There are so many vegan options in supermarkets now. Here's a rundown of some of the ones I've tried.
I've been having these Lidl falafels on my lunch break for a few months now. They're really nice. They're quite oniony, but it's not overpowering. I'm not sure what style they're meant to be. They're from the chilled section. They're £1.25, which is a really good price. Continue reading
After watching Ann Reardon's video about how big companies ruined chocolate, I decided I'd try out some of the fancier single-origin chocolates. I started with the Sainsbury's and Asda ones. I did start taking notes for these ones, but then they all just started to taste like much of a muchness. I do not have a fancy palate. I also find it interesting that she labels Lindt as a bad-tasting brand, as it seems to be on the higher end of the mainstream brands!
Continue reading A couple of years ago (actually, it has been two years exactly almost!), I tried the thirty plants a week challenge. The advice is to eat 30 different types of plants every week to help maintain a healthy gut. Gut health plays a huge part in your immunity and overall wellbeing.
That time, it was a challenge. Despite being plant-based (with a weekly fishcake), I still have a pretty limited diet, tending to eat the same things every day. This time, I was determined to hit that target of 30. Surprisingly enough, I managed it in just two days.
Well, I thought, why not go for 50? And I even managed that before the end of the week. So then I thought, why not go for double the target and try to hit 60?
And I did! I made it by the end of the week!
Here's my list:
Continue readingThis cake was inspired by Micah!
I suddenly got a craving for cherry cupcakes after that! After looking around for a vegan non-chocolate cherry cupcake recipe that didn't have obscure ingredients, and not finding any to my satisfaction, I decided to improvise my own. I used Tesco's vegan Victoria sponge recipe as a base, and got tinkering!
Listen, I've never claimed to be the best at decorating
This cake is dairy-free, egg-free, vegan-friendly, soya-free. Leave out the almonds to make it nut-free. Use your usual substitutes to make it gluten-free.
Skip to the recipe
Can I clarify what happened so we can stop talking about the muffins?
Yes. Yes you may.
I made pumpkin cinnamon rolls the other day. They rose so much that they overflowed off the tray. Anyway, my oven is bonkers: gas mark 1/2 on the middle shelf is equivalent to gas 7. I don’t know what the problem is, but it gets super hotter than it should in there. I put them on the lowest shelf, but they still got kinda burnt on the top while still soggy underneath. I realised afterwards I should have flipped them over, but never mind. They’re still yum, and I’m still overeating them, so…
Continue readingThis is getting out of hand. Every time I go shopping, I discover more and more junk foods that are vegan-friendly.
So last week I went to Morrison’s to compare their doughnuts to the Asda ones.
Continue reading I only found out a couple of days ago that Asda doughnuts are now vegan-friendly! It’s been literally a year — yes, over a whole year, in fact — since I ate a doughnut. It was the two Crosstown ones that I bought with the £10 that they gave us instead of the Christmas dinner. A few weeks later we shut up shop for good, and so my steady supply of dougnuts came to an end. Those doughnuts cost £4.50 each, but my gosh, they were good. I would never buy them myself, though. Sometimes we’d get the leftovers. Good times.
Continue readingAfter over four years of waiting, I finally got hold of some eggs from Stepney Farm! I gave up eggs shortly after giving up dairy, because I love baby chicks and knowing that every time I ate an egg, a baby chick was going to be killed was enough to make me stop. Stepney Farm takes in rescue hens, and they have cockerels too. I've visited a few times, and they are open six days a week, so anyone can go and see how they treat their animals. I'm satisfied they are taking good care of their chickens, and they spread awareness about the cruelty that's still legal in the EU.
I was planning on using some of their eggs to make a vanilla cake, because, let's face it, vegan vanilla cakes suck. Instead I ended up having egg and chips for three days.
And I really wish I didn't.
Continue reading
As a side dish, this could serve between 4 and 6 people. If you're me, this is enough for two meals 😐
They freeze well. Just wrap individually in foil or greaseproof paper and tie up in a freezer bag. Use within three months.
Be warned, this takes AGES to make if you grate by hand (which I have to 🙁 ) I really recommend a food processor with a grater attachment.
The following quantities are just approximate. Feel free to alter proportions to your taste.
Oh my gosh, I have work tomorrow. I should be in bed.
Seriously, bean juice. It's awesome. I tried it and it works!
VEGAN EGG, for seriously.
VEGAN MERINGUE FROM LEFT-OVER BEAN WATER.
FREAKING AMAZING.
...
Whoa.
This is what mouldy cream looks like:
Ewwwww.
Well we've had a heatwave recently, and I didn't keep the creams in the fridge, so the Fruity blend cream got mouldy, as did what was left of the main batch of the Forest blend, which I also kept in my room. But the main batch of the Fruity blend is in the fridge, and at the last check there was no sign of mould.
Now the weird thing is, the first ever cream I made, you remember the main batch went mouldy? But I had decanted some into an old cleaned out lip balm tub and kept that in my bag to use at work. Well, I still have that same cream in there and it is not mouldy. That is so weird.
Anyway, shelf life of the creams is about 3 months, and that was with not putting in enough potassium sorbate. I made that last batch in March, and it went off end of June/beginning of July. So that's not too bad.
It's a weird thing though, I made a new batch last weekend, but for some reason the cream is not thickening like it did the first time. That one was a very thick, creamy cream. This time it's a runny lotion, which I don't like as much. And I used the same proportion of water (6 parts) as I did the first time. Weird. Maybe using more EOs does it, or perhaps the citric acid and p. sorbate? No idea.
Also, lesson learned: grapefruit essential oil is way too drying. Leave it out unless you have really greasy skin.
The real takeaway from this is that you should always store these in the fridge.
Mmmm super yummy yum yum. I really shouldn't be thinking of this while I'm fasting, but...
YUM!!!
Chloe has some seriously yummy recipes.
I couldn't find dijon mustard, so I did it without. It's also the first time I've ever eaten soy sauce.
Here's the recipe: http://chefchloe.com/on-the-side/sweet-potato-mac-n-cheese.htmlarchived
Mmmmmmmmmmm...
Just caught this article by chance, and had many WTH moments. Please excuse typos; I had to manually type it up as it doesn't seem to be published on their site. Full article, plus my observations. No copyright infringement intended, but I have to call this writer out (warning: I get snarky when I lose my patience).
Should we be mooving away from 'filk'?
Fake millks may be fashionable, but are they any better for you than cow's milk, asks Nicole Mowbray.
Stand in the queue in a coffee shop and you're almost certain to hear someone ordering themselves a latte with dairy-free soya, almond, rice, oat or coconut milk. Or as I like to call them, 'filks' (fake milks).
"Filk"... Seriously. And in answer to the first question: yes.
A quick glance at recent statistics shows why. Over the past 25 years, there's been a ten-fold rise in the number of Britons purporting to suffer from food and drink allergies or intolerances (the term given to symptoms of irritation or discomfort, rather than violent allergic reactions). And it's not only adults. In the UK, two in every 100 children have an allergy to cow's milk.
Indeed, lactose or other milk intolerances are not to be sniffed at. GPs agree that, for some, dairy products contain some allergenic elements. Alongside lactose, the naturally occurring protein casein can also cause bloating, stomach discomfort, vomiting and sinus issues.
... and what else?
http://www.livestrong.com/article/257495-casein-protein-dangers/
http://nakedfoodmagazine.com/casein-and-cancer/
Cancer, potentially. You forgot to mention cancer.
These issues go some way to explaining why sales of milk have fallen by 30 per cent over the past 30 years. In comparison, the consumption of substitute milks is soaring, up 17 per cent in the past year alone, with the market being valued at £139million.
Except you forgot to mention that there are plenty of other reasons for giving up dairy, not least the fact that the dairy industry inflicts extreme cruelty on the dairy cows and goats.
Continue readingI was meant to post an update to the state of my home-made moisturiser a while ago, but I just forgot, on account of spending most of my time covered in paper and glue.
So what happened?
Well, my main batch, surprisingly enough, went mouldy. Remember, this was the batch I kept in the fridge. However, it was mouldy only on one side, which seemed to be the bit where I had last scooped out my replenishment batch. The rest of it was fine. Also, the smaller batch I kept in my room, which had my fingers dipped in it at least twice a day, showed no signs of mould, neither did the smaller container which I kept in my bag for use at work.
So I guess it was in fact the Continue reading
As I mentioned in my body butter post, I was planning to make a home-made moisturising cream. Because the body butter is nice, but it's purely fat-based, and I wanted something with water in it as well.
So I ordered my glycerine and emulsifying wax, and had a root through the various recipes I'd accumulated over the last 10 years (yes, that really is how long it's taken me to get to this) and settled on this one I'd found recently:
http://www.herbal-howto-guide.com/creams-and-lotions.htmlarchived
Distilled water is not so ubiquitous here in the UK for some reason, and certainly not so cheap. So instead of the cold infusion recommended in the recipe, I just made regular old bush tea (rooibos) the old fashioned way (with boiling water) and left it to steep for a few hours (that part was unplanned. I just couldn't get a free hob on the cooker for ages). Also, the recipe above doesn't use glycerine, but I wanted to include it for its humectant properties.
As you can see, the bush tea gave it a really lovely golden hue.
So here is what I used (I wasn't too exact with the solid ingredients):
Continue reading