Savoury Yeast Cheesy Garlic Herb and facon Dog Biscuits

Dodge was less of a fan of these than the peanut butter cookies. In saying that he did still eat them! I personally thought the smell of these baking was incredible, and have been eying them off myself.

Recipe makes about 18 biscuits, depending on the size of your cookie cutter and how thick you make them.

You will need:
1 heaped cup of flour
1 cup water
1 tablespoons Garlic Powder
1/4 cup of fresh parsley, chopped finely
1 tablespoon baking powder
3 tablespoons of fake bacon pieces, finely diced
3 tablespoons of sesame seeds
1/4 - 1/2 cup of Nutritional Yeast flakes

1. Preheat oven to 180ºC.
2. Combine all but the water in a bowl and gently whisk together until evenly combined - add water and mix until dough consistency
3. Roll out the dough on a clean, floured work surface to about .5cm thickness. Cut out biscuits with your cookie cutter and place on a lined baking sheet. These biscuits don’t spread/melt much at all so it's fine to place them close together. Bake for 15 - 30 minutes (depending on the size of your biscuit) or until golden brown. Transfer to a wire rack to cool.

Peanut butter & Carob Dog Biscuits

Hello blog world, it's been a while since I've been on!

I've actually been a pretty busy lady. We recently rescued a 12 month old Great Dane, Dodge - He's just so lovely!

So, for my first post since welcoming him into our little fur family, I decided I'd better blog about some dog treats! He loves carob... and he absolutely loves peanut butter....  he loves treats...so it makes sense that he would love Peanut butter & Carob Dog Biscuits!

These are perfectly safe for people to eat - although you'll probably find they're much less sweet than the kind of cookies you're used to eating - but if grandad or the kids get into them, you don't have to worry!

Recipe makes about 14 biscuits, depending on the size of your cookie cutter and how thick you make them.

You will need:
1 cup peanut butter
1 cup soy milk
2 tablespoons agave syrup
1 heaped cup of plain flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 scant teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 cup of dog chocolate treat buttons, roughly chopped

1. Preheat oven to 180ºC. Cream together the peanut butter, milk and agave syrup, gently fold in carob chunks
2. Add the mixture to the remaining dry ingredients and stir until you form a stiff dough (you may have to use your hands). If you find the dough is a bit too wet you can add flour until the dough is to a cookie consistency.
3. Roll out the dough on a clean, floured work surface to about 1cm thickness. Cut out biscuits with your cookie cutter and place on a lined baking sheet. These biscuits don’t spread/melt much at all so it's fine to place them close together. Bake for 15 - 30 minutes (depending on the size of your biscuit) or until golden brown. Transfer to a wire rack to cool.

ta daaa - dodge absolutely loves these!

Creamy vegetable pies

With vegan puff pastry... anything is possible!
These were simple, yet tasty!
For 6 muffin sized pies, you will need:
3 sheets of frozen puff pastry

filling:
2 cups of soy milk
1 cup of diced frozen vegetables
1/2 onion, diced
1/2 cup of finely diced broccoli
1 clove of garlic
1 cup of fresh spinach leaves, finely chopped
4 tablespoons of vegan butter
4 tablespoons of plain flour
1 teaspoon of mustard
3 tablespoons of nutritional yeast
salt and pepper to taste (IMPORTANT)
teaspoon of dried mixed herbs

Preheat oven to 200C

To make sauce: melt butter in a pan over medium heat
whisk in flour to form a roux
whisk in soy milk, nutritional yeast, mustard, herbs, salt and pepper and set to the side.

In a pan, fry onion, garlic and broccoli until soft, combine spinach until wilted, add this along with the diced frozen vegetables to the sauce mixture - this will be your filling.
If you would prefer it runnier, add more soy milk.

Pastry shells:
Slice each sheet of thawed puff pastry into square quarters
Place 6 of these squares neatly into a muffin tray to create the bottom of your pie shell (make sure you have greased tray extremely well!) Gently push the center of the pastry into the muffin tray.
With the remaining 6 squares, find a circular object which will fit just inside the square to create the lid of your pie (should be about a cm wider than the muffin cavity) I found a large nesquik tin was PERFECT. Use this as a template to cut out 6 circular pieces of puff pastry.

Place cooled filling inside uncooked puff pastry shell and neatly place lid on top
use a fork to push the lid and base together firmly, and brush with soy milk - top with sesame seeds (optional)

Place in oven for 20-30 minutes or until golden brown.

Enjoy

Vegan MOFO: Last post - HAPPY HALLOWEEN

Well, it's the end of Vegan MOFO, I've had a blast, and found many new blogs which I've enjoyed!
I thought I would use my final post to show you all my pumpkin carving journey!

1: finding a decent pumpkin!

 2: Scooping out it's guts, transferring an image onto the pumpkin, and starting to carve it

 3: Cleaning up the cuts so they're all nice and neat!

 4: Success!

Happy halloween guys, and happy MOFO-ing :)

Vegan MOFO: mini quiches

Another quick dinner! (I'm super lazy)
Recipe makes 6 mini quiches, muffin size.

You will need
2 sheets of vegan puff pastry
250g of firm tofu, drained
3/4 cup of soy milk
4 tablespoons of nutritional yeast
1 teaspoon of mixed herbs
1 teaspoon of mustard
1 1/2 cups of fried vegetables of choice I used onion, garlic, spinach, mushroom and broccoli
4 tablespoons of plain flour

Preheat oven to 180C
thaw puff pastry
oil a muffin tray thoroughly (6 muffin size)
cut each sheet of puff pastry into quarters, square quarters.
Neatly tuck each square of pastry into a muffin tin, be gentle, you don't need to push it right into the corners, when you place the tofu mix in it will drop more. patch up any holes you may have created with the left over puff pastry.

Place everything but the fried vegetables into a blender, and blend until smooth, if the mixture is too hard for the blender to mix properly, add a dash more soy milk (shouldn't really need it though)
fold vegetables into tofu mixture, and spoon into each uncooked puff pastry shell.
Place in preheated oven for 15-20 minutes or until starting to turn golden brown.
Gently lift out of the muffin tray, and serve hot or cold.

Enjoy

Vegan MOFO: Sushi

Simple concept, tasty food!
Here I have, avocado and mayo rolls, bbq marinated tempeh rolls, edamame pillows and bbq marinated tempeh pillows.

It's pretty simple, and you can use whatever fillings you want

you will need:
2 cups of sushi rice
3 cups of water
2 tablespoons of rice vinegar
4 + nori sheets
Filling of choice (tofu, tempeh, salad, avocado... etc)

A bamboo roller

rinse sushi rice until water is clear, and place in a pot with the water - bring to a boil.
Once boiling, turn down heat and simmer for roughly 20 minutes. I take it off the heat to cool once the mixture is gluggy, almost dry but still has some moisture left in it.

Place rice in fridge and wait until completely cooled, season with vinegar and mix through the rice before using it in your rolls.




Place nori sheet down on bamboo sheet, shiny side down. cover sheet with rice (about 1 cm thick), except leave about 2-3 cms clear at the end furthest from you (you will be rolling the sheet away from yourself)
Place a strip of filling in the center down the roll. For mine I used avocado, mayo and bbq tempeh, but you can use anything you want!
slowly start to wrap the sheet up, rolling away from yourself and tightly tucking it up.
Once you get to the empty part of the nori sheet, brush with water, and roll up. place in the fridge for cutting closer to serving time.



For pillows

Cut a nori sheet longways into cm thick pieces, you will use these to wrap up your pillows
Mould small amounts of rice into little ovals (about 3 tablespoons)
Place a topping on the ball of rice
Gently brush a nori sheet with water, and wrap around the pillow to secure your topping, making sure the nori sheet wraps around itself.


Serve with soy sauce and wasabi, or spring rolls.

Vegan MOFO: 'Cheese'burger

Most of us grew up as meat eaters - lets just face it. Most of us also enjoyed on occasion a cheeseburger from McDonalds. My partner, who is not a full time vegan was craving a cheeseburger, and asked if we could have them for dinner. So, I decided to try and make my own, every vegan likes some good junk food!

For the "meat" patty
1 tin of sanitarium nutmeat, minced
1 onion, finely diced
3/4 cup of cooked rice, white or brown (brown will be chewier)
1/2 cup of BBQ sauce or marinade of choice
3 tablespoons of massels supreme gravy powder (of beef style stock)
2 teaspoons of mixed herbs
3 heaped tablespoons of minced or chopped garlic
1 + cups of flour (for binding)

Mix all ingredients apart from flour together and let sit in the fridge for a few hours (if you can) this will let all the ingredients combine better for a good bbq style flavor.
Add flour and combine, if the mixture is not sticking to itself well, add a little more flour, or even breadcrumbs to bind.
Form 'meaty' mixture into patties which mimic a mcdonalds patty, small and thin (or don't... if you want them thicker)
You can cook these up now until browned and crisp over a medium heat pan, or leave them on a plate in the fridge to cook later on.
These patties are really excellent for BBQ's and picnics as a rissole, omnis and vegans alike love them!




For the 'cheeseburger' you will need

1 x premade recipe for cheddar cheese slices
bread rolls
tomato sauce
mustard
finely diced onion
patty recipe above.



To get the cheese all gooey and melting, throw it in a lightly greased pan on medium high heat for 1 minute, you will see the cheese starting to melt, but you should still be able to gently pull it off in one piece and place it onto a 'meat' patty.

Place patty and cheese into a burger bun, top with sauce, mustard and onion.

Eat straight away - the ultimate vegan junk food!

Vegan MOFO: cheddar 'cheese' slices

These.. are so simple to make, they require minimal effort and time to throw together. I made these solely for the purpose of a 'Cheese'burger, which is my next post!

You will need:

1 1/2 cups Water
2 tablespoons of tomato sauce
2 tablespoons of mustard
1/2 cup raw cashews
1/4 cup nutritional yeast
1 lemon, juiced
1 teaspoon of salt
2 Tablespoons of onion powder.
5 tablespoons of agar flakes.
**(if you want to change up the taste of the mixture before setting it, the below ingredients are completely optional and found in most 'cheeses' I however did not use them!)
1 tablespoon of tahini (optional**)
1/4 cup of miso paste (optional**)


Blend everything but the agar flakes in a food processor/blender until smooth. I was lazy and didn't blend mine for long enough which is why you can still see little lumps of cashew!
taste it at this point. If it's not to your liking - add some more of any of the above ingredients, if you want more colour, add more tomato sauce and mustard, or alternatively, food colouring.
place mixture over medium/high heat until at boiling point - mix this the entire time, you don't want it to burn or you will taste it later on.

Add the agar flakes, and mix into cheese until well incorporated, take off heat and immediately place into a well oiled container. I used a very square container to mimik the cheese slices you get at the supermarket - but any container is fine.
Place in the Fridge for a minimum of 2 hours to set.

Slice or grate.

Enjoy  :)

Vegan MOFO: cheatin' sausage rolls

Another quick and simple treat. I actually made these ones because I was craving something a little more on the unhealthy/indulgent side, but they would be absolutely PERFECT for kids parties, or even catering as finger food.

You will need:
Sanitarium vege sausages. I used the sage and rosemary ones, they come in a 6 pack
1 sheet of vegan puff pastry per two sausages.

Preheat oven to 200 C
Slice each sheet of puff pastry in half lengthwise, this should be long enough to wrap one sausage in.

Wrap each sausage tightly into the puff pastry. If you want them to be a smaller single serve, cut up accordingly.
Lightly baste pastry sausages with soy milk or egg replacer

Place on a greased baking tray and bake for 15-20 minutes or until golden brown.

Vegan MOFO: Berry Crush

Sorry I haven't blogged in a while, I've actually been super sick and hiding from the world with this horrible cough. I thought it would be suiting to blog about something that I was drinking while sick to help me feel better.

Here you have a super tasty berry smoothie! I like to freeze all my berries prior to using them in this drink
You will need:
3/4 cup of frozen raspberries
1/4 cup of frozen strawberries
3 generous scoops of your choice of berry sorbet
1/2 to one cup of your choice of juice, depending how runny you want it (I used blueberry, strawberry, apple, and carrot juice)

Blend together in a blender - done. So quick, easy and delicious!

Vegan MOFO - Day 9: Another 'chicken' salad.

SO, on gym days I usually prepare a salad for dinner - purely because I don't see the point in ruining the sweat and tears I produced just hours earlier on an oily meal.
Fake chicken and salad are one of my favourite combos, and the best part is you can use whatever is in the fridge, and whatever dressing you have on hand to change it up

Salad should feed 4 people comfortably

I used:
1 cup of 4 bean mix
1 cup of sweet corn kernels
a cup of cucumber, diced into bite sized chunks
1 cup of salad greens (I used chopped cabbage)
1/2 cup of shredded carrot
1/2 cup of shredded beetroot

1/2 cup of onion - red or spring onions chopped
1 cup of avocado, diced

fake chicken strips - cooked (i used about 1 cup)

Dressing of choice.


Throw in a large bowl. Top with dressing. DONE OMG!

Vegan MOFO - Day 8: Tempeh BBQ ribs/steak

Apart from marinading, this is actually quite a quick protein to cook. would go great served alongside some salad, or even sliced differently and cooked on skewers as a kebab. I'm not a huge fan of tempeh, but this did win me over. You could also use other marinades apart from BBQ.

You will need:
BBQ sauce, enough to cover tempeh (I used premade, but you can make your own)
a container which fits the tempeh in it snugly. (Too big and you're wasting BBQ sauce)
Tempeh.

Slice tempeh into slabs which are no more than 1cm fat. The thinner they are, the more marinated they will become. You can cut them into whatever shape you like after this, but I stuck with uniform pieces.
Place a small layer of BBQ sauce in the container, and then layer in your tempeh (BBQ sauce, tempeh, BBQ sauce, tempeh etc) until you are out of both.

Place in fridge to marinate overnight (the longer the better)

When ready to cook take out of container, and cook on hot grill until the bbq sauce starts to caramelize.

Serve

Vegan MOFO - Day 7: Spinach Cob Loaf Dip

This recipe is great for any kind of social gatherings, and can be made in advance and kept in the fridge. Although I would not place dip in the loaf until it is ready to be served.
This is exactly how I remember the non-vegan version tasting, only much better for you, and much better for the animals!

You will need
1 cob loaf

Spinach Dip:
1 cup of silken firm tofu
1/4 cup of vegan mayonnaise
1/4 cup of finely diced shallots
1 cup of frozen chopped spinach, thawed and squeezed of excess liquid
1 tablespoon of apple cider vinegar
1 teaspoon of salt
2-3 tablespoons of vegetable stock powder. (more if you think it needs it)

To make dip, place tofu, mayonnaise, vinegar, salt and vegetable stock powder in food processor, blend until smooth
add shallots and spinach and leave in fridge until ready.

Hollow out cob loaf into bite sized pieces and place in oven until slightly crisp
I also like to place the hollowed cob loaf in the oven for a few minutes to crisp up

Place dip inside hollow cob loaf and serve alongside bite size pieces of bread.
Enjoy

Vegan MOFO - Day 6: Bounty Chocolate Bar

The best part of this is you can tweak the recipe to however you want it, and know exactly what's going into your chocolate bar. Not very hard although the recipe makes it look difficult. You'll be making more chocolate bars in the future just because they're so simple but tasty :)


Coconut filling:
1 can(cup) coconut cream
2 1/2 cups of shredded coconut
3 tablespoons of vanilla essence
1/3 cup of vegan butter (I used nuttelex) or coconut oil
1/4 cup of raw sugar (or sweetner of choice, ie maple syrup or agave)
3 tablespoons of xantham gum (or cornflour, or thickening agent)

1 bar of dark cooking chocolate, for melting

melt butter or oil over medium-high heat in a pan until melted
add sugar and cook until melted into the mixture (a few minutes)
Add coconut cream and cook until boiling - at this point add in the vanilla essence and take off the heat.


add shredded coconut and xantham gum
At this point, the mix should be very thick, if it still seems rather gooey, add more shredded coconut.

firmly pack coconut mixture into a square or rectangle container and place in fridge for 3 hours to set
gently cut into the coconut mix and cut it into smaller rectangles. These will be your bars.
place in freezer to set completely for an hour or so.

take out of freezer after an hour or so, break out each piece of coconut bar, if it is too thick, cut in half again, they are very rich when coated in chocolate.  Place pre-cut bars back into the freezer while you melt your chocolate.


You can melt your chocolate a few ways, if you have a microwave, you can use that.
I placed a mixing bowl over a pan of boiling water and kept mixing my chunks of cooking chocolate until it was melted and no clumps remained.


Now - for the fun part, coating your bars in chocolate!

I found he easiest way to do this was skewering each bar with a toothpick - this gives you something to hold onto while you coat them evenly in chocolate, but you have to work quickly, as the coconut hits room temperature it will not be solid enough for the toothpick to hold it up.


I used a silicone spatula to dump melted chocolate onto each coconut bar, and then gently scraped the excess off back into the bowl, making sure each side is covered (you will get the hang of this quite quickly) and then placed each bar onto heavy duty aluminum foil (baking paper would work) to set.
you can put them in the fridge to speed this up.

And then, you're done.

Vegan MOFO - Day 5: Cashew Curry

So, this was surprisingly easy, and Mr Monster can't stop raving about it :)

You can really add whatever vegetables you want to it!

Cashew Curry sauce:

1/2 cup of raw cashews
1/2 cup of coconut cream
4 tablespoons of red curry paste
4 tablespoons of curry powder
1/2 cup of diced tomatoes
3 cloves of garlic
1/4 cup of water + 2 teaspoons of vegetable stock powder added.

Blend all ingredients until smooth in a food processor - yes, it's really that easy!

For the vegetables I used:
2 potatoes, cut into chunks
2 carrots, cut into chunks
1/2 cup of corn kernels
4 cups of loose spinach
1 large broccoli, cut into florets
1 cup of chickpeas (pre soaked or tinned)
1 large onion, diced
3 cloves of garlic, diced

1 tablespoon of red curry paste
1 tablespoon of curry powder

Gently par-boil carrot and potato until almost cooked (still firm) take off the heat and add broccoli for 5 minutes until also slightly cooked.
Place onion, garlic, and curry paste/powder into a frying pan with oil, cook until onion is translucent and curry is fragrant

add par-boiled vegetables, corn and chickpeas, stir well to combine.
Add sauce, and cook through for about 10-15 minutes.
Once sauce is heated through, add spinach and cook until wilted.

Serve with rice.

Vegan MOFO - Day 4: "Chicken" salad

This is really a quick throw together meal that I make for me and Mr. Monster when I'm too busy at the gym.

4 loose cups of fresh spinach, washed
1 packet of frys chicken strips
1/2 red onion, sliced
1/2 cup of cherry tomatoes, cut in half
1 large avocado, sliced
1/2 cup mushrooms, sliced
1 cup of shredded carrot and beetroot
1/4 cup of chargrilled capsicum, eggplant, or semi dried tomatoes (tinned/canned)

Dressing of your choice - in this case I used 99% fat free Praise mayo, but a spicy peri sauce would be nice too

throw everything but the dressing and "chicken" in a bowl and toss
fry chicken on medium heat until cooked
add chicken to salad, and top with dressing - voila.

I know - I'm lazy sometimes, but it was delish!

Vegan MOFO - Day 3: Samosas

This recipe is so easy to mix up. My advice is to change it up, try new things with it. You can always mix up the filling depending on what's in your fridge, and the pastry based on how much effort you want to put into making them.

Filling:
2 cups of mashed potato (sweet or normal or a mix of both is fine)
1 cups of varied vegetables (whatever you have in the fridge) I used, carrot, peas and corn
1 large onion, diced
2 cloves of garlic, diced
3 tablespoons of curry powder
4 tablespoons of oil

Place a pan over medium heat, add oil, onion, garlic, fry until the onion starts to go translucent and then add curry powder, cook until fragrant.
Add varied vegetables and cook for a minute, and then add mashed potato.
mix through and cook for another minute.
Set aside

Pastry:
1 cup plain flour
2 tsp salt
2 tb vegetable oil
1/3 - 1/2 cup warm water.

Preheat oven to 180C (or preheat oil if you want to deep fry them)
Mix flour and salt into a bowl. Make a well in the center, add the oil and enough water to make a firm dough. Knead the dough on a floured surface until smooth and roll into a ball. Cover in plastic wrap and set aside at room temperature for 30 minutes.
Divide the pastry into 12 equal pieces. Roll each piece into a ball and roll out into a circle of 15 cm. Divide this circle into two equal pieces with a knife.
Brush each edge with a little water and form a cone shape around your fingers, sealing the dampened edge.
Fill the cases with a tablespoon of filling and press the two dampened edges together to seal the top of the cone.

There are a few different ways to cook these. I baked mine, but you can also deep fry them!
If you are too lazy to make the pastry on your own (like I am at times) buy some vegan puff pastry and use that, it will work. I'm not 100% about whether the puff would go too well in the deep fry though.

Vegan MOFO - Day 2: Strawberry PopTarts

So, how I actually came about making these was interesting, and purely to prove someone wrong. Would I make them again? Yes, a million times, yes. But I would make a large quantity and freeze them. For a small amount of poptarts this really is an effort. But in the end, worth it.

So, I overheard a conversation between two colleagues at work, and overheard the word "poptart"
now, for anyone who had poptarts as a kid, they were a huge deal. They fit straight into your toaster and came out nice and warm. Most people remember burning the roof of their mouthes on the gooey, hot inside if they couldn't wait for it to cool down.

- Anyway, moving along. Due to the sugar quantity apparently Australia will not allow imports of the product anymore. My colleague was ranting about how he absolutely loved them and he didn't know what he was going to do (A bit of a crazy. He has a wall of poptart boxes on his work desk)
So I piped in to say, "Well... you could always make them at home?"
"...make poptarts? YOU CAN'T JUST MAKE A POP TART!"

That was it, I was sold. I got home and started on my vegan pop tart creation.

First, you have to make the jam - you can buy one if you really want, but making it fresh really made a HUGE difference, and requires minimal effort... plus I had a heap of strawberries in my fridge which I got cheap from the market.



Strawberry Jam:
2 cups of strawberries, diced
2 cups of sugar (brown or white, I used white)
and two small or one large lemon, juiced

Layer strawberries and sugar in a container until you are finished, then pour the juice over the top to cover
Leave OVERNIGHT - this will start preserving and breaking down the strawberries
After at least 24 hours, you can then place the mixture into a heavy bottomed pan (I used a non stick fry pan)
Place pan on medium - medium high heat and let the strawberries cook and the sugar melt.
Cook for about 15 - 20 minutes, using a spatula to mix frequently - you do not want this to burn!
You will know the jam is ready when... well, it looks like jam.

For this recipe the jam cannot be chunky, so I placed the hot jam mixture into my blender, and let sit and cool down for about 10 minutes, before blitzing it until smooth and no chunks remained.
It will then look something like this:

Pop tart pastry:
2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup vegan margarine
1.4 cup of vegan shortening (recipe will work without it)
1/4 cup ice cold water (make this 1/2 cup if omitting shortening)
2 Tbs sugar

Place flour, margarine, shortening and sugar into a food processor and blend until the mixture resembles a sand like mixture.

Place this into a mixing bowl and add cold water, knead until dough like.

To combine:
Preheat oven to 180C

Roll out pastry to about .5cm thick
Cut the pastry in rectangles which fit inside your toaster (check this, you will be disappointed if they don't fit!) You will need two rectangle pieces of pastry for each pop tart
place 1 tablespoon of jam mix into the center of half of the pastry rectangles, and gently smooth out over the surface of the pastry, making sure to leave at least 1 cm gap around the edges, preferably 2cms, wet this section with either a dash of soy milk, a wet no egg mixture, or plain water
Place second sheet on top, with a fork, gently push down the edges to make a pattern, making sure they are well stuck down or all your jam mixture will ooze out everywhere!

Place pop tarts on a greased tray and bake in oven for 15 - 20 minutes or until going golden brown.
Take out of oven and let cool. And dust with a tiny bit of icing sugar if you have it.

To heat back up for individual use - use your toaster!
Enjoy.

Oh, and I brought these in for my colleague who didn't think you could make pop tarts at home, let alone vegan ones. He was very surprised, and loved them. So there you go!

Vegan MOFO - Day 1 post.

So for my first post, I don't actually have a new recipe, but some pictures of the cupcakes I've been working on all day for a friends 21st party.

The base of the cupcake used this recipe which I posted a while back on my blog, with a simple buttercream frosting which I coloured.
I was super stoked with the outcome, I hope he was too!

peanut butter chocolate cookies

another simple cookie recipe, since my blog seems to be lacking!

You will need:

2 cups of plain flour
2 tsp of baking powder
1 cup of raw sugar
1/3 cup of soy milk
1/3 cup of nutellex
1 tsp of vanilla essence
3/4 cup of peanut butter (crunchy or smooth)

Preheat oven to 180C
Cream sugar, butter, peanut butter, soy milk and vanilla essence with a beater until well combined (about 3 minutes)
fold in flour and baking powder until just combined - do not overwork

Roll out dough into small balls and place onto a greased baking tray
with a fork gently push down and slightly flatten the dough balls.
cook in oven for 10-15 minutes or until slightly going golden, then remove from the oven and let sit for a few minutes before transferring to a cooling rack.
The cookies WILL still feel extremely soft when you take them out of the oven, but will harden as they cool down. Do not make the mistake of thinking they are not ready and putting them back in the oven.



optional chocolate topping
1/2 cup of tempered chocolate
hard plastic piping bag

when cookies have cooled pipe zig-zag pattern with tempered chocolate onto cookies and place in fridge to set.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

These were great, nice and chewy which is how I love my cookies!

You will need:

2 cups of plain flour
2 tsp of baking powder
1 cup of raw sugar
1/3 cup of soy milk
1/3 cup of melted nutellex
1 tsp of vanilla essence
1 cup of chocolate chips (I used sweet william choco chips)


Preheat oven to 180C
Combine all the dry ingredients well
Mix in chocolate chips
add wet ingredients to dry ingredients and mix until just combined

Roll out dough into small balls and place onto a greased baking tray
with a fork gently push down and slightly flatten the dough balls.
cook in oven for 10-15 minutes or until slightly going golden, then remove from the oven and let sit for a few minutes before transferring to a cooling rack.
The cookies WILL still feel extremely soft when you take them out of the oven, but will harden as they cool down. Do not make the mistake of thinking they are not ready and putting them back in the oven.

Enjoy

Sesame Herb crusted Eggplant

I've actually been craving these ever since I made them a few nights ago, it reminds me of fish, in the way that it was super amazing with lemon squeezed all over it, and had a nice crunchy coating on it.

You will need:
1 large eggplant, peeled
1 cup of breadcrumbs - either make your own or store bought (make sure they're vegan)
2 tablespoons of dried mixed herb
1 cup of corn flour (or regular flour)
1 cup of water with 3 tablespoons of cornflour added
1/4 cup of sesame seeds
salt for salting eggplant.
oil for frying


preheat your oven to 180C

Prepare your eggplant.

Cut into thick (2-3cm) slices (I cut them lengthwise to get a more 'fishy' shape) and scrape away excess seeds, place on a plate and cover with salt to draw away the bitterness, you will need to do each side with salt for about 15 minutes, you will notice a brownish liquid coming from the eggplant (this is good!) then rinse.

place breadcrumbs, sesame seeds and 1 tablespoon of herbs into a container which is wide enough to dunk the slices of eggplant
prepare a second container (same rules apply) with the water/cornflour mix + extra herbs
and a third bowl with the cornflour or plain flour.

while still wet, dunk eggplant slices into cornflour (ensure fully coated) and then quickly into the water/cornflour mixture (ensure fully coated), and then finally into the breadcrumb mixture.
Fry off in a pan over medium/high heat for about 7 minutes on each side or until starting to go golden brown.
finish off in the oven for about 15 minutes, let them go crispy on the outside.


Enjoy, these were great with some fresh lemon!

Snickers inspired cupcakes

The lovely picture is courtesy of Appetite Affliction
Recipe review on the website can be found here

I was craving a snickers bar yesterday... so I got to work on creating my own cupcake inspired by one.
These cupcakes are SUPER rich and full of flavour... if you get through more than one... you truly are amazing. The caramel in the center tops these for me. It's a delicious suprise!

Makes 12 cupcakes.

Peanut butter cupcake:

3/4 cup of Rice Milk
2 teaspoons of Apple Cider Vinegar
1/2 cup Chunky Peanut Butter
1/2 cup canola oil
2/3 cup raw sugar
2 tablespoons of agave syrup
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon of maple syrup
1 teaspoon of baking powder
1/2 teaspoon of baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons of no egg powder
1 cup of all purpose flour

-Preheat oven to 180 C, line muffin pan with liners, normally I would say lightly spray the inside of the liners with canola oil, but there is more than enough oil in the mixture!
-Mix rice milk with vinegar and set aside to curdle
-In a large bowl, cream together the peanut butter, oil, agave syrup, maple syrup, sugar, vanilla and egg replacer until well combined and creamy. Add rice milk mixture and mix until well combined.
-Sift flower, baking soda, baking powder and salt into wet ingredients and gently mix until just combined.
-Fill cupcake liners two thirds full and bake for 20 minutes or until toothpick inserted into center of cupcake comes out clean.
-Remove from oven and transfer to a cooling rack.

Caramel:
1 cup of raw sugar
1/4 cup of vegan butter
1 teaspoon of vanilla essence
1/2 - 3/4 cup of rice milk
(optional) 1 teaspoon of xantham gum

-Melt sugar in a pan over high heat, also heat rice milk in a seperate pan on high heat until bubbling.
-Once sugar is melted, add butter and vanilla and cook until desired colour (toffee like) Add milk and boil until all sugar is completely mixed.
-For a thicker mix, gently whisk xantham gum into caramel.


Chocolate topping
1/2 cup of icing sugar
1 tablespoon of cocoa powder
1 tablespoon of oil
1 teaspoon of warm water




Mix ingredients together until well combined.


Mousse mixture:
1 tub of kingland soy cream cheese - left out of the fridge to soften
5 heaped tablespoons of nutellex or your choice of vegan unsalted margarine
1 1/2 cups of icing sugar
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
3 heaped tablespoons of cocoa powder

-beat on high with electric beater for 5 minutes or until smooth and fluffy



Final step - assemble your cupcakes!
cut the center out of each cupcake and fill with caramel
pipe mousse into neat swirls over caramel filled hole to cover
Gently pipe chocolate and caramel in zig-zag pattern over mousse
Done! Top with chopped peanuts for a final touch.

chocolate cupcakes with chocolate mousse topping.

These were absolutely delicious if I don't say so myself, also got the seal of approval from omni partner and work colleagues.

Ingredients:
1 cup of soy milk
1 teaspoon of applecider vinegar
3/4 cup of raw sugar
1/3 cup of canola oil
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond/chocolate/vanilla/coconut extract
1 cup plain flour
1/3 cup of cocoa powder
3/4 teaspoon of baking soda
1/2 teaspoon of baking powder
1/4 teaspoon of salt

Method:

1 - preheat oven to 180C
2 - line muffin pain with cupcake liners (I also like to spray them with a little canola oil at this stage)
3- place soy milk and apple cider vinegar into a cup together and leave aside for 5-10 minutes to curdle
4 - place all dry ingredients into a bowl and mix until well combined
5 - add all wet ingredients and mix until blended - try not to overmix, the more you mix, the tougher the cupcakes will be! (at the same time make sure everything is well combined.)
6 - fill cupcake liners 3/4 of the way full with batter
7 - bake cupcakes for about 20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into cupcake comes out clean.

gently remove from muffin pan and place on a cooling rack to completely cool before topping.

Mousse mixture:
1 tub of kingland soy cream cheese - left out of the fridge to soften
5 heaped tablespoons of nutellex or your choice of vegan unsalted margarine
1 1/2 cups of icing sugar
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
3 heaped tablespoons of cocoa powder

beat on high with electric beater for 5 minutes or until smooth and fluffy - place in piping bag and swirl onto cooled cupcakes. Top with garnish if desired (strawberries pictured)

beat

Chocolate Self Saucing pudding

(It's a mess, I know. But it makes up for looks when you taste it!)

Pudding:
1 cup self raising flour
3/4 cup of raw sugar
1/4 teaspoon of salt
3 tablespoons of cocoa
1/2 cup of soy milk (I used soy milky)
2 tablespoons of melted vegan butter (nuttelex)


Method:
Preheat oven to 180 degrees
Mix dry ingredients together in a mixing bowl ( flour, salt, cocoa and sugar)
Stir in wet ingredients (melted butter and soy milk)
Spread the thick mixture into a greased baking dish - leave to side until covered in sauce.

Chocolate Sauce:
1 cup raw sugar
4 tablespoons cocoa
1 3/4 cups boiling water


Mix raw sugar, cocoa and sprinkle over cake mixture
Pour the boiling water over the pudding before going in the oven (GENTLY!!!!)
Bake in oven for approximately 30-40 minutes or until the top resembles a cake.

Serve with fruit, vegan custard, or in my case some coconut cream :)

Stack of pancakes with blueberry sauce

These are a great breakfast idea for any occasion, including mine which was just to satisfy pancake cravings. I'm only human!

Pancake batter:
1 cup of plain flour
1 tablespoon of baking powder
6 heaped tablespoons of raw sugar
1 cup of soy milk
1 tablespoon of vegetable oil
1 teaspoon of vanilla essence (optional)

Method:
mix together dry ingredients well in a bowl and make a well in the center
add wet ingredients and blend until combined with few to no bumps


Heat up a frying pan and add some vegan butter to minimize sticking to the pan

Add small amounts and cook no more than 3 at a time in the pan - set aside





Blueberry sauce:
1/2 cup of frozen blueberries
1 tablespoon of lemon juice
4 heaped tablespoons of raw sugar
3/4 cup of water (a little more if you'd prefer more sauce)
2 tablespoons of cornflour dissolved in 3 tablespoons of water.



Add water, sugar and frozen blueberries to a pot and bring to the boil, the water will discolour and match the berries, this is normal
Let boil for 5 minutes (blueberries must soften) and then add the cornflour and lemon juice, take off the heat and mix in, the sauce will thicken (add more water or cornflour depending on what consistency you would like the sauce)




Stack up your pancakes (or don't) and add your blueberry sauce. Enjoy :)

Hot Chocolate

Everyone enjoys a good hot chocolate in the colder months, but may find it hard to get one whilst out and about, and lets face it, real chocolate tastes that much better than the powdered stuff.

For 3 small mugs (150ml ish each - good luck trying to eat more!) - you will need:

3/4 - 1 cup of grated dark cooking chocolate, grated
4 tablespoons of raw sugar or sweetner quivalent (stevia for example) add more or less depending on your sweet tooth.
2+ cups of soy milk or vegan alternative (rice would go nicely, but I used Soy Milky Lite)

Place about half a cup of the milk in a pot over a high heat, once it starts warming up add half the chocolate and all of the sugar, mix until melted.
Add the rest of the chocolate, mix until melted and combine with the remaining milk.
At this point it's up to you, if you would prefer more milk and less of a chocolatey flavour, add more milk.

Done! Easy!

Place in mugs (make sure you serve it very hot!) and add toppings of your choice. In the picture I've just added some extra grated chocolate, but some whipped soy or coconut cream or vegan marshmallows would also go extremely well.

Mushroom stroganoff

so, this was surprisingly tasty, it's a mixture of mushrooms in a creamy sauce om nom nom


You will need:
1 cup of button mushrooms, cut into halves
1 cup of shitake mushrooms, cut into halves
1 cup of oyster mushrooms
2 large field mushrooms cut into large chunks
1/2 cup of soy creamy cooking milk (I used carnation for this, but coconut cream would also work well)
1/2 cup of vegetable stock
4 cloves of garlic, minced
1 teaspoon of soy sauce
3 tablespoons of red wine
1 brown onion, cut into a medium dice
3 tablespoons of flour (more if you want it thicker)
2 tablespoons of chopped parsley, more for garnish
4 generous tablespoons (heaped) of vegan butter - I used nuttelex
2 tablespoons of salt
3 tablespoons of pepper

Melt butter in a pan and add onion and garlic, fry until translucent but do not burn.
Add half of the mushrooms and all soy sauce, red wine and vegetable stock, salt,  pepper and cook for a further 5 minutes.
add 3/4 of the cooking milk and the parsley to the pan and simmer for another 5 minutes until you start seeing some colour in the sauce, I would add the remaining mushrooms at this point, you want a little variation in the texture of mushroom, but they will all cook.
whisk flour into remaining milk until there are no clumps and add this to the pan, the sauce should thicken, cook for a few more minutes. Taste and add more salt or pepper accordingly (at this point I usually add heaps more pepper!)

You are done, it's that easy! serve on pasta or rice, which ever you prefer

Straight edge, and proud.

So I feel like this is the best place to put this, as I personally see my veganism as much more than a diet it's a philosophy for living well. I also think that my straight edge stance reflects this.

Straight edge is the basic beliefs that drugs and alcohol are not needed and should be rejected. That one should live against the grain of popular society and live by rules and standards from themselves and not the ones dictated by society.

Much alike veganism, I am constantly finding people who seem to have a go when you mention the word 'straight edge' or when you say "No, I don't drink alcohol."
WHY, why do you feel the need to badger on about it? No, I don't smoke, drink or do drugs. I honestly never thought this could be considered a bad thing!
Yes, I eat sugar, if someone spiked my lemonade that doesn't count as an edge break, having to take medicine for surgery is not an edge break, having a red bull is not an edge break, having sex before marriage is not an edge break *insert obvious answer to stupid irrelevant question here*

This is more of a vent than a productive post, but at the end of the day. I guess this is my blog!

“When a slave was drunk, the slaveholder had no fear that he would plan an insurrection…. It was the sober, thinking slave who was dangerous, and needed the vigilance of his master to keep him a slave.” -Frederick Douglas

Banoffee pie

Crust:
You can either make a digestive biscuit crust or a plain one, this time around I opted for plain
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons white sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 tablespoons soy milk

Preheat oven to 180C
Mix dry ingredients together and then add wet ingredients quickly mix until dough - like
Roll out on a flat floured surface and then place into a 9inch pie tin.
Neaten edges and prick the bottom in at least 7 places with a fork on the bottom of the crust.
Bake for about 15 minutes until golden brown and set aside


Banana toffee mixture

2 bananas
100ml milk
4 tbsp caster sugar
3 tablespoons of agar agar powder (optional but preferred - toffee will hold better)

1. Blend the two bananas with the milk until well combined and smooth
2. In a pan over high heat melt the caster sugar. Don’t stir, just gently tilt as it melts to a dark caramel colour
3. Add the banana milk mixture to the toffee, stirring until the toffee melts back into the bananas
4. Add agar agar powder and cook for a further minute then take off heat
5. Pour into the pie case (immediately) and freeze for 20 minutes or refrigerate for a few hours.

Cream
300ml coconut cream fat (separated from rest of can) To do this refrigerate canned coconut cream overnight and scoop out (and use) the thick white fat from the top of the tin. You will probably need about 3 tins.
1 tbsp camp coffee (optional, vanilla essence will work fine)
3/4 cup of powdered sugar.


Beat coconut cream and sugar on high for about 7 minutes until well combined gently fold in vanilla essence or camp coffee.



To assemble rest of pie:
cut up another two bananas into generous slices and cover the banana toffee
place cream on top of this, no need to be neat

For a fancy extra you can either add some powdered instant coffee or coco powder on top of the cream or large chocolate shavings, Enjoy!

choc-mint cheesecake!

Sorry it's been so long since I posted! I was robbed just over a week ago now of all my technology, and I have only just replaced my laptop.
I come bearing choc-mint cheesecake goodness!!!

Yes, I realise that is not actually mint on the top of the cheesecake. But I figured for photo purposes there had to be some green in the picture!

You will need:

Crust:

20ish Digestive biscuits, crushed

1/2 cup dairy-free margarine, melted. I used nutellex.

3 tablespoons cocoa powder
4 tablespoons of raw sugar

Method:
Combine all of the above ingredients until mixed well
Tightly pack crumb mixture into either a spring form pan (just on the bottom) or in a tart casing
Place into fridge while you make the cheesecake mixture

Cheesecake:
1 tub of tofutti cream cheese
150g of firm tofu
5 heaped tablespoons of stevia sweetner powder (or sugar of choice)
3 heaped tablespoons of corn flour
1/3 cup of soy milk
1 tablespoon of canola oil

** for choc mint you can do a few things, you can use a few tablespoons of a mint liquor or mint extract (for these options you will also need to add about a tablespoon of cocoa to the mix) or get your hands on a few vegan chocolate mints and put these with the cheesecake mixture. Or you can forget the whole mint thing and go for a really chocolatey cheesecake!

Method:
Blend until smooth - it's that easy.

Place blended mixture onto biscuit base and bake in 180c oven for about 45 minutes or until the outside is cooked and the center is still a bit wobbly.

Place in fridge for about 4 hours before cutting and eating.


For the topping on mine I have also added some dark and white chocolate shavings.
To get the larger shavings you need to scrape a knive along a block of chocolate towards yourself.


Enjoy :)

Cookies n Cream Cupcakes

You will need:

1 cup soy milk
1 tsp. apple cider vinegar
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup canola oil
1 1/5 tsp. vanilla extract
1 cup plain flour
1/3 cup cocoa powder
3/4 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup oreos - chopped coarsely

Preheat oven to 180°C and line a muffin pan with paper liners. Whisk together the soy milk and vinegar in a large bowl, and set aside for a few minutes to curdle. Add the sugar, oil, vanilla extract, and other extract, if using, to the soy milk mixture and beat until foamy. In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Add in wet ingredients and beat until no large lumps remain (a few tiny lumps are OK). Mix in the sandwich cookies. Pour into liners, filling 3/4 of the way. Bake 18 to 20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Transfer to a cooling rack and let cool completely.

Vegan Fluffy Buttercream Frosting

1/2 - 3/4 cup of nonhydrogenated margarine (I used nutellex)
3 1/2 cups of icing sugar
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1/4 c. plain soy milk

Beat the shortening and margarine together until well-combined and fluffy. Add the sugar and beat for about 3 more minutes. Add the vanilla and the soy milk, and beat for another 5 to 7 minutes until light and fluffy. Just fold in chocolate sandwich cookie crumbs to make it match the cupcakes. If not fluffy enough, add more icing sugar and beat.

Smear or pipe onto cupcakes and then sprinkle with crumbled oreos.


ENJOY!

Gluten free Onion Rings

This one is nice and easy

You will need

2 Large white onions, cut into thick slices and pulled into individual rings
Orgran rice crumbs - a whole packet
2 cups of corn flour
1 cup of water
 Oil for deep frying

Heat oil on High until drops of water dropped into oil spit.

Place 3 bowls on your kitchen bench
In the first bowl place 1 cup of flour
In the second bowl place 1 cup of flour and 1 cup of water, this should look like a pancake mixture, if not, adjust amounts accordingly.
In the third bowl, place the rice crumbs.

Rinse the onion rings and then individually place each slice in the first bowl, the second bowl, and then into the third bowl, they should be very well covered in crumbs.
Place crumbed onion ring into the oil and cook for roughly 5-8 minutes or until browning.
Do this for every onion ring until cooked.


Enjoy.

Vegan macaroni cheese and garlic toasted turkish bread.

Macaroni

Sauce:
3 tablespoons of nutellex or vegan butter of choice
4 tablespoons of flour
3 tablespoons of tomato sauce
3 tablespoons of american mustard
2 tablespoons of lemon juice
5 tablespoons of nutritional yeast flakes
1 1/2 cups of soy milk

Melt nutellex over heat, add flour and whisk until completely blended in
add soy milk, tomato sauce, mustard, lemon juice and yeast flakes and whisk over heat until thickened.
If you would like this to be thicker add more flour, if you would like it thinner, add more soy milk - pretty easy concept.
Note: I like to add a few drops of yellow food colouring when feeding this sauce to omnis/children. It works as a placebo, the more yellow the sauce is, the more 'cheesy' it will taste.

Add this sauce to boiled macaroni elbows (shells are pictured, and I used 1 cup of pasta) and season with salt and pepper, if you would like to make this into a complete meal, like pictured, add 2 cups of chopped, steamed vegetables. This is a great way to get kids eating their vegetables! Pictured is steamed : Cauliflour, Peas, Corn, and Carrot, but you can add whatever is in the fridge.




Garlic toasted turkish bread:

2 turkish bread rolls, cut in half as you could cut a bun to add filling (I use the rather flat long ones, but anything goes)
2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped/minced
1/4 cup of olive/vegetable oil
2 tablespoons of finely diced parsley or other herbs
2 tablespoons of sesame seeds (optional)

Combine oil, garlic, sesame seeds and herbs in a cup
Spoon and spread mixture over turkish bread onto the exposed cut part of the bread bun

toast in a sandwich press on on the pan until golden brown and starting to show signs of slight burning on each side - serve immediately

Mothers Day Coconut Cream Crepe with Berry Sauce.

I hope you all spoilt your mothers on Mothers Day! This is what my mum got on her special day.

Recipe makes roughly 4 crepes

Crepe:
3/4 cup of flour
1/2 cup of soy milk
1/3 cup of nutellex or vegan butter, melted
additional water to thin mixture if needed

Method:
Mix ingredients together until smooth
Heat a frying pan and gently oil with some extra vegan butter.
Pour roughly 1/2 cup of the mixture into the pan and move pan around to cover batter mixture over a majority of the pan. Cook through and flip as you would a pancake - set crepes aside.

Berry Sauce:
1 cup of frozen(or fresh) mixed berrys
1/5 cup of water with 2 tablespoons of cornflour added
4 tablespoons of sugar

Method:
Place sugar and water(with cornflour) in a pot and gently boil until sugar is dissolved, add berrys and cook for 5-10 more minutes until sauce is berry coloured.

Coconut filling:
1 can of coconut cream, separated (place in fridge for a few hours and skim the white cream from the top half of the can, use this)
1 tablespoon of vanilla essence
1/2 cup of icing sugar or powdered sugar

Method:
Beat cold coconut cream with other ingredients until thickened. You can always add mixture to the freezer to harden, but keep in mind this will melt further if let to sit in the crepe on it's own.




Compile your crepes! Wrap coconut cream into crepe and top with berry sauce. I accompanied mine with an orange juice and a lovely Sweet Williams rice crackle chocolate bar!

Melting Mozzarella Cheese!

I did it! YAY!

You will need:

290G Silken tofu - drained
¼ cup of raw (roasted will work, but not preferable) UNSALTED cashews
¼ cup of water
1 tablespoon of Garlic powder
1 tablespoon of Nutritional yeast
½ tablespoon of American Mustard
½ tablespoon of Lemon juice – fresh or bottled
½ - 1 tablespoon of sea salt
3 Tablespoons of Agar-Agar Powder

Place cashews and water in blender/food processer and blend on high for 5 minutes until thickened cream consistency – Most recipes require you to soak overnight (for a cashew cream), but it works fine if you do it straight away
add all other ingredients minus the agar-agar powder and blend for a further 5 minutes until well combined, I would suggest scraping down the sides whilst this is blending to make sure everything is well combined.
Gently fold agar powder into the mixture and blend for a minute until mixed.

In the pot (before cooking), it should look similar to this

Place ‘cheese’ mixture into a pan on medium-high heat and gently fold until cooked through.
It is important that this step is done correctly; otherwise your cheese will not set properly.
The easiest way to tell that it is cooked properly is the mixture will be thickening (a lot)
Once this is happening immediately transfer into a mould (I just used a small take away container) – I would suggest having this ready before you start cooking cheese, it will start to set immediately once off the heat! – smooth down the top of the mixture evenly and place in the fridge to set for a few hours.

Vegetemite and grilled cheese on toast! 

The cheese is much alike the consistency of cheezly, which is quite soft. If you would prefer to grate a harder cheese, I would suggest throwing it in the freezer half an hour or so before you are going to grate it.

I will definitely play around with this recipe more to make a cheddar version. The reason this cheese melts is the agar. At room temperature your cheese block will be very 'gel-like' as agar is a seaweed gelatin, but melts at 85°C.
Bear in mind it will not melt like dairy cheese does, but it's a lot cheaper than buying vegan cheese at a specialty store, or great to make if you're unlucky enough to not live anywhere near a shop which sells it.

Don't be too alarmed by the price of agar agar powder, mine cost about $17.50 for 65 grams of it.
To put it in perspective...
1kg of vegan cheese can be anything over $30
2 batches of the above recipe makes roughly 1kg... and would only require 6 tablespoons of agar. You could make over 5 kilos with the powder = money saving!

Vegan Calzone

'Cheesy' seasoned tofu mixture toasted inside a tortilla

You will need

Jumbo tortillas - I used 3
150G of firm tofu - pressed
1/4 cup of SEMI-dried tomatoes - diced
1 cup of fresh spinach, chopped
2 medium mushrooms, cut into chunks
5 fresh basil leaves, diced finely
4 cloves of garlic, minced
3/4 cup of mozarella melting cheezly
4 tablespoons of nutritional yeast
2 tablespoons of massels chicken stock powder (or vegetable stock powder)
1/2 cup of diced onion
3 tablespoons of oil from semi dried tomato container
1 tablespoon of salt
1 tablespoon of pepper
3 tablespoons of corn flour
oil for frying

sweat onion and garlic in frying pan until translucent, add everything but cheezly, cornflour and tofu and cook for a few more minutes.
Crumble tofu into pan and add 3/4 of the cheezly, keeping the rest for the tortilla, add cornflour
Fry for a few more minutes until hot.
lay tortillas out on a flat base - gently sprinkle with remaining cheezly and add tofu mixture to half of the tortilla, fold over in half.
Cook calzone. I found the most efficient way of doing this was on a toaster grill, but you could also do it in a pan being very careful, or in the oven.

Cut calzone into slices for ease of eating.

Enjoy!

Eggplant Parmigiana

crumbed slices off eggplant topped with pasta sauce and cheezly

You will need:
1 eggplant, cut into 1.5cm thick slices
1 jar of pasta sauce. I used a mushroom and garlic sauce
a tablespoon of grated mozarella cheezly per eggplant slice
Cornflour  for dusting (about half a cup)
breadcrumbs for coating eggplant (about half a cup)
1/2 cup of water mixed with 3 tablespoons of cornflour,( and 2 tablespoons of massells chicken stock ***optional)
salt


prepare eggplant - coat eggplant in salt and let sit for about 15 minutes per side, this will draw out the bitterness from it. Once this is done thoroughly wash salt off eggplant with some fresh water.

get 3 bowls ready
1: cornflour - to coat the eggplant
2: water/cornflour/stock combo which is your 'eggy' mixture
3: breadcrumbs.

Take each eggplant slice and coat first with cornflour, then with egg mixture, and then with breadcrumbs

Shallow fry each slice in a pan for 5 minutes on each side (or until browning) and then bake in oven on 190C for 15 minutes, flip eggplant and cook on other side for another 15 minutes.

Top with pasta sauce and cheezly and cook in oven for a further 10 minutes


Enjoy.