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Asparagus, tomato and feta frittata

Last night’s dinner was a disaster and ended up in the bin. It was a tofu stir-fry with some ready made sauce. I don’t know how Cauldron have managed it, but they’ve made their tofu even more soggy than it used to be and there was no way I could squeeze enough water out of it to adequately fry it until it was in a less blancmange-like state. It was like boiled tofu and absolutely vile. The stir-fry sauce I used with the tofu and vegetables (sugar snap peas and broccoli) was too strong and bitter, even though I’d watered it down. I served the saucy tofu/veg combination on some noodles, The Meat Eater ate a couple of mouthfuls before declaring it inedible and he heated himself up some leftover chilli, while I bravely ploughed on, eating the noodles but pushing the soggy tofu to one side.

Tonight, however, I redeemed myself. This asparagus, tomato and feta frittata out of 200 Veggie Feasts was absolutely delicious and I served it with new potatoes, cauliflower and broccoli.

frittata 003

Asparagus, tomato and feta frittata (serves 4)

3 tbsp olive oil
2 leeks, thinly sliced
1 garlic clove, crushed
250g asparagus, trimmed
6 eggs
100g feta cheese, diced
4 tablespoons grated Parmesan-style cheese
175g cherry tomatoes
salt and black pepper

  1. Heat the oil in a frying pan, add the leeks and garlic and cook over a medium heat, stirring frequently, for 10 minutes until tender. Leave to cool.
  2. Cook the asparagus in a large saucepan of lightly salted boiling water for 2 minutes. Drain, refresh under cold water and pat dry. Cut into 5cm (2 inch) lengths.
  3. Beat the eggs in a bowl and stir in the leek mixture, asparagus, feta, half the Parmesan-style cheese and salt and pepper. Pour the mixture into a 20 cm (8 inch) square baking dish and top with the tomatoes. Sprinkle over the remaining Parmesan-style cheese and bake in a preheated oven, 190C, Gas Mark 5, for 25-30 minutes until puffed up and firm in the centre.
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Broccoli and stilton roulade

I love buying new vegetarian cookery books and recently I bought The Complete Vegetarian Cookbook. It’s big and heavy and glossy and each recipe is accompanied by a big colour photograph. On the downside, the first 129 pages (out of 384) are hints and tips about vegetables, kitchen appliances, nutrition, etc. Plus the index is a bit crap and I haven’t been over-impressed with the recipes I’ve made from it so far. The first recipe I tried from it (sorry, no photo) was baked eggs with mozzarella and fresh tomatoes, which was very easy to make but NO WAY was it going to serve four people. It barely served two.

Next up was pasta with spinach, shiitake mushrooms and tofu.

Upon reading the ingredients (tofu, shiitake mushrooms, spinach, soy sauce, sesame oil and garlic), I wasn’t keen on having it with pasta, feeling it was more of an oriental dish and I had to restrain myself from having it with rice or noodles, but the blurb assured me it went perfectly well with pasta, so I thought I’d be brave. Wrong choice. It didn’t really go with pasta (especially not the big shells I’ve been unsuccessfully trying to cook for a few weeks) and the leftovers will be served with rice.

Last night’s meal wasn’t much of a success either. I don’t usually make fancy or fiddly food but it said preparation was 10 minutes. Was it heck. More like 30 minutes. Still, it looked pretty.

Unfortunately The Meat Eater wasn’t keen and although I said he wasn’t getting tonight’s potato-based meal unless he finished his dinner, half of his roulade went in the bin. I thought it was ok, but the soufflé-type texture got a bit boring after a while. Thinner slices as a starter or as a side to something more substantial would have worked better.

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Jason Vale’s 3 day detox – Conclusion

Supplies needed for the Jason Vale 3 Day Detox
Supplies needed for the Jason Vale 3 Day Detox

I thought I’d feel something going three days without proper food. But, nothing, or at least not much, anyway. No tiredness, no energy loss, no hunger (except when it was getting up to dinnertime, but who doesn’t?), no headaches, no stomach upsets and no more grumpiness than usual. I didn’t miss chewing food and I didn’t have any mega-cravings for crisps or chocolate or any other junk, but maybe 3 days isn’t long enough for me to waiver? I did cop out of the 7 day plan, after all.

I came out the other end 3lbs lighter, with a flatter stomach and I might be imagining it, but my teeth look whiter, too.

Although the detox ended yesterday, I didn’t want to jump straight back into eating loads and put the weight back on immediately, so this morning I had a blueberry and blackberry smoothie with soya milk and for lunch I had the Popeye Power juice which is in the kids’ section of Juice Master Keeping It Simple and contains spinach, apple, pineapple, lemon and ice and as you can’t taste the spinach in it, it would be a good way of getting kids to eat something green and nasty other than bogies. Dinner will be tofu and stir-fried vegetables with Basmati rice.

I’m going to hopefully incorporate juicing into my lifestyle, not just because it’d be a waste of the £66 I spent on a juicer, but because I love smoothies for breakfast anyway (I’m not a fan of solid food first thing, so smoothies are perfect for me) and the juices are lovely (except for the ones with avocado), filling and nutritious enough for lunch.

Do I recommend it? Definitely.

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Jason Vale’s 3 day detox – Day three

I get up really late. This could be because a) I went to bed late; b) my body’s taking subconscious advantage of the fact that it’s the first time in five months I haven’t had to get up to go to work; c) girls’ things; or d) all of the above.

I was going to skip breakfast but I make the Detox Special from day one as that was nice but takes flipping ages as I’m chased around the kitchen by a wasp, attracted by all the fruit pulp.

Lunchtime

I’m back from the gym and have made an executive decision. I’m not going to have the Beyond Detox for lunch as is on the programme, as I can’t face the avocado again, so I’m going to have the Detox Special again. And yes, I know I moaned about having to have it for breakfast and lunch on day one and now I’m voluntarily having the same thing twice in a row. I’ve run out of carrots though, so I’ll have to leave that out.

I also forget to add the beetroot and I could add it in afterwards but I’ve only got one large one left and I don’t want to cut that just for one slice, so I leave it out, so it only contains 2 apples, a slice of lemon, an inch of broccoli stem, a quarter of a yellow bell pepper and blended with ice, and without the carrot it’s a lot thinner and without the beetroot, it’s green instead of red.

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5.27pm

I’m getting hungry as I have done for the last two days around this time and it’s not been made any better by me thinking about what I’m going to have for dinner tomorrow. I’ve decided to stick to a juice or smoothie for breakfast and lunch and then a healthy meal in the evening. Tomorrow’s dinner will be stir-fried tofu and veg with basmati rice. Although, strangely, the thought now – even though it’s only been three days – of eating something hot that requires chewing, seems strange. Ah well, I’m sure that’ll only last until it’s in front of me.

7.31pm

That’s it! I’ve just had my last ‘meal’ of the 3 day detox and very nice it was too. It was the Dreamy Detox that I had for yesterday’s lunch. The Meat Eater is currently eating tortellini with tomato and mascarpone sauce. Jealous, me? Nope, not at all. But only because it’s ham and bacon tortellini. He was very kind and didn’t make any garlic bread though in case I caved in.

I’ll do a summary and conclusion of the detox tomorrow. Now I’m off for some pizza and wine.

Just kidding.

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Curried udon noodle stir fry

Veganomicon
Veganomicon

Tonight’s dinner was made from the brilliant Veganomicon.  I love this book.

This is the only vegan cookbook I’ve ever made anything nice out of, although a lot of the  ingredients are items I’d find difficult to get hold of in London, let alone in a small village in Kent.

I kept quiet about it being vegan to The Meat Eater until he’d told me (without prompting or being kicked under the table) how nice it was and how he liked the fact that although I had spilt a lot of curry powder all over the hob, there wasn’t too much curry powder taste to it (probably because I’d spilt it all over the hob…).

The original recipe calls for Seitan Cutlets but I swapped that for tofu.

Curried udon noodle stir-fry
Curried udon noodle stir-fry

Ingredients (serves 4)

½ pound fresh udon noodles or dried udon noodles

Curry roux sauce
2 tablespoons peanut oil
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1½ teaspoons curry powder
½ teaspoon garam masala
½ cup vegetable broth
2 teaspoons sugar

Udon stir-fry
2 tablespoons peanut oil
1 large yellow onion, sliced into thin strips
1 teaspoon grated fresh ginger
1 red bell pepper, seeded and sliced into thin strips
1 hot red chili pepper, sliced very thinly (optional)
1 block of tofu, cubed
½ pound broccoli florets, sliced into bite-size chunks
¼ cup vegetable broth
2-3 tablespoons soy sauce

Prepare the curry roux sauce

Combine the flour and 2 tablespoons peanut oil in a small saucepan.  Cook over medium-low heat, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, until the mixture browns to the colour of rich caramel and smells toasty, about 10 minutes or less.  Stir in curry powder and garam masala, and cook for another minute while stirring constantly.  Switch to using a wire whisk, then pour in the vegetable broth in a steady stream.  Whisk in the sugar and cook the roux, stirring constantly, until a thick sauce forms, about 2 minutes.  Remove from the heat and set aside.

To prepare the stir-fry

Heat the 2 tablespoons of peanut oil in a large (at least 11-inch) non-stick frying pan or a wok and cook the sliced onion for 5 to 6 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the onion is softened and translucent.  Add the ginger, red bell pepper, hot chili, and tofu, and stir-fry for another 5 minutes, until the pepper starts to soften.  Add the broccoli and stir-fry for 4 to 5 minutes, until it turns bright green.

Add the udon noodles to the stir-fried vegetables, sprinkle with soy sauce and stir-fry for 2 to 3 minutes.

Whisk ¼ cup of the vegetable broth into the curry roux sauce in the saucepan.  Pour the sauce over the udon stir-fry and stir to coat everything completely with the sauce.  Stir and cook for 2 to 3 minutes, until the sauce is simmering and the noodles are warm.  Remove from the heat and serve.

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Competition: Win a copy of Vegan Brunch by Isa Chandra Moskowitz

Vegan Brunch by Isa Chandra Moskowitz
Vegan Brunch by Isa Chandra Moskowitz

If you’re vegan, or even if you’re not, you should own a copy of Veganomicon.

Now Isa Chandra Moskowitz – the bestselling author of Veganomicon and Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World – has brought us a new cookbook: Vegan Brunch.

It starts with a list of pantry items, most of which are quite hard to find in the UK, e.g. vital wheat gluten (I tried to find it and failed, and ended up buying seitan mix from Veganstore), liquid smoke (which apparently is smoke from smouldering wood that has been condensed into its liquid form [no, I’m not making this up, honest] and tempeh. Also, it might be just me, but I’ve never heard of black salt (which according to Isa is pink and tastes of egg yolk and I‘m trying to decide if that‘s a good thing or not) and smoked salt (which only one recipe – tofu benny (Isa’s take on eggs Benedict) – calls for anyway).

The recipes are set out in sections. First up is the savoury section. A bit heavy on the tofu side, it starts with 11 tofu omelette recipes, followed by 20 pages of recipes containing tofu. Good news for tofu lovers then. Bad news for the other 99% of the population. Still, if tofu’s not your thing, there are plenty of other recipes to tempt you, e.g. mushroom, leek & white bean pie, chili cashew dosas with spiced apple cider chutney and buckwheat waffles with red wine tarragon mushroom gravy.

Pancakes and waffles take up a lot of room in the sweet section, including the odd sounding chocolate beer waffles and the gorgeous looking lemon cashew-stuffed crepes with whole berry sauce.

In the sides section there are a few sausage recipes and a recipe that caught my eye was the potato spinach squares.

Next up is the bread basket section, with a selection of baked goods such as muffins, cakes, bagels, rolls and scones (including a very tasty looking tomato & rosemary scone recipe).

Towards the end is the messy stuff; toppings, e.g. cashew sour cream and smoked almond gravy.

Finally, at the end is the drinks section, including pink grapefruit mimosas, so you can drink champagne in the morning, safe in the knowledge that everyone knows this is a socially acceptable thing to do and does not mean you are a raging alcoholic who drinks as soon as they get up.

Paperback, 240 pages, colour photographs throughout.

**Win a copy of Vegan Brunch**

Vegan Brunch is out on 4 June 2009. To get your hands on a copy before then, please leave a comment and I’ll pick a name out of a hat (a pink straw one to be precise) and will send one lucky winner a copy in the post.

Competition ends Friday 22 May 2009.  UK entries only please.

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