Tag Archives: Vegan

Roasted Broccoli and Cauliflower with Seeds

seed roasted broccoli and cauliflower

We are delighted to report that broccoli and cauliflower are cruciferous vegetables, which makes them, like, totes the Harry Potter of the veg basket. Actually, all it means is that they’re part of the cabbage family but, hey, why let plain facts get in the way of a good bit of vegetable-related wizardry?

Nutritionists recommend that we eat several servings of cruciferous veg (cruciferii?!) a week, such are their spectacular health benefits. Among other things, they’re great for bone-healthy vitamins A and K, and for phosphorous, which helps you absorb the calcium in your diet.

Add some seeds and you have a brilliantly nutritious side dish. We added flax, pumpkin, sesame and sunflower seeds – so nutritionally dense that you get iron, protein, B vitamins, vitamin E, Omega 3, magnesium and zinc (and that’s only the half of it!) Note that flax seeds need to be roasted or crushed to make them digestible, so this recipe is perfect for using them to good effect. You can use any combination of seeds to suit your taste – they’re all good for you in one way or another.

You’ll notice our Sweet Potato and Leek Pie with Goat’s Cheese Topping is being served with this. We do really practice what we preach. We don’t use any of the dirty tricks of food photographers. We really do cook – and eat! – everything we post, and none of it is sprayed with deodorant, drizzled in motor oil or rubbed with shoe polish…

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Sweet Nut and Seed Energy Mix

nut and seed energy snack

Ah, yes, here we go. Let’s get the ‘vegetarians only eat bird food’ gags out of the way… This sweet-treat mix made of nuts and seeds does look like something the parrot would enjoy, we grant you, but it’s a brilliant snack for runners. It’s great for before, during and after long runs, and also wonderful to stave off hunger when you’re racking up the miles during marathon training.

I had a little bag of this with me every night when we were doing rehearsals for NVA Speed of Light in Salford. We ran up to 3 hours each night for 7 nights and needed all the healthy help we could get! This energy mix has all the goodness of nuts and seeds, plus it’s made with low GI agave syrup. Sugars are still sugars, of course, but this recipe uses just enough to bind the nuts and seeds together.  Continue reading

Lentil Soup with Marmite Drizzle

lentil soup with marmite drizzle

Marmite haters, look away now. This one is emphatically not for you. In the olden days it would have been no use to readers outside of the UK either. But – joy of joys, miracle of miracles, all hail the internet - you can now buy Marmite online and have it shipped anywhere in the world. Take a bow, britsuperstore.com. You do the world great service.

One of our friendly followers, Tess HS, first alerted us to the possibility of adding Marmite to your lentil soup. This seemed like a great idea to us – one of the best ever, in fact – until we remembered that some strange people have an aversion to this moist, flavourful, heaven sent, sticky brown goo. ‘suppose there’s no accounting for taste…

So, in the interests of global accord, the only way to approach this seemed to us to do the soup and the Marmite separately, allowing lovers and haters both to enjoy their dinner. We served this with blue cheese too and the results were (pardon my language) absolutely freakin’ delicious. It’s vegan if you ditch the cheese, of course.

This is a great, well-rounded, hearty soup. The lentils, as you well know, are a good source of protein and fibre, while the Marmite is an excellent source of B vitamins, including the B12 that vegans need to keep an eye on. B vits, as you also know, help the body break down carbs, protein and fats and help keep your nervous system healthy. Can’t live without ‘em… Whether you can live without Marmite is another matter but with our wonderful drizzle, the choice is yours!

Lentil Soup with Marmite Drizzle

Serves 4

Ingredients

100g red lentils
1 onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, sliced
3 carrots, sliced
1 tin (400g) chopped tomatoes
2 tablespoons tomato puree
700ml vegetable stock
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 heaped teaspoons dried oregano
1 dessertspoon Marmite per person

Method
1 Saute the onions, garlic and carrots in the olive oil for 10 minutes.
2 Add the lentils, tomato puree, oregano and 500ml of the vegetable stock.
3 Bring to the boil then reduce to a simmer. Check frequently and add more stock if necessary.
4 Simmer for 20 minutes or so until the lentils are soft.
5 Buzz in a food processor or with a stick blender but leave some texture.
6 To make the drizzle, place the Marmite in a jug then simply add an equal amount of boiling water. Stir well and drizzle on your soup to your heart’s content.

Serve with crusty bread and blue cheese.

 

Sun Dried Tomato Antipasto

sun dried tomatoes

Our lovely Italian friend, Giorgia, showed us how to make this bottled antipasto. It’s a delicious way of preserving sun dried tomatoes and roasted peppers for use days, weeks or even months later. It’s pretty tasty though so your jars of this stuff probably won’t last that long. It can be eaten as a party nibble but it’s also great in sandwiches, as a side dish with almost anything, in salads and stirred into pasta.

Giorgia calls it ‘bottiglia pomodori secchi con peperoni arrostiti e aglio’ or something along those lines (she obviously doesn’t use Google Translate like I did so there may be a grammatical error or two in my version!) It sounds much better in Italian, of course, but it tastes wonderful whatever language you use to describe it.

You need to leave it for a couple of weeks to let all the flavours blend together; this is a dish that becomes about a million times more than the sum of its parts but you have to be patient and wait for it. You’ll need several clean jars (instructions on how to sterilise them are in the recipe below).

Nutritionally, sun dried tomatoes are a good source of antioxidants, notably lypocene and Vitamins A and C, all of which help reduce risk of cancer and heart disease. They’re also an excellent source of calcium and a good source of iron. I wonder how you say ‘superfood’ in Italian… Continue reading

Carrot and Sweet Potato ‘Fries’

P1000944Chips, fries, call them what you will. All fries are not created equal. This recipe takes all of the good bits of traditional fries – the starchy veg, the crunch, seasoning – and makes them 10x better  for you without sacrifice.  There’s no frying, and the carbs in these veg are more complex for more even blood sugar levels.

I am not a massive carrot fan, and so when I used to buy a large bag, I often ended up with them feeling unloved, wrapped in newspaper in the dark bottom drawer.  Now that I have made this recipe, they’re the first thing that gets eaten from my market shop.

The peanut sauce is for me the  most gorgeous counterpoint to the earthy fries, though I bet they’d be good with ketchup too.

The fries won’t be very crunchy if you crowd them, or cook anything else in the oven. Continue reading

Curried Split Pea and Roasted Red Pepper Soup

Curried Split Pea Soup with Roasted Red Peppers

Ah, random bags of dried peas and beans, where would we be without them? I mentioned this particular bag of split peas before when I wrote up our Spicy Thai Bean Burger recipe. It’s still there, haunting the cupboard, apparently not diminished in size at all, no matter how many recipes I create with it. Which is great, of course. Firstly because thrifty is the new black so I am waaaaaay on trend with my split peas (dahlink). Second, it means that I apparently have an endless supply of heart-healthy, protein rich, low calorie, low fat, mineral rich legumes. Pretty cool, huh?

Split peas are so good for you that WH Foods* describes them as ‘a small but nutritionally mighty member of the legume family’. What’s not to love?

I recently learned how to roast red peppers properly, without mess, fuss or hassle (am I late to the party on this one?) so I decide to create a soup with them in too. Plus, as I’m sure you know by know, we Veggie Runners love a bit of zing to our food so I added some curry spices to get the ping of the zing just right.

*A great not-for-profit site that provide information on healthy eating – really worth checking out. Continue reading

Dark Chocolate Vegan Aztec Truffles

P1070687

The ancient Aztecs believed that avocados had aphrodisiac qualities and the rumours have stuck. In fact, the link between avocados and libido was seen to be so strong that in the 1920s, avocado farmers actually sought to discredit the theory, trying to make their produce seem more wholesome.

Whatever the truth, you’ll feel super sexy after eating these Aphrodisiac Aztec Chocolate truffles, as they’re animal-fat free and low in sugar but still taste like a totally grown-up treat. The avocado lends a rich smoothness without piling on fake fats so … you’ll look and feel fantastic if the aphrodisiac does do the trick on your chosen paramour!

Dark Chocolate Vegan Aztec Truffles

Ingredients

2 very ripe avocadoes

3 tablespoons cream from the top of a can of coconut milk (put it in the fridge over night to harden it up a bit)

3 tablespoons agave nectar

3 tablespoons icing sugar

75g good quality cocoa powder, plus more for coating

Optional, for an extra kick – pinch of chilli flakes

Optional – 2 tablespoons desiccated coconut

Method

  1. Put the avocados, cream from the coconut milk, agave syrup, icing sugar and 75g cocoa powder in a food processor (or use a stick blender) and buzz until smooth.  If you want a fiery truffle, add your pinch of chilli flakes in with all of the other ingredients.
  2. If the mixture is not quite firm enough to roll into a ball, add more icing sugar (it can take up to a couple of tablespoons more – all depends on the avocados). Buzz again.
  3. Put a few tablespoons of cocoa into a bowl. If you want to make cocunut-covered ones, put a few tablespoons of coconut in another bowl. Roll the truffles between the palms of your hands, then roll in the coating of your choice.
  4. Chill for 2 hours before serving. These need to be kept in the fridge until you want to eat them.

bibi's truffle hands

Warning – this gets finger-lickin’ messy!

Crystallised Ginger

Crystallised Ginger

Ginger syrup

I made this for Mama Veggie Runners’ birthday (her birthday is on New Year’s Eve – best day ever for a birthday?). I wanted to make something that came from the heart, was super delicious and that she could use in other cooking.

There are two great by-products from the process, too. In the first stage, you boil the ginger to make it a bit more tender to the tooth. In doing so, you get a fiery ginger water that is perfect with some lemon and a good hit of honey. I can’t comment on how it would be in a hot toddy but I can’t imagine it doing badly.

The second stage involves a lot of sugar (North Americans don’t call this ‘candied ginger’ for nothing!) and produces a deeply ginger simple syrup. I nicked some and had it drizzled over cut melon, and mum has been enjoying it with Greek yogurt since I forced myself it hand it over. I’m sure this too would be good in cocktails! Ginger mojito, perhaps?

We read online that the best way to peel ginger is with a teaspoon. That way you can follow the nooks, bumps and crannies of the root without wasting the precious flesh that you would hacking with a knife. It really works, though the process is pretty arduous no matter how you do it.

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Root Vegetable Barlotto

This is perfect for cosy winter evenings, made with delicious root vegetables and pearl barley. Problem is, we don’t know what to call it. It’s a risotto but it’s not made with rice. Does that make it ris-notto? Given that it’s made with barley, we’ve settled for barlotto, which seems to be gaining currency in made-up-names-for-dishes circles online. We’re not entirely convinced though. If you have any better suggestions, we’d love to hear them.

It’s made of sterner stuff than a regular risotto – you don’t have to give up your life to tend to it delicately. It’s quick and easy to make (you know we like that),  tastes really special and has an unusual nutty, chewiness to it. In other words, yum! If you’re a runner, have this for dinner one night and let us know how you get on on your morning run next day. We’re thinking you’ll fly round… If you’re not a runner, a) why not? and b) you’ll love this anyway. Guaranteed. Continue reading

Sumac Kale Chips

Sumac Kales Chips

Are you taking it easy this January, food wise? Laying off the potatoes for a bit? These kale chips are not only healthier than any fried snack food, but even more moreish and super delicious. If you haven’t tried kale chips, or have only bought the bagged kind, prepare to have your mind blown.

Beloved of Yottam Ottolenghi, sumac is relatively new on foodie tables. It’s a chunky powder made from the fruit of the sumac plant, and it has a bright, citrussy flavour. It pairs beautifully with the earthy kale, and just thinking about the crunch they have is making me wish that I hadn’t already scarfed all of them.

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