My breathing sped, sounding loud and harsh in my own ears even above the steady rush of the water. I wanted you, wanted you more than anything I had ever desired, although I could not imagine what form the having might take.
- Caliban's Hour by Tad Williams
I was reading Theresa's blog this morning about OzVeganMoFo for September and I thought I'd join in the fun since I just live across the ditch in little New Zealand. I'm aiming for about 4 posts a week which could be a miracle but we'll see how it goes. As Theresa says, no worries. Also, it's the first day of spring today which seems like the perfect way to kick this whole thing off! Yay! We've even managed to turn on the sunshine for the occasion.
I think I've mentioned previously how I've come to adore salad. It's interesting because in the past I used to, well, not hate salads but definitely not enjoy them. There were a few I'd like but on the whole I avoided them. I definitely wouldn't have picked one at a cafe if there was another option. But clearly tastes change and I'm pretty glad they have.
Here are a couple of takeaway salads from Revel...these are only half-size 'cause the full-size portions are HUGE (plus this way you can always justify a sweet treat if so desired!). They may not look pretty but they sure tasted good.
Rice salad with tofu and veges
Barley salad with veges and cashews
Main meal salads are becoming a big thing in my diet too especially as the weather gets warmer.
Here's one using all the veges I could find in the fridge along with hummus, dates, sheese, roasted seeds and temeph bacon from Vegan Brunch.
Now if you live down south, go outside and enjoy spring...it feels like summer is finally on it's way!
"It's snowing still," said Eeyore gloomily."So it is."
"And freezing."
"Is it?"
"Yes," said Eeyore. "However," he said, brightening up a little, "we haven't had an earthquake lately."
- The House at Pooh Corner by A. A. Milne
Hmmm...looks like it's been a little while since I've updated! As usual it's been a bit chaotic around here and as of tomorrow we may have another member to add to our flat! SO excited!!! But you'll just have to wait to find out about that! At the moment we are bullet-proofing the flat in preparation!
Anyway, I've been trying to wade through all the photos of food I've eaten and find something worth blogging about!
Hmmm...how about Peanut Butter waffles from Vegan Brunch?
These totally rock! I think mine were slightly adapted to use a half and half of white and wholemeal flour which seemed to work just fine. They were SO filling though.
What about this huge sandwich?
Leftover tempeh bacon (again from Vegan Brunch), various salady type things, almond butter and marmite on homemade country-grain bread. This was one epic sandwich!
After running round and up over One Tree Hill in the drizzling rain, playing squash then spending nearly 4 hours at the climbing wall and not getting home until 9pm one would be pretty hungry (and exhausted but I figured that kinda went without saying). Serious, but quick, refuelling is required.
Our awesome convection oven cooks everything really quickly so kumara chips are done in, like, 20 minutes! Yay! Along with baked tempeh, salad and broccoli you have a feast and I could go to bed with an extremely full but extremely happy tummy!!
Ooo, how about vegan marshmallows?!
Developed by Angel Food all you have to do is follow the directions on the packet (lots of sugar, lots of water and LOTS of beating) and voilà! We rolled ours in coconut and even spent one night roasting some on the fire...reminded me of childhood camping holidays...
Despite it still being winter, I've developed a small obsession with salads.
A clean-out of any kind of salady item in my fridge (baby spinach, capsicum, tomato, carrot, avocado, dates, seeds mix) topped with a Bean Supreme tofu sausage (their awesome sundried tomato and kalamata olive ones) and hummus. I can't believe something so simple and quick is so seriously delicious.
But I can't leave you with something that healthy to linger on so what about...
...vegan chocolate cake from The Blue Bird?! No words to describe how good it was ☺
The listener laughed until tears came into his eyes, and sometimes tears came into his eyes when he was not laughing.
- The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
So another birthday has come and gone (does anyone else feel like this year is moving at an incredible speed? It'll be Christmas before I know it!) so therefore good food had to be consumed. My friend E and I were off to see Starlight Express at the Vector Arena in the afternoon but first we needed some serious refueling (well, I did anyway having just come from yoga). So lunch it was...at Revel, my new favourite cafe. Normally I get the beans on toast but this time I thought I'd have a change and went for the Vegan Reveller instead.
This was seriously good (although I've yet to have something bad from them yet!!). The sundried tomato pesto was especially good. I polished off my whole plate in no time (must have been starving!).
No birthday is complete without cake but Revel didn't have any vegan cake so I settled on a cupcake instead (I'm more of a cake person myself...don't know why).
Coffee and walnut...seriously delicious!
Starlight Express was awesome but then E and I both love musicals, especially ones you can sing along to and are as cheesy and elaborate as this was!
The evening was spent blobbed out in front of the TV watching DVDs with another friend which was just perfect because relaxing is something that I don't do enough of. I don't have a picture of dinner but it was delicious...and I didn't have to do the cooking (or cleaning up either)!! Awesome!
"Now," the man in black said, laughing. "Oh, now. We make great magic together, you and I. You kill me no more than you kill yourself."
- The Dark Tower I: The Gunslinger by Stephen King
The fuse for the oven is blown so we've been without cooking abilities for the last 2 nights...still waiting on the electrician to come since it's one of those really old fuses that make no sense. Other than that though the new flat is great.
That's a terrible photo of our backyard from my bedroom. One lemon tree with more lemons on it than tree, 2 very sour orange trees and a grapefruit tree...awesome! Also a bonus is that the sun is out this morning. I'm solar powered so I feel more alive on sunny days.
I often have breakfast at work during the week since I've come straight from training so I need a variety of quick, easy, filling and delicious meal options that don't require much effort at the time and I can preferably eat at my desk. I love the taste spelt flour gives to baking and I am in love with the spelt flour muffins they make at Kokako so naturally I had to make the Blueberry Ginger Spelt Muffins from Vegan Brunch (I bought a copy via The Book Depository...free shipping and much cheaper prices than books here anyway? How is that possible?).
I only had mixed berries so I used those and I've never seen vanilla soy yogurt in my life. It's hard enough finding plain soy yogurt anyway so I used a berry-flavoured one which seemed somewhat fitting! Also, I made mine texas sized...perfect for breakfast with a piece of fruit. They were SO good.
Another recipe I tried from Vegan Brunch was Chocolate Beer Waffles. I had my friend C over one day and his main hobby seems to be drinking (okay, not really but he does like beer...a lot) so, well, beer and chocolate seemed the perfect mix for a lazy brunch.
My mixture came out pretty runny but I thought I'd give it a shot cooking it anyway...nope definitely too runny. Once I added a little more flour though they were perfect...kind of like a chocolate beer brownie waffle! More of a dessert than a brunch but hey, everyone deserves to treat themselves sometimes.
Since we seem to be on the topic of breakfast/brunch, I've also been having the odd green smoothie...
...very tasty but definitely not good on my stomach before going for a run! Better to save it for afterwards...
