VeganMania

[Bellenda Carlisle]

I love gimmicky vegetarian Christmas stuff so I was all over this vegan Christmas dinner in a bag from Iceland. I didn't really know what to expect but it was amazing, It felt like vegan Christmas astronaut food. 

[Hannibal Scorch]

1 hour ago, Ralphy said:

2 for £1 in hereon foods accord to dem twitters..

still £3 in my local Asda. What a bargain!

[FLips]

Quorn Pieces are a fantastic substitute for chicken it turns out and they've fully replaced chicken in our diet. Unlike the mince which I wasn't 100% on, this is close enough in texture and tastes great.

I know it's a drop in the ocean but it's something.

[Keith Houchen]

1 minute ago, FelatioLips said:

Quorn Pieces are a fantastic substitute for chicken it turns out and they've fully replaced chicken in our diet. Unlike the mince which I wasn't 100% on, this is close enough in texture and tastes great.

I know it's a drop in the ocean but it's something.

Yeah, they're pretty versatile.  I use them in curries, pies, stir fry's and fajitas.

[Sphinx]

I can't get on with them. I do the Quorn nuggets and chop them up to put in fajitas. It's faff and they're already breaded so it doesn't work as well as chicken would with the spice but I find it tastes better than the pieces.

[Merzbow]

You know what makes a nice curry? Those Vbites duck pieces from Holland & Barrett, pricey stuff like everything there but they're lovely.

[UK Kat Von D]

Sainsbury are bringing Gardien products to the U.K. which is one to keep and eye out for

 

 

[Hannibal Scorch]

15 hours ago, Keith Houchen said:

Yeah, they're pretty versatile.  I use them in curries, pies, stir fry's and fajitas.

I thought Waffles were the only thing versatile?

I highly recommend the Fry's products. But heard good things about Gardein and so can't wait to check those out. 

Anyone know of any good Pesto? Used the Asda free from ,and it's nice, but very oily.

[Keith Houchen]

39 minutes ago, Hannibal Scorch said:

I thought Waffles were the only thing versatile?

I highly recommend the Fry's products. But heard good things about Gardein and so can't wait to check those out. 

Anyone know of any good Pesto? Used the Asda free from ,and it's nice, but very oily.

I make my own pesto. Basil, garlic, pine nuts and extra virgin olive oil, put them in a blender and that's it.  Have a few goes until you get the levels right for how you want it. Pine nuts are the most expensive ingredient but Holland and Barratts often have them in a sale so I stock up when they do. 

[mim731]

2 hours ago, Hannibal Scorch said:

I highly recommend the Fry's products. But heard good things about Gardein and so can't wait to check those out. 

I'd second this. I've been using Fry's Chicken-style strips in my salads (I'm not vegan, but I'm trying to reduce dramatically the animal products I use), and they are very good!

2 hours ago, UK Kat Von D said:

Sainsbury are bringing Gardien products to the U.K. which is one to keep and eye out for

I can't speak for everywhere, but near us (and admittedly we're not super far from Brighton, which may have some bearing on that) Sainsbury's are massively ahead of the game on the meat-free and vegan products. Such a fantastic selection compared to Tesco, Morrisons etc. Makes swapping out meat and dairy for plant-based stuff significantly easier. 

[deathrey]

1 hour ago, Keith Houchen said:

I make my own pesto. Basil, garlic, pine nuts and extra virgin olive oil, put them in a blender and that's it.  Have a few goes until you get the levels right for how you want it. Pine nuts are the most expensive ingredient but Holland and Barratts often have them in a sale so I stock up when they do. 

You don't have to use pine nuts either, I've been using walnuts recently but I have also used almonds in the past. 

[Keith Houchen]

10 minutes ago, deathrey said:

You don't have to use pine nuts either, I've been using walnuts recently but I have also used almonds in the past. 

Cool, will give that a go!

[UK Kat Von D]

3 hours ago, mim731 said:

I can't speak for everywhere, but near us (and admittedly we're not super far from Brighton, which may have some bearing on that) Sainsbury's are massively ahead of the game on the meat-free and vegan products. Such a fantastic selection compared to Tesco, Morrisons etc. Makes swapping out meat and dairy for plant-based stuff significantly easier. 

I find Sainsbury to be really good near me too. Brighton is awesome for food though, Purezza, Bok Shop and The Hope And Ruin are all great.

Off to New York for two weeks next week and I’m gonna be round the corner from Champs Diner. I intend to eat there three times a day for my entire trip and I don’t even give a fuck if I get fat 

 

 

[Carbomb]

I made spiced pumpkin soup today. My uncle's a really good gardener, and had grown several bloody huge pumpkins, so he dropped one off for Hallowe'en. Unfortunately, we didn't end up using it as a Jack o'Lantern, so we decided to make what's probably better use of it. Half of it went into making Mauritian pumpkin touffé (will put the recipe up for that another time), other half went into making this soup.

Turned out this particular type of pumpkin isn't particularly flavoursome - they're grown almost specifically for making Jack o'Lanterns from, so flavour isn't a key consideration. As it is, making this soup became more of an exercise in imparting taste via various extra ingredients. Next time, I'll get a stronger-tasting pumpkin, so that I can really pair up the natural sweetness with the spices.

That said, this one turned out pretty good.

I used:

Half a pumpkin, cut into 1-inch slices
Soffrito/mirepoix of finely-chopped onion, carrot and celery - two onions, about four carrots, four/five sticks of celery
Ground mixed spice
Paprika
Cayenne pepper
Garlic & ginger paste
Garlic granules
Chives
Half a lime
Passata (chopped tomatoes will do though)
Vegetable stock (I used one of those fancy Knorr Garden Vegetable Stockpots with Parsley & Bay)


First thing to know about pumpkin is that it takes a while to cook. You can do whatever; I chose to put it in the oven, in the hope it might get a nice roasted taste, as well as getting it to "sweat" a little and draw out the oils from the skin. I drizzled a bit of olive oil on to the pieces to aid the process.

Stick them in a fan oven at 200 Celsius for about 20-25 minutes, turning them over halfway.

Next, stick your soffrito/mirepoix in a pan with two dessert spoons of garlic & ginger paste and a little coconut oil, and cook until softened. 

NB: I chopped the onion, but put the carrot and celery in a blender as my little sister doesn't like big pieces of celery in her food, and I figured I'd get more flavour out of the carrot if it was minced.

By this point, your pumpkin should be ready.

 

Either using a spoon or a sharp knife, scoop the flesh away from the skins. Can get a little messy, so I recommend either being prepared to get your hands oily and wash them afterwards, or cut them into smaller, but big enough to be manageable, chunks. Stick the flesh in the pan with the soffrito, and then start chucking in the spices.

I put in two teaspoons of each spice/spice mix, but one and a half of cayenne, as my mum is still very English and doesn't like things too spicy. Your mileage may vary.

Cook for a bit longer, then stick in the passata/chopped tomatoes, and then pour in about a litre and a half of boiling water, chucking in the stockpot/cube.

 

Cook on a medium heat for about ten minutes, to make sure the spices and later ingredients all have time to cook. Then get a hand-blender and blend until smooth. Once done, stick in loads of chopped chives, squeeze the lime-half's juice in, put in three-quarters of a teaspoon of salt, grind in enough pepper to taste, mix them in, heat for another couple of minutes.

 

Then serve with buttered brown, wholegrain bread!

 

 

THINGS TO BEAR IN MIND:

1. Don't be afraid to test things out. Keep tasting throughout the cooking process to get a feel for the flavour it's taking on, and the direction you want to take it. In the case of this dish, I found out quickly that the pumpkin didn't taste of much, so I adapted it to make sure there was enough flavour.

2. Hold back on the salt - it's always better to put in too little than too much. You can always add more afterwards.

3. Don't be afraid to get things wrong. It's all part of the learning process. In my house, we abhor waste, so unless we get a dish hideously wrong, we eat as much of it as we can. This isn't just because we don't want to waste, it's also because it helps us to understand the subtleties of the taste, figure out what went wrong, and adjust for next time.

[WyattSheepMask]

‘I feed my cats a vegan diet’ - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-england-46390867/animal-welfare-is-it-safe-for-cats-to-be-vegan

where do we stand on this? Is this people taking things too far?