Vegan Pizza @ The Stable, Cheltenham

Vegan Pizza @ The Stable

The Stable has been in Cheltenham for quite a while now, but we have only recently caught onto it's Vegan Pizza menu!! So we rolled down to town (not literally!!) to eat all their Pizza!!

We are quite lucky in Cheltenham as we have a Zizzi nearby, which also makes Vegan Pizza, a large Wholefoods which sells Vegan Pizza (without the v-cheese), plenty of health food stores that sell pizza brands like Redwood with vegan cheese, so we are spoilt for choice really! I have to say though, so far, The Stable do the best Pizza! The base is thin but tasty, plenty of melty vegan cheese (which I hear is the ever popular Violife), and also a large Garlic Bread complete with violife, delicious!

It was fairly steep price wise, but great if you are having a treat. It might be because we bought quite a few drinks too though! 

Whilst we were eating there was live music playing, the atmosphere was really relaxed and family friendly. There was also plenty of vegans there which is always a good sign!

Overall a really good experience, and highly recommended! 

Finn decided he would rather have his milk than pizza, oddly enough :)

The ''I don't have time to have breakfast'' Vegan Flapjacks

Time for school!!

My daughter Esme had her first day at school last week, she is such a grown up girl! I figured there would be many days we would be in a rush and wouldn't have time for breakfast, sometimes so much of a rush that we have to grab something on the way to school, so I threw a load of ingredients together, and made a flapjack of sorts. This is Gluten Free too, so tummy friendly :)

The ''I don't have time to have breakfast'' Vegan Flapjacks

The question is, what are the measurements for the ingredients? The answer to this is, I haven't the foggiest! I would really just add until you get the right consistency. Right now I have an 11 week old baby so I don't get a lot of time so make food, so a recipe throwing everything in a bowl is ideal really!!

This is a mysterious recipe, like that on the great british bake off *rotfl*

Ingredients:

Cup of dates, soaked 

Cup of Cashews, soaked

Slug of maple syrup (no not a real slug ^_^)

Tablespoon of melted non-dairy marg

Quinoa Flakes

*Whizz up the dates and cashews in a food processor or nutribullet

*De-cant into a bowl, add the Quinoa flakes and mix until they are all combined.

*Melt the non-dairy marg in a pan, add the maple syrup

*Pour into the mixture and stir

*Line a tin with baking parchment, press down mixture into the tin, then throwww in the oven!

*Bake for 15-20 mins, take the flapjacks out and cut into squares.

*Cool the flapjacks and put them in a tub, ready to eat!!

I plan on making these again soon with a carob style chocolate on top (chocolate makes my daughter rather loopy!) They are nutty and delicious!

Quick top up shop vlog - Vegan at Aldi

Quick top up shop vlog - from Aldi!!

I am obsessed with Aldi! It is super cheap! :) The only problem is that the veggies go off quickly, so you will have to chomp them quickly, which is no problem for me of course :) I love veggies!! We are trying to eat less processed foods in my house. Esme is not currently convinced, and still wants pizza and chips constantly!! 

Vegan Dhansak Soup & Chapatis

Vegan Dhansak Soup & Chapattis

This soup is a random variation of veggie dhansak, using pretty much what I had in the cupboard! 

I didn't use measurements as I am more of a throw it in the pan sort of wimminz when it comes to soup, so any measurements are aprox (more or less to taste).

Spicy Dhansak Soup

Ingredients:

• Red Lentils
• 1/4 Pineapple
• 2 Bay Leaves
• 1 heaped teaspoon marmite ( or just use a stock cube - I ran out!)
• 2-3 teaspoons Madras Curry Powder (possibly more - measurements out the window)
• 1 Green Chilli ( I would have put more in but it was the last one :( )
• 1 Onion
• 1 small bag of carrots
• Salt & Pepper to taste
• 2 garlic cloves
• Handful of Coriander Leaves
• Oil for frying

Method:

Chop and fry the onion and garlic, then add the chopped carrots. When the onions and garlic and translucent, add finely diced pineapple and chilli. Then add the curry powder and red lentils, add a little more oil if it starts sticking to the bottom. Pour in hot water to cover a few inches above the mixture and turn the heat up. Add the marmite and bay leaves. When the soup starts to boil, turn down and cover with a lid. Leave for aprox 15-20 minutes then check to make sure soup isn't burning (lentils can stick to the bottom super easily). If all the water has gone add another couple of cups of hot water. At this point add the coriander leaves and taste to see if it needs any salt and pepper, and then season to taste. I used a hand blender to whizz my soup up, then serve :)

Alternative soup for fussy 4 year olds:

As my daughter doesn't like spice or most things, I made her a plain lentil soup in another pan. 

I used red lentils, carrots, a little  marmite (add a little stock cube if you have some), then just boil until lentils are cooked. This seems to be the only way she will eat lentils!!

Chapatis

I used a recipe online for the Chapattis, having never made them before! My partner brang home a bag of bread flour which had been slightly damaged so I decided, having a small amount of energy to make Chapatti's with Esme :) Esme enjoyed pretending to be Mary Berry whilst making these!

Recipe from: http://allrecipes.co.uk/recipe/20005/wholemeal-chapattis.aspx

Ingredients:

(Makes 4)

125g Wholemeal Flour

1 pinch of salt

1 tablespoon of Olive Oil

60ml Water

Method:

• Sift together flour and salt (I missed the sift bit - just threw it in the bowl!)
• Stir in the oil and water
• Knead until dough like - add extra flour/water if necessary
• Flour up a flat surface - a board/table etc.
• Cut your kneaded dough into 4
• Either stretch out the dough until very thin or use a rolling pin - actually no idea where our rolling pin is so Esme stretched them out thin
• Heat frying pan on a med-high heat, I added a tiny bit of oil at this stage.
• When hot, cook a Chapati for around a minute or two on each side - until a little golden (taste test to make sure it is cooked). Continue until all Chapatis are cooked.
• Serve with soup!! Yumzords!!

Here is a video of my daughter Esme scoffing said foods!!:

Vegan Sweet Scones Recipe

Vegan Sweet Scones Recipe

Recipe adapted from: https://emilycooksvegan.com/2012/05/28/summery-scones/

Summer is here! Yipppeee!! I mean *dies from the heat*. I am currently very very pregnant and the weather is melting me. MELTING!!

So it was half term and I had a sudden urge to bake. Trying to find something easy that my 4 year old and I could make. I am NOT a natural baker! When I was very young I used to bake constantly, and was pretty good at it! As I grew older I completely forgot how to bake, and now I am vegan I have to relearn everything anyway! 

Esme's dad was round so we all had a go, Esme is actually incredibly good at following the steps!! I was very impressed :) :)

I did alter a few of the ingredients as having pregnancy brain I did indeed forget some of the ingredients!! Here it is anyway :) :)

Ingredients

• 350g Self Raising Flour
• Pinch of Salt
• 1 tsp Baking Powder
• 85g Vegan Margarine
• 3 Tablespoons Caster Sugar (I used maybe 2.5, I hate using the full amount of sugar in any recipe!!)
• 1 tsp Vanilla Extract ( I forgot this, d'oh!!)
• A good squeeze of lemon juice * This doesn't make it particularly lemony, if you want it super lemony I would add the zest*
• 175ml of Soy Milk ( I used rice milk)
• 85g Dried Fruit (I used Sultanas)

What you need to do!

• Preheat the oven to 220 degrees (I just used the highest setting possible)

• Grab a mixing bowl, pour in the flour, baking powder and salt, then add the marg. Get your 4 year old to rub in the margarine to the flour mixture until it is a crumb like consistency. Or all over the floor. 

• Pour in the sugar and fruit and mixxx!! Or squish together in this case!!

• Make a well in the middle of the mixture. Pour in the milk, vanilla and lemon and stir. In the recipe it says stir with a metal knife. In this case Esme squashed the mixture together with her hands, stopping every now and again to taste the dough.
• Tip the mixture onto a surface and knead the dough into a ball. By this time Esme was more interested in eating the dough so dad stepped in!
• Divide the dough into rounds, place on baking tray (with baking parchment - absolute washing up life saver!!) 
• Brush with a little melted marg
• The recipe now says to bake for 10-15 minutes, which I would recommend trying first if you don't have a weird oven like mine. However, my oven took 35 minutes, and I had to flip the scones over to make sure they were cooked all the way through. If in doubt poke a fork in the middle to see in the middle is still uncooked. I have the worst oven ever..
• Take out the oven when cooked, put some delicious vegan cream and jam on, we had no cream so I just had marg and jam. 

 Finally, try and stop your 4 year old licking every single scone before anyone else has tasted them. ENJOY!

Sarah Cupcakes - Vegan Gluten Free Chocolate Cupcakes!

Sarah Cupcakes - Vegan Gluten Free Chocolate Cupcakes!

Soon it will be my lovely daughter's birthday! She will be 3 (I know right!! Time flies!). I was looking for a good vegan cupcake recipe to make, and preferably one that I could taste! Luckily, my lovely friend Sarah sent me one of hers! The design above was a fluke, but amusing! I think I'll probably change the design for a 3 year old's birthday party!! The first vegan AND gluten free cake I have made, really delicious.

Makes 12-14 cupcakes

What you need:

*50g Cocoa Powder

*6 tbsp Boiling Water

*3 Egg replacer eggies ( make them up with the instructions on the box - you can find them at most health stores :) )

*4 tbsp almond/rice/soy milk

*175 Gluten Free Flour (we used Dove's Farm)

*1 rounded tsp baking powder

* 100g Vegan Marg

*200g Caster Sugar (you can get away with less though :) )

*1/2 tsp Xanthin Gum

*Almond Flavouring ( I used maybe a tsp in the cake and 1/2 tsp in the icing)

* Cupcake cases (12-14)

For the icing:

*Icing sugar

*Coconut Oil - Melted over a stove

*Almond Flavouring 1/2 tsp

*Cocoa Powder

What you need to do:

• Preheat the oven to 180 degrees
• Mix cocoa powder and boiling water in a cup/jug until it forms a paste. Add almond flavouring

• Cream butter and sugar in another bowl
• Add the egg replacer, then sift in the flour, baking powder and xanthin gum.
• Place the cupcake cases on a tray, then scoop the mixture into the cases. Should look something like the above picture.
• Into the oven!
• Bake for 20-25 minutes until they look and smell delicious! Check with a fork or skewer, if it comes out clean it should be done.
• Cool on a wire tray

• Now time for the icing! The measurements are kind of sketchy on this so just make as much as you feel you need! If you make too much, then you can just eat it! Omnomnom!
• Sift the icing sugar in a small bowl
• Melt the coconut oil in a pan, and pour into the icing sugar once liquid.
• Add the cocoa powder
• Add the almond flavouring
• Mix!
• Spoon over the cupcakes, and leave to dry. Before it sets, decorate! 

So there you go, delicious chocolatey vegan gluten free cupcakes!! Deelicious. :)

Thank you to Kate for delegating, and Sarah for the lovely recipe!

Hannah x

Stuffed Butternut Squash with Tomato Chickpea Sauce Recipe

Stuffed Butternut Squash with Tomato Chickpea Sauce Recipe

OH MY GOSH I seem to have acquired an actual working oven!! This is wayy too exciting for me, life without an oven isn't impossible, just makes life a little more difficult. Plus having to fry everything isn't the most healthy way to live!!

I have been ridiculously busy today, toddlers are really amazing, but exhausting! If you still have a toddler running around, trying to sleep in the cupboards or taking things out the fridge, giving them a few tasks to do with this will keep them occupied and be pretty helpful! Anyway, FOOD!

What you need:

1 Butternut Squash

Punnet Mushrooms

Basil

1 Onion

2 - 3 Cloves Garlic

1 Tin Chick Peas

Carton of Passata (or tin of tomatoes)
Cherry Tomatoes (optional)

Bag of Spinach
10 olives

Salt/Pepper

1 tsp chilli powder 

Olive Oil

What you need to do:

• Preheat the oven at 180 degrees
• Slice the Butternut Squash in half, scoop out the seeds with a spoon
• Lattice (make grooves across and down the flesh) but very lightly (treaadd lightly)
• Drizzle olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper and put in the oven for 45mins - 1 hour (depending on how big it is - check with fork for softness!)
• MEANWHILE... (in another universe)
• Chop mushrooms finely.. I got my daughter Esme to chop them with a blunt knife, and then went over with them with a sharp one. Alternatively throw them in the food processor.
• Chop 3-4 leaves of Basil and 3/4 bag of Spinach finely, then 1-2 large cloves of garlic, and the onion, as finee as you possible can!! Try to chop the olives, if your 3 year old doesn't try to eat them all.
• Fry up the onion, garlic, olives and mushrooms with a slug of olive oil. Put to the side
•  In another pan, fry 1 clove of garlic, empty a tin of chick peas and the passata, and stir. Add the chilli powder, cherry tomatoes and 3-4 leaves of basil (roughly tear up), cook on low heat, then turn off.
• If you have time, put your feet up for 10 minutes! I went for a run, like a crazy person.
• Check the butternut squash, if getting softer, move onto next step
• Turn on the heat to the mushroom mixture, add the spinach and basil, and heat for a few minutes.
• Once wilted, scoop into the hollow parts of the squash, and bake for another 10-15 minutes
• Heat the tomato sauce through, place onto plate with extra spinach if you fancy :)
• Serve, eat YUM! I added seeds and nutritional yeast to mine, but then I am obsessed with nutritional yeast.

Extra Puddingy part!:

I spotted a discounted pineapple at my local co-op, so I thought it was only fitting to do something with it. Spending hours making a roasted butternut squash didn't leave a lot of time to cook anything else. So I just threw something together:

All you need is: 1 Pineapple, Coconut Cream (just buy coconut milk in a tin, scoop the cream off the top - I bought quite a few of these on offer for 3 for £2), Sweet Freedom or syrup of your choice, Coconut oil (not required, just tasty!)

What you need to do is: Cut the pineapple into rings (or just buy ones in a tin!), prepare a baking dish with a little coconut oil. Place the pineapple rings on the dish, add a little sweet freedom/maple syrup/anything and bake or grill for 5-10 mins. Add the coconut cream and voila! Pudding! 

Time to zzzz
 Hannah x

Vegan Nanaimo Bars Recipe

Vegan Nanaimo Bars Recipe

Ahh the elusive Nanaimo bar (or Noonoo bar, when I'm too tired to pronounce things right!). I have been meaning to blog about these since we made them last week, but have been wayy too distracted by reality. Damn you reality!

The above picture is from the raw vegan food night we went to, and although they aren't 100% raw, we brung them along anyway!! The bar is the one right at the back. Being organised humans as we are we took a lot of photos, but had to rush out at the end to eat all this delicious food. Whoops!

We used the recipe from this blog here. As I have worked out from many American recipes on the internet, it is well worth investing in a set of cup measurements, so as to spend less time converting measurements.  

So here is is! Much deliciousness in a bar!:

What you need: ( A lot of stuff!)

Base:

3 Tbsp Cacao Powder

4 Tbsp Coconut Oil

3 Tbsp Maple Syrup

1/4 Cup + 1 Tbsp Dates

1 1/2 Cup Walnuts

1 3/4 Cup Unsweetened Coconut Flakes

Middle:

1 1/4 Cup Cashews (soaked overnight) (alt. 1 Cup Cashew Butter)

4 Tbsp Coconut Oil

5 Tbsp Maple Syrup

1 Tsp Vanilla

Top:

1/4 Cup + 2 Tbsp Cacao Powder

2 Tbsp Coco Butter

2 Tbsp Coconut Oil

2 Tbsp Maple Syrup/ Agave

(We left out the salt in the recipe, but feel free to add if you feel it needs it!)

What you need to do:

• Base:  Whizz up (or if you are using a Masha aka Marsha then mash!) all the ingredients in a food processor. Press into a lined 8'' x 8'' tin. Set in the fridge while you make the filling.
• Middle: Puree the cashews, then add the oil, maple syrup, and vanilla, and then continue puree or mash! Spread over the base and put in the fridge for 30 mins.
• Top: Melt ingredients together. If you want to do this at a low temperature you can put a jug in a pan, and surround the jug with warm water out of the tap. Add ingredients to the jug and stir, refilling the pan if the water becomes cold quickly. Pour over the middle of the middle section and set in the fridge.
• Cut into squares, eat all the squares, become wayy too excited because of the deliciousness :) *bounces*

We hope to make these again soon, because they are sooo addictive, so may actually post proper pictures of the finished product. Cannot guarantee 100% because OMNOMNOMNOM

Hannah xx

All The Kale Please Vol. II..The Coconut Edition

All The Kale Please Vol. II..The Coconut Edition

I was inspired today by going on a play date with Esme. The kids were eating Thai Green Curry and the house just smelled amazing! It made me SUPER hungry! So I thought, what do I have in my cupboards or fridge that can even remotely replicate this? Being the beginning of the month, we had slightly more of an abundance of food than usual. So this means..KALE!! YUM!!

It was definitely a 15 minute throw everything together sort of meal! But pretty delicious and worth it :)

Note: This does not taste like Green Curry, but the nearest I could get with the ingredients in my cupboards!!

What you need: (feeds 2-3 people)

Tofu (1/2 block for 2 people)

Kale (1/2 bag, more if needed!)

Olive Oil/Coconut oil

Rice

Onion

Garlic (2 Cloves)

1 tbsp flour (GF)

1-2 tsp chilli powder

Salt & Pepper

Tin of Coconut milk
Seeds

What you need to do (apart from save the world)

• Put on enough rice to feed ALL the people
• Fry Onions and Garlic for a couple of minutes, throw in the chopped tofu. Saute until Tofu is brown
• Add the Kale, saute, then the chilli powder.
• Scoop the cream off the top of the coconut milk
• Add the flour, stir, then the water from the tin of coconut milk
• The sauce should thicken, add as much coconut cream as you think is needed!
• Add salt and pepper to taste
• Decorate with seeeds
• EATS!!!

Hannah xx

All The Kale Please.. - Quick Eats

All The Kale Please..

I have been really obsessed with Kale lately. I love cabbage, but Kale really is on another level!

This was a really nice snacky meal, as I am often shattered by lunchtime, due to running after 3 year old all morning! She even enjoyed it, which is a double win for mankind!

So all you really need is:

• Kale
• Houmous (Shop bought or home-made - if you have no time like me rolling out of bed and buying houmous is an easy option!!)
• Walnuts - or any kind of nuts!
• Seeds ( I added this afterwards, because I am so tired I cannot think right now XD)
• 1 Onion
• Optional - Nutritional Yeast - I tend to just put this on everything
• Himalayan Salt or Sea Salt - no table salt please!

You can easily adapt this dish to be raw if you prefer. Esme will not eat raw Kale so I boiled it for maybe 10 mins (generally best to do it for not very long, I do it on orders of a 3 year old!). Meanwhile fry up some onions, when ready just throw together really! Add the walnuts/seeds/houmous. Eat, then fall asleep, if you are very very lucky!

Hannah xx

Vegan Taco Night!- Vegan Mama Noms

Vegan Taco Night! 

Oh how I love tacos. Or wraps. Or just food in general. For some reason there was a day where I had enough energy to actually put together a whole bunch of food to eat. Some of it was just what had rolled out of my cupboards,  Kate bought over a few bits, and there you have it! You may need pre made taco shells, I bought a box with tacos, salsa and seasoning!

Here is what we did:

• Scrambled tofu with taco seasoning
• Black beans, garlic and seasoning
• Fried broccoli, with nutritional yeast and seeds
• Fried mushrooms and onions
• Baked Tacos!
• Ketchup / Vegan Mayo / Salsa

I was planning to do a salad also, but by this time I was so hungry I almost ate my arm.

Tacos were an excellent success, my (almost) 3 year old had great fun smashing them with her hands, then rolling around on the floor giggling.

*Hannah*

Vegan Pancake Day!!

Vegan Pancake Day!!

 Oh hai!

Didn't see you there!

I was too busy EATING DELICIOUS PANCAKES!!

I thought I'd make an actual effort this pancake day, so I searched around the internet for pancake recipes. I did notice that a lot of them were American (when it says ''put 1/2 a cup in - I think, now how can I stir in this cup?) but managed to find a recipe with grams in, and tweaked it! (Original link at the bottom!)

So here it is! Vegan, Gluten Free Pancakes!!

What you need is: ( Some Ingredients)

275g Flour ( I used Dove's Gluten Free)

2 tsp Baking Powder (GF)

250 ml Rice Milk (or soy/coconut/almond - just what I had in!)

125 ml Water

Pack of Blueberries

Sweet Freedom or Maple Syrup (sweetener)

Oil for frying

What you need to do is:

* Sift the flour into a large bowl, add the baking powder and stir. Make a well in the middle (or a hole in the flour - hehe!)

* Mix the Milk, Water and a good squirt of the syrup into a jug, mix

* Pour the milk mixture into the bowl with the flour

* Give it a gooood mixing!

* Add about 3/4 of the Blueberries

* Happen to have a frying pan nearby

* Put some oil in the pan and heat!

* When HOT add a dessert spoonful or two into the pan, you can make maybe two or three little pancakes using the space

* Fry until golden, then FLIP

* While flipping you may squish the blueberries, do not worry about this, as they will be in your tummy soonish.

* When golden on the other side, remove from pan, cover in syrup, put a few blueberries on top.

*Repeat until batter is finished

*Scoff them all

Enjoy! 

Original Recipe

*Hannah*

Creamy Lemon and Chickpea Noms

Creamy Lemon and Chickpea Noms

(Serves 3-4)

Ingredients:

1 Tin of Chick Peas

1 Tin of Coconut Milk (Alt. Soya milk)

1 Onion, Chopped

2 Cloves Garlic

1 small bag of Spinach

Mushrooms

Cornflour

Salt and Pepper

1 Lemon

Savoury Yeast Flakes (optional)

Olive/Sunflower/Coconut oil

Rice

1) Put the rice on to boil, enough for 3-4 people

2) Fry the onion, garlic and then mushrooms together with a little oil

3) Stir in a tin of chick peas!

4) Open the tin of coconut milk, scoop the coconut cream off the top and put in a bowl - Alternatively if soya milk go to the next step

5) Add a little more oil and stir in a few spoons of cornflour

6) Add the coconut or soya milk, a little at a time and stir until a thick sauce

7) Add the spinach, salt and pepper, and a little savoury yeast flakes to taste
8) Stir in the coconut cream

9) Squeeze half a lemon, taste, may need more!

10) Stir!

11) Serve! Omnomnom!

12) Bring me some :D