Easy Falafel Salad

I was in Canberra for work last week and returned quite sick. I think it was a combination of being in air-conditioning all day and night and also sitting next to sick people in my training courses. This week and next week Nat is away for work so don't expect to see to much creation on my blog.

The day I left for Canberra it was quite warm and Nat and I felt like salad for lunch.
We had some leftover falafel from dinner the night before and so we had Tassie Oak Leaf Lettuce, Tassie Tomatoes, Cucumber, red onion and falafel with tahini drizzled over the top. It was so good and refreshing - I think I will make it again as soon as the weather warms up again.

The falafel was from Vegan With a Vengence. This recipe is AWESOME!! I think I know it off by heart now.

Rocket, Walnut and Orange

I have been working at a market stall on Saturdays in return for some organic fruit and veg. Occasionally at the end of the day, if some things haven't sold and will not keep we get given them to take home. This last Saturday I was asked if I wanted to take home a bag of rocket leaves. As I am always needing to increase my leafy green intake I said yes.

I googled rocket salads and, well nothing was really taking my fancy (that and/or I didn't have the ingredients on hand). Eventually I found this recipe. I only had rocket so I couldn't use any other greens. I made a few other changes - I didn't use any oil (I lightly toasted the walnuts in a dry pan). I also only made the recipe for me - so I only used a few walnuts and half an orange. I took this photo before I put on the balsamic vinegar because it didn't look as nice then.

Rocket is sooooo bitter - I know why you need to put sweet fruit with it. It was barely edible. I still had about 3/4 of the package left (and I was still hungry). I made it again except I microwaved the rocket for about 25seconds. then I mixed in the orange pieces, walnuts and balsamic vinegar. I didn't take a photo but the slight cooking of the rocket took the edge off the bitterness and I really enjoyed my second bowl of this salad.

Vegan Mayo Recipe - finally!!

Potato Salad with corn, spring onions, seitan and vegan mayonnaise (recipe below)

Well the day has finally arrived where I put down my mayo recipe.
It is not as thick as regular mayo - but the taste is pretty good (having said that - I haven't eaten real mayo for a VERY long time so I think it tastes like what I imagine it would taste like and Nat loves it so it works for us.

The reason I have had to come up with a mayo recipe is that all the ones I have seen use so much oil - and I am sure that it would make a better texture - but with the amount of mayo that we eat - it would not be healthy at all.

We mainly use this on sandwiches and potato salad.

Anyway - here is the recipe. I kind of based it on Vegan Dad's recipe but used silken tofu instead of soymilk and oil.

Low-fat vegan mayo recipe
1 300g silken tofu
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp sugar (I use raw sugar)*
1/2 tsp mustard powder*
1 tbsp lemon juice
1 tbsp vinegar (I use white wine vinegar)

Combine all the ingredients in a food processor or blender and process for 1-2mins. Adjust seasonings to taste (I sometimes add a little more salt and sugar and lemon juice. Chill before serving. I have stored this in the fridge for up to a week. Sometimes water forms on the top - just stir it back in before using it.

*I have used dijon mustard as well but I reduced the sugar a little bit when I did that.

If you are not afraid of adding oil to your mayo, you might want to also check out Vegan Dad's Recipe.

apple cabbage and spinach salad and Pumpkin oat cookies

Apple, red cabbage and spinach salad. Yuuummmmm.

Well today was a (relatively) busy day for me. I am on holidays but I had a few pre-employment things to sort out. I had to go and get a pre-employment medical done (all clear!!) and then I went to do some op-shopping for some work clothes. I found 4 really nice shirts and one skirt and it all came to under $15 (I think it was $14 exactly). I am trying to walk everywhere so as to help lower my carbon emissions and also reduce the amount of money that we pay for transport.

By the time I got home I was pretty hungry. I initially ate a piece of corn on the cob (it was raw and beautifully sweet). Then I decided to whip up a salad inspired by The Café Fresh Cookbook. It was so simple and easy. I just thinly sliced some red cabbage (local and organic) and some baby spinach leaves (local and organic). I then added a small handful of sultanas and 1/2 a diced jonagold apple (which was the only type of apple I had on hand - this apple is crisp and has a bit of a bite to it but is still quite sweet). I then made a dressing from the juice of 1/2 orange and 1 1/2 tsp of apple juice concentrate and poured this over the salad. It was just divine - I had to stop myself from having seconds.

Pumpkin Oat Cookies

Two days ago I made VWaV's Pumpkin Oatmeal Cookies. I cooked and pureed my own pumpkin because you can't buy canned pumpkin here and I added the flaxseeds, used coconut oil instead of canola oil and used sultanas instead of raisins. I also used spelt flour which seemed to work fine.

I found it a little difficult knowing when these cookies were cooked - they do firm up a LOT when they come out of the oven. They tasted a lot like ANZAC biscuits. I took them to a staff meeting and everyone loved them (and thought that they were ANZACs). I will be making these again but I have notes in my VWaV that these are still REALLY soft when they come out of the oven.

Pot-luck fun and food

Sorry I haven't been blogging lately - I have been pretty vague since the end of exams and through sheer vagueness I have had a few too many kitchen disasters since I last posted - the sheer number of brain-farts I have experienced has been astounding... for example - I made hummus and totally forgot the lemon juice!!! What is hummus without lemon juice??? And that is just the beginning of the disasters - but I don't want to dwell on those because today I went to an awesome potluck for the group Vegetarian Tasmania.

I knew that there were some raw foodies going and so I decided to make a raw dessert and then I complimented it with a fresh (and easy) salad because another brain-fart made me think that I had an extra hour of preparation time up my sleeve and so I wasn't able to make the other raw main dish that I was going to make - so I settled with the simplest quickest salad in the world. Looks fresh and appatising and also is able to be thrown together in 10minutes with minimal effort (shouldn't every meal be like that sometimes??

This simple bean salad has frozen green beans and corn that have been lightly steamed and then rinsed. A can of 4bean mix, about a can of chickpeas (I had some that I had cooked and left in the fridge), some celery, cucumber, red capsicum and spring onion or red onion. I just sprinkled the salad with a little salt water but it is also really good with any of your favourite french or italian dressing.

For dessert I made raw bliss balls. They were so good - I really had to stop myself from eating the mixture while making the balls because it was SO good. They were a hit with the poeple at the lunch and the lady who gave the raw food demonstration and her husband were really impressed and wanted the recipe. That is a sucess in my book :)

Lady's Raw Bliss Surprise

5 dates - soaked in water for a few hours or overnight
110g dessicated coconut (about 1 1/2 cups)
1 tbsp coconut oil
1 1/2 tbsp raw cacao powder
enough raw agave syrup to bind the mixture into balls (between 1/4 and 1/2 cup)
almonds (optional)

Drain the dates and blend in a food processor with the oil, coconut and cacao powder. When processed quite finely, add 1/4 cup agave syrup and process for about 30 seconds. Stop and grab a ball of mixture and squeeze gently to see if it sicks together. If it holds together well the mixture is ready. If not, add a little more agave, process and then test the mixture again.

Once the mixture is ready you can either roll the mix into balls or you can use an almond as the centre of the ball and form the mix around the almond. I was able to take these straight to the potluck and they held together well, but the 3 that I kept for Nat in the fridge were much firmer and really nice.

Nat after he bit through his bliss ball.

It makes 20-24 balls - depending on wether you use almonds or not.

Cooling cucumber and corn salad

Before I get onto talking about my yummy lunch I just want to proclaim to the world that as of 10.15am this morning I FINISHED MY UNDERGRADUATE DEGREE!!! I had my last exam (survey research and statistics) this morning and now I am done. It is also a beautiful day outside. Nat is working and rode his bike to work (he left at 6am this morning) and so he won't be home till about 8 tonight I would imagine - so I am going out for a coffee with one friend and then a few drinks with a few others and then come home and have a late dinner and crack open a bottle of wine and watch a movie or something.

So... the long and the short of it is that... pending passing all my exams - I will have a month of holidays before starting work in my graduate position at the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

Anyway - onto my awesome raw lunch that I am munching on right as we speak.

Cucumber, corn and celery salad

I am really trying to make an effort to include a lot more raw foods in my diet. I am eating a lot more fruit - especially the fruits with higher concentrations of water - and I am trying to eat raw food right up until dinner. It is not a big effort as my body is craving simpler, lighter and cooler foods. (I do sometimes miss my occasional bowl of muesli, but I really want to give this a crack to see whether I notice any difference in my health, energy, mood and skin condition. I am expecting my body to go through a period of detox first though. I don't want to give up on cooked food altogether - I love preparing food and having people over for dinner and going out for dinner with other people. I am going to try and keep my cooked meals simpler but I will still cook food for Nat and when people come over. This is really just a trial.

Anyway - onto my new favourite salad. I am able to eat this salad without any dressing, but if you wanted to it would be nice with some balsamic or cider vinegar or braggs amino acids. Nat doesn't like the idea of raw corn - so when I make him some I usually steam it for a little bit and then dunk it in some cold water before throwing it in.

Cool corn and cucumber salad
Serves 1

1 fresh cob of corn - kernels removed from the cob
1/3 continental cucumber - cubed
1/2 stalk celery - sliced finely
1/2 spring onion or a small amount of red onion diced finely
any other fresh herbs or vegetables you feel like - I like parsley and basil.

Feeling like raw - and this hits the spot!

Carrot salad with grated apple, celery,
sunflower seeds, walnuts, pepitas and sultanas.

Well summer is defiantly approaching and my body is starting to crave a lot more fresh alive foods and meals. I am going to have to look into finding some nice simple raw recipes for summer.

At the moment I can't get enough of my grated carrot salad... I make it differently every time depending on how I am feeling. So I will give you a run down of basic ingredients. In the photo I put most of them in just to show you - usually I use a little less of the "toppings".

Basically I grate a medium-large carrot.
I grate some apple as well (how much apple depends on how sweet I feel like - today I used less than half an apple, some days I use a whole apple).
Any other vegetable I desire: celery (chopped finely), ginger (finely minced)
Then I add desired toppings: nuts (chopped almonds, walnuts, pine nuts, coconut flakes or shreds), seeds (pumpkin and sunflower), dried fruits (sultanas, raisins, chopped up dates)

Then I devour!! It is raw heaven - believe me!!!

When I was a kid an after school treat that mum used to make was grated apple and sultanas... that is another dish if your body is craving sweet things.

**Edited November 4th - I was thinking about other yummies that would rock in this salad I came up with: grated beetroot, grated parsnip, chopped pineapple, orange segments or orange juice... the list goes on... mmmmm***

Sweet and Sour Vegetables and home style salad

Sweet and Sour Stirfry

Mum has been following the posts on my blog and was very excited when I said I would like to blog about our dinner last night. She said she had the perfect dish (ie. a new dish that I had not had before). So we set about cooking this dish together. The recipe comes from this awesome cookbook that mum bought from the New Internationalist - Quick and Easy - Vegetarian Recipes from around the World for the Western Kitchen. Unfortunately it is out of publication and I have been unable to get my own copy (very very sad about this). Due to the fact that you (or I) are not going to be able to run out and get a copy of this awesome book I will put our version of the recipe (we have changed a few things).

It was really yummy - I haven't really ventured into many sweet and sour dishes - but I really like this - and it was really easy - I chopped the vegetables as I needed to add them (to reduce the total time needed). We had this on the table really quickly.

Sweet and Sour Vegetables
Serves:4
Time: 20mins

600g chopped vegetables (we used 1 red and 1 green capsicum, 1/4 cauliflower, 2 carrots, 1/2 zucchini, 1 stick celery, 1/4 cup cabbage, 5 mushrooms and 1/2 cup pineapple - other possibiliteis could be baby sweetcorn, bok choi, bean sprouts, snowpeas).
1 onion - sliced into cresent moons
4 cloves garlic - minced
1/2 - 1 red chili - deseeded and chopped finely
450g extra firm tofu - cubed and marinated in a marinade (we were lazy and just used some tamari).

Sauce
1 1/2 tbsp lemon juice
2 tbsp agave syrup
2 tbsp soy sauce
3 tbsp tomato sauce (we used Muir Glen Tomato Ketchup)
2 tbsp pineapple juice
1/2 tsp cornflour

1. Saute onion in oil or broth until it begins to soften. Then add garlic and stir fry for another minute.
2. Add the vegetables that will take the longest to cook (like carrots and capsicum). Stirfry these for 3-4 mins.
3. Add the chili and the rest of the vegetables, stiring until they are cooked.
4. Mix the sauce ingredients together and pour over vegetables. Add tofu and stir to coat everything in sauce. Leave for a few minutes so that the flavours can sink in.
5. Serve over rice or noodles (we served it over thin rice noodles)

**********
There are many different things that are exclusive to my parents home (where I spent the first 18 years of my life). One of these is the Vita Mix. I remember my brother and I convincing our parents to buy a vita mix at an Organic Gardening Festival in Penguin when I was about 10years old. I think we used the line that it would help us to eat lots of fruits.
Since then - every morning we would share a fruit smoothie (with banana, orange, apple, kiwi, avocado, and other fruits when in season - eg. pears, pineapples, berries etc etc).
Also - and this is a little more unusal - mum and dad would make themselve a whizzed salad. This is because dad's teath make it difficult for him to eat really crunchy vegetables. I used to frown upon this green smoothie - but now I really love sharing it with them when I come home - it tastes surprisingly good - it usually includes - beetroot tomato, carrot, different types of salad greenery, celery, parsley, capsicum, cucumber and a little bit of salt water. So as I am home - I thought I would document the making of the whizzed salad. It can't be called a green smoothie as the beetroot makes it pink at the moment.

The salad before it is whizzed.

The salad after it is whizzed up.

Lunch time and Jessy's AWESOME pickled cuc and onions

Today's lunch wrap - Spicy Pumpkin Dip with alfalfa,
capsicum, red onion and baby spinach

I am a grazer - I think I was a horse (or maybe more an elephant) in a previous life because I LOVE grazing. I love having a piece of fruit for breakfast and then having another one a little later... and then having another a little later. Same goes for lunch - I grab something from the fridge and have a little and then have a little something else a little later.

Anyway - instead of talking about grazing I am going to talk about my lunches while I am at home studying. During winter I would make a pot of whatever (usually lentils and whatever vegetables I had on hand) but during summer I don't often feel like hot stuff.

So what do you have for lunch thats healthy - but filling. I have found vegetable wraps are great because then I can graze later ;)

I always make them differently because I have different ingredients and varying levels of spare time. I usually have some form of dip that I use as a base then I pile on some home sprouted alfalfa, capsicum, cucumber, grated carrot, red onion, baby spinach leaves - roll it up and YUM!!

I saw an awesome quick recipe for pickled cucumbers and onions posted by Jessy at happyveganface. I love her recipes and I thought that this looked fantastic so I had to give it a go. Initially I was worried that I wouldn't use it up before Nat and I went to our parents place this weekend... how silly of me - I ate it within a day!!! It was fantastic!!


Because I wasn't thinking of keeping it for a while and because I am trying to not use extra oils/fats I ommitted the oil and sugar and just used rice wine vinegar (cause that is all I had) and salt and pepper. It was FLIPPIN AWESOME!!! I think that if your were not an oil-phobic like me you should definatly rock on to check out the Jessy' s recipe.

So I am sure that I will be posting more summer time lunches over the coming months. When I start working (and can only have one lunch) I am sure my lunches will be more substantial - so I guess these are really just a grazing snack ;)