Mabon and Samhain 2021

Two more Sabbats have passed this year. For us in the southern hemisphere it was Mabon and Samhain.

Mabon aka Autumn Equinox (19th March, 2021)

Autumn Equinox is often still very warm here. Brisbane's seasons tend to run towards the majority of the year being some sort of summer. For previous Mabon's I have made salads, but it was a bit cooler this year!

Cranberry Chili from 500 Vegan Recipes by Celine Steen and Joni Marie Newman: I have loads of frozen cranberries that I have hoarded in my freezer. They are rarely if ever available here and when they are I tend to buy loads and then am reluctant to use them so I can 'save them'. A fine thought, except for freezer burn. So time to get using them. This is an unsual chili that is a mix of frozen cranberries and kidney beans. This recipe called for a tiny bit of tequila, which I didnpt have so a web site suggested a mix of lime and water as a potential sub. I would not use lime again, as my cranberries were very tart. Next time I'd just leave out the sub all together and add a smidge extra agave. Because I am me, I of course did notuse actual chili powder in my chili, using paprika instead. I had to rapid simmer it at the end for about five minutes to get it to thicken up enough. I served it that night with spinach and roasted sweet potato, which was a nice side. I had some leftovers which I reheated with some corn (for sweetness), celery and spinach and served over a baked potato.
Rating: :)





Pumpkin Spice Bread from Forks Over Knives The Cookbook (recipe by Isa Chandra Moskowitz): This recipe is full of autumn flavours, with pumpkin, apple butter (I'll be doing a future post about this), and lots of spices. You can only get tinned pumpkin puree here from online, so I used homemade butternut puree (which I prefer anyway). This recipe has the option of adding raisins and walnuts, but I left them out. The bread itself was a touch gummy, but it was really nice and smelled amazing. I ate this a number of ways. On it's own, smeared with apple butter, or one day with some leftover ice cream and blueberry sauce.
Rating: :)





Samhain (April 30th - May 1st, 2021)

Samhain is on the 31st of October in the northern hemisphere, which is the same time as Halloween. Here it is at the end of April, so I don't really go for Halloween-type food. Samhain is traditionally considered the time when the veil between the worlds is thinnest, and is the new year on the wheel of the year. It is a time for honouring those that have passed. I ate my dinner in silence, and lit a candle for everyone who has passed... which this year included my sweet Dim Sim, as well as so many others.

Autumn Stroganoff from Cafe Flora Cookbook: This is a wonderful stew that has roasted pumpkin (it called for delicata which I cannot get, so I used butternut) and roasted mushrooms (I had a mix of cremini and portobello), with caramelised onions. You start by making a mushroom essence, a slow simmered mushroom stock, which is further reduced by simmering in this recipe. This recipe is not written vegan, but is super easy to make vegan by using vegan butter for the butter (I used Nuttelex) and I used Kingland Natural Soy Yoghurt in place of the creme fraiche. It is served over noodles, and I used the Nature's Kitchen fresh spinach fettucine from Coles. Served over some baby spinach, I got three very satisfying serves.
Rating: :D



Chocolate Pumpkin Loaf from Forks Over Knives The Cookbook (recipe by Isa Chandra Moskowitz): I had some leftover butternut puree in my freezer, so decided to dip back into FOK for another yummy load. This time it is butternut and chocolate (cocoa in the dry mix and chocolate chips folded through the batter), full of spices. I also added some plump apple-juice sweetened semi-dried cranberries. I needed to bake this for an extra 15 minutes to cook it through.
Rating: :)

Granola Round-Up

How about another crunchy granola round-up. It's been a while since I've made any, I've been leaning towards the much easier option of buying some, but here are some really fun flavours I made last year. Pretty much all of these were served over some sort of soy, almond, or cashew yoghurt and sometimes I added fresh fruit if I had some around.

Pecan-Sweet Potato Granola from Sweet Potato Soul by Jenne Claiborne: This granola is delicious! Though the sweet potato flavour in it, coming from grated sweet potato, is fairly subtle. It has both brown sugar and maple syrup in it, putting it on the sweeter side of granolas, but it has a bunch of cinnamon to make it warming and welcoming. I found out as I was making it that I didn't have quite enough pecans for the recipe, so I topped it up with some pepitas.
Rating: :D



Homemade Granola from Chloe's Vegan Desserts by Chloe Coscarelli: This is in the dessert for breakfast chapter, but even with a hefty amount of maple syrup is more a traditional granola rather than anything particularly desserty. I have seen recipes for ones with chocolate chips and marshmallows in other places! But this recipe is super easy, can be scaled up or down, and tastes great. As well as oats it has almonds cinnamon. It called for raisins as the fruit, but I don't love raisins so I used a mix of sultanans and cranberries instead.
Rating: :)



Stove Top Granola from Forks Over Knives The Cookbook by Del Sroufe: I hadn't made granola not in the oven before. This method was easy, however it didn't crisp up the way it does in the oven and while it was yummy, it was also very sticky! It uses date molasses as the sweetener and binder here, which was lovely and not too sweet. Surprising, given how sweet dates themselves are! I used a blend of mixed fruit (like for Christmas cakes) and cranberries. I made 1/3 of a recipe for 3 serves.
Rating: :)



Chai-Spiced Almond Granola from The Easy Vegan Cookbook by Kathy Hester: This granola uses a lovely mix of spices to give it a warming glow. It uses a combination of flax-seed mixed with water and oil to bind it together. They call for coconut oil, gross, I used canola oil instead. The mix of the spices and crunchy almonds makes it a lovely way to start the day.
Rating: :)



Sesame-Apricot Granola from Vegan Bowl Attack by Jackie Sobon: I just realised this is a recipe from a bowl cookbook but it is the only one I photographed not in a bowl! Ha. This is a really nice combination, with a mix of oats, buckwheat, coconut flakes, almonds, apricots, and seeds (including sesame seeds and chia seeds... I could do without the latter in there, they were weird). All coated in a tahini mixture. I had to add a smidge of hot water to my tahini mix to get it thin enough to be able to stir through and coat everything. I also had to bake it for slightly longer in my oven. It came out in wonderful crunchy crumbles! I made a whole recipe, which said it served 6 but really makes 3 generous serves.
Rating: :)



Homemade Hippie Cereal from Minimalist Baker's Everyday Cooking by Dana Shultz: This is a combination of granola mixed with puffed rice cereal. The granola part is gluten free, so no oats. It is all based on a mix of nuts (I used almonds and pecans) and seeds... including chia seeds again. I just really only like them under specific circumstances. I also added some raw sunflower seeds to the first baking stage, rather than adding rosated ones later on. It also has dried blueberries, and I added extra cinnamon as well. Confession time: I forgot to set a timer for this after I put it in my oven, so it baked for however long it took for the lovely smell to remind me that I had something in there! But it all worked out well. Once cooled, you mix it with the rice cereal. It is pretty fun to eat!
Rating: :)



Crunchy Citrus Toasted Granola from Cooking With Kindness (Edgar's Mission): A bright and tangy take on granola, using orange, lemon, and lime zest in mix. I made a half recipe for this, and used a blend of rolled oats and rolled rye. It also has coconut flakes, almonds, pumpkin seeds, sesame seeds, dried dates, and dried apricots. I left out a the linseeds (aka flaxseeds) and the dried figs (I don't like figs), and I used canola oil instead of coconut. Served with some orange segments, it was a refreshing start to the day.
Rating: :)

Recipe Round-Up: Forks Over Knives The Cookbook

The Forks Over Knives Cookbook is a solid book, that I frequently turn to. I have made a lot of things from it! It may not be as flashy as some other cookbooks, but it consistently provides tasty food that is a bit on the healthier side. You can see other things that I have made here.

Mean Green Smoothie: This is a simple smoothie with non-dairy milk, greens, berries, banana and dates. The recipe calls for kale as the green, but I used mostly spinach and a bit of kale. The recipe called for 1/2 cup of dates, but I only used three and it was still far too sweet like that. For the most part I use dates very sparingly. I used frozen strawberries for the berries, and I used frozen banana as well to make sure it was thick and cold.
Rating: :)



Banana Cranberry Smoothie: This was so good! It is so pretty, and has an amazing tart and sweet flavour. If only frozen cranberries were not almost always impossible to find here, I would make this a lot! The recipe again calls for 1/2 cup of dates, and this time I used 5 small dates. But because the cranberries are so tart, this was a perfect balance for me.
Rating; :D



Basic Oatmeal: This is the simplest of recipes - oats, milk/water, a bit of toast. I used oat milk, because I like it creamy. I made a half recipe of this (the whole says it will serve 2), and it was an OK single serving. But I also added a bit scoop of peanut butter that I put at the bottom of my bowl to melt and stir through, and I also sprinkled on some cinnamon. This really is just a blueprint recipe, you can add anything you want!
Rating: :)



Savoury Squash Soup: You may recall from some of my recent market posts that there were a couple of times that I had given myself some painful mouth burns the day before, and this was one of the culprits. Unfortunately, for the pain it caused, the taste wasn't really work it. It was a bit thin and bland. I would definitely recommend using stock instead of water to cook it in. I must take a little bit of blame though, as I ended up with slightly more butternut and slightly less potato than the recipe called for, though it all balanced out. But perhaps the higher potato content would have made it creamier. It says to garnish with parsley, but I only had coriander so that is what I used. It had lime juice in it, so the coriander worked well.
Rating: :|



Eggplant Dengaku Stir-Fry: I love dengaku eggplant. This was a tasty stir-fry, though the flavour wasn't quite as strong as you would find with a traditional dengaku. You make a batch of the easy miso sauce, and then add it to some stir-fried eggplant. Technically also capsicum, but I used celery instead or some crunch. I also garnished with some sesame seeds rather than green onions. The miso sauce is a mix of kombu stock, miso, mirin and sake. Using the amount of eggplant specified, I got three serves with some rice and spinach.
Rating: Stir-Fry :), Miso Sauce :)



Vegetable Lo Mein: This is a quick and easy stir-fry, with onion, carrots, and snow peas. Also capsicum and mung bean sprouts, but I used celery and bamboo shoots instead. The sauce is a mix of soy and brown rice syrup, but needs to be doubled or even maybe tripled, by the time you add the noodles there is not enough to go around.
Rating: :)



Singapore Noodles: I love Singapore noodles, as long as they are not too hot from too much curry powder. Making them at home means I get to control this, and use mild curry powder. As well as noodles, there are a range of vegetables like onion, carrots, mushroom, and capsicum. I just left out the capsicum and didn't replace it with anything.
Rating: :)



Five-Spice Noodles: Five spice is one of my favourite spices blends! This recipe uses the Chinese Brown Sauce as a base, and calls for just half a cup. I used the entire batch (so just over 3/4 cup), and increased the five-spice powder accordingly. I also added some Japanese flavoured tofu cubes to bulk it up. It did get a bit dry during the cooking of the vegetables, so I added a few splashes of water to keep things moving in the pan. This recipe gave me three good serves, using 200g of brown rice vermicelli. My dad really liked this as well.
Rating: :)



Stir-Fried Vegetables with Miso and Sake: Another quick and easy recipe. No need to make one of the sauces from the book first, this recipe makes its own very easy sauce. It has lots of vegetables (I left out the capsicum), and made a great meal served with some brown rice and some... sort of marinated tempeh. I honestly have no idea what exactly I served it with.
Rating: :)



Indian Spiced Eggplant: I had an abundance of eggplants to use up, so this seemed like an excellent choice of recipe. But it came out kind of bland, unfortunately. Onions and eggplants and tomatoes with some spices, it just needed a bit of extra oomph somewhere.
Rating: :|



Cute Kitty Photo of the Post



This beautiful green-eyed boy thought that if his slunk into the sink, we wouldn't notice him.

Recipe Round-Up: Forks Over Knives

Forks Over Knives: The Cookbook is a trusty volume that I often head to when I am feeling the need for something a little bit lighter, but not lacking in flavour. I have also done a round-up for this book before. Here is some more from it!

Chinese Brown Sauce: This sauce comes together quickly, and has a rich and garlicky flavour. I never have date molasses and found myself unexpectedly out of rice syrup, so I used some maple syrup mixed with a touch of water instead. This is a base for several recipes in the book, but is also handy for a quick stir-fry sauce on its own.
Rating: :)



Spicy Tropical Green Smoothie: I was not a big fan of this, and I normally love green smoothies. I found this thin (even with frozen fruit), kind of grassy and it had an odd smell. I used the lime juice option, and added a sprinkle of cayenne as suggested.
Rating: :/



Chilean Bean Stew: This was nice, though quite sweet because it has a lot of corn and is also based on pumpkin. It has basil stirred through which gives a lovely accent. It is great with nooch added to make it a bit cheesy.
Rating: :)



Brown Lentil Stew with Avocado Salsa: It is funny how some dishes you remember because of what happened while you were eating them. I had just sat down to a bowl of this when a large glass door panel shattered. Not the fault of the stew, of course, which was exactly what I needed to get through. I needed to add an extra cup of water to get the lentils to cook all the way through, and I left out the capsicum. I doubled the salsa, which you will definitely want to do as well. Served with quinoa, baby spinach and a side of glass-door related angst.
Rating: :)



Bean and Mushroom Chili: I made a half batch of this (a full recipe says it serves six), and I got one dinner and one lunch out of it, so I think I eat more than they think you should eat. I served it with avocado, some nooch, a baked sweet potato and baby spinach. After simmering covered, I had to simmer for a bit longer at the end without a cover to thicken up.
Rating: :)



Penne with Spicy Eggplant: This was yum. I used only half the penne (so 250g instead of 1 pound... 1 pound of pasta makes too much for me, and I like my pasta on the saucier side) and added a tin of kidney beans and some frozen peas, and served over spinach. Even with only using half the pasta I still got five serves out it! The recipe says that full amount of pasta will serve 4!
Rating: :)



'Penne' with Swiss Chard, Olives and Currants: When I was shopping for this recipe I could have sworn that I had penne at home in the cupboard, but when it came time to cook it turned out that it was rotini. Oh well! Still good. Once again I used 250g pasta, rather than 1 pound, and I added kidney beans. I didn't have fresh thyme, so I used dry. I also sliced my shallots in quarter moons rather than dicing them small. Overall this was a little lacking in flavour, so I added some veggie stock to it and topped with nooch and it was good. I would suggest adding veggie stock powder to the reserved pasta water when it comes to that step.
Rating: :)



Sicilian Cauliflower Linguine: This recipe again calls for 1 pound, I happened to have 12 oz/375g left in my cupboard so I used it all, but it was really a bit too much pasta for the sauce, I would use 250g next time. I also added in some chopped spinach as well for greens. This has a nice flavour, with lots of garlic and miso in the sauce.
Rating: :)



Stir-Fried Noodles with Spring Vegetables: This uses a recipe of the Chinese Brown Sauce from the beginning of this post. it calls for onion, carrot, asparagus and snow peas, I also added some sauteed tofu. I got three and a half serves of this, serving over wholewheat noodles because I couldn't find the brown rice ones the recipe called for.
Rating: :)



Peanut Noodles with Broccoli: Peanut sauce, noodles and broccoli have to be one of my favourite combinations. The sauce here is super awesome, using refreshing coconut water as a base. I served this over baby spinach leaves. Highly recommend.
Rating: :D



Cute Kitty Photo of the Post



A few weeks ago Dim Sim had to go to the clinic because she was off her food. Everything ended up being fine! But I popped out of the room to go pay my bill and when I came back had a moment of panic - where was Dim Sim? She was hiding under the flap of my bag, but poked her nose out when she realised I was back.

Recipe Round-Up: Forks Over Knives The Cookbook

A brief break in the Seattle posts, as I realised that I have not labeled the rest of my photos yet and that will take a little while, so here is a recipe round-up post I prepared earlier. And what better book to break up the indulgences of an overseas eating trip than Forks Over Knives - The Cookbook.

Mayonnaise: My favourite store-bought mayo is super expensive (I like the Plamil, we don't have have all of the choices that people in the USA have), and the cheaper one that you can get in the supermarket is too sweet and vinegary for me, so I am a big fan of home-made silken tofu mayos. This oil-free mayo is creamy and comes together in a snap.
Rating; :)



No-Cheese Sauce: I didn't have any roasted capsicum on hand when I first made this (which is one of the options) so I warily made it with the raw red capsicum. A small amount of cashews and tahini add creaminess, and the cheesiness came from a cup of nooch. Though I added an extra 1/4 cup to get it cheesy enough for me. The sauce has a slight sweet quality, and the capsicum was not overpowering at all. I made this in a food processor because I knew that the ration of solid to liquid would not do well in my blender, which meant it was a little granular. I added 1/4 cup of water to smooth it all out. This sauce is used in lots of recipes in the book.
Rating: :)



Very Berry Smoothie: This pretty in pink smoothie is extra pretty in my Vegan Wares mug. It is simply dates, berries and almond milk blended. It gives you a choice of berries, but I went with strawberries.
Rating: :)



Breakfast Scramble: This unusual scramble uses cauliflower instead of tofu (there is the option of using tinned ackee instead, but I have never found that here), plus lots of vegetables. I used zucchini and carrot in place of green and red capsicum. it lists nooch as an optional ingredient, but we all know that there is nothing optional about nooch in our lives. I served this with some avocado on toast and some tinned baked beans.
Rating: :)



Breakfast Rancheros: This recipe requires some of the breakfast scramble from above, which is topped with a tomato-chili sauce and served on corn tortillas. It says it serves 6, but really it is 4.
Rating: :)



Portobello Florentine: Cauliflower hollandaise tops some sauteed spinach, which rests on a grilled mushroom (more on those below). The sauce is quite thick, as you can see, and very lemony, but this all melds perfectly with the other flavours. It says it serves 4, but serves two as a light meal.
Rating: :)



Rice Salad with Fennel, Orange and Chickpeas: This is a very refreshing salad, with the mild flavour of the fennel and the bright citrus of the orange. I served this with over some spinach, and topped it with some avocado and a leftover grilled mushroom.
Rating: :)



Tuscan Bean Stew: Sometimes you just want a simple and satisfying vegetable soup, and this hits the spot. Leeks, celery, carrots, cabbage and potato with lots of garlic and basil will make you happy.
Rating: :)



Millet Stew: I really enjoy millet as a grain, it makes a nice change from rice and quinoa (not that I could ever get tired of those!), and it adds a great bulk to this stew. Large serving sizes mean that this will keep you full.
Rating: :)



Creamy Basil Pasta Salad: This is a nice way to use up some of that homemade mayo. It says to halve the artichokes, but I chopped then roughly to make them a better size. Definitely make sure you use the pinenuts, they should not be optional, as they add a great flavour and texture.
Rating: :)



Grilled Portobello Mushrooms: These were used in the florentine recipe above, and turn up in a few recipes throughout the book. These are garlicky and juicy. I didn't have a grill, so I just pan-fried these. The marinade goes very sticky when it hits the hot pan, so make sure you have lots of hot water to clean it quickly.
Rating :)



More Seattle coming your way soon!

Cute Kitty Photo of the Post



Dim Sim loves to find little tents to hide herself away in. This is her current favourite, which is created by an crocheted blanked draped over a flat basket. Here I breached the sanctity of the tent to take a photo of her.