Sunday, 11 August 2013

Raw day food eats

 
I got into work with my huge supplies bag of food, I was going straight from work to the studio to do some painting, so needed plenty to keep me going.
 
I started the day off with a banana and a cup of herbal tea, and then I snacked on coconut filled dates. Mmm dates and avocado are the best things to keep me going in the office.
I then messily ate a whole fresh mango and an orange. I had also prepared some sliced tomatoes with basil and cucumber batons.
 
Testing the gazpacho the night before with ice!
 
Lunch was avocado guacamole lettuce tacos with lime juice and sunflower and pumpkin seed and a thermal flask of cold gazpacho.
I really liked the raw garlic in this soup, and have seen a few Green Juices recipes which call for garlic; I’m definitely more willing to try that now!
 
After lunch I had peppermint tea and more dates and a few blueberries, I also had a few cashews and almonds. I wish I had been at home to make a nice big banana and frozen blueberry smoothie.
 
Dinner was going to be courgette spaghetti, but after a trip to the shops where I found some young sweet corn on the cob, I opted for a delicious corn, avocado and lime salad instead.
 
Apologies for the awful photo, this was about 9pm, I was hungry!
 
Doing the raw day, I first thought it was a food plan of restriction, “you are not allowed this, this and this” but the following day I realised it is instead about promoting eating more healthy food.
I think I would start to have more salads for dinners but having some cooked chickpeas in my salad isn’t going to kill me.
Also one of my friends has a sugar deficiency which means she also can’t eat many carbs, like white flour or rice. So I made her some almond Raw, Sugar free cookies, using diabetic jam, and using the recipe from the Vegan Vida Con Recipe book, send from Vegan in Brighton. I would use some time to make these treats before my next Raw Day.
 
Two of my friends at derby have done 2 week Detox plans, where they cut out processed sugar, alcohol, caffeine and wheat. I think after feeling how un-bloated I was after the raw day, I may take up this detox, and I think it not being raw means I will be able to do it for longer than a day. Brown rice and sweet potatoes are still included and I can live off of those J
 

Thai Food and Craft Festival

Basingstoke War Memorial Park on Sunday the 28th July.
 
I found about this Thai food and Craft festival via Facebook, so popped down on the Sunday morning.
As well as hot food stalls, imported Thai foods, they had clothes and kick-boxing and lady boy contests.
 
I have been looking for somewhere online to get Kaffir Lime leaves at a decent price. At the super market you can buy a small spice jar of leaves for just under £2. So when I saw a stall full of imported Thai spices, I knew what to get. The huge bags were only £1 each, so of course bought two bags. I can now lavish my home made Thai Green Curries with loads of tasty limey leaves!
 


 
They were also selling lots of Thai Beer, there was a really nice picnic atmosphere.
 
I was scouting for some lunch, and was a little confused about what Jay food was, apparently no onions or garlic, I assume no eggs as well? 
 
Anyway I found a curry amongst the Pad Thai, meat and fish.
 
Well placed Thai food banner in the background...

 
Here is the Thai vegetable red curry served with a massive amount of rice. I checked no fish sauce or cream (only coconut milk).
 
They also had stands selling Mango Sticky rice, which is fresh sliced mango served with coconut cooked sticky rice. I had no room left to eat that after this huge plate!
 
 
Mr Dada had a Thai Tea, (sadly un-vegan) it is made with condensed milk (very popular in Asia) it is made using brewed tea and served over lots of ice. The tea is a special kind that doesn't get too bitter and its a lovely orange colour when mixed with the milk.
 
The 7/11 shops in Thailand sell huge cups of Ice Tea and Thai Tea.
 
I hope to see more interesting festivals in Basingstoke like this, promoting not only independent restaurants but also different cultures.
 

RAW Day Preparation

For some time now I have been toying with the idea of committing to try a Raw day, I have eaten raw lunches and Raw breakfast, but I’ve never consciously gone a whole day just eating Raw foods.
If it goes well I might make it a regularly month adventure, much like the source of my inspiration Vegan Crunk, if it goes really well I might extend it to a few days or even a week!
I realise to anyone who is living raw or doing a detox this doesn’t sounds like much of a challenge, but with no restaurants nearby that offer Raw food and very limited health food shops, I’m going to have to do a lot of preparation myself.
I don’t own any books on Raw food. So most of my information is coming from what Blogs and my usual vegan diet.
Here are my meal plan ideas and a shopping list:
1st of the month Raw day
 
© Breakfast: Banana & Strawberry smoothie/ mango smoothie /Blueberry smoothie
© Lunch: Avocado Salad/ Lettuce tacos/ Gazpacho / coleslaw / carrot & raisin salad
© Dinner: Spaghetti courgette with tomato and basil sauce / Raw Mexican wraps
© Drinks: Herbal Tea - Peppermint, green tea, watermelon juice.
© Snacks: Dates stuffed with coconut, unroasted cashews & almonds, seeds, raisins homemade cashew cookies. Vegetable crudités
© Snack: Mini pizzas; sliced tomato with basil and sundried tomatoes
Im not sure if herbal tea is considered raw, but its really good for you, so I will allow some.
Planned Shopping list:
Veg:
Avocado
Basil
Tomato cherry and big
Carrots
Little gem lettuce
Celery
Sun dried tomato
Limes
Fruit:
Bananas
Mango
Oranges
Berries
Watermelon
Dates
Coconut
Nuts:
Cashew
Almond
Sunflower and pumpkin seeds

Wednesday, 26 June 2013

Doughnutsssssssssssssssssss!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 
Inspired by my friend and fellow vegan Cassie {TeaBeardsandCake} I bought a 6 hole doughnut oven pan from Amazon and used this recipe from Chocolate Covered Katie to make vegan krispy Kreme doughnuts!
 
I was kind enough to test out the first batch on my omnivorous family, who absolutely loved them!
 
I am not the best person to be a critic of doughnuts, as in my 7/8 years of being vegan I've only had 3 doughnuts and 2 were from this batch!
 
The only other doughnut I have had was on my first visit to Ms Cupcake in Brixton, where I waited for one to come fresh out of the fryer and it was warm and deliciously sugary! Mmmm!
 
I checked with my family and they said you cant really tell that these are baked and not fried, they aren't as oily as fried would be but they are perfectly sweet and soft.
 
 
On my second attempt I threw together a chocolate icing {seen above}, which was so delicious and even after a few days {how did they last that long?} they still tasted amazing, the chocolate icing seems to melt more into the doughnut! Definately my favourite.
 
In my trials I realised the way to add sprinkles to an iced doughnut isn't to throw tiny colourful sugared balls all over you kitchen, but in fact to cover a plate with sprinkles and press recently iced the doughnut into them, who knew!?.  
 

Wednesday, 12 June 2013

Chickpeas & Avocado Caesar Salad and Sprouting Seeds

 
I saw Post Punk Kitchen's recent post on a very vegan Caesar salad, and realised my fridge was loaded with chickpeas and avocado that needed eating, I took this as a perfect opportunity to actually follow a recipe (I like to improvise too much) for once!
                 
 
I’ve never made a dressing with Tahini and was so surprised how it easy it was to thin the tahini with water, I added the mustard and garlic (losing friends because I added too much) the dressing had a very rich nutty taste. Actually the garlic flavour had really mellowed by the following day.
It inspired me to dig out my Appetite for reduction and start making more of my own salad dressings.
The salad came together really easily and the Tahini is really nutty, the chickpeas were out of a jar, yum! It also made a tasty lunch the next day and my work colleagues didn't notice the garlic.
 
 
 
At my local corner shop, they sell a lot of ethnic foods, mostly Indian and Asian, the other day I was picking up Rose water, dried chickpeas and Thai green curry paste (HOT) for my friend when I spotted Chickpeas in a jar!
When I spent a month in Rome I became totally addicted to jarred chickpeas. I could scoop a spoon full out onto my salad and add some raw garlic and Italian extra virgin olive oil and lunch was sorted.
So of course I bought a jar, in fact they were the same price as a can of chickpeas, but they taste so much better! They are really well cooked and soft enough to eat straight up.
Plus you can reuse the glass jar as storage for dried cupboard stables, or even for sprouting seeds.
This leads me nicely onto...sprouting seeds! With said dried chickpeas, I got out my Bio-Snacky Germinator and began socking my chickpeas ready for sprouting.
I’ve read that sprouted seeds and beans are really good for you, because they are easier to digest and have lots of healthy happy stuff in them. I have a lot of seeds and pulses I can sprout at home.
I did read somewhere that you should boil the chickpeas for a few minutes before you consume them.
 
Soaking the Chickpeas before the sprouting starts!

Please comment on this blog post if you love sprouting! 
 

Monday, 27 May 2013

Ms Cupcake Golden Syrup Cupcakes and a Roller Marathon

After the long awaited release date I finally got my hands on a copy of Ms Cupcakes recipe book.
 
Ive been a fan of Ms Cupcake since my first encounter when I stopped off there before visiting a Roller Derby game in London, Ms Cupcake was at the game too, as one of her staff was a roller girl too.
I don't get to visit as much as I like, but I am always looking at the tasty photos of their treats online.
I have always been really impressed with their cakes, especially the Gluten Free ones, as they taste equally as good as the wheaty ones.
 
Golden Syrup Cupcake recipe by Ms Cupcake
 
This weekend I skated 26 miles for charity as part of the South Coast Roll at Goodwood motor circuit. Our team Basingstoke Bullets skated a total of 583.2 miles and raised £500 for the Youth Sports Trust. It was hard work to skate 26 miles but I was so happy to have the support of my team.

As the tradition seems to go, I make a batch of vegan GF cupcakes for all the gang.
I have been eyeing up my new cupcake book for a few days and eventually made my choice.

 
 
 Im really addicted to golden syrup porridge and the smell of it sends me into a frenzy.
I thought about making vanilla cupcakes as anything too fancy might not suit everyones taste buds, (cinnamon haters) but when I saw this Golden Syrup Cupcake Recipe I knew I had to make them.
 
Icing using a plastic bag, next time I will be using real icing kit.
 
The best things bout Ms Cupcakes book (apart from the beautiful 50's style photos) is the English-American ingredients translation, as I have never known what to use in my frosting/buttercream as a shortening, the book suggest Trek, which is pretty solid at room temperate which makes for perfect frosting on a sunny day.

 
Jaffa Cakes and Turkish Delight Cake are high on my to make list as well as custard icing!
 
Ive already spurred a few friends curiosity to buy the book with my cupcake photos on Instagram DropkickNoMercy.
 
 
You should buy Ms Cupcakes book and then join a Roller Derby team; this sport seems to come with vegan cakes (and sometimes vegans too).

 

Bath; Roman Spa, Nepalese food and ancient stones

Since coming abck from traveling we are trying to see more of england, so we drove after work to Bath on a Friday to make the most of the weekend.
We found our lovely little hotel Midway Place, which was 10 minute drive from Bath, and stopped for a cuppa in our room whilst watching the hairy bikers.
 
View of bath in the evening
The lovely hotel owner gave us a useful map and pointed out a few restaurants, having done my research I knew most of them and had scouted them out on trip advisor, happy cow and vegetarian places.
 
I tried to book a table whilst on the motor way to the Nepalese restaurant I has read about. Friday and curry go very together. They couldn't guarantee us a table, so we planned out visit to the later end of the night.
We parked up and walked over the bridge in the rain and strolled past Demuths veggie restaurant before finding our dinner for the night at Yak Yeti Yak. 
 
As soon as we walked in the door the smell of incense took us straight back to travelling in Nepal and India. The decor was equally as authentic, with all kinds of colourful fabric we were used to seeing near the Dalai Lamas residence in Dharamsala.
The menu looked great and I spotted the word vegan on the dessert section! I'm really not used to seeing that word on menus as we don't even have a vegetarian restaurant in my home town. 
 

We decided to order some vegetable momos to share, momos are Nepalese and Tibetan dumplings, these were really good and the sauce went to well with them.

For our main we ordered the Dahl baht; this literally translates to rice and lentil Dahl, and we also had the choice of which veg curry to add to the aloo channa. They gave us a few options but the seasonal Broccoli and Asparagus sounded the best. There was so much rice, and it came with popadom too, I didnt finish my meal, but enjoyed it so much. 
I had some how missed the bit where they mentioned a Dahl made "with vegan butter" and when I asked the waiter if it could be made vegan he was so well informed and I just had to take off the 'curd' which comes with the meal. We had fresh lime sodas to drink, very comon in India and Nepal.
 
 
We started the second day with our hotel breakfast of fresh fruit, tea, toast and an English breakfast; beans, tomato and hash brown, they also had Linda McCarthy sausages which are vegan!
 
We made our way into bath and parked at a church near the centre as the parking was fixed price all day and raised money for the church.
 
 
Once in Bath we queued for The Roman Bath House. It was a really intesting place with lots of roman architecture and of course you could see the huge steaming hot baths. At the end you could even drink some Filtered Spring Water. I also heard that this is the only natural hot spring in the whole of the UK, it must have been quite a treat to have hot baths anytime.
 
 
We finished looking around about lunch time and did a little shopping before picking where to have lunch, I had read about a mushroom burger with vegan cashew cheese and chilli juice, but couldn't remember which restaurant it was. We decided to eat at the Green Rocket, a relative new comer to bath; only opened in Feburary and fully veg with lots of vegan / gluten free options, there was one Raw main too!
 
 
After studying the menu I realised this was the place with the burger.
So we ordered: one Egyptian mezze platter and one mushroom rice burger. The mezze had falafel, hummus, carrot salad, flat bread and quinoa. Both came with a pesto drizzled salad.

To drink I had a pot of earl grey with soy milk, it made so many cups! They were fully stocked to make any kind of soya coffee and chai latte too.
 


They sell their famous chilli juice by the jar, it was really unique and complemented the burger so well. I tried the vegan cashew cheese on its own and it tasted so fantastic, I hope they think of using it for vegan Toasties in the future, because it is a star by itself.
We eyed up the extensive choice of cake but we didn't have room again.
Having said that we came back an hour later; I had vegan coffee & walnut cake, I'm not a huge coffee fan but it tasted great and was so moist with plenty of buttery frosting. Mr Dada had non vegan gluten free salted caramel cake and soya cappuccino. They also do gluten free brownies, which I was assured by the waitress are also really good. They had other choices for vegans including cupcakes, carrot cake, ninja bread men and huge coconut chocolate flapjacks.
 

 
We briefly visited the Metropolitan cafe with is above and inside a high street shop, and they had a huge range of gluten free cake but sadly no vegan ones.
 
We wanted to visit Demuths because it has a huge reputation as being one if the best exclusively vegetarian restaurants in the south west, but after splashing the cash at our last 2 meals we couldn't justify it. A set lunch is much cheaper than an evening meal, so that would be a great way to try it on a budget. Or for a special occasion I would be tempted by the hour and a half drive to Bath to eat here.
 
I would love to one day visit Rachel Demuths Vegetarian Cooking school, but for now I can at least read her blog!
 

I highly recommend Bath for a day trip or an over night stay (so you can eat more).
 
On our way home we stopped at Avebury to see the neolithic stone circles, it was lambing season and they were so cute!