Planet VeGMeL

Kale Chips I can’t believe it took me this long to make...

2010-09-07T19:12:22+00:00

Kale Chips

I can’t believe it took me this long to make these things. Not only are they insanely easy, they’re also delicious and really satisfying to make. Inspired by this post, I stemmed and chopped some curly kale, tossed it with a little cayanne, salt and olive oil, spread the leaves on a baking tray and baked them in a lowish oven (less than 150C) until they had dried, browned and crisped up.

They’re ready to eat straight away, which is good because I can’t stop picking at them.

Quit fucking around and make yourself some kale chips.

Mexico, the verdict

2010-09-07T11:09:52+00:00

I still love Mexican food, and I had a lot of fun trying new ingredients such as the chayote and the plethora of peppers.

I liked making Mexican at home, the bright colour and inviting smells make dinner extra tempting, and it reminded me of having burritos as kids – it always felt like a treat, like takeaway from the kitchen. I will be making tacos and burritos on a regular basis (as always) but I look forward to finding more corn tortillas instead of the flour ones.

I also had a lot of fun using my newly purchased liquid smoke, which made a decent knock off of the tofu asada topping from Trippy Taco, without the asada-smoke in the kitchen.

Mexican is one cuisine i think I really could live off without getting bored.

I only wish I could have tried more recipes, but we must go on to a new country!

Next week… Tanzania!

Picadillo and a Bean Bonanza

2010-09-07T10:51:52+00:00

Picadillo is a mince-based dish, sometimes eaten alone, and sometimes used as a filling for various tortilla dishes like burritos and tacos. It is served in many countries, including the Phillipines, and is basically just mince and vegetables.

I used this recipe from MexicanFoodie and served it up with some rice cooked with tomatoes, chillies, capsicum and onions, as a sort of Mexican Risotto.

It was the perfect weeknight dinner- fast, filling, tasty, and with a nice protein hit from the vegan mince we used.

Picadillo and rice - not exactly photogenic

On the last day of Mexico week, it was time to make refried beans. I had a lot of bits and pieces in the cupboard and the fridge, and decided to turn this into meal less ordinary, with some inspiration drawn from Vegan Mexican Food’s 7 layer Fiesta Bean Dip.

I used variations on this recipe to produce to versions of refired beans: a typical kidney bean version with chilli, and my own canellini (white) bean version with some nooch, liquid smoke and cumin.

I made a quick red salsa and green salsa, and mashed some avocado, then layered them to make a 5 layered bean dip in the colours of the Mexican flag (kinda, and with repeats).

It was tasty and filling, and I served it with steamed vegies and some bread. Top marks, if I do say so myself, for creative use of fridge dregs.

Layers - not exactly neat, but you get the idea

Its pretty from this angle

Port Fairy - a welcome break

2010-09-06T22:09:00+00:00

We got back from a relaxing few days in Port Fairy yesterday. No blogging, not much tv, lots of reading, and early nights. The rain pelted down, the wind howled, but we were snug in a cottage with a warm fire and lots of good food. I was glad we took a box of food with us but we managed quite a few meals out and E struck up a good relationship with the local fish and chip shop.

Here is our kitchen with Sylvia's high chair tucked out of view. Quite symbolic really, given that she preferred to sit on a regular kitchen chair for meals despite being hardly able to see over the top of the table. Last night we had a guest in our kitchen - the hungriest cat I have ever met. He was even eating chickpeas that fell from Sylvia's plate.

The cottage had a feel of yesteryear with old books and photographs around the room. We lit a wood stove each night to keep us warm. E was quite pleased that Sylvia kept yelling "daddy" and pointing at the picture of the UK's King George VI, Queen Mary and Princess Margaret.

Outside the front door was a tree in blossom. It was shaken about by the rain and wind by the time we left but a lovely reminder that the warm days of spring are on the way.

On our first morning, we went to Rebecca's Cafe for brunch. I had toast, baked beans, avocado, spinach and grilled tomatoes. I loved the food. I loved the old wooden high chair that Sylvia sat in. I loved the service and the ambiance.

I loved Sylvia's compote of rhubarb and berries, even without the yoghurt that it usually comes with. I loved that Sylvia ate quite a few of the strawberries. I loved that the compote wasn't too sweet or overcooked but had fantastic flavour.

I even loved E's wild rice porridge, despite him ordering it without rhubarb and berries that it usually comes with. It was more rice pudding than porridge. Soft, nutty and slightly chewy, it was sweetened with maple syrup and a little spicy. I liked it so much I ordered it on our last morning but was disappointed at how little fruit was served with it and found it too sweet to finish the large serving. It was great in small doses.

After my initial love of Rebecca's we returned twice and neither visit was as fantastic as the first time. It still seemed the best place for brunch and I would return for the vegie breakfast and the fruit compote. E also loved his big brekkie. I tried a cake which had been in the fridge too long but would have loved to try the ice creams.

On Saturday, I had a lovely soft lentil burger with salad, avocado, sweet chilli sauce and satay sauce which was delicious but I wasn't keen on the way it was served in parts. However it was the end of a morning when everything went wrong, Sylvia was ratty and I was so disorganised I forgot my camera. A peaceful afternoon when Sylvia slept for 3 hours and we read our books was just what we needed to overcome the morning.

We also had lunch at the Hub on the corner next door to Rebecca's. Port Fairy caters well for vegetarians and gluten free folk. I even noticed that the local pizza place had GF pizza bases. It is that sort of place. The Hub had a few veg options. I had the pesto arancini (rice balls) with chips and salad. E chose the sweet potato and cashew curry. Sylvia had toasted cheese sandwiches. The food was nice but not outstanding. However, the staff get bonus points for being tolerant of Sylvia's shenanigans with a noisy toy lawn mower!

The one restaurant I would have loved to visit was the Merrijig Inn (reviewed by Cindy and Michael earlier this year). Unfortunately, a small toddler didn't see the right accessory for a fine dining establishment so our dinners were more of the fish and chip variety. I also managed to bake some pasties (coming soon) to eat on a couple of nights and took some tinned soup.

Our fish and chip shop of choice was Wisharts at the Wharf just near our cottage. The potato cakes were a bit low on the batter but the chips were crisp and golden. We didn't plan to go there three nights in a row but it was cheap, close and comforting. And if you went walking along the waterfront in the evening, the smell was very tempting. Sylvia loved the chips and they were easy take away food.

It is the first time I have visited Port Fairy outside of their famous folk festival. During the festival the streets are filled with lively and colourful crowds, but this week it was more subdued, though friendly nevertheless. On our last day we went for a walk to Griffiths Island to see the lighthouse (photo at top of post). True to the weather of our holiday it was sunshine one moment and heavy rain the next. The rocky seaside and fierce waves were a reminder that the town was originally a whaling station and saw many ship wrecks.

We left feeling relaxed and refreshed. There were places we didn't get a chance to visit (The History Centre on Gipps Street and the Clonmara tea rooms on the Princes Hiighway) but we enjoyed our stay. Above is a photo of some of the goodies we took home. E and I indulged in some nostalgia at an op shop with bargain purchases of the Scotland Yard board game and the Patsy Biscoe Nursery Rhyme record. Sylvia chose a toy lawn mower that makes a noise when she pushes it. We also did a bit of shopping at gourmet food stores and a sample of the food can be seen above too. It is just that sort of place!

Rebecca's Café
70 Sackville Street
03 5568 2555

The Hub @ Port Fairy
15 Bank Street
03 5568 2326

Wisharts at the Wharf
King George Square
29 Gipps St
(03) 5568 1884

Orchard Cottages
18 Gipps Street
Tel: 03 5568 2487 Mob: 0428 326 012
Email: orchardcottages@port-fairy.com
Web: http://www.port-fairy.com/orchardcottage/

Purple Pies

2010-09-06T19:55:00+00:00

OK, so the pies weren't purple. But the side dishes I served with the pies were VERY purple. When I decided to make 2 purple sides I thought it would look cool, but they ended up looking kind of strange (& D was very suspicious). Of course, as we all know, colour doesn't affect taste!I finally got around to making Cindy's I-can't-believe-it's-not-meat pies. My gravy was a mix of Massel 'beef' stock & red wine, with extra flavouring added by vegan worcestershire sauce & black pepper. It didn't thicken up much (even when I added extra cornflour), so next time I'll probably use slightly less than the 2 cups of liquid. I also used about double the quantity of mushrooms because I have a whole bag of them in the fridge that need to get used.

I served the pies with a purple cauliflower mash - which ended up looking kind of grey because most of the lovely purple colour seeped into the cooking water. It was still delicious though - I just mashed it with a dash of the cooking water, olive oil, some salt & pepper. Next to the mash is steamed purple cabbage - mixed with olive oil, salt & pepper - yum!

The verdict? A delicious, pretty simple dinner. Next time I'll probably follow Cindy's suggestion & make a cheat's gravy with powder :-)

August 28, 2010: Kimchi

2010-09-06T18:23:00+00:00

Our vegie box has been loading us up with more cabbage than we can eat lately (there's only so many times you can have spring rolls for dinner!), so Cindy suggested we try to make kimchi with our stockpile.

We started with this incredibly simple recipe and then simplified it even more (mostly because we had no spring onions in the house). The measurements were all pretty imprecise too (mostly because I was in charge and couldn't be bothered weighing anything), but things seemed to work out pretty well. I cut down the chilli powder a bit to try to make sure our kimchi didn't turn out insanely hot but it still had a pretty impressive kick.

To ensure we weren't blown away, we mixed a cup or so of the kim chi with some chopped up tofu, spinach and coriander and Cindy made these fantastic little dumplings that had just a hint of fermented spicy goodness. We probably could have upped the kim chi quotient a little, but this was a nice gentle start to our kimchi eating experiences.

Kimchi

white cabbage (I'm guessing we had about 500g), roughly chopped

10-15g of minced ginger
4 cloves of garlic, minced
1 level tablespoon of chilli powder
1 - 2 tablespoons of soy sauce
1 tablespoon of sugar
1/4 cup of salt

Lay the chopped cabbage out on a baking tray and slather with the salt - you want to make sure all the leaves are pretty well salted. Let it sit for half an hour or so, to draw out the cabbage's moisture.

Drain and rinse the cabbage leaves thoroughly.

Stir all the ingredients together, making sure everything is evenly distributed. Store the mix in an airtight container for around 2 days - I read in various places that it's meant to bubble when it's ready. I'm not sure that ours hit the bubbling stage, but there was a definite release of built up gas when we opened the lid, suggesting things had fermented pretty well.

Tacos

2010-09-06T10:35:18+00:00

I cheated on this recipe. There, I said it. I didn’t use anything like a traditional, authentic Mexican recipe. I didn’t even use a recipe. I sorta just made these up.

This was because i was having trouble differentiating the TexMex from the Mex on the net, the library was out of Mexican cook books (they’re back now, of course), and I actually made this before Niki posted her helpful comment.

So, I decided to make tacos, using the wonderful soft corn tortillas I got at AztecMexican. I made Salsa Roja (tomato and chilli) and Salsa Verde (green capsicum, cucumber, onion and chilli), and fried up some tofu with liquid smoke and teriyaki sauce (an oddly wonderful combination) to go with it. I added some mashed avocado, and suddenly we had a really fresh, tasty dinner, that was, almost, Mexican.

So I hope you don’t feel cheated by my cheating, but I wont be adding anything more about the origin of tacos, or any traditional recipe. Instead, I’m just adding the photos, and as a bonus for anyone who does feel cheated, a picture of our cats, Frances and Toby.

Corn Tortillas

Salsa Roja

Salsa Verde

The spread

A delicious soft taco

Awkwardly sleeping cats

Vegan Edinburgh II

2010-09-06T10:14:27+00:00

Apart from my go-to places, I enjoyed a whole bunch of vegan meals while in Edinburgh…

The Forest, Bristo Place, Edinburgh

Everyone kept telling me this was the place for me, and I was dying to check it out. However, I had three failed attempts before I finally got to eat there a few days before I left town. Food is cheap, healthy and fully veg with majority vegan-optional.

Vegan beast with coleslaw – seitan and a creamy sweet dried tomato sauce wrap

Soup and salad for a fiver

But The Forest is more than a cafe. It is an arts collective that run events, throw parties, publish books and more. (Think Format in Adelaide and add a veg cafe.) It is an incredible space and the crew that run it are smart, energetic and inspiring. I discovered The Forest late but spent a lot of time there in the end. I had a ridiculously happy night there dancing. Sam and I found zines in the downstairs lounge. I spent a hungover morning napping on the couches. If I lived in Edinburgh I would hang at the Forest all the time.

Any place with a hair and vodka salon is alright by me…

Henderson’s Vegetarian Restaurant

Henderson’s of Edinburgh is a restaurant with an attached bistro and food shop in New Town. The food is mostly tasty, if a little bland, and overpriced considering it is all served from a bain marie. Few vegan options, but everything is marked, including the wine list.

Nut roast on sweet potato mash with red wine jus. Amazing ginger and plum cake in background – together set me back about £13, I think.

Three-bean chili with savoury rice, fairly bland but filling. Bonus, included four kinds of beans – aduki, black, kidney and chickpea. £8

They had a good range of beer but I fell in love with Black Isle blonde – seriously awesome.

Urban Angel, Edinburgh

Overpriced organic tapas + very few vegan options = Urban Angel.

Patatas bravas, hommus and pita bread, house salad

David Bann’s Vegetarian Restaurant

This is the place everyone told me I had to go. Like, everyone. So on my last day in Edinburgh I went with a friend. And it was ace! Beautiful restaurant, chilled service, amazing food, great wine. FULL MARKS to David Bann.

Gingery yaki-udon. Bit sauce heavy but the fried, house-smoked tofu was outta this world. Seriously amazing.

House-made vegan icecream!!!

Engine Shed Cafe, St Leonard’s Place, Edinburgh

The Engine Shed is a very cute vego cafe that employs people with learning disabilities. Food is pretty good, and very cheap. Everything is marked V or GF and the staff know what is in everything, which is ace. Picked up some homemade vegan biscuits here also, which were fantastic!

Excellent cashew nut pie, with a potato and a lentil salad. Not pictured: worst. coffee. ever.

There is a guide to vegan Edinburgh here, though it is a little out of date.

More photos on flickr – British food 2010.

East Brunswick Club - Weekend Breakfast II

2010-09-06T08:56:00+00:00

For Greg's first Father's Day I told him that I would take him for a meal of his choice & he decided that he would like to go back to EBC for breakfast & try the pancakes.

I was quite hungry so got the Vegan Big Breakfast (which Greg got last time) & he went for The Elvis pancakes.
My breakfast was good, but I am still not sure that I love their scrambled tofu, although I think it was better than last time. The toast is also much better, it is now turkish bread & it comes with nuttelex on it. But the whole time I was jealously watching Greg eat his pancakes because they looked amazing! I had a little bit & they were so, so good - fluffy & perfect. They came with heaps of maple syrup, fake bacon, banana, ice cream & peanut butter. Greg really enjoyed them & I want to go back next weekend & eat this.

Vegan Big Breakfast

The Elvis Pancakes

Breakfast is available on weekends from 12-4pm & they now also do $12 parmas on the weekend after 2pm.

East Brunswick Club

280 Lygon Street

East Brunswick

03 9388 9794

Vegan Edinburgh I

2010-09-06T05:20:28+00:00

As mentioned, my food intake was pretty hit and miss for the first part of my Edinburgh stay. Cos I was staying in a house I thought I would cater for myself all the time, but actually when I ate, it was mostly out.

The Baked Potato Shop and a felafel joint saw a lot of my business – they were cheap, filling and protein-heavy. Important.

The Baked Potato Shop, Cockburn Street, Edinburgh

Step one, say Co-burn not Cock-burn Street.

Step two, queue for up to 25 mins; this joint is popular and the staff are rubbish.

Step three, order a small or medium potato based on hunger. Note that a medium potato weighs approx a kilo when fully loaded, and never under any circumstances order a large (suicide).

Tattie with haggis – appealing, nut- and lentil-filled mess. Bit dry but very tasty.

Tattie with hummus and spinach salad

A huge potato will cost around £3.50 and fill you up for hours.

Elfelafel, Bristo Place, Edinburgh

So… felafels can be the bane of the travelling vegan. Tasty, yeah, and widely available, but… boring when you have to eat it all the time. Elfelafel was a bit of a fall-back for me, cos they are always open and it was a quick and cheap way to fill up. £3.45 for a huge felafel roll.

Gourmet Burger Kitchen, George St, Edinburgh

Overpriced ‘fancy’ burgers, but this place was about two minutes walk from Charlotte Square and had a book listing every ingredient in every burger, so I ran there when I needed food quickly.

Ridiculously stacked veggie stack

Crooked felafel burger

Gourmet Burger Kitchen burgers are pricey, at around £6-7 for just a burger, but quite tasty. There are outlets right across the UK.

As in London, I think being veg is harder in Edinburgh than Melbourne. When eating at non-veg places, choices are pretty limited, especially if you want protein. However, labelling is definitely better, and most things at the supermarket have ‘suitable for vegetarians’ or ‘suitable for vegans’ on them.

My friend Noni made me a jar of gingerbread dinosaurs and...

2010-09-05T23:28:00+00:00

My friend Noni made me a jar of gingerbread dinosaurs and castles For my birthday. They’re so chewy and soft and spicy.

Where's The Beef Week - Day 7 - Curried Eggplant Soup

2010-09-05T19:50:00+00:00

The final night of my Where's The Beef week! It has been ages since I have had a week where every meal has been a winner taste-wise & that us exactly what has happened this week. I am actually keen to try more recipes from Cindy & Michael's blog now since I have had such good results.

I love eggplant & I love soup so I was pretty excited to make Curried Eggplant Soup (which was via Yeah that vegan shit via Fatfree vegan kitchen), but it was probably my least favourite meal of the week. My curry powder is kind of old though so I think that might have been an issue. That being said, I did have leftovers for lunch the next week & I did like it a lot more & I did like the soft chunks of eggplant in it.

Coffees of Edinburgh

2010-09-05T19:31:43+00:00

Coffee in Edinburgh is prolly even worse than London… I got very used to ordering an Americano and loading it up with sugar to make it palateable. Mostly I drank filter coffee in the yurt, however, I sometimes wandered further afield:

The Grind House, Newington

This was … ok. Americano is like a long black but usually comes with milk on the side.

Press Cafe, Edinburgh

I tried a latte at Press because I hadn’t had a milky coffee in weeks and I was craving. Bad move. It looked pretty though.

Artisan Roast, Broughton St, Edinburgh

Jackpot!! Artisan Roast are ace. Cute cafe, hot baristas and the coffee is fantastic. Go here if you are in Edinburgh.

Penguin Engagement Cake

2010-09-05T19:05:00+00:00

Yesterday Cind y and I teamed up to make a cake for an engagement party for friends Craig and Bec. Craig loves penguins and they both have fake penguin themed names on facebook and so I though it was fitting to put something penguin related on top.

It was a much more pleasant experience decorating a cake with someone else, there was none of the usual swearing, frustration, tears and stress. It also helps that Cindy has a very steady hand and was quite brave and quick in her icing abilities. It did however take about 4 trips to the supermarket because we were not particularly organised but I was really pleased with the finished picture:

Taste wise, it was a slight let down. I chose a vegan mud cake recipe that looked and smelt quite rich but was not very sweet and kind of bland. We used the same technique that I used to make the stumpy dog cake to decorate the cake. So basically using toothpicks/skewer to make dots around the outline. Although, in this case instead of tracing the picture, Cindy drew it onto baking paper free hand because she is super awesome. For the icing we used a black icing pen to do the outline first and then coloured in the white bits with a basic 'butter' cream and then added pomegranate molasses and vegan food colouring to make the other parts pink. The darker parts that look black in this photo were actually brown and made from melted chocolate. Cindy and I have gone halves in a 2.5kg bag of dark chocolate from here so we had plenty to use. We then used the icing pen to do the eyes and to go over the outline again. Unlike the stumpy cake we didn't pipe the icing just used teaspoons to smooth the icing into place after roughly piping it in some places. It resulted in a much finer texture and look which I preferred but would have been quite timing consuming if I was doing it myself.

Here is Bec with a piece:

Photo Spam!

2010-09-05T18:48:00+00:00

Soooo, group project of D00M is eating our brains and our lives, so I'm just gonna share some photos of food I've eaten/made in the last couple of weeks. (I am still in love with my Mr Bento box!)

Veganomicon chilli lentil and grilled pineapple soup, YUM

Mum's birthday curry dinner leftovers :)

Miso-tahini dressing from Veganomicon

Chickpeas, blondies from Vegan Cookies Take Over Your Cookie Jar, and lemony garlic roast potatoes from Veganomicon, ohhhh so deeply satisfying. OMG I could live on these. 3 !

Lentil, barley and vegetable soup. I have been partying pretty...

2010-09-05T18:19:00+00:00

Lentil, barley and vegetable soup.

I have been partying pretty hard lately so I thought I should take some measure to ensure I don’t get sick and die. I made this huge pot of soup, filled with onion, garlic, carrot, broccoli, potato, mushroom, zucchini, kale, barley, lentils, oregano, and bay leaves.

In a big pot with some heated rice bran oil I added a diced onion, 3 cloves of garlic, and all the chopped veggies, except for the kale. I let these guys sizzle for a few minutes before adding about 6-7 cups of water, the barley, lentils, and herbs. This simmered for about half an hour (adding the kale 10 minutes before the end) or until the barley and lentils were tender. I then added a heap of Braggs and salt to taste, and dressed it with some home-made coriander pesto.

Beany goodness

2010-09-05T17:18:00+00:00

I know it's still freezing cold in Melbourne, but I'm getting sick of stews, so decided to make something a bit different for lunch next week. I've been eyeing off this recipe for Bigilla for a while so thought I'd make some Hummus to go with it.That's the hummus in the front - in my opinion it's the best dip ever invented. No wonder it's been around for so long. The bigilla is in the back - I didn't have any fresh parsley on hand so substituted with fresh rosemary - delicious!Along with carrot & celery sticks these dips make the perfect healthy lunch!Because I was away last weekend my schedule was all mucked up, so I got my veg delivery on Friday instead. A good selection this week:

Rainbow Chard
Leek
Purple cauliflower (I'd like to make a cool purple mash with this)
Potatoes
Zucchini
Carrots
Celery
Corn
Broccoli
Pumpkin
Rosemary

August 28, 2010: Espresso & oat truffles

2010-09-05T13:33:00+00:00

On the weekend Michael and I helped a friend move house. She's an almost-neighbour that we swap cat-sitting favours and keep spare keys with; we're sad that she's moving further away from us but very happy that she's found a gorgeous house and terrific gardening space to call her own out in the country. Not everything went to plan but we got the job done and the picnic lunch I prepared the night before became a celebratory dinner, eaten on the floor in Jos' grand new living area and washed down with champagne. We started with silverbeet calzone and then moved on to cheese, fruit and these espresso and oat truffles.

The truffle recipe is from Green Kitchen Stories and seems to be inspired by a Danish Christmas sweet that I'm unfamiliar with. I'm just keen for new no-bake treats that make use of the ingredients that are typically in my pantry. (And I've just decided, whilst perusing other such recipes in our archives, that they deserve their own label.) These ones get their bulk from oats and coconut, sweetness from dates and a smooth truffle texture from coconut oil. Everything gets blended up in the food processor and then rolled into balls - it couldn't be simpler. I found the mixture too sloppy once processed so I added a little extra coconut and oats to the original quantity and gave it a little time in the fridge to allow the coconut oil to firm up.

I would have preferred these to be a little sweeter but Michael loved them just as they are. A week later we're both thoroughly enjoying a second batch that substitutes rice bubbles for the oats, has a smidge of agave nectar for sweetness, and is much stronger on the coffee aroma. They're definitely a worthy addition to the no-bake treat rotation - simple to prepare, using common pantry ingredients and amenable to substitutions for taste and convenience.

Espresso & oat truffles
(based on a recipe at Green Kitchen Stories)

15 fresh dates (or soak dried dates in water for half an hour and drain)
5 tablespoons rolled oats
3 tablespoons dessicated coconut
2 tablespoons coconut oil
2 tablespoons cocoa
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon cardamom
1 shot espresso, cooled
extra dessicated coconut and/or rolled oats for rolling

Use a food processor to mix together the first 8 ingredients. Taste the mixture and adjust the flavour to your liking.

If the mixture is too mushy to be rolled, refrigerate it for 15-30 minutes so that the coconut oil solidifies. When the mixture is ready, roll it into balls and coat them in coconut or oats. Refrigerate the balls further before eating.

Hot Chocolate, how I love you

2010-09-05T10:07:24+00:00

Hot chocolate is perhaps my favourite way to chase away the winter shivers, and its even better when its home made. I could write an essay on all the different ways to make fantastic vegan hot chocolate, but this isn’t the time.

Today, its time to talk about Mexican hot chocolate.

I tried two kinds of Mexican hot chocolate this week: Basic, everyday, hot chocolate, and Champurrado, a thick hot chocolate drink made with masa dough. I didn’t want to limit myself to just one, Mexico being the birthplace of chocolate, after all.

Box of Mexican chocolate disks

I bought a packet of “proper” Mexican chocolate from AztecMexican. Its very different from chocolate as we know it. This was dark, had a rough texture and visible raw sugar crystals, and was very dry in comparison to the chocolate we’re used to in Australia. This version also had cinnamon in it, meaning I didn’t need to add any to the pot.

Disk of chocolate

The basic hot chocolate is very simple to make. Just take 1 cup of vegan milk (soy, rice, oat, almond, whatever), and heat it, careful not to burn or boil, in a small saucepan. When its hot, add the chocolate, and whisk until it is melted, well combined, and a little frothy. Then drink.

Mmmm, steaming hot chocolate

The champurrado is a little harder. It is similar to ordinary hot chocolate, but its thickened with masa dough (corn meal), and flavoured with anise. I used this recipe, substituting a mixture of soy and almond milks for the dairy, and using golden syrup instead of molasses. It turned out a little grainy, but otherwise fab, the anise adding a bit of a kick to it.

Not frothy, but nice and thick- Champurrado

In both cases, Mexican cooks use a molinillo to work up a froth, which I found almost impossible using a whisk. I don’t know if it was my inadequate utensils, my lack of whisking ability, or the substituted milk, but in any case, the best we got was a few lack-lustre bubbles.

Froth or not, I’ve been drinking hot chocolate all week, and I’m pretty darn happy about it Up with chocolate!

Almost real froth!

Where's The Beef Week - Day 6 - Sort-of Spring Rolls

2010-09-04T20:41:00+00:00

These were my only kind of fail for the week, but I think it was more my fault rather than the recipe. I made up the sort-of spring rolls which use rice paper & then left them on my wooden chopping board while I fed Holly. Then I came back half an hour or so later & they had stuck a bit so when I cooked them quite a few had holes in them & completely fell apart. They were still really tasty & I really liked the rice paper rather than the usual spring roll pastry. I think I need to try these again.

Bebida Bar and Cafe

2010-09-04T15:16:38+00:00

After our Birdman Eating brunch and an afternoon of treasure hunting along Smith Street, Phoebe had to leave us in order to go to work. Did that stop Emma and I from going on? Heck no! We required nibbles and wine to finish our day with. And we chose Bebida to provide us these life-giving morsels.

Bebida is a warm, friendly place, with a long, thin front bar and a courtyard out back. The dark red walls in the bar area create a comforting space, particularly if you’re looking for a refuge from inclement weather. It really is the perfect place to sit, sip a wine and have a lazy nosh.

Speaking of nosh, oh my goodness, let me introduce you to the new love of my life, Bebida’s green pea and sage dip. I LOVE IT WITH A BURNING PASSION, I AM GOING TO MARRY IT AND HAVE PEA DIP BABIES, WHICH I WILL THEN ALSO EAT. It comes out in a little pot on a plate surrounded by six big bits of pide. I at first eyed it suspiciously and was all “Hmm, that’s a lot of bread for such a wee pot of dip”, but oh holy Hannah, does this stuff contain a taste explosion or what! A little goes a very, VERY long way. I was in such raptures over it I think Emma thought I was having an episode.

We also had one of the desserts on the specials board, the berry cheesecake. Cheesecake is kind of just cheesecake to me (ordinarily I am a cake FIEND, but cheesecake, meh. Not to say I won’t eat it if it’s there, cake is cake), but this one was a nice generous piece and loaded with berries, and I don’t say no to berries, no sir. The crust was much tastier too than I usually find with cheesecake, though it was rather thick and we did end up leaving a bit of shell behind.

Another plus to the fabulous food is that the staff are also ridiculously friendly, and contribute to the overall feeling that Bebida is really focused on creating a place that feels like your lounge room, only better decorated, where everyone is there to relax with friends and have fun, and also there’s wine. Also, kudos to whoever decided to play the entirety of Augie March’s Sunset Studies for mood music during our visit, it prompted squeals of “This album CHANGED MY LIFE!” from myself and several others, and lent a happy air of nostalgia to proceedings.

Also, if you have to go to the little girls or boys room while at Bebida, enjoy the absolutely hilario record covers that are stuck on the back of the bathroom doors. They inspired me to have a “Bongos and Pizza” party at some point in the future.

Bebida Bar and Cafe

325 Smith Street, Fitzroy

Ph: 9419 5260

http://www.bebida.com.au/

Remember me?

2010-09-04T14:46:00+00:00

Probably not.

I'm going to try and not make excuses because blogging isn't meant to be an obligation but I will say that I have still been cooking and eating and having adventures and, overall, I think my complete lack of blogging for the past 8 months has been due to the fact that learning how to be a teacher takes up a lot of time! A LOT! Particularly when you are trying to work two other jobs around it. Holy mackerel, kids! (Also, my camera's screen has been playing up a bit. It is frustrating.)

That said, yesterday afternoon signalled the end of my teaching rounds for this year. Obviously, I still have uni for the rest of the year but no more school time. It's weird - I am totally jazzed that time is passing and I am closer to becoming a teacher but it is also really sad. The school was fantastic (the kind of school dreams are made of, particularly for rounds) and the students were engaged, bright and funny. I think I will miss my two classes of Year 11s the most and, to thank them for being so awesome to teach, I made them some Catastrophe Cookies for class yesterday. They were very popular and, thus, I bought the love of my first class. Note to self: food works.

Anyway, let's use this moment to clear some of the 8 months worth of photos I have on hand. There probably won't be heaps of info but, hopefully, it will get me in the mood to do some more up to the date blogging.

At some point in February, I made my first ever spring onion pancake. Please excuse the iPhone photo:

So easy and tasty. In fact, I believe I lured our 'new' flatmate, Byron into moving in by promising him spring onion pancake. I have yet to make it again. Oops.

For Easter, I made an amazing carrot cake (recipe from The Pioneer Woman) and it was super-tasty.

I also made some Hot Cross Buns, using the amazing BBC recipe which they have since changed! WHY, BBC?!

For the lovely Miss Jen's birthday, I made this Gingerbread Layer Cake with Lemon Frosting.

The birthday girl seemed to enjoy it and I remember it was nice but not groundbreaking. It was, however, a lovely birthday picnic and anytime you rock up with
a cake and cake stand in the middle of the botanic gardens, you do become very popular.

Three Bags Full. Believe the hype. (Also, get there ridiculously early to get a table.)

The lovely M and I have been baking buddies for the past little while. Our first effort was a Rainbow Cake.

Don't worry - I checked with her mother before filling her full of food colouring.

A month or so later, we decided to make something else. She had wanted to make a chocolate cake but as soon as she saw the pink jelly cakes in the recipe book, it was impossible to convince her otherwise.

They looked pretty enough . . .

Expectations were high . . .

But . . .

Oh, I hear you, bb. They weren't so great. As M said, "I thought they had a flavour but they don't."

Finally (for now), the other day we made the most ridiculous brownies the world has ever seen.

Each quarter was a different stroke of evil genius: marshmallow, gummi bear, mini m&ms and turkish delight.

AND THEN WE MADE OURSELVES SICK EATING THEM.

Marshmallow and Turkish Delight were the best. Would make again.

Anyway, I do have some other stuff (Daylesford, St Andrews Market, misc other things) but this has become a bit ridiculous already. I will be back soon - I promise!

Sopa de mexico

2010-09-04T09:29:16+00:00

My love of soup has been well documented on this site, so it will come as no surprise that I couldn’t decided on just one variety to try this week. In the end two soups won my attention: Sopa De Lima (Lime Soup), and Creamy Chayote Soup.

Sopa De Lima

Lime in soup, sounds great to me! This soup is said to be a traditional dish of the Yuctan Peninsula, and a lot of ingredients go into the preparation, but it wasn’t as much work as it looks like. I used the ingredients of this recipe, however I didn’t put in as much effort as it suggests, being a weeknight.

I simply got the ingredients for the stock together (subbing stock powder for the chicken or turkey carcass in the recipe, and leaving out the lime by accident) and simmered them for 20 minutes. The cut in cooking time was due to not needing to cook any meat (hooray!).

I then strained it, and began to follow the recipe from that point. Unfortunately, that’s when our not-so-reliable internet connection cut out. Having turned of my computer (sometimes my computer is the problem, not the net), I had lost the site, and couldn’t retrieve it. Damn. So, looking at the ingredients on my chopping board, I guessed my way through.

The soup smelled, looked and tasted promising, all the way through. Until, that is, I made the tragic mistake of adding some lime slice (skin still on) while still simmering. Suddenly, the whole pot of soup took on the bitter flavour of failure (and lime rind). The soup looked brillian, smelled fantastic, but tasted so bad it was practically inedible. Even Mr could only manage a spoonful or two (and he can eat just about any vegan thing).

Luckily, I made both soups at once, in a frenzy of soup fanaticism, so we didn’t go hungry.

Looks great... will have to try again

Chayote Soup

As mentioned above, I only decided to make chayote soup because I didn’t know what a chayote was, and after a google image search realised I recognised it as one of the many fruits and vegetables I can’t identify at the Preston Market.

I didn’t know anything about chayote, but creamy soup always sounds good to me. The more I read, however, the more I became concerned. SusanV at FatFreeVeganKitchen said her child thought it was “yucky” and she herself said the flavour was “hard to describe” and “not for everyone”. Hannah commented on my menu post, wondering how choko could be made tasty. I was really starting to wonder now.

I searched for recipes, and finally settled on this one, although I adapted it somewhat, and I’ll share the changes below.

Given the way the Lime Soup turned out, I’m very glad to say that the Chayote soup was delicious. It was creamy and just little spicy with a delicate flavour that, as SusanV said, is hard to describe. It saved the day though, and I’m so glad we tried it.

Creamy Chayote Soup, vegan style

Vegan Creamy Chayote Soup, serves 2

1 onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 cups vegetable stock or equivalent stock powder and water

1 large chayote, peeled and diced (keep the seed in)
2 poblano peppers (I used canned, but you could sub cooked green peppers, capsicum, or chillies, depending on your spice tolerance) chopped finely.
1 large chayote, peeled and diced (keep the seed in)
2 poblano peppers (I used canned, but you could sub cooked green peppers, capsicum, or chillies, depending on your spice tolerance) chopped finely.
3 tablespoons vegan cream cheese
salt, to taste
pinch cayenne pepper

in a little oil, cook the onion until soft, then add the garlic and continue to cook for another 5 minutes.
Add the chopped chayote and the stock. Bring to the boil. reduce heat to a simmer and cook for at least 20 minutes, until the chayote is tender.
Remove from heat. Add poblano peppers, cream cheese and blend until smooth.
Add salt and cayenne pepper to taste.

Where's The Beef Week - Day 5 - Vegetarian Hor Fun

2010-09-03T21:14:00+00:00

This was originally a recipe by Pip, which I found on Where's the Beef here. I normally have issues with making stir fry type dishes because they just don't work that well for me but this was great. I halved the amount of stock & increased the amount of cornflour & my sauce thickened up beautifully. I also just used extra firm tofu rather than the fried tofu puffs & added in some chopped almonds before serving. I always have the ingredients for this on hand & it is quick, easy & tasty so this is another meal that is now going on regular rotation.

¡Mole, mole, mole!

2010-09-03T09:32:22+00:00

¡Hola¡

¡Acabo de descubrir cómo hacer la “¡”!

And now, moving on from my grammatical excitement (¡!), lets talk mole. (just a note, I’m talking about the edible, chocolate-chilli sauce, not this furry little guy).

Mole, in Mexico, refers to a number of different sauces. However, we usually understand it to refer to the particular sauce, made of several varieties of chilli and chocolate. This, I am told by the internets, is more accurately called, Mole Poblano.

After reading a number of Mole recipes online, several questions emerged. Where would I find the ingredients? What would I replace the chicken with? And, most importantly, who would eat the vast amount of sauce the recipe resulted in?

The questions proved easier to answer than I first anticipated. I decided to use tempeh (which is far too often overlooked in our house) instead of a chicken, and some more research led me to a Mexican grocer in Tullamarine. Last, I remembered a campaign review meeting I was supposed to bring food to, and decided these would be preciesly the large group of people to feed the huge batch of sauce to.

So off I trooped first thing in the morning (well, after clients at 6am, so almost first thing), to Aztec Mexican, where I was met with very friendly and helpful service and a range of chillies, spices, tortillas, corn flours and other Mexican ingredients. For anyone considering heading there, I definitely recommend, though, as per usual, vegans should be aware of labels as some products that you wouldn’t normally check contain lard. Also, it should be noted that it doesn’t look like much from the outside. It looks like a warehouse. Just head to the office, and they’ll let you in to the shop behind.

I got a little over excited, and bought the chillies I needed, as well as some corn tortillas, a tin of poblano chillies, and some mexican chocolate. Yum!

I then spent more time poring over recipes. In the end, I condensed two recipes into one. I will not post a recipe as such, but direct you to the two I followed, here, and here. I am adding the ingredients list I used at the bottom of this post though, as a guide.

So I soaked, and blended and ground and simmered, and then blended everything again with my trusty stick blender. The result was a spicy, deep-flavoured sauce, which was, to be honest, a little odd to our tastes. It was very strong and very hot, though the heat wasn’t unpleasant. The sesame and almonds really came through, as did the smoke flavour from the chipotles. It was much less smooth than those pictured elsewhere on the net, but I put that down to the fact that i don’t have a real blender.

Mr ate it, but wasn’t a big fan. It seemed to go down well at the meeting-cum-potluck, but I think a fair bit of that may have been hype about the idea of chocolate for dinner.

Don’t let it put you off – it was an interesting dinner, and I think it worked well in the context of a potluck. It wasn’t bad, I’m just not in a rush to make it again.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get a good photo, having rushed it to the meeting in a large plastic container. Rest assured it looked somewhat better than this:

Sea of Mole

Ingredients List for Vegan Mole Poblano

2 dried pasilla chilies (called Chillis Negros at AztecMexican)
3 dried mulato chilies
3 dried ancho chilies
2 dried chipotle chillies
1/2 cup lightly packed sultanas
Water to cover
3/4 cup almonds
Cinnamon stick
2 tablespoons sesame seeds
I tortilla, broken in small pieces
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon ground coriander seeds
1/2 teaspoon anise seeds
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
2 diced onions
3 medium tomatoes, peeled, seeded and coarsely chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
some pretend beef stock in water (I can’t remember how much)
1 disk Mexican chocolate
1 tablespoon cocoa powder (my addition)
3 tablespoons tomato paste (my addition)
2 packets of tempeh, fried in olive oil

August 21, 2010: Compost cookies

2010-09-03T07:34:00+00:00

These days it's rare that I prepare food for a group of unmitigated omnivores. But I was faced with this very situation on election night (a distant 10 days ago, and we still don't have a firm government; I wonder if, in the manner of cricket, it's about time we called a draw). Michael and I agreed that we wouldn't go to too much effort, so we all nibbled on bread and dips as Antony Green warmed up his electoral models and were gobbling down a Penang Affair delivery by the time Kerry O'Brien accidentally called a seat for the ABC.

I put more effort into a non-alcoholic beverage (mint-garnished Lebanese lemonade) and something sweet for the final call that never came. Free of dietary restrictions, I decided on a butter-laden and utterly glutenous recipe for 'compost cookies'. I just couldn't resist the prospect of stuffing cookie dough with chips of the potato as well as the chocolate variety.

Yes indeed, this recipe requires you to select one and a half cups each of your favourite sweet and savoury junk foods, chop them up, and bake them into cookies. I gleefully picked out plain potato chips, sesame pretzel sticks, mini M&Ms and Twix-flavoured Pods and with a twinge of irony added organic butter, free-range eggs and fair trade sugar to the same shopping basket. And just as I had hoped this cookie dough was sweet buttery heaven on a spatula, probably the most delicious unbaked dough I have ever tasted.

Unfortunately the fully-baked cookies didn't quite match up to my moment of bliss with the electric beaters. I was given due warning - Adam emphasised that the dough balls must be thoroughly refrigerated before baking and Penny recounted a case of over-baking. But limited to two trays and with a fridge full of election night drinks there was only so much I was willing to do. The dough balls were firm and cold but clearly not firm and cold enough, and when they hit the oven they rapidly flattened and turned a deep brown round the edges. The ones pictured above were the few most successful cookies and while they were certainly the tastiest, they were nothing on that sweet, sweet dough. While I'd be interested to taste compost cookies at their best, I'm not sure that I'm inclined to bake these ever again.

Compost cookies
(recipe sourced from the Amateur Gourmet)

250g butter
1 cup raw sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon corn syrup
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 large eggs
1 3/4 cups plain flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons salt
3/4 cup (160g packet) mini M&Ms
3/4 cup finely chopped pods with Twix
3/4 cup plain crisps, crushed
3/4 cup sesame pretzel sticks, chopped finely

With an electric beater, cream together the butter, raw and brown sugars and corn syrup for several minutes, until fluffy. With the beater running at a lower speed, incorporate the vanilla and eggs. Once they're in, crank up the speed again and beat the mixture thoroughly for 10 minutes. Yes, really - the mixture will become much smoother and lighter.

Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. When the butter mixture is ready, gradually add the dry ingredients at a low beating speed until just combined. Stir the sweet and savoury snacks into the dough until they're just mixed through. Roll the mixture into balls and refrigerate them for between 1 hour and 1 week.

Preheat the oven to 200°C. Place the dough balls on baking trays and bake them until just barely set. (AG says 9-11 minutes but some of my over-baked bikkies were in there for as little as 7 minutes.) Allow the cookies to cool completely on the tray before eating or storing them.

Penne pasta with sauteed shredded brussel sprouts, minced...

2010-09-02T20:51:45+00:00

Penne pasta with sauteed shredded brussel sprouts, minced garlic, red chilli, grated zucchini, zest of one lemon, juice of half, assorted toasted seeds, salt, pepper and plenty of olive oil. So good after an epic birthday celebration.

Where's The Beef Week - Day 4 - Cheesy Tofu Fritters

2010-09-02T19:31:00+00:00

Day 4, I made the Cheesy Tofu Fritters which are a veganised gluten free version of goats cheese fritters. These are so, so good! I followed the recipe exactly, but also added in a little bit of grated mozzarella cheezly into the mix & I only cooked them in a tiny bit of oil. I served these with a simple & delicious cranberry gravy just made from cranberry sauce, massel chicken stock & flour, I reduced the gravy too much though & didn't make nearly enough.
This meal is going on regular rotation.

Quesadillas

2010-09-02T15:37:50+00:00

Tasty, easy Quesadillas with guacamole and salsa fresca made up our first meal from Mexico.

Quesadillas are popular in Mexico and in the United States, but there are some differences. Mexican Quesadillas use corn tortillas, not flour, tend to have only one or two fillings, and are made by folding one tortilla in half, not putting one on top of the other.

The word Quesadilla just means “cheese in a tortilla”, and that’s what I went with in ours. I used Cheezly vegan cheese, which tasted great, but didn’t stick the tortilla halves together like dairy cheese does. We don’t possess a press of any sort either (tortilla, sandwich, other), which may have contributed to this problem, as I just slid them under the grill attached to my oven.

Despite the lack of sticking, the meal was delicious. I am a bit of a fake-cheese fanatic, and will eat any variety in any way, so I was bound to be impressed.

Quesdailla, a difficult photo for my little camera to get.

The tortilla and cheeze went well with the salsa fresca and guacamole, mixing spicy, creamy and tangy. Recipes, if you can call them that, for such easy fare, are below.

Salsa Fresca

3 tomatoes, diced (use ripe red ones)
2 spring onions, chopped finely
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 a Jalepeño chilli (the short, fat, green ones)
a small bunch (technical, I know) of corriander, chopped
2 tsp lime juice
2 tsp oil (I used flax to up our Omega 3, but you could use any oil)
pinch salt

Mix all ingredients in a small bowl immediately before serving.

Spicy salsa fresca

Guacamole

2 Avocados
2 spring onions, chopped finely
1 small tomato, diced finely
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tablespoon lime juice
small dash of Tabasco Sauce (yeah, i cheated)
pinch of sea salt

Mash all ingredients together in a small bowl immediately before serving.

Creamy Guacamole

cooking with wholefoods - a vegan cooking and yoga retreat with Alexis and Ostii

2010-09-02T09:13:00+00:00

Friends! I had to break my silence to let you know about a retreat that is coming up. Although I have not been there after reading Ostiis website and seeing what they do I had to let you know about it! Unfortunately I cant make it to this one (but I'm so happy that a place like this is so near to me!) but perhaps you might want to. The point of this blog is to promote veg*an living and what a great way to get cooking than a weekend retreat!

Cooking with wholefoods - A vegan cooking and yoga retreat with Alexis and Ostii

Anyone interested in going to the Vegan banquet sometime?

Smoky Parsnip Muffins

2010-09-01T22:25:00+00:00

I had a crazy day yesterday. My day at home started with me whipping up some parsnip muffins, breaking a glass, battling with Sylvia over who would sweep up broken glass, racing to the office to finish off some work while a colleague distracted Sylvia, racing home where I had a friend and her daughter to lunch.

Kathleen had brought a lovely home made loaf of rice spelt bread. I salvaged some salad vegetables from the fridge and offered my parsnip muffins. In an ideal world I would have had more time and energy to put into making lunch but I had been so tired the night before that I had found myself trying to clean the cursor off my computer screen. Simple lunches suit children so it was an easy one to share. Anyway, Kathleen was here to catch up with me, and Rosie was just excited to play with Sylvia.

Life continues to be crazy today. We are going away for a few days tomorrow. I still haven’t started packing though I have bee preparing some food to take with us. The weather forecast is for rain the whole time we are away.

It rained cats and dogs while we rushed about today. Sylvia is in preparation for a wet holiday by getting herself as soaked as possible in our front yard with her little neighbour and partner-in-crime, but at least our washing is hung inside rather than outside. It has been such a wet winter that our succulents in the backyard are out of control. I am looking forward to a drive through some green countryside.

I have been interested in baking with parsnip for a while and was inspired by the King Island Smoked Cheddar that I bought at the Taste of Melbourne. I think the good quality smoked cheddar made a difference. I suspect the recipe would also work with regular cheddar and smoked paprika. Next time I would add the parsley if I wasn’t racing to get out the door.

I wish I had more time to tell you about these muffins. They were a bit disappointing when still slightly warm but once they cooled and the smoked cheese shone through, they were amazing. These had to have been the whitest muffins I have ever made. But they were full of flavour and excellent with tomato soup for lunch today.

I am sending these muffins to Helen Fuss Free Flavours for the Breakfast Club (#3) because the theme this month is muffins. I know I posted muffins for this event yesterday but this were the muffins I had originally intended for the event because I much prefer the idea of savoury muffins for breakfast. Now I am off to get packing and have a break from the blog while on holiday!

Previously on Green Gourmet Giraffe:
This time last year: Spring garden and WIP pasta
This time two years ago: Choc chip and cherry cookies

Parsnip and Smoked Cheddar Muffins
Adapted from Stephanie Alexander via A Food Lover’s Journey

1 largish parsnip, grated
15 stalks of parsley, finely chopped (I didn’t add this but would recommend it)
80g smoked cheese (I used King Island), grated
1 cup self raising flour
½ cup wholemeal self raising flour
¾ cup buttermilk (I used milk with ¾ tsp cider vinegar)
½ cup canola oil
1 egg

Mix parsnip, parsley, cheese and flours in a large mixing bowl. Mix buttermilk, oil and egg in a small bowl with a fork until mixed. Spoon into greased or lined 12 hole muffin tin. Bake at 180 C for 20-25 minutes (I baked mine for 20 minutes at 20 minutes). Cool on a wire rack. Best eaten when cold.

On the Stereo:
The Boy with the Arab Strap: Belle and Sebastian

Shakahari's new menu

2010-09-01T22:10:00+00:00

A few weeks ago we went to Shakahari's for a friend Marisa's birthday. It's been over 6 months since our last visit there so I was pleased to try things from new menu, which carried over a few of the older dishes like 'avocado magic' and 'satay legend' with lots of new options too:

For entree, Toby had for 'bright idea chestnuts' which consisted or ravioli filled with chestnuts, soy grits, herbs with a mushroom based soy sauce. He thought it tasted a lot like regular dumplings but really enjoyed the sauce.
And I couldn't go past the buckwheat flatbread, because it's such a rare thing being able to eat gluten free bread with dips. It was served with a tangy citrus cashew dip. I really liked the dip and enjoyed the flatbread, although I could see that it might be a bit disappointing for those that can eat regular flatbread, because it reminds me a little of stale bread. But I am definitely not complaining!
We both shared two mains, first the croquette chinamoon which remind me a lot of the old quinoa croquettes. It contained yam, potatoes, macadamia nuts with a sweet chilli sauce. This was our favourite dish of the night.

And the 'potpie'. I can't remember the exact name of this dish and it was stupidly on the page of the menu that I didn't photograph. However, it was much more of a casserole than a potpie. It had a risotto pine nut bottom, with roasted vegetables and soy cheese on top. Served with garlicky greens on the side. The pine nut flavour was the overwhelming flavour, although not quite what I expected.

I was intrigued by the look of the quinoa and sago dessert so ordered it. It looked pretty cool and was fine, but I really do hate all desserts with quinoa, so had wished that I had ordered the tofu caramel.
Overall, the food was really yummy and I'm relieved that they have continued to offer plenty of gluten free dishes. See Steph's review here for more feedback about the new menu.

Shakahari
201-203 Faraday St
Carlton
9347 3843

Weeknight congee dinner

2010-09-01T21:41:51+00:00

Brown rice congee with carrots
//Simmer brown rice, water and carrots until softened.

Stir-fried gai choy, black fungus and mushrooms in a mixture of fermented beancurd and oyster sauce.
//Fry some minced garlic, black fungus and mushrooms for 3 minutes. // Toss in vegetables, fry and another minute. // Mix 1 cube of fermented beancurd, 3 tbs oyster sauce and a bowl of water, add into wok, put on lid, and simmer until liquid has reduced (uncover lid if there’s still too much liquid). // Season with rice wine and white pepper.

It’s September! Just 2.5 months to summer vacation!

Little Cupcakes

2010-09-01T21:24:52+00:00

Of all the sweet shops I’ve ever been to, Little Cupcakes is the best! Cupcakes, cupcakes galore! The shop is a parlour filled with lovely, dreamy cakes. Cupcakes are creamy and delicious and it seems heaven is concealed beneath the cupcake crumbs. We cannot even walk by Little Cupcakes without getting a treat or two! I [...]

Where's the Beef week - Day 3 - I can't believe it's not meat pies

2010-09-01T20:35:00+00:00

More deliciousness! I really liked these 'I can't believe it's not meat pies' & found the filling not unlike the La Panella pies, but with red wine. These are really easy & really versatile because you can flavour them to your tastes. I left out the mushrooms because I didn't have any but next time I will certainly add them in next time. I used the following ingredients:

INGREDIENTS

1/2 cup red wine
1/2 cup massel beef stock
1 tsp onion powder
1/2 cup tvp
1 tbsp tomato paste
1 tbsp worcestershire sauce
1 tbsp flour

Banana buttermilk muffins

2010-08-31T22:51:00+00:00

Last week I arranged to go over to see my friend Nicki and her baby Poppy. While I waited for Sylvia to wake from her long sleep I baked muffins. I idly flicked through cookbooks until I found a recipe for banana buttermilk muffins that would use some of the items that lingered in the kitchen.

Along the way I found my orange was a mandarin and decided I needed to use raspberries that had been in the freezer too long rather than use the dates that had been in the pantry too long.

I had a lovely time at Nicki’s. She had made poppyseed, orange and prune muffins (you can see them in the photo with the green muffin paper). Both babies had a lovely time eating their muffins. Sylvia’s favourite word is ‘more’ at the moment, even when she is mid-muffin. She certainly was asking for more muffins. They were both delicious.

Nicki and I talked about children’s books. She has been thinking about them because not only does she love reading them to Poppy but she has also written one and it is being published soon. I can’t wait to get my copy. Meanwhile, I took a photo of one of Sylvia’s favourite toys at the moment – the alien in the sock who is always with her in the car – I thought it would appeal to Nicki who has a fascination for slug and bugs.

I am sending these muffins to Helen at Fuss Free Flavours for her Breakfast Club (#3) because the theme this month is muffins! There are still 5 days to get a muffin to Helen if like me you love trying different flavours.

Previously on Green Gourmet Giraffe:
This time last year: The old and the new – date scones and vego loaf
This time two years ago: Shepherd’s Pie Traditions
This time three years ago: WTSIM ... Beggars Burgers

Banana buttermilk muffins
source unrecorded (it was many years ago that I jotted it down)
Makes 12 muffins

¾ cup white self raising flour
¾ cup wholemeal self raising flour
¼ tsp level bicarbonate soda
pinch salt
½ tsp ground cinnamon
½ cup brown sugar, lightly packed
1 tsp grated orange rind (I used mandarin)
½ cup dates finely chopped (I used frozen raspberries)
¼ cup neutral oil, such as canola
¾ cup buttermilk
1 egg lightly beaten
1 banana mashed

Place dry ingredients in a large bowl. Add remaining ingredients (if you use raspberries rather than dates then add the raspberries after you have mixed up everything else). Spoon into greased or lined muffin tin. Bake at 210 C for 20-25 minutes. Cool on a rack.

On the Stereo:
Haunted Graves, Moving Waves: Current 93

August 18, 2010: Casserole for Kirsten

2010-08-31T22:01:00+00:00

I recently cooked this meal to share with some colleagues and I'm naming it after Kirsten in particular because it's designed with her dietary needs in mind. Kirsten is vegetarian, gluten-free and has an intolerance to fructans and galactans. This means a whole host of veges - including legumes, onion and plants of the brassica genus - are off limits. I took inspiration from the Fox Hotel vegetarian moussaka that so impressed me the previous weekend, gently cooking down some Kirsten-friendly vege chunks in tomato and garlic and slathering them with an ultra-cheesy mash, baked until a little crispy on top. It takes quite some time but it's not too complicated and yields many, many serves; a truly hearty and homely meal for the depths of winter.

Casserole for Kirsten

first layer
4 cloves garlic
2 tablespoons olive oil
5 large tomatoes
1 green capcicum
1 large carrot
2 small zucchinis
10 button mushrooms
1 large eggplant
1 teaspoon basil
1 teaspoon oregano
1 teaspoon parsley
1 tablespoon tamari
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
salt and pepper

second layer
5 large potatoes
1 1/2 cups grated tasty cheese
1 tablespoon butter
1/3 cup milk
salt and pepper

Mince the garlic. Place the oil and garlic in a large pot over medium-low heat. Finely chop the tomatoes and add them to the pot as you chop them, bashing them a little with a wooden spoon. Gradually chop and add the other vegetables as they're ready - the carrot in tiny cubes, capsicum in medium-sized chunks, zucchini in half-moons, mushrooms and eggplant in large chunks. Cook the vegetables, stirring regularly, until they are very tender, at least 30 minutes. Add the basil, oregano, parsley, tamari and balsamic vinegar. Taste the mixture, seasoning and adjusting the flavour balance to your liking.

While the vegetables are cooking, peel and chop the potatoes into chunks. Place them in a saucepan and cover them with water. Bring the potatoes to the boil and cook them until they're very tender, about 15 minutes. Mash the potatoes thoroughly, adding the cheese, butter and milk as you go - you want a thinner, more spreadable mash than you would usually use as a side dish. Season the mash to taste.

Preheat the oven to 180°C. In a large casserole dish, and pour the tomato-sauced vegatable mixture into it. Gently spread over the mashed potatoes. Bake the casserole until it's golden-brown and a little crisp on top, about 15 minutes.

the joy of gardening

2010-08-31T21:11:46+00:00

Note:
Sorry I haven’t been on the blog for a while, everyone. I have been cooking up a storm and will some recipes online in the coming days.

My husband and I have just moved to a little unit with a cute little courtyard (only 5 houses from the beach – woo!).

I’ve been busy planting things in our new vegie garden. I’m SO EXCITED! I’ve always valued being able to grown my own food but have been cooped up in an apartment for the last 3 years. It’s only a small strip (about 1m x 4m) but my new little garden is bringing me a lot of joy. I’ve also planted up big with herbs in pots and am enjoying the prospect on never having to buy herbs again (scandalous).

So, thanks for your patience. I’ll post some photos of the vegies as they grow up big and strong.

Kudos:
To my parents, for inspiring us with their own vegetable gardens and for helping us get things going. Thanks also to my Dad for helping me build it, so they might grow (mmmmm manure).

birthday dinners

2010-08-31T20:47:00+00:00

after reading meveg's post on the abyssinian last week i decided that's where i wanted to have my birthday dinner last nite. i don't think i'd ever had ethiopian food before. i loved it. unfortunately i didn't get any photos cuz zac was "starving" and if i didn't dig in i would miss out. we got the same as meveg (chef's vegetarian combo for 2) and there's some good photos over there. when i mentioned to friends and workmates that we were doing ethiopian food for my birthday dinner, everyone's response was "the bread is amazing! i love the bread!" the bread was pretty good (and kinda fun to use instead of cutlery for eating). i also had an ethiopian beer with my meal too (Dashen Lager)-- it was really nice.
i wanted to get some EBC cheesecake after but we were both too full. we went home, i had a bath and we both relaxed for a bit and i decided i needed a birthday cheesecake. after some convincing, i got zac to get dressed again and take me for cheesecake at the east brunswick club. soooooo worth going back out in the cool evening for it. i got a slice of peanut butter cheesecake(soooo good!). zac got the chocolate mint one which i didn't really care for but i don't really like mint chocolate (he liked it and that's what's important).
today i got to celebrate day 2 of my birthday (the best part about living here, being born in canada-- i can convince people to celebrate 2 days with me. once when the date here matches my birthday and again when its actually my birth date in canada). we went to haskins/north fitzroy arms for dinner. i got the same as i always get (i think it's the only vegan-izable main but i love it): eggplant parma minus the cheese. it's done really nicely with chopped tomato and onions on top of the well cooked, tender eggplant. it comes with a big salad and some chips. yum.
too bad my birthday is done with now and we'll have to go back to doing some cooking at home.

Where's The Beef Week - Day 2 - Felafels & ZIppy Warm Potato Salad

2010-08-31T20:22:00+00:00

I have tried to make felafels in the past with a very poor result so wasn't expecting to really like these that much, but I loved them! This is the recipe that will stop me ever using the packet mix again. I had them drizzled with sweet chilli sauce & made this potato salad to go with them which was also really nice.

Fried Rice with a difference

2010-08-31T19:36:00+00:00

Despite my best efforts before I went away I still have a few vegies in the fridge to use up - cabbage, broccoli, carrots & celery. I read through my recipe books but didn't find anything too inspiring, so decided to make Fried Rice with Crispy Fried Tofu. This recipe is completely flexible - just substitute whatever vegetables you have on hand.
Fried Rice with Crispy Fried Tofu

400g firm tofu, cubed
1 TBS tamari
1 TBS sesame oil
Liquid smoke (optional)
1 1/2 cups brown rice, cooked & chilled
1/4 red cabbage, sliced thinly
1 head of broccoli, broken into small florets
2 small carrots, julienned
1 stalk celery, julienned
1 garlic clove, crushed
1 tsp minced ginger
2 TBS soy sauce
1 TBS sweet chili sauce
1 TBS lemon juice
2 TBS sesame seeds

Press the tofu to reduce the moisture content, then mix the tamari, sesame oil & a few splashes of liquid smoke in a bowl. Add the tofu & toss to coat. Marinate up to a few hours (but for at least 10min). Heat a small amount of peanut oil in a wok over high heat. Add the tofu & fry, stirring frequently, until the tofu is crispy & golden brown (around 10mins). Remove the tofu from the wok & drain on paper towel.

Add the vegetables to the hot wok, along with the garlic & ginger - stir-fry for a few minutes, until starting to soften. Add the rice, soy sauce, sweet chili sauce & lemon juice. Stir-fry another few minutes. Add the tofu & sesame seeds & cook until heated through.

The touristy stuff

2010-08-31T14:52:00+00:00

I had a really lovely weekend in NSW, not least because of the weather. It was blue skies & warm sun the whole weekend, with temperatures in the high teens - perfect winter weather!

Mum & Dad live on a small property & it was so nice waking up to the sound of birds in the morning instead of car doors slamming & people yelling at each other. Here's the view from the front verandah of the house. I really took these surroundings for granted when I was growing up.
Yesterday the family went to the Gosford Regional Gallery & Edogawa Commemorative Garden in East Gosford. Entry is free - the gallery contains 2 small rotating exhibitions & a foyer space that local artists can hire for displaying their work for sale. The gorgeous gardens adjoin the gallery. A few of my friends & cousins have been married here over the years & I can see why - it's very serene here. There are meandering pathways, small wooden bridges over the lakes & streams & a waterfall.I lay on this bench for quite a while & soaked up the beautiful sunshine.The 'Tea House'There is also a pair of resident ducks - I LOVE ducks - I think they're probably my favourite animal.After the gardens, we all went to Body Fuel cafe for lunch - in Gosford this time. I went with the veg Vietnamese Rolls again - and again forgot to take a photo! You'll just have to trust me - Body Fuel is awesome!

Gosford Regional Gallery
36 Webb St, East Gosford
7 days, 10am-4pm (gardens 9.30am-4.30pm)
www.gosfordregionalgallery.com

Bay Cafe, Toowoon Bay

2010-08-31T14:25:00+00:00

I was in NSW on the weekend for my Dad's birthday. The whole family went out for dinner on Sunday night to the Bay Cafe in Toowoon Bay. This is a seafood restaurant, but the website advertises a separate vegetarian menu.

The veg menu has a fairly good range of entrees & mains, including the standards like Vegetable Stack & Vegetable Lasagne, but also Nasi Goreng & Stuffed Capsicum. I went with the stuffed capsicum & asked the waitress to make sure it wasn't prepared with any dairy products.

My stuffed capsicum was presented beautifully. It was on a bed of mashed something - it was hard to tell what it was because it was completely flavourless (it was orange & was probably a mix of potato & sweet potato). The capsicum was stuffed with rice (which didn't appear to be flavoured with anything) & topped with tempura asparagus & mushroom. Unfortunately the meal overall was a bit bland. And, unbelievably, despite having specifically requested no dairy products, it came out covered in melted cheese! I was dumbfounded, but really didn't want to cause a scene, and was able to cut the top of the capsicum & remove the cheese. Sometimes I really feel like banging my head against the wall & screaming!The service at the Bay Cafe is friendly & efficient & the meals came out quite quickly. It's a BYO restaurant, but they don't charge corkage, which is a nice change.

The Bay Cafe
141-143 Bay Rd, Toowoon Bay
Dinner 7 days, Lunch Thur-Sat
www.thebaycafe.com.au

Mexican Menu

2010-08-31T11:32:00+00:00

Mmmmm, just looking at all the sites with Mexican recipes makes me salivate with anticipation of the food to come this week.

I was surprised to learn earlier this year, that almost all my favourite “Mexican” dishes weren’t Mexican at all, but Tex-Mex. Nachos? Out. Cheese Sauce? Out. That said, the dishes that are Mexican still look fabulous, and exactly what the doctor ordered for the end of winter: colourful, spicy, limey and filling, with lots of corn and beans.

Unfortunately the Moreland Libraries couldn’t pull through for me with an available book about Mexican Cuisine, so I resorted to the internets once more. After perusing a number of sites, listed below, I put together the following menu:

Mole Poblano
Hot Chocolate
Champurrado (thick hot chocolate with aniseed)
Chayote Soup
Quesadillias
Tacos
Picadillo ( a mince-based dish)
Refried Beans
Rice
Lime soup (sopa de lima)
salads, salsas and stuff

Can’t wait to start the nomming.

Separating the Mexican from the Tex Mex on the net was more difficult and time consuming than you’d think. Below are a few links I liked the look of, including a few for veg recipes.

This site is about Mexican Culture, written by a group of students. I always fall for the id stuff.
VMexx, a vegan Mexican Food blog
Vegan Mexican Food dot Com (self explanatory)
Earth Vegan has a nice assembly of posts about Mexican food
Authentic Mexican Recipes, Mexican Foodie, and MexGrocer – not vegan
and do check out K’s post on her new Tortilla press, over at In The Mood For Noddles.

TOFWD

2010-08-30T20:34:04+00:00

Of all the things I like best, sandwiches from TOFWD tops them all! Those lush, lovely, crumbly pieces of heaven are a joy to vegetarians and a great lunch time snack. Now I’ve tasted these creations of bliss. I’ve given up on vegemite and cheese sandwiches and asked Mum to put these in my lunch box! [...]

Where's The Beef Week - Day 1 - Maple Marinated Tofu

2010-08-30T20:13:00+00:00

I am the sort of person that plans everything & I am pretty organised so now that I am on maternity leave & can't use that at work I have to channel that elsewhere. At the moment it is mostly going into wedding planning, gym training & meal planning. For my meal planning, every weekend I sit down & work out all our meals for the week, lunches & dinners, and write up a shopping list & then hit Vic Market, the supermarket & any specialty shops like the Asian supermarket or Radical Grocery.
This week I noticed that I had a couple of recipes bookmarked from Where's The Beef so decided to make all my dinners this week from that blog. When I went through their recipes working out what to make I had trouble narrowing it down to just a week's worth, there was so much I wanted to make!

So, day 1. I had some tofu that needed using so I decided to make this marinade recipe to make maple marinated tofu. This marinade is so, so delicious! I am definitely making it again. It was a super quick, easy & tasty way to cook tofu & I just had it with some steamed vegies - yum.

Introducing Mexico

2010-08-30T11:12:40+00:00

I’ve been looking forward to taking this blog to Mexico since I began it. Now that our corriander is preparing to bolt (and needs using before it starts to taste like grass) its time to take a trip south of the border and soak up the spices.

Geography

Mexico is in North and Central America, between the Pacific Ocean to the west, and the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean to the east. It shares a northern border with the United States of America, and southern borders with Belize and Guatemala.

Mexico is almost 2million Square Kilometers in size, and is the 15th largest country in the world, in terms of physical size. Its a little bigger than Indonesia, and about a quarter the size of Australia.

Economy, People and politics

Population: 111,211,789, 11th largest population in the world.
Median Age: 26.7 years old
Ubanisation: 77% of the population live in urban areas
Life expectancy at birth is 76 years.
Ethnicity groupings: mestizo (Amerindian-Spanish) 60%, Amerindian or predominantly Amerindian 30%, white 9%, other 1%
Religions: Roman Catholic 76.5%, Protestant 6.3% (Pentecostal 1.4%, Jehovah’s Witnesses 1.1%, other 3.8%), other 0.3%, unspecified 13.8%, none 3.1% (2000 census)
GDP per capita: $13 200 (it was $14 300, however Mexico has been heavily impacted by the GFC).
Unemployments: 5.5% (has risen from 4% in 2008). However there is a note on the CIA age, stating that underemployment may be as high as 25%.
18% of people are below the poverty line, using a food-based scale. Using an assets-based scale, 47% of people are below the poverty line.
The Government consists of a popularly elected President, appointed Ministers, and an elected Senate and Chamber of Deputies.
The main language is Spanish, though indigenous languages are also spoken.

Trivia

Mexico is the most populous Spanish-speaking country in the world.
There are 62 Government-recognized indigenous languages.
Presidents are elected for only one single 6 year term.
Exports to the US generate more than a quarter of Mexico’s GDP
There is a special coming of age ceremony for girls in Mexico when they turn 15, called quincera.
The Mexican flag has an image of bird holding a snake and sitting on a cactus, because it is said that the people were told to settle in the place they saw this. The place they settled became Mexico City.

Onwards and upwards now… looking forward to sharing the food we’ve been eating over the last few days…

Digital detox

2010-08-30T07:59:00+00:00

Hi Everyone! I've been really concentrating on my self development lately. I've stopped dating, started meditating seriously and committed to doing the couch to 5 km running program (I'm on week two!). I've had to make a lot of massive life decisions lately and I guess I'm just giving myself room to get used to them. So in keeping with the space/self betterment I'm going on a digital detox for 2 weeks starting today (I will still be checking email) but no Facebook, no Twitter and no Blogging. Thanks for being the best readers EVER, you guys keep me inspired with your positivity and your great feedback but ALSO your wonderful cooking. So many of you have great food blogs.

So I'm going to miss you but I'll see you in two weeks! Adbusters digital detox is supposed to happen in April but its great to do it any time. xoxox.

Tokuya!

2010-08-29T19:56:23+00:00

Have you ever sat inside your bedroom wishing there was a fun, playful and secret place you could escape to without having to do any household work or duties? Tokuya is for you! Packed full of fun Japanese toys, school accessories and cooking gear, it’s suprising how all the fun fits into one smallish Japanese basement shop! My [...]

Cool Geelong #3 Steampocket Pizzeria

2010-08-29T19:48:27+00:00

Have you ever been feeling dud? Have you ever felt like a clump of mud? Why not try the Pizza Spud At the Steampocket Pizzeria! Why not turn into a fun guy? Why just break down a cry? Why not try the pizza funghi? At the Steampocket Pizzeria! Try the chippies, lime and salt Never stop eating, never halt Try the pumpkin, it’ll make you [...]

Rustic tomato and goat’s cheese tartlets

2010-08-29T18:58:13+00:00

Beautiful Roma tomatoes

I made these delicious tartlets to take to a friend’s house for afternoon tea. The creamy goat’s cheese juxtaposed with the acidity of the balsamic vinegar and fragrant thyme is a delightful combination. They are really easy to make but always a winner.

You could just as easily make a single large tart as individual tartlets, but I rather like the self contained nature of the separate tartlets and of course the extra buttery pastry that encases each one is a flaky treat. The individual tartlets would also make an excellent entrée or light lunch served with a couple of different salads.

What you’ll need (makes 8 tartlets):

2 sheets vegetarian puff pastry
300g organic vegetarian goat’s cheese
6-8 tomatoes
4 tsp fresh thyme
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
salt and pepper

Method:

Place the frozen pastry sheets on baking paper to defrost, than cut each one into four squares. Gently score each pastry square about 1cm from the edge all the way round. This will encourage the pastry to puff up and give you a guide for placing the filling.

Mix the goat’s cheese with about 3 tsp of thyme in a bowl. The easiest way to prepare the thyme is to hold the top of the stalk and pull gently downwards to strip the leaves away. Spread the cheese mixture on to the pastry squares being careful not to go over the score lines.

Thinly slice the tomatoes and dip in a little balsamic vinegar before placing on to the goat’s cheese mixture. I love to use Roma tomatoes because they have an intense tomato flavor and tend not to be too watery inside, but any in-season variety will do as long as the tomatoes are nicely ripe. Season with a little salt and freshly ground black pepper and sprinkle the remaining thyme leaves over the top.

Bake at about 190 degrees for 30 minutes or until the edges have puffed and turned golden brown. Serve warm or cold.

Rustic tomato and goat's cheese tartlets

Lunch in a country pub

2010-08-29T16:45:00+00:00

Today we went to the Mountain Country Markets at Mangrove Mountain. The markets aren't that great - there were about 15 stalls, selling a mix of organic vegetables, crafts & cakes/biscuits. What is good is having an excuse to drive around the area - which has a stunning natural beauty. After the market we decided to keep on driving to St Albans, with the inention of visiting the Settler's Arms pub for lunch. We took part of the Convict Trail to get there. This is an amazing drive over a 35km dirt road - since I wasn't driving I was able to enjoy the views and imagine what it might have been like back in 1826 when the road was started.

Unfortunately when we arrived in St Albans, there was a line out the door of people waiting to get lunch at the pub. We weren't in the mood to line up, so decided to drive on to Wiseman's Ferry. You have to take a car ferry to get across the Hawkesbury River - it's free & even though it's a really short trip (only a couple of minutes), I enjoyed it.

Here are a some photos out of the car window - you can just see the second car ferry in the right of this one.

Eventually we ended up at the Wiseman's Inn Hotel. This isn't a vegetarian-friendly place, the options were limited to a garden salad or chips. To be honest though, you'd have to be pretty silly to expect great vegan food in a country pub like this one, so I'm not complaining. Trying to be healthy, I went with the garden salad. Now, what I do object to when I order a garden salad, is receiving a mix of garden & greek salads, including feta cheese! It was easy enough to pick the feta out (which I did, because I really hate sending food back). Here is the salad, already sans feta - as you can see it was all really fresh & was also a huge serving.
And here are a couple of photos of the outside of the pub - it's a beautiful building.

Watch out for more NSW adventures tomorrow!

Wiseman's Inn Hotel
Lot 1, Old Northern Rd, Wiseman's Ferry
www.wisemanshotel.com.au

Simple Vegetable & Rice bake

2010-08-29T09:17:00+00:00

I know I said on Friday that I was looking forward to letting Mum look after me, but it was only a joke (sort of) :-)

One thing I like to do when I'm home (in the family home that is) is scour Mum's magazines for new recipes (she buys Womens Weekly & Better Homes & Gardens & things like that). Occasionally I'll find a real gem. Last night I found a ninja vegan recipe in Australian Good Food. The Vegetable & Rice bake looked super easy & super simple so I thought it wouldn't stretch my relaxing mini-break too much for me to prepare it :-) I halved the recipe (I'm feeding just me after all), which still made enough for 2 people.

Here it is, served with some turkish bread drizzled with olive oil & sprinkled with fresh parsley - yum!
Vegetable & Rice Bake

1 cup basmati rice
1 TBS olive oil
1 large onion, chopped
2 tsp chopped rosemary
250g button mushrooms, quartered
2 red capsicums, sliced
400g can chopped tomatoes
1 3/4 cups vegetable stock
Freshly ground black pepper
1/4 cup chopped flat-leaf parsley

Preheat the oven to 190C. Rinse the rice & drain. Heat the oil in a flameproof casserole dish & cook the onion 2-3mins, until softened. Add the rosemary & mushrooms & cook another 2mins.

Add the rice & stir to coat, then add the capsicum, tomato, stock & pepper to taste. Bring to the boil, then cover with a tightly fitting lid. Put into the oven & bake 20-25mins, until the rice is tender. Serve topped with the parsley.

When I get back to Melbourne I'm going to try a couple of alterations to make it even healthier - I'd like to use brown rice (I'll add a little more liquid & increase the cooking time) and throw in some protein - I think chickpeas or red kidney beans would work well.

Here are some shots of Mum & Dad's dogs. So cute! I really miss them when I'm away. Tess is a cross between a collie & something mysterious. She's a massive sook as you can probably tell by those eyes :-)
Lucy is a border collie & hates getting her photo taken.

Body Fuel in sunny NSW

2010-08-29T09:01:00+00:00

I flew into Newcastle yesterday morning to spend the weekend with my family on the Central Coast & it's so sunny & beautiful here! I just have to keep reminding myself that I'm in Melbourne for the culture, food, shopping etc etc... I'm sure if I repeat it like a mantra it will sink in eventually.

We had lunch yesterday at Body Fuel in Terrigal. I used to visit the Gosford cafe regularly when I worked there because the staff are so friendly, there are a couple of vegan items on the menu & the coffee is about as good as you can get in Gosford. Since then they have opened cafes in Terrigal & Tuggerah. The Terrigal cafe is right around the corner from my old house - I so wish it had been there a few years ago! It's in a beautiful sunny spot one block up the hill from the beach, capturing the sea breeze perfectly.

Yesterday I went with my old regular Body Fuel dish - Veg Vietnamese Rice Paper Rolls. This comes with a mix of (vegan) salads, soy mayonnaise & a sweet chilli-based sauce for the rolls. I was so hungry I ate it all before I remembered to take a photo :-( They also have a juice-bar & can do dairy-free smoothies. You can make other items on the menu vegan too - just talk to the super-friendly staff.

Here's a photo of Terrigal (taken just over the road from the cafe). It doesn't really do it justice, but you can see the lovely Norfolk Island Pines that line the beach (plus the unfortunate monstrosity that is the Crowne Plaza hotel on the corner).

Body Fuel
2/12 Kurrawyba Ave, Terrigal
7 days, 6am-4pm
www.bodyfuel.com.au

Taste of Melbourne: on a sugar high

2010-08-28T20:23:00+00:00

The Taste of Melbourne Festival is on this weekend. It is exactly the sort of event I often don't get around to attending despite good intentions, so I accepted SBS Food's offer of a VIP pass and $60 of Crowns. I was concerned about going once I ran my eye over the restaurant dishes and saw how few vegetarian mains were available. Consequently, I spent more time on the sugary side of the menu than I would prefer but I had a lovely time.

I arrived and had my first inkling of how busy it would be when I saw the queues at the entrance. My first impression was that the place was packed with stalls catering to those who wanted to eat meat and drink alcohol, neither of which interests me. I turned my attention instead to the beauty of the Exhibition Buildings.

I have spent a lot more of my life admiring historic architecture than dining in fancy restaurants, so I am no expert on the latter. I was more excited by the magnificent interior decoration than by celebrity chefs. I was more comfortable browsing the producers stalls than the restaurants. It was exciting to be able to try food from restaurants that I don't usually frequent but my enjoyment was somewhat dimme by the scarcity of vegetarian mains.

Fortunately Cindy and Michael have shown that vegetarians can eat well in such places but to see the offerings at Taste of Melbourne you wouldn't think so. The lack of vegetarian dishes from these high end restaurants is disappointing. Surely 14 restaurants presenting three dishes each should be able to have more than one savoury vegetarian dish among them. It implies that to eat good food you must have meat. But where is the creativity, the environmental good will and the generosity found in catering to vegetarians (or vegans or celiacs or others).

I had my crowns (tokens that the restaurants accept in lieu of cash) so I set about finding the Izakaya Den stall in the pop up restaurant who offered the only savoury restaurant meal that was vegetarian. The sweet corn kaki-age with green tea salt was delicious.Little mounds of fresh juicy corn were fried in tempura batter. Together with the amazing salt, it was a light and tasty with a perfect balance of sweet and salty flavours. It was worth trying just for the unusual and beautufully coloured salt.

En route to the pop up restaurant, I had stopped at Longrain to taste the mocktails (ie the ones with no alcohol). I ordered a Virgin Calmin' Miranda of mandarin, apple, cranberry and pink grapefruit juice, garnished with passionfruit. You can see a glimpse of it in the above sweet corn photo. Not a combination I would normally choose, I found myself wishing that there was more of this refreshing juice. I don't go out to bars often these days so I don't know if the bartender's performance with the cocktail shaker is the norm but I found it over the top.

After trying the one savoury main on offer for vegetarians, I then turned my attention to the desserts. The first one I wanted to try was from Charcoal Lane, not because I was unable to attend a work dinner there last week, but because it intrigued me. The raspberry and rosella flower cannelloni with strawberry and native mint salad didn't let me down.

The 'cannelloni' was a sheet of rosella flower gel made from something called elastic gel that I was told did not have any gelatine in it. It was wrapped around a light fruity mousse. I loved how the smooth creaminess contrasted with the fresh minty strawberry chunks. It was both simple and impressive.

Next was The Bombe from The Stokehouse! Fun to order and amazing to eat! This dessert was another fine pairing of flavours and textures. It was a slice of tangy intense strawberry sorbet, creamy white chocolate ice cream, and meringue. It was undoubtedly the most impressively presented dessert of the day but I was still surprised at how good this tasted.

I don't know how they managed to have the ice cream so firm and the meringue beside it cooked crisp and golden brown on the outside. I do know that the meringue was unlike any I have had before. It was soft and sweet like raw egg white and sugar when I dug my spoon in. I will always applaud a dessert with some fresh fruit and this was no exception. The strawberries on top were the icing on the cake!

Two desserts were probably quite enough but I had the opportunity and commitment. However I wasn't sure I could continue pumping all that sugar into myself. Fortunately I passed the Yarra Valley Dairy stall and took a taste of some blue cheese for some balance. It fortified me to try the Pistachio 'panna cotta' with caramel salted popcorn from Sarti. I am not normally a fan of either. The popcorn was too sweet but I did enjoy a few mouthfuls of the panna cotta which was silky smooth and full of flavour but by then I was unable to eat much.

I decided I needed another drink. Having enjoyed the first mocktail, I returned to Longrain for another. This time I chose the Virgin Moscow Mule of fresh lime and mint topped with ginger beer. It wasn't as good as my first drink. Maybe too much sugar had passed my lips or maybe the noisy dj dulled my senses but I found it too sweet for my liking.

My fourth and last restaurant dessert that I tried was the hot date tart from Esposito. It was not served hot but I suspect the pun was more important than the temperature. It was nice with a wintery combination of spices but was quite dense and the sort of slice that I would expect to see in a cake shop than a high end restaurant. (Update: I just found a proper description thanks to Thanh - "Hot date tart made of lemon shortcrust pastry, date compote cooked in spice, orange juice, port and an almond frangipane".) I had a small spoonful or two but could not summon up much enthusiasm for it, because I had really hit the ceiling of my sugar intake. On another day, I might enjoy it more.

I should mention that one of the enjoyable aspects of the day was the many different places where you could sit and eat. The Age newspaper and Gourmet Traveller magazine were free with entry. You could choose to sit in large couches, at a high table with stools, at this lovely marbled topped table next to a cumquat tree in the photo, or even stand at a table of fake grass. Something for everyone!

Having used up my crowns (which are the only currency accepted in the restaurants), I set off to browse the producers' stalls. Being a vegetarian means developing an ability to ignore those whose world revolves around meat and enjoying what else is on offer. There was an interesting range of chocolates, pasta, cheeses, dips, jams, ice creams, olive oils. The one glaring omission was the lack of any bread bakers. Fortunately I could still admire sweet food.

The first one that caught my eye was the Chocolate Master. The chocolates were exquisite to look at. I just loved these gorgeous chocolate shoes. I sampled a couple of the small beautifully coloured chocolates (after I got home) and they tasted as wonderful as they looked. There were quite a few chocolate and ice cream stalls which I would have tried if I hadn't been on a sugar high.

I was pleased to see that Maria's Select Foods were selling small tubs of gnocchi with pesto. Someone beside me said that pasta with feta and olives was amazing but I just took the first thing available as I needed some salt in me.

I also enjoyed sampling the pesto at Alberto's Delicacies. The eggplant pesto was delicious but I ended up taking home basil pesto and some fresh fettucine to please the folks at home. It made an easy dinner that night. Alberto was a character, telling me how he used to wake on a Sunday morning to find his mother making pasta to the strains of opera.

Perhaps my favourite place was the Yarra Valley Regional Food Trail. This was just like browsing a really interesting farmer's market. Lavender honey, kiwi fruit chutney, rhubarb and raspberry jam, lemon myrtle gluten free shortbreads, meringues, poffertjes and plum pudding were among the foods the took my fancy here. And, like most of the other stalls, they were staffed by friendly folk who were generous with their free tastings. The Lavender Lady, dressed all in purple, of course, invited me to visit her farm.

I arrived home with a swag of purchases. Rochester Ginger Wine, Culinary Lavender and Lavender Honey from Warritina Lavender Farm, Rhubarb and Raspberry Jam from Yarra Valley Gourmet Foods, Pesto and Pasta from Alberto's Delicacies, Smoked Cheddar and Honey and Cinnamon Yoghurt from King Island Dairy, Chocolate with Cinnamon Almonds, a Raspberry chocolate and a Honey Caramel chocolate from the Chocolate Master and Gourmet Traveller. All very fascinating for little hands.

The verdict: I hope to be back, although the $30 entrance fee is prohibitive and the crowds were overwhelming at times. The lack of vegetarian dishes from the restaurants is disappointing but the food I tasted at the restaurants was inspired and shows that food can taste excellent even when not made fresh to order. The producers' stalls had a great variety of interesting and good quality foods. Good food and friendly stall holders in a beautiful setting is the perfect recipe for a relaxing and enjoyable day.

Thanks to SBS Food for a great experience. For more reviews and photos, see other bloggers who have written about the event: Iron Chef Shellie, Kitchen Wench, Off the Spork, Sweet Cherry Pie, Jeroxie, More Food = Happy Life, Melbourne Gastronome, I Eat Therefore I Am, SBS Food Blog.

The Taste of Melbourne
Royal Exhibition Buildings, Carlton
26-29 August 2010
Web: http://www.tastefestivals.com.au/melbourne/

August 17, 2010: 'Lamb' korma pilaf

2010-08-28T07:58:00+00:00

Cindy came home from Global Green with a bag of faux-lamb and a plan. She'd been excited about Camellia Panjabi's lamb pilaf for some time and a bag of frozen 'lamb' seemed like the perfect excuse to give it a try. We supplemented the faux meat with a handful of mushrooms and otherwise stuck reasonably close to the recipe. It's a fair bit of work, although I managed to squeeze it in pre-netball on a Tuesday night (give yourself 90 minutes or so I guess). The results? Aromatic and amazingly full of flavour but texturally a bit challenging - the fake lamb turned out much tougher than we hoped, making the meal authentically chewy. Still, the combination of the rich clove and cinnamon flavours and the sharper chilli and ginger bite, made this a winning recipe. We're already plotting to have another shot at this with a less meaty filling - possibly just mushrooms, or maybe a combination of eggplant and mushies. We'll keep you posted. The main thing to note is that this is a wonderfully spicy treat and our first effort was almost the perfect winter meal - we just need to work on the texture.

Lamb korma pilaf

400g basmati rice
4 onions, chopped finely
Thumb-sized piece of ginger, minced
6 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2 green chillies, finely chopped
5 cloves
5 cardamom pods
1 5cm cinnamon stick, broken into pieces
600g faux-lamb
400g mushrooms
1 tablespoon ground coriander
1/2 teaspoon turmeric powder
1 teaspoon cumin powder
1-2 teaspoons chilli powder
1 teaspoon mace powder
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg powder
100ml yoghurt
3 tomatoes, chopped
2 teaspoons salt
2 bay leaves
a few strands of saffron
a splash of milk

Wash the rice and leave to soak in cold water for 30 minutes.

Heat a couple of tablespoons of oil in a big pot and fry the onions until they're soft and medium to dark brown. Add the ginger, garlic, chillies, cardamom, cloves and cinnamon and fry for a few minutes. Add the 'lamb' and mushrooms and stir-fry for a few minutes, until it's well coated in the onions and spices.

Add the spice powders (coriander, cumin, mace, chilli and nutmeg) and mix well. Add in 1/4 cup of water and stir, simmering for a couple of minutes.

Add the yoghurt, tomatoes and salt to the pot, stirring through. Cover and leave to cook for 15-20 minutes, adding water if everything dries up. When everything is cooked, it should be thick and spicy and not a runny, saucy gravy.

Drain the rice and put it in a pot with an equal volume of water and the bay leaves. Bring to the boil, add the turmeric, salt and a splash of oil and simmer uncovered, until the water has been soaked up and the rice is about 3/4 cooked.

Soak the saffron in the milk and set aside.

Take a large casserole dish and brush the bottom with oil. Put half the rice in the bottom and spread evenly. Add the spiced lamb on top and smooth it out, before adding the rest of the rice on top. Cover and cook at 160 degrees for 20 minutes (until the rice is completely cooked).

Remove from the oven and sprinkle the saffron/milk over the top before serving.

Quince Curiosity

2010-08-27T21:07:00+00:00

Some months ago I listened to Aboriginal elder talking about passing culture down the generations. She said that she never expected to become like her mum but now she finds herself following in her footsteps. I feel the same way about quinces. When I was a child they were the mysterious fruit that my mum transformed into quince jelly. They were hard, ugly and inedible fruit that I could never imagine wanting to buy or cook. Yet here I am telling you about my kitchen experiments with quinces.

No quince jelly has been made in my kitchen but perhaps there will come a day when I truly turn into my mother and begin to cook up huge pots of beautiful rose coloured jelly. My mother was given her quinces by my dad’s boss’s wife who had a quince tree. Mrs M was a kind lady who seemed very old to us. My sister Fran and I loved visiting her to help make toys for charity.

The yearly quince jelly day involved a my mum stewing quinces in her huge preserving pan for ages, straining the pulp from the quinces (that I have read somewhere can make quince paste) and then filling the kitchen with jars of ruby-colored quince jelly with my mum’s handwritten labels. It was sticky and messy but the jelly had a sweet seductive fragrance. There always seemed to be jars of quince jelly in our pantry for eating on toast at breakfast. I don’t think I have ever eaten a quince jelly that my mum didn’t make. Even today the smell fills me with nostalgia.

My mum still makes quince jelly, though she no longer gets her quinces from Mrs M. She is a connoisseur when it comes to quince jelly. Sometimes we go to a store of home made jams and my mother holds jars of quince jelly up to the light to see if they are clear enough to reach her high standards. Not all are.

I read somewhere that quinces are not produced commercially. We keep them alive in our home kitchens. My mother gently persuaded me to start cooking with quinces by bringing me some of her poached quinces last year. I experimented with baking quince in cakes. I tried Stephanie’s Quince Cake, with nuts and spices. I would try this again, though maybe sticking more closely to her recipe. I also tried quinces in place of apples in a low fat vegan brownie but wouldn’t bother repeating this because it was too cakey.

I then bought some quince paste and was inspired by Haalo to use this in a cake recipe instead of dried fruit in an apple cake. This was a success. The studs of quince paste were pleasingly soft fruity bursts in the cake. However, the caramel apple cake I tried was a bit intense. I think the chopped quince paste would be better in a plain buttery cake with apple, or an olive oil one like Haalo’s.

By far the best use of quinces was in an apple crumble earlier this winter. I first tried this with some syrup from a large jar of poached quinces that I bought in a specialty store. It gave such wonderful flavour that I tried it again when I finally poached some quinces myself. I loosely followed David Lebovitz’s instructions.

I made an apple, quince and rhubarb crumble that we all loved. Sylvia loves the fruit crumbles I have been making and this was one where she sat opening her mouth for more like a little bird. It is so lovely to have peace and quiet while feeding her. Quince brings out the best of apple flavour and fragrance. I decided on a buttery crumble from Smitten Kitchen using mostly butter, flour and sugar but I think I would prefer it with an oaty crumble.

So in my beginning is my end and the quince is now my friend. I have had it baked with honey and it is exquisite but for now I think I will stick to cakes and crumbles. Maybe one day you will find me making quince jelly or baking quince to eat with icecream for dessert. And maybe one day Sylvia will learn about quinces from me, just like I have from my mum.

Below I have listed some quince recipes that have interested me. I am sending the Rhubarb, Quince and Apple Crumble to Astrid of Paulchen’s Foodblog for Weekend Herb Blogging (#248), overseen by Haalo and founded by Kalyn.

Dimpled quince pudding cake – Always Order Dessert
Latkes with pomegranate quince chutney – A Vegan Visitor
Quince and blueberry crumble cake - Where’s the Beef
Quince paste and olive oil cake – Cook Almost Anything at Least Once
Quince and polenta cake – Ninesm
Spiced quince ice cream – A Food Lover’s Journey

Previous on Green Gourmet Giraffe:

This time last year: Accidental Plastic Tart
This time three years ago: WTSIM ... Beggars Burgers

Poached quinces
Adapted from David Lebowitz

4 cups water
½ cup castor sugar
¼ cup honey
½ lemon, cut in half
1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise
1 cinnamon quill
3 large quince (I got between 1-2 quinces because mine were brown inside), roughly chopped

Place all ingredients in a large saucepan and bring to boil. Simmer for about 30 minutes or until cooked (This can take up to 2 hours but mine took much less).

Banana and quince smoothie

1 banana, peeled and roughly chopped
1 kiwi fruit, peeled and chopped (or a generous handful of berries)
1 cup quince poaching liquid
½ cup apple juice

Blend

Rhubarb, quince and apple crumble
serves 4-6

Stewed fruit:

2 cups quince poaching liquid
2 cups poached quinces (see above), sliced
3 apples, peeled, cored and sliced
300-400g rhubarb
2 tbsp brown sugar

For the topping:

Adapted from Smitten Kitchen

1⅓ cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 tsp ground cinnamon
½ tsp allspice
2 tablespoons castor sugar
2 tablespoons brown sugar
110g butter, chilled and chopped

Simmer the apples in quince poaching liquid for 10 minutes. Add the quinces and simmer another 10 minutes. Add rhubarb and cook another 5 minutes until it just starts to soften. Set aside to cool for a bit and the rhubarb will continue to soften. Check sweetness and add sugar as required (I added 2 tbsp brown sugar).

To make crumble, place all ingredients into bowl and use your fingers to rub butter into flour and other ingredients.

Place stewed fruit in a greased baking dish. Scatter with crumble. Bake at 180 C for about 40 minutes or until crumble is golden brown.

Stephanie’s Quince Cake
Adapted from Stephanie Alexander’s Cook’s Companion via http://www.woolfit.com/quincenutcake.html

187g plain flour
1 teaspoons bicarbonate of soda
1 heaped teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 heaped teaspoons ground allspice
¼ teaspoon salt
½ cup roughly crushed walnuts
½ cup poached quince, mashed
1 tbsp treacle
1 tbsp quince jelly
2 tbsp honey
1 egg
¼ cup oil plus 1 tbsp
¼ cup poaching liquid
icing sugar to dust

Grease a 15cm square cake tin. (NB I halved the recipe to fit a small tin instead of the 23 cm round springform pan originally called for). Preheat the oven to 180C.

Place dry ingredients into a large bowl. Mix the mashed quinces with remaining ingredients in a small bowl. Pour wet ingredients into dry ingredients and gently stir to combine.

Spoon into the prepared tin. Bake for 40 minutes, or until a knife inserted in the centre comes out clean. Cool the cake in the tin. Remove from tin and dust with icing sugar before serving. Mine was a little dry so I serve some with yoghurt and some with leftover cream cheese frosting.

Caramel Apple Cake with Quince
adapted from Australian Women’s Weekly cakes and slices cookbook

1 cup plain flour
¼ cup wholemeal self raising flour
1½ cups dark brown sugar
1½ tsp cinnamon
60g butter
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla essence
2 apples, peeled and grated
1 cup walnuts, chopped
100g quince paste, chopped (instead of raisins)

Mix flours, sugar, cinnamon, butter, eggs and vanilla with electric beaters or by hand (I can’t remember which I did). It will be quite a stiff batter. Stir in apples and walnuts and then gently fold in quince paste lumps. Spoon into a greased and lined 20cm round cake tin. Bake in a moderate oven (180 C) for about 50 minutes (and if you have a dodgy oven like mine you will need another 30 minutes on the bottom shelf of the oven.) Cool on a wire rack.

On the Stereo:
Tigermilk: Belle and Sebastian

Gluten free super chocolate cake by freefancy

2010-08-27T19:33:00+00:00

Gluten free super chocolate cake by freefancy

The baking machine

2010-08-27T06:21:00+00:00

I was a BAKING MACHINE when I got home last night! My motivation was to use up the veges in the fridge because I'm away this weekend & there's no way D will use them - I'm not sure he even knows where the vegetable crisper is in the fridge :-).

First up on the menu was a Baked Pumpkin Risotto for dinner - loosely based on this one. I've started making it regularly, basically because it's simple, delicious & pretty impossible to stuff up. Last night I used leek, pumpkin & silverbeet. There ended up being about the twice the weight of vegetables than the recipe called for, so I added some extra rice & stock to compensate.
While the risotto was in the oven, I started on a double-batch of Chickpea & Mushroom sausages, first attempted last week. I'm freezing these for D to eat while I'm away - he tends to subsist on a diet of frozen pizza if I don't provide a healthier alternative, plus, I had a huge bag of mushrooms to get rid of.

I didn't have any onion, so I just fried the mushrooms with some onion powder, plus some garlic powder thrown in for good measure. I also threw in about half a bunch of coriander which I had to use up. I went to mix in the breadcrumbs & realised I only had about half the required amount & didn't even have any bread in the house to make more. So I added some rolled oats instead. Finally, because there were so many of the damn things, I decided to bake, rather than grill them. You can see the result below. Yes, I KNOW what they look like, you don't need to tell me - but I stick by my assertion that it's the taste, not the presentation, that counts :-). The baking did make them a little dry, but that's nothing that lashings of tomato sauce won't fix.
Finally, I wanted to get rid of 2 beetroots - I decided to make a massive batch of Chocolate Beetroot Cupcakes for freezing. I figure I'll always have some on hand now which will be very handy in cupcake emergencies.

I doubled the recipe, which ended up making a whopping 34 cupcakes! I had to pull out my nifty new cupcake carrier to store them in.
Three hours later I was completely exhausted & I never want to see a kitchen again. I figure that at least now I know how much I can cook in 3 hrs, which is:

A risotto for 6
24 sausages
34 cupcakes

Luckily, I'm visiting Mum & Dad this weekend, so I'll be able to revert to childhood & let Mum look after me :-)

Lentil shepherd’s pie

2010-08-26T20:13:57+00:00

Lentil shepherd's pie

I’m a big fan of cooking up large dishes that last for two or three days. It’s worth the extra effort to make a dish that has a few stages involved in the cooking process if it means you can come home from work the following night and it just needs heating up and a quick salad thrown together to go with it.

Lentil shepherd’s pie is an old favourite that I have been making for many years. It was originally a recipe by the wonderful vegetarian cook Rose Elliot, but I have adapted it over time to suit my own taste.

In fact each time I make this pie it turns out a little different. I tend to not follow recipes to the tee but rather adapt and make up new bits up as I go along. When I stumble on a great combination I write it down with the hope that I’ll dig out the instructions next time and repeat the formula. Of course it doesn’t always happen that way and the next incarnation is different again.

Anyway, I think this version of my favourite lentil shepherd’s pie is pretty good and worth blogging.

What you’ll need:

400g brown lentils
2 large onions, quartered and thinly sliced
750g mashed potatoes
420g tin chopped tomatoes
2 tbsp tomato paste
2 tsp chopped garlic
2 tbsp reduced salt soya sauce
4 tbsp chopped fresh parsley
Ground black pepper
Olive oil

Method:

Rinse the lentils thoroughly and simmer in a large pan for about 25 minutes until softened, then drain. Sauté the onions and garlic in the olive oil for about 5 minutes. Add the tomato paste, chopped tomatoes, soya sauce and parsley and simmer for a more few minutes. Stir through the lentils and heat through. Season with black pepper and transfer the mixture to a large baking dish.

You can prepare the mashed potatoes from scratch or buy frozen pre-prepared ones. When I make them from scratch I always leave the skins on, however I now often buy frozen mash as it tastes fantastic, is really creamy and it’s so easy to use. I’m a big fan of wholesome home cooked food but I’m also very happy to accept a food prep short cut such as this one when it’s just as good as the homemade variety. It all depends on the quality available at your local supermarket.

Spread the mashed potatoes in an even layer over the lentil mixture. I use a spatula and knife to help with this process. When you’ve got a nice thick even layer of potatoes drag the back of a fork across it in lines to create a ridge pattern. You can dot the top with butter or margarine if you like but I usually don’t bother.

Bake the pie for about 40 minutes in a medium to high oven until the top is nicely browned. Serve with salad or steamed vegetables, and perhaps some tomato sauce for on the top of the pie (a must for my boys).

Lentil shepherd's pie with salad

Lentil shepherd's pie with salad - kids' style