Recipe Round-Up: Bold Flavored Vegan Cooking

It's been a while, but time to get back to rounding up recipes, and finishing off Bold Flavored Vegan Cooking. You can see my other posts about this book here. As I write this I have an awful head cold, and am home awaiting results of a COVID test. It won't be COVID, we haven't had community transmission here for almost two months, but it still is yucky. Blerh. But now, food.

Hash and Spice: This is a mix of wonderfully seasoned roast potatoes topped with sauteed vegetables (I used a mix of celery, carrot, and zucchini instead of capsicum and peppers, as well as the called for onion and mushrooms) and beans, I left the chili powder out of the vegetables as well. I topped it off with some avocado as well. This is delicious! I got three serves out of it, rather than four. Definitely no not skip the Hash Spice for serving. It is a blend of almonds and spices, leave out the chili powder to make it mild.
Rating: :D



Harissa Sprouts and Chickpeas: I scaled down the heat on this big time by leaving out the Harissa Paste all together and just using the teeniest sprinkle of Harissa spice mix (store bought, though there is a recipe for making your own in the book). This is done entirely on the stove-top, sauteed in the Brussels sprouts and chickpeas in a lovely sauce thatis both a little bit sweet and a little bit tangy.
Rating: :)



Red Curry Scramble with Lime-y Broccoli: I think this was the first thing I made during testing for this book. There is a recipe for Red Curry Paste in the book, or you can use a store-bought one like I did. Of course I decreased the amount of curry paste I used as well. The scramble also has nutritional yeast in it, and that gives a really good flavour with the red curry. The lime broccoli makes a nice side to go with it. Lots of flavours.
Rating: :)



Harissa Citrus Veggies: I halved the amount of Harissa spice mix in this, but still found it a touch spicy, so I would suggest just a sprinkle if I was making it again. The Harissa is also in both the roasted potatoes and the sauteed vegie mix, so I'd probably skip it on the potatoes as well. The sauteed veggies are a mix of zucchini, onion, and I used carrot and celery instead of capiscum and jalapenos. They also have black eyed peas in the saute, and use the citrus sauce recipe from the book to give a citrus kick
Rating: :)



Mango Papaya Smoothie Bowl: Moving into the sweet section of the cookbook now, and boy does my sore throat crave this sweet and ice smoothie bowl right now. I used frozen mango and frozen banana to make sure it was nice and thick, and just cold papaya that had been in the fridge. I used a mix of light coconut milk and plain soy Greek yoghurt instead of 1/2 cup of coconut cream. The bowl is topped with a lovely lemon, ginger, and turmeric syrup that is not too sweet, just nice and tangy. The fun part about smoothie bowls is you can put whatever you want on them to make them pretty, so for this one I used cocoa nibs, slivered almonds, and some fancy Maple Rose Cinnamon coconut flakes that I had bought on super sale. This said it was two serves, but I ate it all as one.
Rating: :)



Miso Sweet Cookies: These cookies are SO GOOD! The use white miso and orange juice/zest for a really unique flavour. I found that the orange flavour was stronger on the first day, but on the second the miso really shines through. They are an oat-based cookie, with rolled oats, nuts, and shredded coconut in them. Definitely something to make immediately.
Rating: :D



Pomegranate Sumac Berries: This is another great dessert. Strawberries are roasted with pomegranate molasses and sumac, and then served over ice cream with fresh berries and pomegranate arils. The recipe called for fresh raspberries, but at the time they were super expensive so I used fresh blueberries instead.
Rating: :D



Pomegranate Strawberry Granita: This gives an intense flavour! All the recipes in the book that call for pomegranate molasses have the option to make some from another recipe in the book, which I highly recommend as it blows the store bought ones out of the water. This refreshing granita doesn't need any sort of fancy ice cream maker, but does require some time as you need to stir it every hour for four hours once it is in the freezer. But while it takes time, it is not labour intesive.
Rating: :)



Marmite Peanut Butter Halva: Of course the only mite I will use is Vegemite, so that is what I used here. This is SO GOOD! The bonus of the Vegemite is that it is not too sweet, and the flavour gets stronger over time. The recipe calls for a candy thermometer, but mine didn't really seem to work so I just had to eyeball it to guess when it was done. The recipe calls for coconut cream, but I used light coconut milk and it was fine. I spread it a bit thin by accident, but a little goes a long way so that is fine.
Rating: :D



Cute Kitty Photo of the Post



What's that you say? You want more kitten content? Happy to oblige. Amazingly, in the space of three days we rehomed six kittens!! So now we just have... seven to go. Hah. Though five of those are too small to be ready yet, but hopefully we will have all of them rehomed as soon as they are able to.

Recipe Round-Up: Bold Flavoured Vegan Cooking

I thought I was keeping on top of my comment approvals, but I just found a few that had slipped through the cracks from the last couple of months. I will have to change the way I check on them to make sure I don't miss any more!

Back to another round of Bold Flavoured Vegan Cooking by Celine Steen, a book that I recipe tested for. You can see previous posts about this book here.

Quick and Easy Pad Thai: This is indeed pretty fast to make. The recipe calls for tempeh, but as I live with a couple of tempeh haters (alas!) I used tofu instead. The sauce comes togethr quickly, and has a nice tang from a combination of lime and tamarind. I'd add a bunch of extra green veggies to it next time because you know how I love the veggies. It is also topped with some Serundeng, a delicious spiced mix of pan-toasted coconut, peanuts, and shallots.
Rating: Pad Thai: :), Serundeng :D



Orange Marmite Noodle Bowl: Yes, marmite! Or in my case, Vegemite. The best of the mites! The thing about Vegemite is that it is a lot stronger than other mites, hence why it is the best mite. Bianca will back me up on this. As well as the sauce and the noodles, this bowl also has tofy, cabbage, and carrot in it. The sauce is a mix of OJ and Vegemite, along with other things. I blitzed the sauce together because Vegemite is quite thick and won't stir into things withouth blitzing or melting. I used the upper ampount of Vegemite, 2 TBS, as I love me some Vegemite. However although the sauce smelled strongly of Vegemite, the orange juice was the stronger flavour.
Rating: :)



'Crispy Thin Savoury Pancakes' with Mushroom Filling: I have a terrible track record with making this sort of pancake, they always fall apart. And this time was no different. So behold my pancake mushroom bowl! All the flavours, but none of the presentation. Despite my troubles, this was still a really nice and filling dinner. I noticed that Celine has changed the pancake recipe substantially between the tester recipe that I used here and the one in the book, so I hope to try again one day and perhaps have better success! But if all fails, just put it in a bowl.
Rating: :)



Soy Pomegranate-Glazed Eggplants with Dukkah: This recipe was supposed to be made with cute baby eggplants cut into slices, but I could not find anything but big eggplants, so they had to do. This was a lovely sweet, tangy, earthy and crunchy dish. I served it along side some rice, steamed broccoli, and za'atar spiced chickpeas.
Rating: :)



Roasted Fingerling Potatoes with White Barbecue Sauce: Yay for potatoes! I left out the capsicum and chile, and just stuck with the potatoes and the red onion for this dish. Also I used regular new potatoes. They are all very nicely roasted, tossed with a lovely savoury dark sauce. The white BBQ sauce is mayo-based, and is very tangy. I don't know that I would think of BBQ sauce flavours when I was eating it, but it is nice in its own way.
Rating: :)



Sweet Potato Fries with Sriracha Ketchup: No matter what I do with sweet potato fries, I just struggle so hard to get them to go crispy. I hear this is common. While these didn't go crispy, they were still very tasty. They are dusted with a porcini salt, which gives a great flavour. The ketchup is a mix of, you guessed it, sriracha and ketchup, but also has other yummy things in it like miso and lime juice. I scaled back on the amount of sriracha called for from 1-2 TBS to just a scant tsp.
Rating: :)



Red Chana Dal Mujaddara: I love mujaddara, a simple but wonderful mix of rice and lentils topped with fried onions. This is a fancy version with added flavours. The red comes from red onion and sun-dried tomatoes, and it was also meant to have red capsicum but I used carrot instead. I couldn't get the right sort of chana dal, so I used yellow split peas instead. In this one, the chana dal and the rice are cooked separately ahead of time, so you just add everything together in the end. It has a lovely flavour. The recipe has an option drizzle of pomegranate molasses to serve, but I found I preferred it without.
Rating: :)



Red Curry Veggies: For this recipe you can either make your own red curry paste or use a bought one. I went for a bought one, and I used less than the recipe called for. I also used light coconut milk and water as a blend for the coconut milk. This has green beans, red onion, eggplant, and carrot (used instead of eggplant), but would be great with some tofu added as well. I got 2-3 serves out of this, served over jasmine rice.
Rating: :)



Very Tahini Teffballs and Dressing: This is one of the recipes I have made since testing, as life gifted me some super onsale teff grain that I could't resist, but also needed to use up. I did change a few things in the balls themselves, leaving out the jalapeno and capsicum, and using parsley instead of coriander because that was what I had. They were very tasty little balls. Topped with a tahini dressing. The dressing calls for coconut cream and I used oat milk with some extra tahini, though it was still quite thin, which I accept as a result of my subs. It still tasted great.
Rating: :)



Cute Kitty Photo of the Post



Dim Sim. If you follow me on IG, you'll be up to date. But for those who don't, here's the story. I noticed that she had been peeing an extra time a day compared to normal, so I felt her bladder after she had peed to see if it was completely empty as she has issues with urinary retention. It was empty, but it felt bumpy. Since my last post, we have done an ultrasound that comfirmed my fear that she has a bladder mass. Masses, to be precise. Initial testing did not give any answers, so the plan is the do a needle aspirate of them while she is sedated to hopefully get a diagnosis. I am coping while waiting by distracting myself with things (like blogging), and keeping myself feeling emotionally dead inside. The important thing is that she in herself is not unwell right now. She is her normal happy little self. I love her so much.

Recipe Round-Up: Bold Flavoured Vegan Cooking

A new contender enters the ring! I haven't done a recipe round-up for Bold Flavoured Vegan Cooking (by Celine Steen) yet, but I have posted about one of the recipes before here. I'm going to have a few posts for stuff I have made so far from this book. I was a recipe tester for it, so I have made a bunch of things! The bold flavours loosely are Savoury, Spicy, and Sweet. 'But Susan!' I hear you say, 'Spicy?' Yes, spicy. So when I tested for this book it was at a time when I hadn't completely lost my tolerance for spicy, but I still needed to make things very mild. Celine was super cook about me reducing the heat (and leaving out capsicum and coconut oil) during my testing, I was her spicy wimp tester. Let's get into it, shall we?

Chickpea-Nut Croquettes with Asian-Style Peanut Salad: What a lovely and refreshing combination these two recipes make! The croquettes are amazing, packed full of chickpeas, peanut butter, carrots, panki, coriander, and more. I loved them. The salad is a blend of carrot and cucumbers, sliced into ribbons, in a dressing that makes it almost a quick pickled salad. I decreased the amount of sambal oelek in both of them.
Rating: Croquettes :D, Salad :)



Pulled Jackfruit Rolls: What a stellar recipe, and it included my piece de resistance - making a super mild gochujang. I am a master spicy wimp! The book also has a basics chapter, which are not your usual basics, and a lot of the recipes use components from there. This sandwich is amazing! But it does take a while, as the jackfruit and slow simmers in a delicious sauce for an hour. The sauce includes the gochujang. It also calls for Lapsan Souchong tea, but I couldn't find any so there is a sub provided for liquid smoke instead. The sandwich is assembled with mayo, grated carrot (which I used in place of red cabbage), cucumber, and the most amazing pickles. The Asian Pear Pickles are just so delicious and delightful and an absolute MUST!
Rating: Sandwich :D, Pickles :D



Matcha Tempeh and Pickled Veggies Sandwiches: I didn't make this recipe exactly as it was meant to be made, as I had made the matcha tempeh for another recipe and was using some of it up here. But the matcha tempeh is really the star of this show, and I highly recommend it! The rest of the sandwich has some wasabi mayo and quick pickled veggies. The pickled veggies are where I had to improvise with what I had on hand, so I used the carrot but I used cucumber instead of bok choy and I left out the radishes and scallions. Regardless, it makes for a lovely sandwich combination.
Rating: :)



Caramelised Jackfruit Tacos: Confession, I made these corn tortillas. Can you tell? Ha! I really don't like store-bought corn tortillas, so most of the time I just sub them for wheat ones. But occassionally I will make my own (using the recipe from The Taco Cleanse). But that is neither here nor there for this recipe. This is another great flavour combination. The jackfruit is tossed with a glaze and baked, which is really nice and not something I had done with jackfruit before. The tacos also have some lime-y broccoli, coriander, and pickles on them. The book calls for the Peppers in a Pickle recipe, I used the liquid part of that but pickled carrots and cucumbers instead.
Rating: :)



Smoky Kale and Chickpeas with Miso Peanut Drizzle: This is super fast to make, with the chickpeas and kale just needing a quick sautee. They are really just a vehicle for the sauce. It calls it 'drizzle', but you will want to drown everything in this amazing delicious sauce. I served this with some roasted sweet potatoes as well.
Rating: :D



Kinoko Gohan: This is Celine's spin on a classic Japanese dish of 'mushroom rice'. Rice is cooked in a mushroom dashi broth, and then mixed through with sauteed mushrooms. The cookbook version has the addition of kim chi, which the tester version did not, but I would just be leaving that out regardless. Topped with some grated carrot, sauteed enoki mushrooms, and served over baby spinach with some baked tofu on the side.
Rating: :)



Chazuke (Matcha Soaked Rice): This has a double hit of matcha, with a matcha-infused broth as well as matcha tempeh, however it is never overpowering. It just adds a subtle but lovely flavour to the dish. This recipe is also topped with Japanese Carrot Pickles, which are very easy to make.
Rating: Chazuke :), Carrot Pickles :)



Tamarind Miso Soup: A fun combination of two flavours I really enjoy. This is a light soup, with bok choy and carrots in a broth made of all sorts of fun things. Including some hefty doses of miso and tamarind for a really rice and tangy flavour.
Rating: :)



Cute Kitty Photo of the Post



I will never get tired of watching my sleepy bub nap next to me on her cushion/pinkie/blankie pile on the sofa.

VeganMoFo 2017 #15: Five Spice

15th: Spicy! – Talk us through your spice rack or cook with your favourite spice.

For MoFo 2015, I talked about how much I loved cinnamon, and it is indeed my favourite spice. But I've already posted about that, so for this year I thought I might talk about my favourite spice blend, which is Chinese Five Spice. It includes cinnamon! There are different variations on this blend, and recipes for making your own, but I normally use a store bought one that has cinnamon, star anise, cloves, fennel and pepper. It is very good!

To celebrate five spice, here are a few dishes I made from different cookbooks that feature it.

Five Spice Teriyaki Bowl from Bold Flavored Vegan Cooking by Celine Steen. I was lucky enough to test for this cookbook, and this was one of my favourite recipes. Celine has a super quick teriyaki sauce recipe in the book, which forms the base of the sauce. She also has a five spice blend recipe, but I used my pre-made one. The recipe calls for 1 1/2 to 2 teaspoons, I used the full amount being a five spice lover, and I could have maybe added a touch more. I served mine over rice rather than noodles, and I left out the capsicum and added a bit of celery for crunch.
Rating: :D



Flying Massaman Curry from Vegan Eats World by Terry Hope Romero. This curry uses a combination of garam masala and five spice to make a quick curry paste with shallots and garlic. Mixed with peanut butter and coconut milk, it was a quick and easy way to get a really nice flavour. The curry also has tofu (I used the savoury baked tofu recipe from the book), potatoes, broccoli and cherry tomatoes. The curry paste was meant to have chile and cayenne added, but I left them out for a nice mild result. I did have to add a bit of water to the curry paste to get it to blend easily, but it didn't seem to dilute the flavour.
Rating: :)



Vanessa Kabocha Salad from Salad Samurai by Terry Hope Romero. Another coconut, peanut and five spice creation, the sauce for this salad is absolutely delicious. The salad itself is a mix of steamed kabocha, edamame and green beans. It is meant to be served over red cabbage, but I served mine over a mix of cabbage and baby spinach as too much raw cabbage is not good for my stomach. I think this would benefit from roasting the pumpkin, rather than steaming, and you could easily use butternut instead. The recipe calls for steaming the pumpkin, then adding the edamame and beans on top to finish steaming, but then to remove the beans and edamame from the pot at the end of cooking to blanch. Removing them from the pot with the pumpkin was quite time consuming!
Rating: :) (but sauce alone is :D)



I had hoped to make some five spiced cookies (Wholegrain Vegan Baking, also be Celine, has a couple of recipes with five spice in the mix), but I ran out of time. But definitely keen to make them in the future. Five spice scented ginger cookies? Yes. Peanut Butter Five Spice Sriracha cookies? Yes. One day in my future!

Cute Kitty Photo of the Post - Month of Sahara



Speaking of cinnamon, my favourite cinnamon of all was of course Sahara. Her colour is called cinnamon here in Australia (in the US they just call it red). Her fur perfectly matched the colour of my hair! You always had to be careful about any flowers or plants that Sahara could get access to, because as you can see she loved to sniff them. I love this photo of her.