Autumn is kicking in

Our favourite afternoon snack since regular, reasonably priced bread is out of the question temporarily: Baked sweet potato fries and decaf coffee. I just cut a sweet potato into large fry-like pieces, coat them in a few tsp of rice bran oil (depending on how much I'm making), liberally apply fresh cracked sea salt and bake in the oven at 220 degrees C for about 45 minutes. I like to make the edges a little bit burnt so I sometimes just leave it in til the coffee has finished brewing or something. At (still!) 49c a kilo, this is one cheap snack, that's much better for us than our toast with margarine and jam :)

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Now, about the gluten thang.

Nadine decided she wanted to the Quantum Wellness Cleanse (a book by Kathy Freston, find it here on FishPond) so naturally I would do it with her (makes food prep easier and all that) which is basically going without sugar, alcohol, gluten, caffiene and animal products for 3 weeks. Why not? I'm sure my body could do without those for a while, particularly the caffiene. We weren't going to do the gluten part in the first place, but then I heard from a coworker that someone she knew (who wasn't a celiac, OR intolerant OR allergic to gluten/wheat) decided to try going gluten free to fix up her skin which was dry and excema-y. And of course it worked very well and her skin cleared up really quickly. So I thought, hmm. My hands and forearms are covered in dermatitis. And it hurts. And it's really gross. Maybe gluten could be the problem.

So there you have it, I'm seeing if gluten is aggravating the dermatitis. After the three weeks if it has cleared up (I am starting an indoors job soon so that should help too) I will start eating gluteny things again and if it flares up, well, then I'll know. It'll suck, but it's a small price. Who knows, it could be soy, or sugar, or some random unlikely fruit or vegetable. (I could just go to the doctor and get tested, but I don't want to, and they tend to just prescribe cortisone - been there done that, don't want to have to use that again.)

So anyway, today's lunch was just delicious. I made the curried pumpkin soup I found on Scandi Foodie and splurged on some gluten free bread to eat it with.

I was going to make my own bread but I got a bit lazy.

You have to spend a little bit more to buy gluten free bread that is also vegan. A lot of gluten free bread uses eggs and milk - I believe it helps with binding and rising. I say pish posh to your eggs and milk. Unecessary.

This loaf is pretty good, and the ingredients are nice excpet one - palm oil. I mean, really? That'll be my motivation to bake my own when this loaf runs out ( I predict tomorrow). It toasted up really well, though I tried to defrost one piece just to eat as bread and it kind of went all squishy in the microwave. Maybe if I just leave it out until it's ready...



Roasted pumpkin soup

Roasted Pumpkin Soup

Serves 7 as a starter

Ingredients:

650g butternut pumpkin (weighed without skin)

350g kent pumpkin (weighed without skin)

1 whole head of garlic

2 small onions

2 cups chicken style stock (or veg stock)

coconut cream and reserved pumpkin seeds for garnish

Method:

 Preheat oven to 220 degrees C.

Chop pumpkin into 2 inch chunks. Cut onions into quarters. Put into a bowl with the pumpkin and mix in a bit of sea salt and cracked pepper, and two teaspoons of any neutral cooking oil (I use rice bran). Spread in a single layer on a baking tray. Cut the top off the garlic and peel off the papery part of the skin. Wrap it up in tin foil and stick on the tray with pumpkin. Bake for about 40 minutes or until pumpkin and garlic are soft.

Once cooled a little, put into a food processor (if yours is gigantic you could do it all at once but I had to do mine in batches) with the stock and blend until smooth. Pour into a saucepan.

For the pumpkin seeds you could leave raw or wash all the pumpkin pulp off them and dry fry them in a pan until toasted and then chop into pieces.

Heat soup just before serving. If you want it thinner add more water or stock. Garnish with pumpkin seed pieces and a tablespoon of coconut cream :)

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 We had this as an entree last night at dinner. My garlic wasn't quite roasted enough so it was very garlicky. Perhaps put the garlic in the oven for 5-10 minutes before the pumpkin. Also my coconut cream was pretty much milk by the time I spooned it on. I'd suggest putting a can of coconut cream in the fridge overnight and using just the thick cream from the top of the can :)

The beauty of pumpkin soup is that it can be a started to pretty much anything and you can add any other seasonings you want (curry powder, italian herbs, etc). I find it quite filling so I try to make sure my main course (especially if dessert is a third course!) a fair bit smaller than usual so as my stomach doesn't explode.

I did have a dessert third course: Chocolate and vanilla ice cream sandwiches! Best idea ever by the way. I made the homemade vanilla ice cream from Veganomicon, and baked the Mocha Mama cookies from Vegan Cookies etc.

I bought the wrong kind of tofu for the ice cream but I just blended it a bit longer and it worked perfectly fine. I am so glad I only made enough ice cream sandwiches for everyone because I'd have eaten any leftovers all at once =D

One tip...make sure your cookies are pretty cold before putting the ice cream on them. Refrigerating would have been a good idea! As you can see it melted a bit. Still good though.

Beans beans the magical fruit

This meal is so simple, yet turns out delicious. And it's so cheap! Inspired from a Chilean recipe in the Oxfam Vegetarian Cookbook.

Makes 6 servings

Ingredients:

500g dry red kidney beans (about 2.5 cups)

2 large onions, sliced

4 cloves garlic chopped

250g pumpkin

3 cups corn kernels (from 3 cobs, or frozen)

1 tsp oregano

1 tsp thyme

1 tsp chilli flakes

2 cups chicken style stock

Method:

Cook kidney beans (soak overnight, simmer for about 1 hour OR boil beans, let soak 1 hour, drain, and simmer in new water for about 1 hour) and set aside.

Fry onion and garlic in some oil (or water) until soft. Add pumpkin and corn kernels and cook until it starts to soften. Add beans, spices and stock, bring to boil and turn down to a simmer. Cook for 20 minutes and serve on rice! Or we used cracked wheat because I forgot to buy rice.

Been baking up a cyclone lately.

First, it was the bagels. (I also baked some carrot muffins on the same day as the bagels that I've posted about before).

And now I am foraying even further into the vast world of Bread.

With these pumpkin scrolls I found randomly somehow on veganbaking.net. Actually, they are called Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls but to me they are scrolls. I've always called this type of thing scrolls. I opted out of the rum icing, because I had no rum (and whiskey would not suffice this time) and I don't really like icing. *get's shot by fellow bloggers* Besides, this bread is so sweet and so moist and so delicious it doesn't need any. When I make these at Christmas I'll probably put some on, you know, for presentation.

These are surprisingly easy to make. I only made a few substitutions: wholemeal plain flour + 1 tbsp gluten flour for the All Purpose, and rice syrup for the barley malt syrup.

These turned out so soft and like something you'd buy at a bakery. It tastes and has a texture like it was made with soft white flour. They taste to me like a perfect hot cross bun - I might even use this recipe for my buns next Easter. No one will notice they are orange...or they could just be pumpkin hot cross buns! They are sticky - I don't know how I'm going to manage one at work tomorrow, but we shall see.

So this is what I do when I chuck a sickie have a mental health day. Tell ya what, this business of breadmaking is very relaxing.

Tasty tasty

Been on a bit of a Veganomicon kick this week (spicy tempeh pasta) and the Asparagus and Lemongrass Risotto on page 198 was also freakin fantastic. It took forever to make (though I was making bread by hand at the same time so that may have held me up a tad) and I didn't have any basil or mint or peanut oil, ooor enough arborio rice but I don't know if I'll make risotto any other way again (jk). I used about 1 cup of arborio and half a cup of regular brown rice, skipped the basil/mint and did serve it with the suggested Tangerine Baked Tofu but used oranges and whiskey instead of tangerines and rum. Amazing. Served with lime zest, pan roasted cashew nuts and extra marinade from the tofu.

All the flavours worked really well together but I think next time I'll slice the tofu a little thinner and marinate for longer because it didn't pick up the flavour it could have.

Another one we've made is the 'Pumpkin Baked Ziti with Caramelised onion and Sage Crumb Topping'  (phew long title!) on page 194. (I obviously didn't go further than the pasta and risotto chapter.) I used wholewheat spirals instead of the ziti and I'm pretty sure that's the only edit I made to it! I could eat the cashew ricotta with a spoon and the breadcrumbs on top were to die for (though I wish I'd used some wholemeal bread instead of the white baguette we got for 50c since it gave both of us a stomachache!) and the whole thing was quite moreish. It was better the next day for lunch too.

Now a non Vgeanomicon related thing - my breakfast for the past few days! I had a tiny bit of whole oat groats leftover in a jar that was annoying me by being there so I cooked it up in some soy milk with handful of chopped dates and chopped brazil nuts. I didn't measure the dry grain but I ended up with 2 cups of cooked oats. I divided it in two and stuck it in the fridge. In the morning I heated it up, added sliced strawberries (on special at Coles hooray!) some chia seeds and a drizzle of brown rice syrup. Yum. Filled me up for ages which is really good since I have to wait 4 hours since I eat breakfast before I get to eat again. I highly reccomend a whole grain for breakfast - brown rice, wheat, oats, spelt (omg yum), buckwheat, barley. Just cook it up the night before, or on Sunday cook enough for your whole work week, it should keep in the fridge.

Now I am going to sit and watch the Gruen Transfer with a cup of hot red clover tea. Apparently it helps reduce hot flashes (cuz I get those! haha), healp relieve rheumatic or gout pain, contains vitamin E and can help sore throats. [source] Good o :)

Ginormous farmer's market vegetable stew

I spent my Sunday listening to records and fiddling about the house. I love watching the needle touch down.

It was lovely until the neighbour decided to deafen me and everyone in Perth with her doof doof. Oh well, I played records all day yesterday too :)

This is today's farmer's markets haul. From bottom left clockwise: the best bananas in the world, 1/4 jap pumpkin, celery, kale, brazil nuts, bunya nuts (no idea of what to do with these yet!), parsnip, turnips and potato.

Almost all of the above turned into a gigantic stew!

BIG HONKING ROOT VEGETABLE STEW.

Serves 6 (big)

Ingredients:

400g turnips

700g potatoes

200g carrot

600g pumpkin

250g parsnip

250g celery (about 4 stalks), sliced

1 1/2 cups cooked kidney beans

500g brown onion, quartered

5 cloves garlic, roughly chopped

2 tbsp whole peppercorns, crushed or cracked

1 thyme stem left whole

2cm long stem of rosemary left whole

3 bay leaves

2 heaped tsp wholegrain mustard

8 cups weak chicken style stock (or water)

125g short pasta (any shape!)

The method is very simple, as with all stew/soup type dealies.

First, I peeled things that needed peeling (I peel parsnips because we find the skin bitter, and I peeled the larger turnip but left the skin on the smaller one as per the Internet's reccomendations).

Chop everything into large chunks, try to keep the size uniform.

Put everything into a large stock pot, except the pasta shapes and cooked kidney beans. (As you can see, mine was ALMOST too small. [5L] I could have used a smaller potato or something!)

Give it a gentle stir, so as not to overflow the pot, unless yours is ginormous.

Bring pot to a boil, then turn down and simmer for half an hour.

(At this point I turned it off and left it for about an hour while I went to pick Nadine up from work, so if you don't need to leave it just check to see if the vegetables are cooked.)

The pumpkin will be falling apart - this is good. If you want your pumpkin chunks to stay whole, don't put them in at the beginning.

I found that it was too watery still, so I thickened it with a bit of cornflour. This is optional.

Bring back to a boil and add the pasta and beans. Cook until pasta is ready (about as long as the packet says!) Cooking the pasta in it also helps to thicken the gravy!

Serve and enjoy! I served ours with some sauteed kale and silverbeet, but feel free to go for bread or something.

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This was so hearty and flavourful. If you aren't into spicy, cut down the pepper to half. It was very peppery, just how I like it! The herbs were light enough for us to be able to taste each different vegetable, which was good. I liked how the pumpkin turned into mush and spread through the whole thing, making it soupy. 

For something that I just made up on the spot, I'm quite happy with the results! I think this is the first time I've had turnips cooked properly. Last time I tried they were pretty thick and raw haha. I like them. I'll probably buy more next week and do something different.

This would be awesome to chuck in a slow cooker to come home to after work! Unfortunately I don't have one. One day I will, when I have more storage!

School's over!

As the title implies, I finished my last class at tafe today! Hooray! Now I have a Certificate 3 in Horticulture (assuming it gets sent to me in the mail) which is very exciting. It means I'm qualified...for stuff. Hmm. It was quite an anti climactic end to the semester. We don't get a 'graduation' or anything. Oh well - I passed and that is all that matters. What am I supposed to do now? There's nothing to procrastinate for! Relax, I suppose.
I do have a job - I've left the fruit shop and got a job at a large production nursery up north a little ways. It's not particularly exciting (I'm a nursery hand on the maintenance team - weeding, pruning, you name it) but I really like it. It's hard labourious work usually in the full sun, but I enjoy a challenge. Never drunk so much water in my life. At the moment I'm doing 2 days per week but I'm almost 100% sure I'll be full time after the little holiday we are going to take. I should find out the major details of that tomorrow :)

Anyway enough of the boring stuff.

My sage is starting to look lovely! Almost as soon as I potted it when I bought it it pretty much died. It just shrivelled away and now it's just suddenly exploded with lovely leaves which smell and taste amazing.

My tomatoes have all got little tomatoes hanging off them now. Some even have 2 or 3! I'm very excited for a tomato. It's been windy lately but none have toppled over yet. Though today I will stake them I think, just in case the wind gets worse. I don't want to lose them before I get to eat them!

Nadine cooked the other night and made this amazing 'Peanutty Pumpkin Stew' from Vegan on the Cheap by Robin Robertson. This book wins the prize for being the most used recently! This stew was so good. So so good. She made it with black quinoa as a base but we had leftovers another night and I cooked up some millet grain as the base instead for something different. Both went equally as well with it. It's basically this very spicy satay-y delicious mess of vegetables and chickpeas. Yum. 

I also made a yummy dessert recently but I'll put it in a separate post because otherwise there will be too much on this one. :)

Pumpkin, Potato and Kidney Bean Stew

I got this potato from the farmers markets. It was called a red-something...only $3 a kilo! I was hoping it would be red inside (I've seen purple ones in seed catalogues) but unfortunately it was white. It tasted like a regular potato but with an earthier skin (I never peel mine).

So I decided to put it in a stew - I adapted this recipe, and changed most of it to suit me, I think.

Pumpkin, Potato and Kidney Bean Stew

Serves 8 with grain base or 10 without

Ingredients

4 cups cooked kidney beans (about 2 cups dried)

1 cup stock (I used Massel Chicken Style)

Oil for frying

4 cups roughly diced onion

4 cups mixed diced: pumpkin, sweet potato, regular potato

1 cup chopped carrot (about 2 medium)

1 chopped jalapeno chili*

2 tsp dried sage

1 tsp dried thyme

1 tsp smoked paprika

3 cups cooked tomatoes (about 1 800g can)

Method

1. Put some oil in a large stock pot and add onions, carrot, chilli and pumpkin/potatoes until onion starts to soften - about ten minutes.

2. Add beans to this mixture. Add sage, thyme, and paprika and then tomatoes and some of the stock. Add more later if it starts to dry out a little. Stir well and bring to a boil.

3. Cover and reduce heat to a simmer. Simmer until vegetables are tender.

*It could have done with 2 or more!

I served ours with a mixture of unpearled barley and brown rice. I did 2 parts rice to one part barley.

It also would have a little tastier with just sweet potato or pumpkin - or a few extra herbs. I also forgot to put pepper in.

Unpearled barley is whole barley. It takes a LONG time to cook (about 1.5 hours) but I think it's worth it. I cook in the same way as dried beans: Put barley and water to cover in saucepan, bring to boil. Turn off heat and let stand for a few hours (at least 1). Drain barley and put new water in. Bring to boil again then turn down and simmer until tender (this really does take about 1.5 hours - maybe 2!). I just like making life difficult for myself :) It took a few forkfuls to get used to - just remember to chew it well, and not breathe in the husk. We really like the taste and texture, actually. I love regular pearled barley but this adds a little more.

I'm actually trying to gain some weight (only 4-5kg or so) and I figure I should eat more carbs than I burn. Unpearled barley, brown rice, lots of bread etc. They are cheaper for me to buy than good fats such as avocado, peanut butter, other nuts. 1kg of this unpearled barley only cost me $2.60! I'll still be eating my nuts etc occasionally when I can afford it too though.

Pumpkin and Spinach Ravioli with tomato sauce

So yesterday I got in the mood to spend hours slaving over hand made pasta (ie: I was procrastinating hardcore). This is another dish that seems to dominate the vegetarian option(s) on restaurant menus. However for some reason it's generally served with a thick heavy cream sauce PLUS truckloads of cheese grated on top and I could never finish the whole thing without feeling as big as a house.

Pumpkin and Spinach Ravioli
Serves 5

For the pasta:
I used Bryanna Clark Grogans homemade pasta recipe. I made one batch. (I couldn't find the actual recipe - printed it yonks ago)

For the stuffing:
About 1/4 medium sized organic pumpkin
1 packet frozen spinach (125g)

Defrost spinach. Steam pumpkin. Squeeze some of the water out of the spinach (I used this as the water in the pasta) and drain pumpkin. Mash together and set aside.

For the sauce:
About 1kg fresh tomatoes
Whole garlic, chopped
Chilli
Mixed herbs to taste
Splash of red wine

I've started to make my own 'tin' tomatoes to save on packaging. I also know it's just tomatoes - no salt, sugar, acid anything. Just tomatoes. I chop them all up and simmer them down for an hour or so, let cool, and freeze.

Just fry the garlic and chilli then mix everything else in. Leave it to simmer for a good while - at least half an hour but longer is better.

My mum got me a pasta roller and ravioli mold (mould?) for christmas last year so it made it reallllllyy easy to make. That's why they're all exactly the same size, etc. I just made up each batch of ravioli and put them on a floured baking tray to go into the freezer. They keep for a few months in an airtight container, but they never actually last that long in my house. It's a really great meal to have on hand for when there's no time to make dinner. They take minutes to cook, and I've usually got tomato sauce in the freezer too. If not it's not hard to make. They are also good to feed omnivorous friends and family.

I think 12 ravioli is adequate for one person. Mine measure 1.5 inches across.

This is the best ravioli I've made so far :) We think it's because I took my sweet time making them (I had no one coming for dinner, no time limits or anything. If you make them for company, maybe make it the day before or something.) Though my kitchen bench is tiny and I had barely enough room to move, it's still a quite relaxing experience making them. You can fly off with the fairies if you feel like it :)

Roast Pumpkin and White Bean Vegetable soup

This is the delicious pumpkin I bought the other day! I've never seen a pumpkin so orange. It smelled really good too. I'm going to be so sick of pumpkin by the end of it. Haha so worth it.

Roast Pumpkin and White Bean Vegetable Soup
4 small serves
Ingredients:

¼ medium sized organic pumpkin
1 med-large onion
1 small head garlic
1-2 tbsp rice bran oil
½ tsp dried oregano
½ cup uncooked navy beans (soaked overnight in cold water, or quick boiled and soaked for 1 hour)
½ red capsicum
½ small head brocolli
½ small head cauliflower
2 yellow squash
500ml ‘chicken’ stock (or vegetable broth, or water)
½ tsp chilli powder
½ tsp ground sage
freshly ground black pepper

Method:

Cook beans. Leave in the water until they are required.

Cut pumpkin into equal sized chunks. Leave the skin on if you want, I did. Put the chunks into a bowl with the oil and oregano. Toss until well coated. Arrange chunks on a baking tray. Put whole garlic (I took some skin off and trimmed the top) and whole peeled and trimmed onion in leftover oil in bowl and coat. Wrap them in tin foil and put on the tray with pumpkin. Roast at 180 degrees C (350 F) for one hour.

Once cooked, let cool for a little while and then put it all in a food processor (minus the skins). Blend until smooth and transfer it to a large saucepan.

Chop the capsicum, brocolli, cauliflower and squash into small chunks. Blend until mostly smooth and add to pumpkin mix in saucepan.

Make 500ml chicken stock out of the bean’s cooking water (no waste!) and put the beans in with the pumpkin. Add spices and turn element to medium heat. Add enough stock to get the consistency you want. I used pretty much all 500ml and it was pasta-sauce thick.

Serve with garlic bread!

This soup was quite sweet but so yummy. I'm thinking next time I make it I may roast all the vegetables. The extra veg was sort of an after thought when I looked in the fridge and saw it was about to go bad. I managed to get the seasoning perfect first time and you can pretty much taste each individual vegetable without it being too much. Tomorrow lunch we are going to have leftovers as a pasta sauce. Very excited :)

Beetroot chips, Sweet Millet soup, and Tofu sausages!

I decided today was the day I would try to make my beetroot chips :) Yesterday I bought a little pack of discounted baby beetroot for $1.50, it's perfectly fresh. We've mainly been having it steamed with potatoes as a side dish.

So I sliced the beetroot as thinly as possible (I thought I got it quite thin but apparently not thin enough) and lay them out on a piece of baking paper on the glass dish inside the microwave, ground a little bit of salt on it and zapped it on high for about 2 minutes before it started to smoke so I turned it off for a few minutes. Then zapped it again, and turned it off...flipped over the slices and repeated. If I zapped it for longer they probabaly would have been perfect, but I think little sections of beetroot caught fire...well I didn't see fire but when I got them out there were little circles of burnt =D

They tasted fine though, they tasted almost raw (good thing I like raw beetroot), but chewy instead of crunchy. It was odd, and I will try again another day. I think I'll put them under the grill instead of the microwave next time! I had them with a banana smoothie (pink from the extra bits of beetroot I chucked in) with wheat germ and whole oats. Tasty :)

For tonight I decided to make a 2 course meal with a light soup as a starter. I made Sweet Millet Soup from Karma Cookbook by Boy George and Dragana G. Brown. Yeah Boy George wrote a macrobiotic vegan cookbook! Who knew? I didn't, until I saw it when I was scouring through the cookbook section in one of those cheap cheap book sale stores, hoping to stumble upon a gem...I did. This book is great! I got it for $3!

 Anyway, the soup is just millet, pumpkin, parsnip, carrot and onion boiled in water until vegetables are soft and millet cooked properly. Sprinkle some green onions on top and you have yourself a tasty soup! Apparently it helps any digestive problems you may have. It's very light and naturally sweet. The only 'flavouring' is a sprinkle of salt. Perfect starter.

As soon as I saw this recipe for tofu sausages, I knew I wanted to make them. So I did :) I blended the tofu to make it as smooth as possible (it feels like a sticky dough!) and cooked the cracked wheat (recipe didn't specify but I didn't want to break my teeth :P). I used almonds instead of walnuts because I don't like walnuts,but almonds worked fine. While they were cooking they smelled like peanut butter for some reason!

We had them with steamed brocolli, Steamed-and-then-grilled potato and beetroot (this makes the potato taste like a baked potato!), hummus, and this amazing beetroot and orange relish Nadine picked up for $1 at her work (discount rack, yerrrr!).

The sausages held together very well (I refrigerated them for about an hour before cooking too, only because I made them earlier. I don't think it would make too much of a difference.) I made them quite a bit larger than the recipe says, too. I made 12 out of the mix. 3 would have been enough for one person :) As you cut into them they do crumble but that's fine. You gotta like tofu to like these! I wouldn't give them to someone who didn't really, like my dad :) We loved them. I will make them again.

Lasagne and pumpkin scones

Nadine made lasagne for tea the other night =D I think it was the best lasagne I've ever had. She just used home brand lasagne sheets, leftover napoli sauce (that we had with the gnocchi) extra olives, random chopped veg including: capsicum, zucchini, carrot, pumpkin, onion. Cooked beans (1/3 cup [uncooked]each of soy, kidney and pinto beans) and layered it as usual with white sauce (which I ruined and made lumpy but it still tasted okay). Bread crumbs on top are the best bit I reckon.

We ended up with gigantic pieces (we always drink wine with pasta and I think we had a little too much before dinner was served so our eyes were way bigger than our stomachs) so this would definately have served six instead of four. I don't have a recipe because everything was just eyeballed and plonked in the oven :)

I managed to use a little bit more of my 99c pumpkin yesterday - I made scones. They didn't really turn out like what I think scones are like, though. They were more like pieces of moist pumpkin cake. But they were very delicious. I ate two! Shouldn't have because I think they gave me stomach cramps afterwards (too much sugar and cream all at once I think!) but one at a time is just fine. I used this recipe. It was the first one I found and I was sold because it also used the pumpkin seeds I had put it in fridge from the pumpkin. I've been trying to think of something to do with them.

This is what they looked like coming out of the oven (after I'd taken my two pieces of course). You sort of pull them apart...it was a little uncooked in the middle, five more minutes would have solved that but it was fine for me anyway. I like dough.

I had mine with a cup of chocolate black tea from a little cafe that has since closed down (very sad), a tiny bit of plum jam, and a great big dollop of soy mock cream. Recipe for that is from Leah Leneman's Easy Vegan Cooking.

I have to say if you do make mock cream with soy milk and cornflour like I do (I can't afford cashews very often!) try to use 'full cream' soy milk. It works MUCH better, and it much closer to the traditional dairy whipped cream we all used to love. Also, I didn't have to add sugar while blending it this time (we always use light soy milk because it has less sugar, fat, in it and tastes much less beany) and it did turn out much thicker than it has before. I love this soy cream - I use it when I make my christmas trifle and it works perfectly :)

Pumpkin Gnocchi with Tomato Sauce

Tonight I decided to make pumpkin gnocchi with the pumpkin I still haven't used yet :)

Making gnocchi is always relaxing (except for that one time I was in a rush and I didn't mash the potato enogh and it ruined an entire batch) and the end results tasty tasty!

First, steam enough pumpkin to make one cup of mashed pumpkin. Mix 1 cup of wholemeal flour (Italians will traditionally use type 00 white flour but wholemeal works perfectly for me) with 1 tablespoon of powdered sage and two crushed garlic cloves. Or a teaspoon of dried garlic flakes. Mix this together then add the pumpkin and stir until lumps form. If the mixture is too wet or sticky, add more flour. When it starts clumping together take it out of the bowl and knead a few times until it's a smooth dough.

Let it sit for about 1/2 an hour.

Once it's been sitting for a while, take chunks of it and roll out into a snake about 2cm thick. Cut bits off about a cm wide. They'll look like little pillows.

Set out the gnocchi onto a floured tray (using baking paper will prevent sticking as I discovered the hard way today, but I was trying to save paper haha), and put it into the freezer to freeze uncovered, until solid.

Gnocchi can be frozen for up to 3 months.

Meanwhile, prepare the sauce. This is my take on a traditional Napoli sauce. There is probabaly another sauce that uses olives in a basic Napoli base but I can't be bothered looking for it :).

Chop about 5-6 cloves of garlic roughly. Slice up some chillies (as much as you like).

I also sliced up a handful of the black olives we had on our picnic (see last post) but kalamata is preferred.

Fry the garlic, chilli, and olives in a little bit of oil on low heat until garlic is soft.

Add in two 800g cans of crushed or chopped tomatoes and stir well. Leave to simmer for about half an hour. Longer is ideal, but if like me you get impatient, it's still good if left for not as long :)

When the sauce is just about ready, add in 1-2 tablespoons of mixed herbs, fresh basil, whatever you have on hand and bring some water to boil in a large pot.

Once boiling put in the gnocchi. I measured one cup of frozen gnocchi per person, and it was the perfect amount. They are ready when floating, don't overcook!

They'll be mushy and horrible.

At the last minute add about a tablespoon of vegan butter to the sauce. You don't have to, but it makes it slightly creamier. Stir until melted.

Serve on top of gnocchi!

Sauce recipe serves about 6, gnocchi recipe serves about 3. I usually make a double amount of gnocchi, but I didn't quite cook enough pumpkin today :)

Pot pie

I bough a whole butternut pumpkin the other day (it's only a small one) because they were 99c a kilogram. And since my pumpkin plants were eaten alive by powdery mildew, I figured I'd start buying them again. So I had to find a recipe! I also have 3kg of potatoes ($2 a bag!) so I wanted one that had both. So I decided to cook this:

Celebration Pot Pie with Pumpkin from fatfree vegan kitchen. I know I make a lot of stuff from there, but most of it so far has been delicious, easy to make with basic ingredients, and there's just so much on the one page :)

The only problem I had with this recipe was the amount of sodium! Holy crap 986.1mg sodium per serving! According to this website (I just ran a search on google.com) the RDI of sodium is 920 to 2300mg per day. I suppose for all your other meals and snacks of the day you could just not have salt, but salt is in pretty much everything.

So I think I cut the salt about in half by skipping a few things I just didn't have, and not adding the actual salt in the recipe in.

It was quite tasty, in the way stews are (meaning a little bit bland) so I just dripped some hot chilli sauce on top. It could go with a bit more garlic (maybe incorporate more into the biscuits).

I also didn't have any seitan (I've never used/made it before) as I have no idea where to find vital wheat gluten. Maybe health food stores like Mrs. Flannery's, but generally places like that are regular haunts for me and I haven't come across it yet. Not that I've looked :) But I do on occasion buy fake meat products like Lamyong TVP Chunks which is what I put in this. The texture is a little odd (I wouldn't recommend feeding it to an omnivorous friend or relative) but as a vegan expecting strange texture they are perfectly fine. I've also tried the Beef strips by lamyong too and they are probably better than the chunks, but really do NOT freeze well. I had them in a stir fry and they were fine but I froze the leftovers and had it the next day and I couldn't chew through them. So avoid freezing :) This TVP stuff is quite expensive ($4-$6 or thereabouts a packet) but I buy it rarely so I think that's fine. They tend to last a while because I use them in conjunction with tofu and other veges, so I can get 10 servings out of a packet meant for 4, for example.

My 'biscuits' (more like cakes) didn't really turn out how they were meant to but they were fine to me anyway. They were quite crispy on the outside and soft and cakey on the inside.