is the 1/4 of the takings that wouldn't fit in the freezer:

I made mulberry tarts. I used some leftover pate brisee dough that I had made for mini vegan cheesecakes (recipe in future post), which is pretty simple. One recipe makes enough to line two 12-cup muffin tins. I filled them with leftover cooked cheesecake mixture, because I was too lazy to make pastry cream. It made a fine substitution. I glazed them with qatar sugar syrup, with some arrowroot added.

They look fantastic and are delicious. The tart case is crisp and biscuit-like, and the sugar syrup oozes out to form sticky, sugary (but tasty!) residue on your hands, face and computer desk. Even my mum said they were fantastic, and she has some personal meme that my baking often fails because it's vegan.

Recipe

Pâte Brisée:
(adapted from Baking Bites. Feel free to halve this, unless you want to freeze some for later)

2 cups plain flour
2/3 cup wholemeal plain flour
1 tsp salt
1 tbsp vanilla sugar (sugar with vanilla bean pods in the jar, basically)
1 cup dairy-free butter
1/2 cup cold water

Put flour, salt, sugar in a blender and pulse to combine. Then add the butter in chunks, and pulse until it resembles coarse breadcrumbs. Pour water in slowly, until the dough seems to be forming larger balls. The dough shouldn't be sticky, or too wet, but it should hold together if you squeeze it. Put the ball of dough in a zip-lock bag in the fridge for at least 2 hours.

Grease a 12-cup muffin pan with dairy-free butter or vegetable oil. Preheat the oven to 180C. Flour a clean surface, grab a chunk of dough (rolling it out in batches is easiest) and roll it out with a heavy rolling pin. It should be about 1/2 cm thick, roughly. Use a large round biscuit cutter to cut out circles, then press these gently into the muffin pan.

I used silicone muffin cups to blind bake the dough, but baking paper would also work. Place a silicone muffin cup or square of baking paper in each dough-lined muffin cup. Fill with baking beans. Bake in the oven for 25mins, then remove the silicone muffin cups. Put back into the oven until golden brown, about 10mins. You can fill them when they are cool.

Filling:

A large handful of mulberries, washed and stemmed
A small bowl of pastry cream, or leftover vegan cheesecake mixture

Dollop the pastry cream into each of the tart cases, just enough to cover the bottom and provide a bit of sticking for the berries. Fill the tart cases with mulberries.

Glaze:
(adapted from Classic Vegetarian Cooking, by Habeeb Salloum)

1/2 cup vanilla sugar
1/4 cup water
squeeze of lemon juice
1 tbsp arrowroot

Put the sugar and water in a pot, and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until the sugar is completely dissolved. This may take as long as 10mins. Remove from heat, stir in lemon juice and arrowroot. Bring to the boil, then simmer until the mixture goes clear.

Allow to cool a bit, then spoon or brush over the berries. It won't set completely like gelatine glaze, but that just makes it more juicy and tasty.

Next post: Mulberry muffins. And maybe cake.

Hello

2007-10-15T01:21:00.000+10:00

Hello,

We just started this blog and we'll try to get it up in the air in a couple of days (there will be mulberries!).

In the meantime, I guess you can marvel at my weird name. Oh, and there's a blogroll.

See ya.