Fueling up

"It's just one of those things people worry about, even if it doesn't make sense."

- Wolf-Speaker by Tamora Pierce

Most mornings I am up super early for training...either running, spin class or a gym session (today, because I'm slightly crazy at times, I went to spin and then went for a training run with a friend...lucky I don't work today so I can go back to bed and have a nana nap!). Although I could never eat a proper breakfast before heading out, I certainly can't train on an empty stomach so I normally have some fruit or a muesli bar. These bars are SO good and keep me going right up until I hit the showers (and then I'm definitely ready for breakfast!).


I've changed the recipe enough that it's probably okay to post it so here it is (although each time I make a batch I end up changing the ingredients a bit anyway...it's pretty forgiving):

¼ cup agave nectar
¼ cup molasses
¼ cup rice syrup
¼ cup almond butter
¼ cup peanut butter
⅔ cup chopped dried fruit
1 tsp vanilla essence
1 cup rolled oats
1 cup wholegrain oats
1 cup rye oats
¼ cup ground flaxseed
¼ cup pumpkin seeds
¼ cup sesame seeds
¼ cup sunflower seeds
¾ cup coconut thread

Heat the agave nectar, molasses, rice syrup, almond butter, peanut butter and dried fruit together in a medium saucepan until the mixture starts to simmer, stirring to make sure the mixture doesn’t stick to the bottom of the pan.

Once it starts to bubble take the pan off the heat.

Mix in the rest of the ingredients (you might need to use your hands here to get it to mix in properly).

Line the base and sides of a 20cm x 20cm baking dish with baking paper and press the mixture firmly into the pan (the firmer you press it in, the better the bars will hold together).

Freezer the mixture in the pan for about 20 minutes and then remove and tip the set mixture onto a cutting board. Slice into bars (I find a bread knife best here). This recipe makes somewhere between 15 and 20 depending on the size you want them but don’t make them too big ‘cause they’re pretty dense!

Wrap each bar up individually and store either in the fridge or freezer.

Crunchy mouthfuls of sweetness

It is a mistake to think you can solve any major problems just with potatoes.
- Life, the Universe and Everything by Douglas Adams

As a belated birthday present for my darling cousin D I whipped up a batch of sickeningly sweet granola following the recipe for Caramel Walnut Chocolate Chunk Granola (now that's a mouthful!) from eat me, delicious. I added some almonds too since I had some sitting around so I guess that means I made Caramel Walnut Almond Chocolate Chunk Granola which is a seriously long-winded way of saying yum!


Before sending her off with it I had to give it a taste test. It was delicious but seriously sweet...not really breakfast material but perfect for sprinkling over fruit or soy ice cream for dessert.

Operation presentation

The High Lord was on her side. So why did she want to take the skillet that was still sitting on the counter and smack him over the head with it?
- Dreams Made Flesh by Anne Bishop

Day 2 of (Oz&NZ)VeganMoFo and here I am again...I'm impressed with myself already!

Anyway, it was my darling cousin D's birthday a couple of weeks back so we had to celebrate somehow. Since neither of us had anything planned for our actual birthdays we decided on a belated party (basically an excuse to eat cake). But on her actual day I met her in town for lunch at Raw Power. Neither of us had been there in ages so it all felt new again.

I couldn't resist getting the tofu burger...I swear it has grown since I was last here! So full afterwards I could barely move!


The juice of the day was the Vulcan. I can't remember what was in it other than carrot and beetroot but it was delicious and really refreshing.


A few nights ago I was having a discussion with my friend L and his flatmate about food photographs in cookbooks versus what they actually turn out like. We were flipping through some cookbook and complaining that the pictures always look so fabulous but nothing we did turned out quite like the pictures (not that they didn’t still taste good though).

A couple of days later I found myself in the kitchen putting together the birthday cake for our belated party and, spurned on by this conversation, I felt quite determined for mine to look at least somewhat like the photo! The cake I was tackling was the Decadent Almond Cake from My Sweet Vegan (with a few adaptions - I used a combination of maple syrup, agave nectar and rice syrup instead of straight maple syrup and in the chocolate ganache I used agave nectar and coconut cream because I’ve never seen soy creamer in my life...wouldn’t even know what it was so I just hoped like hell that coconut cream would work!).


I was rather pleasantly surprised with the results (unfortunately my actual photography skills suck though...it looked so much prettier in real life!). It would have been even better if I’d have been less impatient with waiting for the ganache to cool and set a little before icing the cake ‘cause it was a bit runny to start with.


The cake went down a treat with my flatmates and L devouring all the leftovers...lucky I'd eaten two slices on the night otherwise I'd have felt a little cheated!

(Oz&NZ)VeganMoFo: Spring!!

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!

Puppy vs cat - the epic battle

Thinking of nothing. Trying to think of nothing. Thinking of everything.
- The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton

I know you've all been hanging out to meet the new member of our flat (well, you probably haven't but I'm going to tell you anyway!!). So blogworld meet Keisha...


She's an 8 week old German Shepherd and the cutest thing ever but I swear that since Saturday she's already grown a whole lot! Scary stuff...

Sprocky the cat looks on. He's not too impressed with the whole situation but coping with the new arrival so much better than we ever anticipated (he's quite a wild, aggressive cat and we were afraid he'd take off).


Anyway, let's have some food...

After a long night out (normally I'm a nana even in the weekend but clearly I was due for a night as a rebel!) and then dragging myself out for a run round the park I was completely starving (and exhausted...more from the lack of sleep than the run though). It was lunch time by the time I'd showered and got my head screwed on so quick but serious refueling was needed.


Carrot and capsicum sticks with hummus, avocado, falafel and toast with almond and peanut butters. This rescued me and kept me going until dinner time (although I did fall asleep on the concrete outside while on guard duty - keeping the cat and the puppy from attacking each other). Sometimes simple is really delicious (actually, I seem to say that a lot at the moment so it must be more than sometimes!).

My darling cousin D and I are addicted to the claypot at one of the foodcourts in town so every couple of weeks we have to meet up for dinner to get our fix!


My usual...the tofu and vegetable claypot. It is so good that I cannot even begin to describe the cravings it inspires just thinking about it! So far I'm on medium heat but I'm trying to build up my tolerance to order a hot next time!

And just because she's so gorgeous, here's Keisha one more time...I never believed in love at first sight until now!

Bullet-proof food and toasted memories

"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 ☺

Roller-skating revels

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!