Showing posts with label La Dolce Vegan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label La Dolce Vegan. Show all posts

Wednesday, 30 April 2008

Food and a rant

Or should I say a rant and food pics? I'll get to approximately three weeks worth of food porn momentarily but first a word from our sponsor.

Feminism. Is it really a scary word? Despite the new cultural angst over the idea of feminism, I identify myself as a feminist. The problem? I'm doing a first-year law course (I would name it, but to save myself the heartache....) with basically the intent to persuade the students of their responsibilities to act morally and their duty to help others in society. This is a very "leftie" agenda. I, as one who celebrated Kevin Rudd's victory with a smashing hangover, think this is a great idea (as do many of the students, conservative or not!). However.....
This week's topic was "Gender and Race" - basically an analysis of access to justice/legal assistance from the perspective of women and non-white people. I was surprised to find that I was the only person (other than our awesome female tutor) that identified themselves as a feminist (most of my class is under the age of 20). They didn't seem to think that feminism was really required anymore. One fellow classmember actually listed the reason that they didn't identify as a feminist was that "the boys laugh at feminists. They think they're dikey lesbians". !!!!!! Notwithstanding the utter disparity in this statement, I want to say a few things....
We need feminism for everyone. Feminists don't hate men! They want equality for everyone! This means equality in pay and treatment. We're not going to get change unless we push for it.
I know I'm not the most articulate when I'm angry, so here's a video that you must watch (thanks to my favourite feminist website Feministing for the link):



And now, as advertised, food!

I think this may have come from Vegan Fire and Spice? Sorry Cam, I remember it was tasty though! I call it "Cam's chickpea dish with mashed potatoes and hummus". I do remember that I put nooch and smoked paprika in the potatoes!


Moroccan Chickpea and Lentil Soup. This did come from Vegan Fire and Spice. Yummers.


An awesome photo of my Dad slicing Veggie Roast with his fancy knife. I heart this knife. Check out the wafer thinless of the slices.


Cam's been making lots of Indian curries (as always they're awesome). So here's a small selection (there's a bit of a theme here!):

Chilli Potatoes (These burn for me, but gosh (did I just say gosh? When did I turn into a polite person?) they're tasteeeeeee!)


Chilli Potatoes with Spinach and Chickpea Curry (Also delectable)


Chilli Potatoes with Mushroom and Pea Curry (Cam said that he'll have a recipe for the Mushroom and Pea curry soon!)


Leeks are finally available in Brisbane!!!! I've been waiting for Leeks to become affordable since getting Veganomicon.

Firstly, a Leek and Potato soup from La Dolce Vegan (it has carrots in it, thus the orangey goodness):


THE Leek and Bean Cassoulet from Veganomicon. So. Damn. Good.


And onto my particular favourites, the non-savoury things!
Choc-chip Blondies with Rasperries from Vegan With a Vengeance!


Fancy Mushroom and Red Wine Scrolly Bread. It was a bit tough, but still AWESOME.


Ginger Pear Muffins (overripe pears equals incredibly smooth batter equals yummy goodness):

I attempted some apple scrolls based on Bittersweet's Pizza Scroll recipe. They just weren't sweet enough (more sugar is required in the dough!):

Finally, I'd had a crap morning at work and raced home for lunch before uni in the afternoon.... Someone was nice enough to leave me the last of the "middle" of the bread (I hate the end/crusty bits)! So I had the ultimate in convenience snacks: The (vegan) luncheon sandwich.

Thinly sliced Sanitarium Lunchon is sandwiched between two slices of High Fibre White Bread from Baker's Delight. Spread with Nuttelex, this sandwich will fill the needs of vegans on the run....

Sunday, 2 December 2007

More Cookies


I tend to get fixated on particular recipes from time to time. For most of last year I was obsessed with the Gingerbread Cut-Out Cookies from La Dolce Vegan. I made them for work, uni, christmas, family, etc. The choc-chips are awesome and they remind me of m & ms. Tasteeeeee!


Hope everyone's well. Life isn't that exciting around here at the moment. We're pretty much still in disbelief over last Saturday night. Did it really happen? Are the 11 years of JWH really over? Are people starting to actually care about things OTHER than money? Time will tell.... Peace out - go hug an animal for me!

Thursday, 29 November 2007

The Zombies are taking over...

This isn't a rather late Halloween special post (we don't celebrate Halloween in Australia). A friend of mine (from work) is going on maternity leave tomorrow, so I made Gingerbread men (she's having a boy). She also loves Horror movies. So I made Zombies!
Zombie cookie

The Zombie army, ready to take over work tomorrow:Zombie cookie army

Mwahahahahahahahaha! My evil plan is almost at fruition!

Tuesday, 28 August 2007

Update 28th August

Here's a selection of what we've been chomping on for the last few weeks!

We went out to dinner about two weeks ago for family birthdays (my brother is born on the 13th and my sister and dad are born on the 14th of August!). We went out to a really yummy restaurant called Olivetto's. It's really fancy (we had real table linens and napkins - you really don't get that in the cheap vegan cafes!).

This was all that I remembered to snap (I was unable to after 4 glasses of Pimms!). It was a mushroom and potato thing... Don't remember what it was called. Do remember that it was AWESOME and I wanted MORE! This isn't from a vegan restaurant, but isn't it funny that "normal" chefs can produce excellent quality non-meaty food!
Awesome Mushroom & Potato Thing

Next, we had our friends Kath and Adam over for dinner. I was studying that day (surprise, surprise), so Cam made an Indian feast!
Chickpea Curry:
Chickpea Curry

Potato Dahl:
Potato Dahl

And Indian Flatbreads:
Indian Flatbreads

As I recall, the Chickpea Curry and the bread came from our normal Indian reference text. Potato Dahl was (I think) a Cam original. I'll check & let you know! My contribution was VWAV Gingerbread Apple Pie. It tasted good, but it really sticks to the pan!
Gingerbread Apple Pie

Speaking of Cam originals, I present, Mushroom & Pea Curry! Our local Indian restaurant makes a recipe exactly like this one. So good!
Cam's Mushroom & Pea Curry

We've also made La Dolce Vegan Stroganoff (I found portabellos on special!!).
LDV Stroganoff

As inspired by PPK Food Porn, I made Scalloped Potatoes, which we had with "chicken" nuggets from the chinese supermarket & random vegetables (they're buried UNDER the gravy!).
Scalloped Potatoes & chicken nuggets

Tony, who gets to share an office with me at work (isn't he lucky?), had his 55th birthday on the weekend, so on Thursday night I made Pistachio and Rosewater Cuppers from VCTOTW. I ate too many (and I'm now sick of rosewater!).
Pistachio & Rosewater Cuppers

Checkout my lame decorating skills!
My bad decorating skills

And the reason I was so excited about making cupcakes - I got a proper cupcake carrier!
Cupcake holder1

And finally, Susanna, a lovely girl that I work with, bought this for me! She's heard me go on and on about how much I LOVE Hello Kitty! She's so awesome (I need a new adjective)! It's a lunchbag (yes, I'm a 26yr old who has a pink Hello Kitty lunchbag - I rock!).
Hello Kitty Lunchbag

Hope everyone's doing well. I sent off chapter two to my thesis supervisor yesterday, so I'm onto chapter three. I have ten weeks (from yesterday) until it is due! I don't need sleep to live, do I? LOL... Peace Out!

Thursday, 5 July 2007

Slow week.....

It hasn't been the most exciting week here at Casa Cam & Amy. I've been working my a$$ off on my thesis. I sent a draft of almost 4000 words to my thesis supervisor on Monday night (at about midnight) and I got it back on Tuesday afternoon - the number of corrections and rethinks I have to do is ENORMOUS. So depressing.

We don't have many exciting pics for you this week. I've been doing a bit of a repeat week - I've made Seitan Bolognaise (nowhere near as tasty as the last batch), Fresh Spring Rolls (although I skip the noodles now & use grated carrot - so many less cals (I think!)), and a disasterous attempt at a stuffed seitan (it looks like roast beef with the potato when you slice it now)!

I had a friend over on Saturday morning & we made a SoG (Vegetation's fabbo term for Seitan o'Greatness) and some Apricot and Almond Cuppers from the Vegan Cupcake Bible (VCTOTW):
Almond & Apricot Cuppers

I didn't get a chance to try these, but I'm dying to try a variation with raspberry jam (I'm not an apricot fan)..... My friend said they were awesome! So I suppose I can take her word for it! :)

Cam cooked last night ('cause I was working on the thesis redraft - sigh). Potato and Leek soup. The leeks were a ripoff at about $2.50 a stalk (damn you drought), so we joked about not bruising our gold plated leeks. LOL.... Anyway, it totally rocked - we don't have a handmixer (and there's no way in hell I'm sticking something this hot into my food processor) so it was chunky! In a word - YUM!
Potato & Leek Soup

We're having pizza for dinner tonight (yay) so I may have a few pics in a few days. **End Communication**

Friday, 25 May 2007

Tonight's dinner and dessert!

We're going out to a family get-together tonight (it's my aunt's birthday!) & all the omni's are having roast & veggies, so I thought I'd do a traditional type dish for us.

Voila! I present mini shepherds pies!

pies

And I also made cookies for dessert, gee what a surprise! I got a cookie stamper last night (it kinda looks like a gun. Anyways, I was able to make purty flowers.... Recipe is Gingerbread Cut-Out Cookies from La Dolce Vegan.

Cookies and soy milk

I'm snacking on a few right now with soy milk (as you can see)! Here's a closeup of the cookie magic:

Cookies

I'm definitely looking forward to dinner & dessert tonight!!!

Update: everyone loved the pies (except my big sister insisted on calling them party pies - ARRGGHH!!!) and the cookies. But there's no surprise there, everyone always love my cookies. Maybe I should change the name of the blog to be Iron Chef Cookie? :)


Edit 28/05 (partly to get out of study & partly to share my easy recipe):

Contents of the pies:
Fry up a teaspoon/clove of garlic (of course I add about three, but then again, I hate vampires. No wait, I LOVE vampires!! Especially if they're on Buffy... But I digress) in olive oil. Add a whole chopped onion and fry until transparent. Add a tin of Sanitarium casserole mince (it's a wheat gluten product), half a dozen chopped 'shrooms, a handful each of frozen peas and corn, and approx three dessert spoons (heaped) of Orgran vegan gravy (available in the health food section of Coles). Add a bit of water (I'm not sure exactly, a slurp)? And stir until it looks tasty.

Add to the pie crusts that you've already blind baked in the oven (we've found that the low-fat puff pastry from the supermarket (not sure which brand) is vegan - not the butter one) and top with mashed potatoes. Make sure that your mash has extra margarine in it - it helps with the crunchy top.

Bake until you get a nice crunchy top - I usually check the pastry & chuck it under the grill to finish (I don't like burned pastry).

Enjoy!

Tuesday, 22 May 2007

More damned cookies (and other stuff)!

It has certainly been cookie fest around here for the last few weeks. The sugar monster has awoken and demanded feasts. Anyway, here's another batch of cookies I sent off last Friday!

These are the Sparkled Ginger Cookies from VWAV: 

Sparkled Ginger Cookies

And these are the Coconut Choc Chip Cookies from La Dolce Vegan (I promise that this is the very last time I'll post a photo of these:
Vegan Coconut Choc Chip Cookies

And finally, I've gotten something that I've been drooling over for about a year.....

A Hello Kitty toaster! (Yes, it would appear that I am a 5 year old!!!)


Hello Kitty Toaster

We're going out to dinner at our favourite Asian restaurant tonight, Magic Wok, so I'm planning to take the camera. Mmmmm Vegan BBQ Pork Buns.....

Wednesday, 16 May 2007

PPK Cookie Swap!

Here are the cookies that Amy swapped for the first OZ cookie swap (it may not be the first, but I'm announcing it as such until contradicted).

Coconut Choc Chip (La Dolce Vegan) (in my top 5 favourite cookie recipes)Coconut Cookies


Chocolate Jam Drops (VWAV) (first time making)Jam Drop

I had to try them before they were sent, just for quality control and they were mighty tasty. I've got another person to send cookies too (I put Cam on the list so we had even numbers) later this week, so I'll be posting more cookies soon (even though I have a wedding to go to in a month and my belly's looking a lot like Santa's)....

Wednesday, 18 April 2007

Black Eyed Bean & Mushroom Stroganoff



I'm a wee bit obsessed with this recipe at the moment (I believe I've cooked it three times in as many weeks. The recipe is on page 136 of Sarah Kramer's La Dolce Vegan!
I substituted the mock meat with Black Eyed Beans (that I put on to soak last night). It was tasty (I love the sauce, I believe I could drink it) but I think that next time I'll mash the beans a bit before I add it to the sauce (I added the beans in after the mushrooms & onions were browned). The beans didn't really soak up any of the sauce.

Still yummy though.

And now, for the newest, geekiest section of this blog, I'm going to start referencing the recipes (when from cookbooks) in MLA style. I'm trying to get the reference style into my head for my thesis, so this is good practice!!!

Referencing the whole book:

Kramer, Sarah. La Dolce Vegan! Vegan Livin' Made Easy. Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp, 2005.

Referencing the recipe:

Kramer, Sarah. "Phebe's Mushroom Stroganoff." La Dolce Vegan! Vegan Livin' Made Easy. Ed. Sarah Kramer. Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp, 2005.

I can't get Blogger to indent the second line - darnit.... Anyway, enjoy!!!

Tuesday, 20 March 2007

Mushroom Stroganoff



This is from page 136 of La Dolce Vegan. I've replaced the Faux Chicken with Soy Nuggets (they're from one of our local Asian grocers). The meal contained at least a tenth of the fat of normal stroganoff - and it's cruelty free!!! I'm definitely looking forward to lunch tomorrow (YMCA - Yesterday's Meal Cooked Again).... LOL! 

Friday, 9 February 2007

Tip-Top Tofu Loaf and Sesame Asparagus


The sesame asparagus was great (p124 Vegan With A Vengeance) but the tofu loaf didn't turn out very well (p 154 La Dolce Vegan). It's probably because I used extra tomato sauce & didn't bake it in a loaf tin (I used a loaf shaped ceramic thing)... The tofu loaf smelled awesome when it was cooking, but the texture left a little to be desired.

I added some roast carrots (just tossed in olive oil, garlic and dried italian herbs) and mushrooms (remove the stem and sprinkle some salt in the middle & bake on an oiled sheet - tasty juicy mushroominess).

It was an interesting meal - that took about 2 hours to prepare..... I'm definitely going to try again, but after I find a new loaf tin!

Saturday, 27 January 2007

Coconut Choc-Chip Cookies



Here's some Coconut Choc-Chip Cookies I made a few weeks ago. They're mighty tasty.....

From La Dolce Vegan by Sarah Kramer (p218). I made a batch for work & people have been asking when I'll bring in more ever since!

They're fairly high in fat, but if you use low-fat marg, you need to add in about a 1/4 cup extra flour - otherwise they're too runny.

Enjoy!