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!