October:
* I turned 26, and to celebrate we went to see Back to the Future at the cinema. It was incredible.
*I got a Diana Mini camera for my birthday, which makes it surprisingly easy for me to take good photos
*The week after my birthday I made an effort to start following a vegan diet, and the rules I am playing by are: no dairy or eggs, no meat, but I'm still eating honey and wearing some leather.
*I went to see an indiepop band called "The Whatevers", and liked them a lot. The second time I went to see them, they said they needed a drummer. I'd been wanting to drum for a while so I said I would try out at their rehearsal the next week. Despite my very basic skills, and minimal time to actually practice my drumming in between drunkenly putting myself forward and trying out, they said I could stay in the band. We've now been recording and planning gigs, and you can hear us here: www.myspace.com/samepowerchords. I absolutely love playing the drums.
November:
*I planned to write a novel for NaNoWriMo but only got about 4000 words in. It started off being a fictionalised account of my October, with the plan to divert into fantasy once I had written up to speed, but I ended up writing myself into a corner and my characters (being closely modelled on those I had met the month before) seemed incapable of doing things differently to their real-life counterparts. I decided it would be unfair to write them like-for-like so gave in and focussed on the drumming and planning vegan meals.
*I got a junior drumkit from ebay, which is red, shiny, adorable and very useful. It was also only £13.
*It was really icy and cold, and one week I got a snowball thrown in my face whilst cycling, and in an unrelated incident fell off my bike on Meanwood Road. I then gave in and walked everywhere until the thaw, and ended up getting a really persistent cough and cold, and having to take time off work.
*I applied to be a volunteer at Leeds rape crisis centre SARSVL
*I carried on having driving lessons, and passed my theory and hazard perception test third time round.
December:
*I gave myself licence to be less strict with my veganism this month what with Christmas and still being ill and worn out. That sounds like a cop-out as I type, and to be honest I would probably have gotten better more quickly if I had focussed on eating well and not falling back on dairy and snacking on festive food.
*I started going to Leeds Roller Dolls Training, and am making *very* slow progress.
*I went to the Belle and Sebastian ATP and had a glorious, drama-free time. I especially enjoyed the fun-pool with rapids, the grabber machines and also the bands. The Vaselines and Edwyn Collins were my favourites.
*Set up a tumblr for my diana mini photographs: http://oh-diana.tumblr.com/
*Booked a trip to Paris in the New Year to go see the elles@centrepompidou exhibition
*I got through the selection process for SARSVL so will be starting training in the new year. To make time for this, I decided to stop volunteering at Brownies, which was surprisingly emotional, but the definitely the right decision.
*On new years eve I went out to the commonplace, twisted my ankle on the way there and then danced on it all night and walked home to Meanwood. Ended up talking more freely, and kissing more people than usual, but I suppose it was new year's eve after all.
January:
*Woke up on the 1st with a really swollen ankle, which is only just starting to feel better. Read back issues of the fantastic magazine make/shift, drank a lot of tea, watched a lot of Little House on the Prairie.
*Did all this again in the 2nd January, then went round to see friends in the evening for a vegan potluck and films with "Paris" in the title.
*Today I made some great peanut chilli, and am just waiting for the bread to rise before I bake it. I've already mended my first puncture of the year, and cheated by just putting in a new inner tube as I suspected it was a slow puncture as the bike was fine last time I rode it.
*And tomorrow I have to go back to work.
So that's an overview of what I've been doing instead of blogging. I've started keeping a paper journal again for 2011 to give me some perspective and hopefully spot patterns in my behaviour, but hopefully that's something I will do alongside maintaining this blog!
Showing posts with label vegan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label vegan. Show all posts
Monday, 3 January 2011
Saturday, 27 March 2010
The Muffins Are On Me.
I got my copy of Vegan Brunch through the post this morning and got completely over excited. Our Saturday post arrives around 11am, so by the time I had looked through the book and decided what I wanted to make, it was already lunchtime. I went out on my bike for ingredients to make English Muffins and Scrambled Tofu (and also picked up some reduced plantain which I think I will cook up for brunch tomorrow), and at about 4pm sat down to this feast:
And (whilst it may not be the most photogenic meal ever and could have done with some green vegetables in it) it was great, and the potato salad on the right was made with the last of my smile potatoes! I've never made (savoury) muffins from scratch, so that was pretty exciting. I am already planning a smoked paprika version, and a marmite version. Mmmm. And scrambled tofu. I know it's this big vegan cliche staple that everyone is bored with, but I'd never tried it, and I think I could eat a lot of it before I got bored.
Vegan Brunch is a very exciting cookery book. I already own a couple of books by Isa Chandra Moskowitz (Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World and Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar) and they are all beautiful and entertaining and inspiring.
The only thing that trips me up is the American English (as these are American cookbooks), which is particularly difficult when it comes to measurements/volumes and the fact that some ingredients have different names. Like what the American's call cornmeal, we call maize flour - or more commonly - polenta. So I often have to approach recipes with my computer on in the background so I can google anything I don't understand.
Whilst trying to work out what cornmeal was, I came across this site, which promises to answer "life's vexing cooking questions". It's set up in a Q & A style, and you can search the archive or submit new questions. The tone of the answers can be a bit sarcastic at times, but it's a really useful site especially if you are trying to bridge the American/British cooking terms divide.
I also discovered that US and UK teaspoons and tablespoons are not exactly the same size as their transatlantic counterparts, which led me to this site which not only gives conversions from US teaspoons to UK teaspoons, but all sorts of other useful conversions, like a cup of flour converted into metric weight. Although to be honest I just have a set of American-size measuring cups which I use for any American cookbooks.
And (whilst it may not be the most photogenic meal ever and could have done with some green vegetables in it) it was great, and the potato salad on the right was made with the last of my smile potatoes! I've never made (savoury) muffins from scratch, so that was pretty exciting. I am already planning a smoked paprika version, and a marmite version. Mmmm. And scrambled tofu. I know it's this big vegan cliche staple that everyone is bored with, but I'd never tried it, and I think I could eat a lot of it before I got bored.
Vegan Brunch is a very exciting cookery book. I already own a couple of books by Isa Chandra Moskowitz (Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World and Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar) and they are all beautiful and entertaining and inspiring.
The only thing that trips me up is the American English (as these are American cookbooks), which is particularly difficult when it comes to measurements/volumes and the fact that some ingredients have different names. Like what the American's call cornmeal, we call maize flour - or more commonly - polenta. So I often have to approach recipes with my computer on in the background so I can google anything I don't understand.
Whilst trying to work out what cornmeal was, I came across this site, which promises to answer "life's vexing cooking questions". It's set up in a Q & A style, and you can search the archive or submit new questions. The tone of the answers can be a bit sarcastic at times, but it's a really useful site especially if you are trying to bridge the American/British cooking terms divide.
I also discovered that US and UK teaspoons and tablespoons are not exactly the same size as their transatlantic counterparts, which led me to this site which not only gives conversions from US teaspoons to UK teaspoons, but all sorts of other useful conversions, like a cup of flour converted into metric weight. Although to be honest I just have a set of American-size measuring cups which I use for any American cookbooks.
Saturday, 20 February 2010
My Favourite Banana Bread Recipe
This is my favourite banana bread recipe, from the Post Punk Kitchen site:
http://theppk.com/recipes/dbrecipes/index.php?RecipeID=121
One of my old housemates used to bake all the time, and she made a really great banana bread. But it had eggs and alcohol in it, which made it seem a bit decadent for a Saturday morning. You also had to gently simmer apple juice on the stove to cook the sultanas and it all got a little labour intensive.
I like this recipe because it uses ingredients I always have in the house, including a number of bananas going past their best. I try and make my baking vegan, as I like the challenge, plus I still have aspirations of kicking my dairy habit. I have also eaten a lot of disappointing vegan cake over the years, so want to build up a box of tried and trusted recipes to restore people's faith in vegan baking.
I've always made the recipe in a large loaf tin until now, but I recently came across these mini loaf tins and thought they would be adorable for making lots of mini versions of whatever I was making. The batch actually made eight mini loaves, six of which are pictured here, with each loaf about the size of a small muffin/generous cupcake. (The other two of them were eaten before taking the photograph).
Delicious hot or cold, with peanut butter or chocolate spread, or just by itself delicious.
http://theppk.com/recipes/dbrecipes/index.php?RecipeID=121
One of my old housemates used to bake all the time, and she made a really great banana bread. But it had eggs and alcohol in it, which made it seem a bit decadent for a Saturday morning. You also had to gently simmer apple juice on the stove to cook the sultanas and it all got a little labour intensive.
I like this recipe because it uses ingredients I always have in the house, including a number of bananas going past their best. I try and make my baking vegan, as I like the challenge, plus I still have aspirations of kicking my dairy habit. I have also eaten a lot of disappointing vegan cake over the years, so want to build up a box of tried and trusted recipes to restore people's faith in vegan baking.
I've always made the recipe in a large loaf tin until now, but I recently came across these mini loaf tins and thought they would be adorable for making lots of mini versions of whatever I was making. The batch actually made eight mini loaves, six of which are pictured here, with each loaf about the size of a small muffin/generous cupcake. (The other two of them were eaten before taking the photograph).
Delicious hot or cold, with peanut butter or chocolate spread, or just by itself delicious.
Tuesday, 2 February 2010
Vegan, gluten-free browie recipe.
I'm going to a vegan potluck dinner tonight, and so I decided to make chocolate brownies. I have a tried and tested recipe from "Another Dinner is Possible" and they are one of the tastiest things I have ever eaten.
BUT they use flour, so I started wondering if I could make a gluten-free version. (A usually unseen competitive edge comes out of me when cooking for other people, and as I seem to move in circles where multiple food preferences/intolerances are commonplace a 'vegan plus gluten-free' recipe will be a good one to have under my belt. I also hate it when vegan cake tastes less satisfying than cake using dairy, so this shouldn't be a problem here.)
So this is the version I made, with significant inspiration from both ADIP and the now-defunct "nosh ninjas" website. You do have to pre-soak the beans overnight and also cook them before using them in this recipe, but I do this in batches and then freeze them in usable portions so it's not too much of a faff.
Topping:
4tbsp cocoa
4tbsp soy milk
60g margerine
160g brown sugar
1tsp vanilla essence
Main Brownie:
100g margerine
100g cocoa
100g white sugar
100g brown sugar
1/4 tsp salt
Egg replacer equivalent to 2 eggs
200g cooked haricot beans (but black beans work too)
1/4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla essence
1/2 cup chopped walnuts OR 50g chocolate chopped up (optional)
Method:
1. Preheat the oven to 180c, and grease an 8inch x 8inch tin. Only grease the base, as this will help the mixture climb the sides
2. Make topping: melt margerine in a saucepan with cocoa, sugar and soya milk. Slowly bring to the boil, then simmer for a minute (stirring well). Take off the heat and transfer to a boll, then beat it with a fork for ten minutes to help it cool and thicken. Add vanilla essence.
3. To make the main brownie part: Melt the margerine in a saucepan. Meanwhile, in a medium bowl, mix together the cocoa, white sugar, brown sugar and salt. Pour the melted margerine over this mixture and stir together.
4. In a food processor (or with a potato masher) puree the beans with the egg replacer and vanilla essence.
5. Add the bean mixture to the chocolate mixture, along with the baking powder, and mix well. Stir in the walnuts/chocolate chips.
6. Transfer the mixture into the greased tin and spread out with a spatula. Then pour the topping on top. Cook for 40 minutes. A knitting needle inserted in the middle should come out with only a few moist crumbs (unless you hit a melted chocolate chip - there's some guesswork involved!)
7. Wait for it to cool down, then cut into squares.
I use "no-egg" as an egg replacer, but I have read about flaxseeds making a nifty substitute. My friend Swithun adds vegetable oil in place of eggs to veganize recipes, and apparently bananas can also work.
I also think this might be nice with a pinch of chilli powder or cayenne pepper. It's pretty heavy on sugar, but I don't think you can really get away from that when making brownies.
BUT they use flour, so I started wondering if I could make a gluten-free version. (A usually unseen competitive edge comes out of me when cooking for other people, and as I seem to move in circles where multiple food preferences/intolerances are commonplace a 'vegan plus gluten-free' recipe will be a good one to have under my belt. I also hate it when vegan cake tastes less satisfying than cake using dairy, so this shouldn't be a problem here.)
So this is the version I made, with significant inspiration from both ADIP and the now-defunct "nosh ninjas" website. You do have to pre-soak the beans overnight and also cook them before using them in this recipe, but I do this in batches and then freeze them in usable portions so it's not too much of a faff.
Topping:
4tbsp cocoa
4tbsp soy milk
60g margerine
160g brown sugar
1tsp vanilla essence
Main Brownie:
100g margerine
100g cocoa
100g white sugar
100g brown sugar
1/4 tsp salt
Egg replacer equivalent to 2 eggs
200g cooked haricot beans (but black beans work too)
1/4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla essence
1/2 cup chopped walnuts OR 50g chocolate chopped up (optional)
Method:
1. Preheat the oven to 180c, and grease an 8inch x 8inch tin. Only grease the base, as this will help the mixture climb the sides
2. Make topping: melt margerine in a saucepan with cocoa, sugar and soya milk. Slowly bring to the boil, then simmer for a minute (stirring well). Take off the heat and transfer to a boll, then beat it with a fork for ten minutes to help it cool and thicken. Add vanilla essence.
3. To make the main brownie part: Melt the margerine in a saucepan. Meanwhile, in a medium bowl, mix together the cocoa, white sugar, brown sugar and salt. Pour the melted margerine over this mixture and stir together.
4. In a food processor (or with a potato masher) puree the beans with the egg replacer and vanilla essence.
5. Add the bean mixture to the chocolate mixture, along with the baking powder, and mix well. Stir in the walnuts/chocolate chips.
6. Transfer the mixture into the greased tin and spread out with a spatula. Then pour the topping on top. Cook for 40 minutes. A knitting needle inserted in the middle should come out with only a few moist crumbs (unless you hit a melted chocolate chip - there's some guesswork involved!)
7. Wait for it to cool down, then cut into squares.
I use "no-egg" as an egg replacer, but I have read about flaxseeds making a nifty substitute. My friend Swithun adds vegetable oil in place of eggs to veganize recipes, and apparently bananas can also work.
I also think this might be nice with a pinch of chilli powder or cayenne pepper. It's pretty heavy on sugar, but I don't think you can really get away from that when making brownies.
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