A Hearty Bake for World Vegan Month

I have been cooking my way through the World Vegan Month of November and to finish off the series I decided to share a staple recipe I have been making regularly for some time now. Since I always have a few tins of various beans in the cupboard this hearty bake can be ready on the table in 30 minutes and is not only filling, but also tasty and nutritious.

Cannellini and Tomato Bake with Garlic Bread Topping

For the bake:

• 1 x 400g (14oz) tin cannellini beans
• 1 x 400g (14oz) tin tomatoes
• 1 onion, chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, crushed
• 1 tbsp sugar
• 1 tbsp tomato puree
• 1 tbsp mixed dried herbs
• Freshly ground black pepper
• Optional ‘glug’ of red wine or sherry!

For the topping:

• Half a baguette, thickly sliced (you could use leftover bread of any kind here)
• 3 tbsps olive oil mixed with 1 clove garlic, crushed

Heat a little olive oil in a frying pan and gently saute the onion until soft. Add the garlic and cook for a further minute. Add all the other ingredients. Gently cook for a few more minutes until it starts to thicken. In the meanwhile preheat your grill to medium – high and put a baking dish under it to warm.

When your dish is nice and hot, pour the bean and tomato mixture in. Arrange the slices of bread on top and distribute the garlic oil evenly over the slices. Place under the grill for a couple of minutes – be careful not to look away as the bread will burn very quickly if you don’t watch it! Add a little chopped fresh parsley as a garnish if you have any at hand.

 

That’s it. Dinner in 30 minutes! 😀

I hope you have enjoyed this series of recipes. I will be posting a vegan Christmas cookie recipe for you soon!

🙂

In a Vase on Monday: A Vase for Alys

Last week was grey and damp and I was feeling rather despondent about my vase contents for today.

And then magic happened, and a surprise parcel arrived all the way from sunny California from my dear blogging friend Alys, at Gardening Nirvana.

😀 😀 😀

The package contained a beautiful handmade card displaying a vase full of flowers and the calendar marking Monday…

It is so pretty, and so ‘me’.

And the icing on the cake was a pack of vase arrangers that Alys also sent along – these are soft wire discs/’nets’ that can be bent to shape for any vase and help keep individual stems in place. I have wanted one for ages after seeing them on someone’s blog, but have never seen them here.

This was the inspiration I needed for my vase, and I spent this morning happily playing around with stems and seed heads. One of my favourite vases has quite a wide top and so I was pleased I could use it for fewer stems this week.

A big thank you to you, Alys, for cheering up my week and being so thoughtful! This vase is for you! xxx (I hope you have read my mail Alys!)

The main components are red stems and foliage, with the Mahonia at the centre. The Fennel seeds are a favourite element for Advent vases, as when the seeds drop they leave behind little stars…

I included several different grasses – names forgotten for the moment.

Some Iris sibirica seedheads still look good in the garden and I found some fresh red Cotinus shoots as well…

To top it all, we had sunshine today – the first for what seems like weeks! (It was very frosty too this morning).

Thanks to Cathy at Rambling in the Garden for hosting this meme and getting me out searching for vase materials even on a cold and frosty November morning. 🙂

And thanks again to Alys. 🙂

Have a great week everyone!

Pumpkin Pie for World Vegan Month

As Christmas approaches, and with Thanksgiving in the US this week, I thought my vegan pumpkin pie recipe might go down well. I adapted my original recipe (which you can also find on my recipes page) using alternatives for the eggs and milk, and the result was amazing… it tasted fantastic, full of flavour and nobody would ever guess it’s vegan!

I invited a friend over to test it, and the verdict was a definite thumbs up!

So here it is:

Vegan Pumpkin Pie

Pie crust:

• 225g (1 4/5 cups) plain flour
• a pinch of salt
• 100g (3 1/2 oz) vegan butter

Filling:

• 425 g (15 oz) pumpkin puree
• 125 g (2/3 cup) brown sugar
• 4 tbsps maple syrup
• 100 ml (2/5 cup) canned full-fat coconut milk
• 4 tbsps unsweetened almond or soya milk
• 3 tbsps cornflour
• a pinch of salt
• 1 tsp allspice
• 1 tsp cardamom
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp ginger

Method:

Grease a 23 cm pie or flan dish. Rub the butter into the flour and salt until fine and crumbly, then add just enough cold water to bring the dough together. Wrap in clingfilm and chill for at least 30 minutes. Preheat the oven to 180°C.

Roll out the pastry to fit your pie dish. Place some greaseproof paper on top and fill with baking beans. Bake blind for about ten minutes. Remove the beans and paper.

Blend all the filling ingredients together. Pour into the pastry case and bake in the oven for a further 40 – 50 minutes.

Leave to cool and then chill for a few hours or preferably overnight.

Serve with vegan whipped cream and enjoy! 

Wishing all American readers a Happy Thanksgiving!

😀

In a Vase on Monday: Now what is that thing called again?

After the frosts ten days ago the past week was just so incredibly wet that even the Persicaria has given up the ghost. Which leaves me with very little to cut for my Monday vases now. The Golden Euonymus usually stays golden all winter though, so I picked a large sprig of it and some grasses; Miscanthus and…? Then the last Echinacea seed head (the others have gone mouldy), a Skimmia flower, and some of that silvery foliage…

Now what is that called again! I have a mental block concerning that plant. Marrubia? Or something similar?

I am not at all keen on Skimmias, but this was in a basket given to me last month and has at least added a bit of colour to the patio.

The vase, with its tree silhouettes seemed appropriate for the season. Most of the leaves have come down now, but there are still some birch hanging on, and the larches are turning golden too.

If you are joining in Cathy’s meme I hope you have better luck than I did finding something for a vase this week. But if you hop over to Rambling in the Garden I am sure our dear host has created something lovely once again to inspire us all. 🙂

Chocolate Amarena Brownies for World Vegan Month

Yes, it IS possible to make delicious vegan brownies without eggs and butter!

As promised, here is the recipe in my November ‘World Vegan Month’ series, and it is in fact relatively healthy compared to most other brownie recipes I have tried… relatively. 😉

The twist to these particular brownies is the amarena cherries I used – the sort that come in syrup in a small jar. They are incredibly sweet and have a lovely slightly almondy flavour. If you can’t find them, try using an alternative syrup and ordinary tinned cherries.

Vegan Chocolate Amarena Brownies

(in a heart-shaped tin, just because! 😉

Dry ingredients:

• 150g (1 1/4 cups) plain flour (I use one third wholemeal)
• 1 tbsp cocoa powder
• 3/4 tsp baking powder
• 50g (1/4 cup) raw cane sugar
• pinch of salt
• 1 tbsp vanilla sugar or 1tsp vanilla essence

Wet ingredients:

• 2 tbsps syrup from the amarena cherry jar
• 2 tbsps vegetable oil
• 150ml (2/3 cup) sparkling mineral water
• 50g (1 3/4 oz) vegan dark chocolate, melted in a bain marie
• About 10-12 amarena cherries

Grease and flour a 15 x 15 cm (6 x 6 inch) baking tin (or a heart-shaped one 😉 )

Preheat the oven to 180°C/350° F.

Mix all the dry ingredients together in a large mixing bowl. Stir the syrup, oil and water together and mix in, whisking lightly with a fork. Fold in the melted chocolate. Pour into the baking tin and spread evenly. Scatter the cherries on the top.

Bake for 20-25 minutes.

Leave in the tin until completely cool, then turn out, sprinkle with a little icing sugar if you like, and slice. Serves 8.

Delicious with vegan whipped cream! 😉

 

Enjoy!

(I dare you to resist!) 😉

In a Vase on Monday: Always the Optimist…

This Monday, as I join Cathy once more at Rambling in the Garden in the fourth year of her lovely meme, I really wanted to use the vase my sister gave me just one more time before the winter sets in, but was I being just a little optimistic? After all, it is a large jug – 1.5 litres at least…

😀

Well, as those of you who join in each week will know, it is a constant surprise as to what we will find in our gardens and nearby hedgerows to put in a vase!

The Clematis tangutica seed heads were put to use again, along with the faithful Sedums (which are slowly collapsing, not at all gracefully), some Persicaria Red Dragon foliage and a single Scabiosa ochroleuca.

Until this morning the frost hadn’t quite got the last buddleia flowers – one yellow one in the picture above, and a couple of purple ones below…

The other purple flowers above are the Teucrium, along with some hedgerow snippets including Euonymus berries, and at the back some Bergenia leaves.

It was very cold outdoors yesterday (today even colder), so I moved the vase indoors to take a couple more photos and noticed how the light made the whole arrangement look more orange than pink. I rather like the effect.

A few sprigs of Miscanthus and a spent Spiraea flower were added to fill out the vase a bit more.

I also cut some Plumbago – the red foliage is lovely even after the flowers are gone. (On the right below)

And bottom right is a sprig of Oenothera.

I wonder what other bloggers have found in their gardens this week. Let’s go over to Cathy’s post and see who else has linked in with a vase today! 🙂

Have a great week, and don’t forget to look out at the supermoon tonight! 🙂

Butternut ‘Steaks’ for World Vegan Month

Here is another recipe for World Vegan month 2016, and one I mentioned that I would post not long ago… Butternut ‘Steaks’. 😀

At this time of year it is easy to find pumpkins of any kind, and I like to make the most of them while they are in season. Since my Man of Many Talents is not so keen on the sweet flavour in savoury dishes, except for soup anyway, I make these butternut steaks just for myself. And the beauty is, you can slice as much as you need off the ‘neck’ of a butternut and save the rest of the squash for another day.

Butternut Steaks

So, take a butternut squash and cut some 1-2 cm thick slices from the long end (not the end where the seeds are), then peel with a potato peeler. Place on a baking sheet, lined with greaseproof paper.

Preheat your oven to 225°C/ 425°F.

Mix 1tbsp olive oil with 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar and spread over the slices of squash. Season with freshly ground black pepper and, if you like, a sprinkle of ground ginger for some added heat. I also sometimes use ground dried garlic or coriander, or add a sprig of rosemary or two.

Bake in the oven for about 20 minutes. Depending how thick your slices are, they may need another few minutes, but try not to let them get too brown. You can test one with a sharp knife to see if it is tender.

They can be served with just about anything, or even eaten on their own as a snack!

So simple and so tasty!

What’s your favourite pumpkin/squash dish? I bet a lot of you are going to say ‘pie’ , and I hope to post a vegan recipe for that too soon. Stay tuned! 😉