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My First Veganuary
I thought Veganuary had been a thing for a number of years but it seems that number is only three, with 2016 being its third year. Which means that I may be fashionably late to the party but not that late. Yay for me.
Veganuary – as you’ll probably guess, if you don’t already know – is a month-long challenge to be vegan throughout the month of January. I did my own Veganuary during July 2008, but as Veganuly sounds more like a venereal disease than a fun food-based challenge, I can see why that didn’t catch on. I only slipped up once during my Veganuly when, one Sunday evening, I fancied something creamy and remembered the Baileys in the fridge, before remembering what exactly made Baileys creamy (clue: it’s cream).
As you’ll know if you’re a regular here (or know me personally), I a) have strong vegan leanings (dietary-wise at least); but b) live with someone who is strongly anti-vegan and who, if he suspects I’ve put something vegan on his plate, will cover it in salad cream. Which gave me something of a dilemma as someone who a) has strong vegan leanings; and b) loves monthly challenges.
But, I kept hinting I wanted to do Veganuary and the more I hinted at it, the more I wanted to do it and the more The Meat Eater didn’t really seem to mind that much. YAY. I drew up a list of ‘normal’ food that I’d be cooking, to assure him that nothing would really change that much and he wouldn’t be getting anything ‘odd’ like omelettes made out of chickpea flour instead of eggs.
I’m on Day 5 at the moment and all is well. We’ve had pizza, garlic bread, jacket potato with chilli and stew for dinner and my daytimes have been the same as usual with my Nutriblasts – the only thing I’ve had to change is making hot chocolate with vegan cocoa powder and soya milk, instead of boiling a kettle and using the instant stuff that contains milk. No biggie.
Below are photos of everything I’ve eaten so far during Veganuary 2016.
Veganuary 2016 – Day 1
Um, this was New Year’s Day and I was too hungover to eat. I couldn’t even stomach any hot chocolate. Still, 100% is 100%.
Veganuary 2016 – Day 2
Breakfast
Um… might have skipped breakfast… next…
Lunch
I’m still using my Nutriblast regularly (even if I did skip breakfast over the holidays) and this banana, passion fruit, kiwi, dates, cashew, cacao, soya milk and coconut water smoothie was not only delicious, it was filling too. A complete meal in a glass (or jar).
Dinner
I’ve got to admit, making two pizzas and two lots of garlic bread was a bit of an inconvenience, but an inconvenience that was most definitely worth it. I had Violife vegan cheese on my pizza and made my half of the garlic bread with Vitalite, while The Meat Eater had Cheddar on his pizza, and I made his garlic bread with Flora. The pizza was fab but the garlic bread was a revelation – I’d only ever made homemade garlic bread before with real butter and thought Vitalite wouldn’t quite cut it, but I can honestly say this was better than any garlic bread I’ve ever made or bought in the supermarket.
Here’s my tortilla pizza recipe (swap the mozzarella for vegan cheese, or just leave out).
As I said above, this garlic bread was amazing. It’s so easy to make – mix up some crushed garlic and/or garlic powder (I used about 4 cloves of crushed garlic, then added some garlic powder too) with vegan spread (I used Vitalite), slice a part-baked baguette (available in all supermarkets), and thickly spread the slices with the garlic butter and put the slices back together and wrap with foil. Bake in the oven at 180C for about 10 minutes, then unwrap the foil and bake for another 5 minutes, so the bread crisps up.
Snacks
My friend Cassie had sent me a selection box of Mini Moo vegan chocolate for my birthday (thank you, Cassie!), so I won’t be going without chocolate this month.
I also have a mint chocolate after dinner every night and as Tesco Mint Thins are about a third of the price of After Eights, that’s what we have and, luckily, unlike After Eights, Tesco Mint Thins are vegan. Yayness.
Veganuary 2016 – Day 3
Breakfast
I have no record of having anything for breakfast so either I didn’t have anything or I didn’t write it down or take a photo. Eat something and not take a photo first? I don’t know what the world’s coming to.
Lunch
I had planned to have a Nutriblast for lunch, then I changed my mind and had peanut butter on toast and hot chocolate instead. Near enough, isn’t it? As mentioned earlier, the only thing I’ve had to change so far is to stop drinking my usual instant hot chocolate and drink cocoa powder and soya milk instead. Which can only be a good thing, taking into consideration just how much crap is in that instant stuff.
(Do you like my cow mug? My friend Gene sent it to me from America.)
Dinner
Another ‘vegan cheese for me’, ‘Cheddar for The Meat Eater’ meal. The chilli was easy enough, having remembered to check the stock was vegan (did you know some vegetable stock has milk in? Fuck knows why, but it does) and buy Tesco Meat-Free mince, which is vegan (unlike Quorn mince). The cheese was also easy enough, as I still had some Violife in the fridge and, anyway, Tesco sells it. But… sour cream… I love my condiments and didn’t like the idea of going without my usual sour cream topping. So, what’s a girl supposed to do? Yep, make her own. Here it is:
I got the recipe from here – it’s really easy to make and, as a bonus, I had all the ingredients in already, including the coconut nectar. If you don’t have any coconut nectar (I only had some because it had been sent to me, along with some coconut oil, to review), you could use agave nectar or maple syrup instead. Or leave it out all together, I don’t think it’ll make much of a difference.
I’ve got to admit, it’s not exactly the same as sour cream but it’s creamy and tangy and if you – like me – are a condiment lover, then give it a go.
Snacks
I’d had an inkling I’d seen on a vegan Facebook group someone mentioning these crisps at Christmastime, so I checked the ingredients and all seemed okay, but to triple-check, I had a look on the Vegan Womble website and yay, these Winter Berries & Prosecco crisps from Marks & Spencer that I hadn’t finished over Christmas are vegan. But, sod the vegan bit, they contain edible gold stars – what more do you want from a crisp?
Veganuary 2016 – Day 4
Breakfast
No skipping breakfast for me today. Today’s Nutriblast was a combination of spinach, clementine, apple, chia seeds and coconut water. Did you know you don’t have to core apples before putting them in your Nutribullet? It’ll break the seeds up just fine (so none of that worrying about whole seeds sprouting and turning into trees in your stomach – or was that just my mum who told me that when I was little?)
Lunch
Another ‘I’m going to have a Nutriblast for lunch/I’ve changed my mind and going to have carbs instead’ lunch and very nice it was too. I coated some tofu in Jack Daniel’s Extra Hot Habanero BBQ Sauce (they’re not joking when they say ‘extra hot’ either), grilled it on my George Foreman grill until crispy, cut it into cubes and put it in a wrap with some homemade hummus and salad.
Dinner
I make this tasty stew often and you can find the recipe here. I cooked Linda McCartney sausages beforehand, then added them to the stew with the dumplings (made with Tesco’s own vegetarian suet, which is vegan) for the last 15 minutes. I had Vitalite on my half of the bread roll, while The Meat Eater had Flora on his (he also wiped his vegetables on his buttered roll to un-veganise them. I kid you not).
Snacks
I wasn’t going to be strict about E numbers during this Veganuary but although these Oat Flips that were given to us for Christmas seemed to be vegan – at least to my untrained eye – there was no mention on the tin of them being suitable for vegetarians and the E numbers played on my mind. As I was indoors with all the information I needed on the internet, I decided it’d be silly not to check so I looked up E475. Unfortunately, E475 is of dubious origin and although it’s usually derived from plants, it can also be of animal origin. I looked on the Oat Flips website for more information and on there it said the Oat Flips were suitable for vegetarians. The logical part of my brain then thought, ‘Well, if they’re suitable for vegetarians, then this E475 must be of plant origin because if it was animal origin, it wouldn’t be vegetarian and if it was made of milk or egg, that would have to be listed in the allergy bit, which it isn’t, so that must mean these Oat Flips are vegan’. But, I didn’t want to trust my logic so I asked on the Veganuary Facebook page if my logic was correct and was told yes, it was.
That was a very long-winded way of saying these Oat Flips are vegan. Yay for Oat Flips.
And that brings me up to Day 4 of my first Veganuary. I’ll be posting for the rest of the month, so keep checking back to see how I’m doing (and what I’m eating).
For more information on Veganuary and to sign up, visit the Veganuary website.
My fellow veggie blogger Kate at The Veg Space is also doing Veganuary and you can read what she says about it here.
Also, read my Q&A with Jacqui about how she’s continued being vegan after taking part in Veganuary 2015.
Recipe: Vegetarian Scotch Eggs
I’d been coveting the Scotch eggs in the fridge. Obviously, I wasn’t going to eat them, because they contain meat but, I’d coveted them, nonetheless. But the good thing about being a vegetarian who likes to cook is that I don’t need to covet meaty things in the fridge – I can just make my own vegetarian or vegan version. Yay.
I first thought I’d have to make them by defrosting some Linda McCartney sausages (other vegetarian sausages are available, but I like the Linda McCartney ones), mashing them up, then squidging them around an egg. I wasn’t sure how this would turn out; after all, the sausages are already made into sausage shapes and are meant to be cooked from frozen. Would they like being defrosted, mashed and squidged?
My mind drifted into the direction of Sosmix. I haven’t had Sosmix since the 90s – as you’ll know if you read my article about being a vegetarian back then – but I knew Holland & Barrett still sold it, or something similar, but I didn’t want to go into town to get some. Then I remembered hearing about a meat-free sausage mix from Asda and, after asking on the Little Vegan Kitchen After Dinner Chat Facebook page whereabouts in Asda I could find it (near the tinned tomatoes, in case you’re wondering), cycled to my local Asda to buy some.
Be warned – although I loved these vegetarian Scotch eggs, the Asda meat-free sausage mix has a very strong taste of sage, which lingers for a long time afterwards. It’s also a bit soft but it firmed up after a couple of days in the fridge.
I deep-fried these but a friend on Facebook said she also makes vegetarian Scotch eggs, but bakes hers in the oven.
My next attempt at vegetarian Scotch eggs will be vegan ones, made with tofu.
Vegetarian Scotch Eggs
Prep time
Cook time
Total time
Author: Cathy @ Planet Veggie
Recipe type: Vegetarian
Cuisine: Snack
Serves: 2
Ingredients
- 2 hard-boiled eggs
- 1 packet meat-free sausage mix
- Golden breadcrumbs
- Oil for deep-frying
Instructions
- Heat the oil
- Make up the meat-free sausage mix according to the instructions on the packet
- Mould the made-up sausage mix around the eggs and coat in breadcrumbs
- Test the oil is hot enough by dropping a bit of made up sausage mix into the oil. If it sizzles, it's hot enough
- Deep fry the vegetarian Scotch eggs for about 10 minutes
Review: Nosh ABC Diet – Day 1
Nosh (I’m guessing whoever named the company didn’t go to school at an east London comprehensive) asked me about my current diet, exercise regime and goals and suggested I try their energising ABC (alkalise, balance and cleanse) raw plan for three days. That sounded good to me, so I filled in their new client form and awaited my delivery.
Unfortunately, there was a mix-up and my first delivery contained fish and chicken. When I informed Nosh, they told me I hadn’t specified vegetarian on my form. As there was a) nowhere on the form to specify any special requirements; b) I’d been in email correspondence with Nosh about which diet plan suited me best; and c) the diet plan would be reviewed on this *ahem* vegetarian blog, it didn’t occur to me a man would turn up on my doorstep brandishing a box of dead animal bits.
Still, Nosh apologised, and arranged for a new delivery, which arrived yesterday lunchtime (unfortunately, you don’t get a very narrow window for delivery – I’d only been told ‘before 5:30pm’).
Disappointment struck when I opened the box. Although the food was packaged separately for each day, with each day being further separately packaged for each meal, the only information given for the three days was each day’s menu: No cooking instructions, no list of ingredients, no nutritional information, no nothing except a list of meals. You can’t even get any further information on the website.
Still, unless you call a deep-seated hatred of avocado an allergy, I’m not allergic to anything so it didn’t really matter but I would have liked to have known what I was eating as, believe me, if I took part on Masterchef and got to the round where the contestants write down the ingredients they think the dishes contain, I would fail. Big time. Monica would give me one of her death stares, hand me my coat and point me in the direction of Ready Steady Cook.
Breakfast would have been gluten-free organic gram flour & cashew nut pancakes which sounded fab, as I’ve made gram flour (chickpea flour) pancakes myself and loved them but I’d planned to start the three-day plan on Tuesday lunchtime to fit in with my week (i.e. Friday night is chippy night and I’m not swapping battered halloumi for salad). The pancakes would keep for another day though.
The mung bean cold salad with home-made salad dressing provided for lunch was huge, containing a massive amount of mung beans, a few leaves of crunchy iceberg lettuce, a few strips of yellow and orange pepper, and a few bits of red onion. My guess is the salad dressing contained olive oil and not much else, and I would have preferred something a bit more imaginative. On the whole though, the salad was fresh, and I certainly can’t grumble about the portion size.
Despite the mung bean salad being huge, I fancied something else to eat shortly afterwards – partly because I’m a glutton but partly to get rid of the oily aftertaste the dressing had left behind. Usually, I’d have a hot chocolate post-lunch but that’s not really in keeping with the spirit of the ABC raw programme, so I ate some of the provided mixed seeds with almonds and got an insight into how a hamster feels at dinnertime.
Although this Nosh Detox plan is called the ‘ABC Raw Menu’, I assumed I didn’t have to eat the stir-fry cold – it had already been cooked, after all, so I heated it up in a saucepan. I enjoyed the tofu, which came with sliced mange tout, a couple of pak choi leaves and a few beansprouts. Don’t take my word for it (see what I said about Masterchef earlier) but I think it might have been lightly fried in sesame oil before it got to me to give it an authentic ‘Chinese take-away’ taste.
In keeping with an authentic Chinese take-away, hunger struck soon after finishing the stir-fry, so I ate the mid-morning snack I didn’t have in the morning of green pesto with organic brown rice cake.
This pesto was like no pesto I’ve had before. I don’t know from which green substance it was made, but it had certainly never been near a basil leaf. As for the texture, although I’ve never had mushy peas, I would imagine they would be the texture of this pesto but with more taste.
So, that’s Day 1 and I’m aware this post is a tad negative but, unfortunately, my first impressions haven’t been too favourable. Let’s hope Day 2 is better.
The Nosh Detox ABC three-day plan has been provided free of charge to me by Nosh to review. All views and opinions are my own (as you can probably tell).
Recipe: Battered Halloumi
I love halloumi. I love the saltiness, the squeakiness and the oh-my-god-it’s-just-so-fucking-delicious-ness of it. In the fridge languished half a block that needed to be used up and instead of stuffing it in the portobella mushrooms that are also languishing in the fridge needing to be used up, I decided to batter the halloumi, like they do in my local chippy.
I’ve made Yorkshire Puddings and battered tofu before, but I’ve never made a chip shop type batter. I whisked up the flour, milk and baking powder and seasoned it with salt and pepper but I felt it was missing something. The Meat Eater said it wasn’t and said that was how batter is made so I took his word for it, even though he couldn’t tell me how he knew how to make batter. He also assured me that it’s supposed to be the texture of wallpaper paste.
This battered halloumi was so, so good. It was even better than the chip shop’s. The halloumi had softened and lost its squeak and weirdly developed the texture of fish.
I don’t have a deep fat fryer or deep fryer machine, so I used the Tefal wok-type pan I use for almost everything. I’ve had it over ten years and I still think it’s brilliant and you can buy one here. (This post isn’t sponsored by Tefal, I just wanted to tell you how much I love my wok.)
Now I want to batter all the things.
Battered Halloumi
Prep time
Cook time
Total time
Author: Cathy @ Planet Veggie
Cuisine: Vegetarian
Serves: 2
Ingredients
- ½ block halloumi, sliced into 4 pieces
- 60g plain flour
- 30ml water
- 30ml milk
- 1 tsp baking powder
- salt and pepper
- Oil for deep frying
Instructions
- Heat the oil in a large pan or deep fat fryer if you have one
- Whisk together the flour, milk, water and baking powder and season with salt and pepper
- Check the oil is hot enough by dropping in a bit of batter. If it floats and sizzles, the oil is hot enough
- Dredge the halloumi in the batter and fry for 5-10 minutes, until golden, turning over a few times
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If you like the look of this battered halloumi, you may also like these beer battered mushrooms from Amuse Your Bouche. But be careful surfing the Internet. Protect your online privacy with Veepn for a worry-free browsing experience.
My battered halloumi recipe has also had the honour of being featured on Twinkl’s blog, so be sure to check that out!
Recipe: Banana, Cacao, Cashew & Coconut Smoothie
I’d had rather an unhealthy lunch of a toasted tofu, Violife cheese, onion, sundried tomato, cucumber, srirarcha and salad cream sandwich which, thinking about it, probably isn’t that unhealthy but it was so gooey and delicious, at the time it seemed like the junkiest junk food ever. So junky I put a photo of it on the What Fat Vegans Eat Facebook page.
So, because of my unhealthy lunch and because my energy levels over the last few days have been zero, I thought I’d give my body a boost and put something healthy into it and that something healthy was this banana, blueberry, cacao, cashew and coconut smoothie.
Although I use cacao quite often, such as in these recipes you can find elsewhere on my blog:
- Jelly Tots chocolate cake
- vegan chocolate silken tofu pudding
- vegan choco ringo nutto bars
- raw chilli coconut chocolate
- raw vegan brownies
- raw vegan chocolate peanut butter fudge
I’ve never used it in a smoothie before. I reckon this is because, subconsciously, I equate chocolate to sweets and therefore to junk and, as far as I’m concerned, although junk has its place, its place is not in a smoothie. But, as we’re always being told, cacao (or raw chocolate) is healthy and, not only is it healthy, it’s frequently given the status of being a superfood.
This smoothie was not only delicious but I could feel the goodness streaming through my bloodstream as I was drinking it, I kid you not. I used Alpro Coconut Drink (which I found in the Free From section in Tesco) but it would work just as well with any other soya/rice/almond/oat milk of your choice.
Recipe: Banana, Blueberry, Cacao, Cashew & Coconut Smoothie
Prep time
Cook time
Total time
Author: Cathy @ Planet Veggie
Recipe type: Smoothie
Cuisine: Vegan
Serves: 1
Ingredients
- 1 banana
- 1 handful of blueberries (fresh or frozen)
- 1 handful of cashews
- 1 tbsp cacao
- Alpro Coconut Drink
Instructions
- Put the banana, blueberries, cashews and cacao in a blending jug (or Nutribullet or whatever you use to blend things) and top up with the Alpro Coconut Drink.
- Blend and serve.
Review & Giveaway: The Part-Time Vegetarian by Nicola Graimes
Review: The Part-Time Vegetarian by Nicola Graimes
Nicola Graimes wrote one of my favourite vegetarian cookbooks – Veggienomics. This is definitely one of my ‘go to’ cookbooks and you can see some of the recipes I’ve tried from it here, here and (my favourite) here.
In Nicola’s latest cookbook – The Part-Time Vegetarian – she confesses that, after almost thirty years of being vegetarian, she now occasionally eats meat and fish. While Nicola doesn’t go into detail about why she chose to start eating meat again, part of me dearly hopes one of the reasons is ‘got drunk and bought a kebab on the way back from the pub’ but my guess is that probably wasn’t a contributing factor and, after thirty years, deciding to re-introduce meat and fish into her diet probably wasn’t something she did lightly.
Still, whatever Nicola’s reasons, I’ve got to admit when her publisher asked me if I’d like a review copy, I was hesitant to accept. Although I’m pro-choice and, as far as I’m concerned, if people want to eat meat then that’s their prerogative, my collection of cookbooks is 100% vegetarian/vegan and I don’t want to see meat recipes while I’m flicking through a cookbook looking for something to make.
This isn’t a half-meat/half-vegetarian cookbook though – The Part-Time Vegetarian contains vegetarian recipes that can be adapted to include meat and fish. For example, it could be something as simple as sprinkling some crispy bacon on the finished dish, the addition of prawns, or a more substantial alteration such as spiced grilled lamb instead of roasted mushrooms served on a white bean mash.
So, if you’re one of the two out of three part-time ‘vegetarians’ who occasionally eat meat, chicken or fish*; you cook for a family that contains a vegetarian; or you just want to incorporate a few vegetarian meals to your weekly menu, then this book will be of interest to you. Nicola’s also included menu plans for a family vegetarian week, a part-time vegetarian week, a 7-day healthy week, part-time vegetarian meals for friends and menus for different occasions.
Recipe: Paneer, egg and potato gratin
I don’t know if it was my subconscious to blame, but the recipe I decided to try first from The Part-Time Vegetarian didn’t have a meaty alternative. I also don’t know if how it turned out was anything like it was supposed to, as there’s no photo for this recipe in the book (there are plenty of full-page photos to accompany other recipes though) and the finished result wasn’t how I’d pictured it in my head but, appearances aside, this was a tasty, filling meal, with the paneer and Indian spices giving an interesting twist to the potatoes and eggs.
[Please note: As usual, this is my simplified/altered to my preference version and not how it appears in the book.]
Paneer, egg and potato gratin
Author: Nicola Graimes
Cuisine: Vegetarian
Ingredients
- 800g potatoes, halved if large - no need to peel
- 2 tsp turmeric
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- 2 onions, sliced
- 2 garlic cloves, crushed
- 1 tsp cumin seeds
- 2 green peppers, deseeded and sliced
- 1 green chilli, deseeded and sliced
- 325ml vegetable stock
- 2 tbsp fresh coriander, chopped
- 4 eggs
- 150g paneer, cubed
- Salt and pepper
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 200C/180C fan/Gas 6
- Cook the potatoes in boiling salted water with half the turmeric for 10-12 minutes, or until almost tender. Drain the potatoes and leave until cool enough to handle.
- Meanwhile, heat 2 tablespoons of the oil in a large non-stick pan and fry the onions for 8 minutes until softened. Add the garlic, cumin seeds, green peppers and chilli and cook for 5 minutes until softened.
- Slice the potatoes into 1cm slices and add to the pan, turning gently until combined, then pour in the stock. Bring to the boil, then simmer for 5 minutes until the stock has reduced by three-quarters. Stir in half the coriander and transfer to a baking dish.
- Make four indentations in the potato mixture and break an egg into each one. Scatter the paneer over the top and drizzle with the remaining oil. Season with salt and pepper, cover with foil, then bake in the oven for 15 minutes.
- Remove the foil and cook for a further 5-8 minutes.
- Scatter over the remaining coriander.
Giveaway: Win a copy of The Part-Time Vegetarian by Nicola Graimes
I’ve got a copy of The Part-Time Vegetarian to give away and if you’d like to win it, just leave a comment below and I’ll pick a winner at random after the closing date of Friday 2 October 2015.
UK entries only.
*Yes, I know there’s no such thing as a part-time vegetarian. Don’t shoot me.
Recipe: Vegan Halloumi
My cheese consumption has gone down massively recently but when The Meat Eater said he was going back to the old chippy for our usual Friday night chippy chips, I thought I’d give their battered halloumi another go. This was the second time I’d tried battered halloumi from the chippy and the first time, I wasn’t keen, despite me usually loving halloumi. I don’t know whether it just seemed a bit odd getting it from the chippy, along with chips that’d been chucked in a huge vat of oil, or maybe I thought it was trying to fool me into thinking it was fish but, whatever it was, the first time just didn’t do it for me.
This time, however, I loved it and remembered how much I love halloumi (to be honest, I hadn’t forgotten. How could anyone forget how delicious it is?) and so when I saw a link to this recipe for vegan tofu halloumi on the Little Vegan Kitchen Facebook group, I knew I had to give it a go, slightly adapting the recipe to my own taste and preference.
I wasn’t expecting it to be much of a convincing replica for halloumi but, I’ve got to say, although it doesn’t have the ‘squeak’ of dairy halloumi, it’s a salty and tangy, perfectly acceptable alternative. I’ve enjoyed it so much, I’ve been having it for lunch stuffed in pitta bread with hummus and salad for the last three days.
I used my George Foreman to get it crispy but I would imagine it’d also be great fried in a little olive oil.
Don’t forget to press your tofu first – either by using the ‘pile a load of heavy stuff on top of it’ method or with a tofu press, such as this one from TofuBud.
Recipe: Vegan Halloumi (Using Tofu)
Author: Cathy @ Planet Veggie
Cuisine: Vegan
Ingredients
- ¼ block tofu, pressed and sliced lengthways into two
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 1 tbsp nutritional yeast
- ½ tsp sea salt
- 1 tbsp lemon juice
Instructions
- Mix the olive oil, nutritional yeast, salt and lemon juice in a bowl
- Rub the tofu with the olive oil mixture and leave to soak in for about 15 minutes
- Grill in a George Foreman grill for about 5-10 minutes until crispy on the outside
Vegan Lunch Tapas Style
My healthiest meal of the day by far is breakfast. I used to make a smoothie in my blender most days but then I jumped on the Nutribullet bandwagon and now have a Nutriblast of spinach or kale, fruit and coconut water each morning.
I love my Nutribullet. I love it so much, I’ve also been having a Nutriblast for lunch – albeit a bigger, thicker one made with frozen banana, whatever fruit I fancy (most recently pineapple and kiwi fruit), a handful of cashews for protein and some Alpro soya yoghurt (man, I love that stuff – it’s so much nicer than the dairy yoghurt).
Although I love my Nutriblasts, sometimes I want something more substantial for lunch and, in the summer, that something is usually salad and although I love the usual salad combo of leaves, raw veg and dressing, recently, I’ve been enjoying a tapas-style lunch.
I generally don’t eat much out of jars but I can’t resist the supermarket shelves laden with artichokes, stuffed vine leaves, sundried tomatoes, roasted peppers and olives. I love to serve them with hummus (shop-bought is delicious but if you want to make your own, here’s the best ever hummus recipe) and marinated, baked tofu.
Despite this being a healthy lunch, it’s calorie-laden as the jars are packed with oil, so if you want to save some calories, pat everything (no, not the hummus!) dry with kitchen roll to mop up a load of oil.
Marinated Baked Tofu
Prep time
Cook time
Total time
Author: Cathy @ Planet Veggie
Cuisine: Vegan
Serves: 1
Ingredients
- ⅓ block tofu, pressed and cubed
- Marinade of your choice (I used Jack Daniel's BBQ Sauce)
Instructions
- Coat the tofu in the marinade and leave to soak in for a few hours
- Line a baking tray with baking paper and bake the tofu in the oven at 200C for about 20-30 minutes
Review: Norman’s Coach and Horses – London’s First Vegetarian Pub
The Coach & Horses – London’s First Vegetarian Pub
The ‘West End’s Best Known Pub’ is famous for a few reasons. Mostly for its legendary self-proclaimed ‘rudest landlord’ – Norman Balon – who reigned over the bar for 62 years before handing over the keys to its current owners in 2006, and also for its clientele of writerly types, including late columnist Jeffery Bernard (you’ll be pleased to hear I’m going to resist making *that*joke). Now it’s famous for being London’s first vegetarian pub.
‘Vegetarian pub’ is a slight misnomer; on entering the pub, I spied a Guinness pump on the bar. As any self-respecting vegetarian will tell you – because it contains isinglass – Guinness isn’t vegetarian. For the uninitiated, isinglass is bits of fish bladder. Mmm, tasty. Pedantry aside, the menu served in the upstairs restaurant is 100% vegetarian, including customers’ favourites such as vegan tofush and chips, vegetarian pies and beetroot ravioli. Despite the downstairs bar serving non-vegetarian drinks, all the alcoholic drinks on the restaurant’s menu are labelled as suitable for vegetarians, with a few also labelled suitable for vegans.
The entrance to the restaurant is behind the bar and, as the management isn’t keen on any old riff raff wandering about the staff only areas, you need to let a member of staff know you’d like a table, then they’ll show you up (to your table, that is; I don’t mean they embarrass you in front of your friends). The Coach & Horses hosts the Private Eye fortnightly lunches, which explains the Private Eye covers and photos of Ian Hislop adorning the walls. Ian Hislop aside though, the upstairs is charmingly decorated like a 50s tearoom.
I’m informed by a friend who knows more about these things than I do, that the music is ‘ambient’. I’m not sure exactly what that means, but it’s certainly not something I’d listen to in my house. On entering the toilet, the first thing I notice is an art deco mirror, the likes of which can be seen in bedsits across the country. Old-style graffiti is scrawled on the door; my favourites being ‘I take it the cat went down the loo as there is no room to swing it’ and ‘Nigella Lawson is innocent’. The toilets were – to be blunt – downright disgusting, but as this is an old-fashioned boozer, not a high-end gastro pub, I can’t really complain. Not that I would complain, I’m far too British. I’d just moan to my mates about it. Or update my Facebook status.
Our starters arrived quickly. My blue cheese quiche was luke warm; I’m not sure if it was supposed to be but I don’t like food that can’t make its mind up. Be hot or cold but not in between. The apple and cranberry chutney it came with certainly knew what it was – it was so cold it set my teeth on edge. The quiche was fine but slightly lacked blue cheese flavour. My friend described her soup of the day as, ‘Okay but the chickpeas were a bit hard’ but we were impressed that the bread accompanying the soup came with a choice of spreads; butter, or dairy-free for vegans and those (as in my friend’s case) who are dairy intolerant.
After a long wait, our main meals arrived. I’d been looking forward all day to the tofush and chips (tofu wrapped in seaweed and battered with organic ale batter, served with minted peas and avocado tartar sauce). The tofush was fab and even better than I’d remembered but the chips were obviously mass-produced frozen ones. They’re certainly missing a trick here by not serving homemade wedges or Heston-esque twice (or is it thrice?) cooked handcut chips. I loved the avocado tartar sauce, despite me usually hating avocado and the peas were, well, they were peas. I gave a bit of the tofush to my friend to try, warning her it would probably be too fishy for her. I was right; she screwed up her face and said, ‘Ew, too fishy.’ Well, she can’t say I didn’t warn her.
My friend’s burger (chickpeas, red kidney beans, onion, carrot, garlic and paprika) arrived with a slice of halloumi, despite her asking for it to be left out. It didn’t particularly bother her as she’s not vegan, but said if she was a vegan, she wouldn’t be very happy. I was happy though – delighted, even – as I love halloumi, so she gave it to me. She agreed the chips were rubbish and she wasn’t a fan of her burger either. ‘Too much bun and it wasn’t that nice a bun,’ she said and took the burger out of the bun to eat on its own but complained it was dry and bland.
Our meals filled us up but I’d been eyeing up the vegan chocolate mousse on the dessert board. We decided to share one and it’s just as well we didn’t get one each as the mousse was huge as well as being wonderfully thick and rich. After telling the waitress how much we loved it, she wrote down the recipe for us.
We left with our bellies full and our wallets about £28 lighter (not including drinks) between the two of us. I noticed on the way out four flavours of pickled eggs in jars behind the bar. I bet they all taste like mouldy balloons inside mouldy balloons though – I’ll stick to my tofush and chips, thanks.
You’ll find London’s first vegetarian pub at:
29 Greek Street, W1D 5DH
Tel: 020 7437 5920
Website: www.thecoachandhorsessoho.co.uk
Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/NormansCoachAndHorsesSoho
Opening times:
Bar:
Monday-Thursday: 11am – 11.30pm
Friday-Saturday: 11am – 12am
Sunday: 12pm – 10.30pm
Food Service:
Monday-Thursday: 12pm – 3pm and 5pm – 10pm
Friday-Saturday: 12pm – 10pm
Sunday: 12pm – 9pm
Recipe: Vegan Spinach and Mushroom Galette
Unfortunately, this didn’t go down too well with The Meat Eater. I loved it – I especially loved the pastry because – round of applause, please – I made it all by myself. I don’t think I’ve ever made pastry before; I might have made some at school I suppose, but that would have been a *cough* few *cough* years ago now.
You’ve got to hand it to The Meat Eater though – he’d do well on Masterchef’s palette test. He said the pastry had an odd taste to it and as I thought back to what had gone into it, I remembered the coconut oil, so that was probably the ‘odd taste’ he was referring to. He did admit to liking ‘bits of it’ though.
Hopefully, the coconut oil hasn’t put you off, so I’m going to post the recipe below as I made it (which is pretty much as it appears in Greens 24/7 by Jessica Nadel, which I talked about a bit more in yesterday’s post – my version is only slightly simplified). The end result is a kind of quiche-like dish which I reckon would be just as nice cold, as hot.
Please don’t be put off by making your own pastry – this was about as simple as it gets and if I can be bothered to do it, so can you.
Although the recipe below states 240g tofu, I used a normal (normal for the UK, anyway) sized block of Cauldron tofu and pressed it (nothing fancy – just between two saucers), this left me with 275g tofu and I used all of it.
Recipe: Vegan Spinach and Mushroom Galette
Prep time
Cook time
Total time
(adapted from Greens 24/7 by Jessica Nadel)
Author: Cathy
Serves: 4
Ingredients
- 125g wholemeal flour
- 30g plain flour
- 60ml coconut oil
- 125ml iced water
- 2 portobello mushrooms, sliced
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- 2 cloves garlic, crushed
- 1 whole garlic clove
- 125g spinach
- 240g firm tofu
- 3 tsp lemon juice
- 1 tsp nutritional yeast
- salt and pepper
Instructions
- Make the pastry. In a large bowl, mix together the flours and ½ tsp salt. Work the coconut oil into the flour, leaving small lumps. Add the water gradually and work until the dough comes together. Roll into a ball, wrap in clingfilm and leave in the fridge for 20 minutes.
- Heat 2 tbsp oil in a large frying pan, add the crushed garlic, mushrooms and a generous pinch of salt and cook, stirring occasionally, for 15-20 minutes, until the mushrooms release their juices and the juices evaporate. Remove from the heat and set aside.
- Meanwhile, steam the spinach until partially wilted, then leave to cool.
- Place the tofu, lemon juice, 1½ tsp olive oil, nutritional yeast and the whole garlic clove in a food processor and process until fairly smooth (you might need to add a bit more oil). Season to taste with salt and pepper, then add the spinach and fold in by hand.
- Preheat the oven to 200C/180C fan/gas mark 6. On a piece of baking paper, roll out the pastry to a 30-cm (12") round. Transfer the pastry and baking paper onto a baking sheet and spread the spinach-tofu mixture over, leaving a 5cm (2") border. Top with the mushrooms and gently fold the extra pastry up and onto the toppings, pleating as you move around the outside.
- Bake in the oven for about 30 minutes, until the pastry is golden brown. Remove from the oven and leave for 5 minutes before slicing and serving.