Showing posts with label vegan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label vegan. Show all posts

Wednesday, September 23, 2015

Simple Sides - Pink Grapefruit Beets

Simple Sides - Pink Grapefruit Beets



This is just a really quick post about what is one of my favourite side dishes at the moment. I really love the earthiness of beetroot, and our tree is currently laden with pink grapefruit which led to this experimentation. Ordinarily, I add a little balsamic when I roast my beets, but the grapefruit juice brings a brightness with the acidity, rather than the richness that balsamic vinegar does. The ginger adds a little bite and the pink peppercorns add a dill-like freshness to the whole situation.

This is great served alongside a roast and if you have leftovers, they make the best salad with grains and a little Greek Yoghurt or goat’s cheese.


Simple Sides - Pink Grapefruit Beets


Pink Grapefruit Beets

8 baby beets, peeled and quartered
1 pink grapefruit, zest and juice
Thumbsize piece of ginger, peeled and grated
½ tsp salt
½ tsp pink peppercorns
1 tbsp olive oil


Preheat the oven to 170C

In a casserole dish, pour in the baby beets, olive oil, zest, ginger, salt and pepper and toss to coat. Pour over the grapefruit juice. Cover the casserole tightly with a lid, or alfoil, then pop in the oven for 45 minutes, or until the beets are tender.

Remove the lid/alfoil and pop back in the oven for a further 15 minutes so the juice reduces a little.


Serve, drizzling with the reduced juices.


Simple Sides - Pink Grapefruit Beets
Simple Sides - Pink Grapefruit Beets

Tuesday, June 2, 2015

Simply Delicious - Cumin Mango Roast Carrots

Simply Delicious - Cumin Mango Roast Carrots
Simply Delicious - Cumin Mango Roast Carrots

I don’t have much to say about this recipe, other than I had a bag of lovely baby carrots from the Nanna Shop. And I had a one lone mango left from my tree. And I was reading a book on Moroccan and North African cuisine. It all sort of just happened, from there. Cumin, fruit and vegetables. Simple, but tasty. Like a mango-ey version of honey roasted carrots. If you can, toast some cumin seeds in a pan and grind to a powder yourself.

This is a sweet vegetable dish, so it’s a perfect accompaniment to richer, fattier meats like lamb. And drier style wines. We ate it with toasted tortillas, Greek yoghurt and lamb sausages. All in all, a very nice enjoyable meal.

I had leftovers with a poached egg the next day for lunch.
Simply Delicious - Cumin Mango Roast Carrots
Simply Delicious - Cumin Mango Roast Carrots
Simply Delicious - Cumin Mango Roast CarrotsSimply Delicious - Cumin Mango Roast Carrots

 

Cumin Mango Roast Carrots

500g baby carrots, scrubbed
1tbsp olive oil
1 mango, peeled, sliced
¼ tsp ground cumin
¼ tsp ground cinnamon
1 jalapeno, finely sliced
Generous sprinkling sea salt and fresh black pepper

To serve:
Toasted pistachios, roughly chopped
Sesame seeds (I used black, but white are fine too)
Sprig of coriander, leaves removed and finely chopped
Drizzle balsamic glaze

Preheat the oven to 170C

Make sure the baby carrots are approximately the same thickness, so cut in half lengthwise if necessary. Drizzle with olive oil, the cumin, cinnamon and season well with salt and pepper. Toss to coat. Add the mango and jalapeno and toss gently. You don’t want to break the mango up too much.

Roast for 20-25 minutes, or until mostly tender, turning at around the half-way mark and coating the carrots in the mango that’s broken down.

Turn up the oven to 200C and cook for a further 5-10 minutes, so the sugars caramelize a little.

Remove from the oven, drizzle with balsamic glaze, sprinkle with the nuts, seeds and coriander.

Simply Delicious - Cumin Mango Roast Carrots
Simply Delicious - Cumin Mango Roast Carrots
Simply Delicious - Cumin Mango Roast Carrots

Tuesday, March 17, 2015

Summer Salads - Grilled Nectarine Panzanella




Grilled Nectarine Panzanella Salad

Grilled Nectarine Panzanella Salad


Summer and stone fruit go hand in hand. I love stone fruit season. It is the most excited I get about fruit. Don’t get me wrong, I like fruit all year around. I don’t have to force myself to eat it by any means. But a lot of fruits we can get all year around so they’re less special. Except for summer fruits. In summer we have an abundance of fruits you can only get in summer. Like mangoes. And peaches. And melons. And cherries. And nectarines. Oh, nectarines! I think every year, my preference of peaches vs. nectarines changes. This year, I am firmly Team Nectarine. I can’t get enough of them.


Usually I just hoe into them. No real thought or process to it. Occasionally having the sense to eat it over the sink so I don’t dribble juice everywhere. But sometimes, I put them to a more inventive use. Like this salad. The wonderful thing about stone fruit is that although delicious fresh, they also grill so well. Nothing required except a hotplate and they caramelise up and form a slightly crunchy brulee-like crust and intensify the sweetness.

We had a verge-side junk collection day, so whilst Lance and I cleaned the house and looked to declutter – Lance also smoked a leg of pork. Pork and grilled nectarines are a combo made in heaven. I made this salad with beet leaves. They’re one of my favourite salad leaves, and I love that I can buy a bunch of baby beets and not only have the wonderful sweet beets, but also make use of the leaves in salads! I rub them with a little olive oil and lime juice to help soften some of the larger, tougher leaves then just scatter the other ingredients through them. This would also be fabulous with some fetta or goat’s cheese. Are you Team Peach or Team Nectarine?




Grilled Nectarine Panzanella Salad


Grilled Nectarine Panzanella Salad - Beet LeavesGrilled Nectarine Panzanella Salad

Grilled Nectarine Panzanella

(serves 2)
3 nectarines, de-seeded and chopped into slices
3 tbsp rice bran oil (or other high smoke point oil)
1 brown onion, thinly sliced into half moons
Pinch salt
Bunch beet leaves, washed and dried
1 tbsp olive oil
Juice of 1 lime
1 jalapeno, thinly sliced
2 stale tortillas


Heat your BBQ to medium high. Add the rice bran oil and use your spatula to spread it across the hot plate. Wait a few more minutes for this to heat up and add the onion slices to one section of the plate and cook for 5 minutes or so, until starting to go translucent. 

Sprinkle the onion slices with salt and toss to combine. Spread the nectarine slices across the other section. Cook for 3-5 minutes, or until the first side of the nectarine is blackened in spots and caramelised. Flip to cook the other side. Toss the onions here and there whilst the nectarines cook. Remove both to a plate and set aside.


Heat the grill side of the BBQ and toast the tortillas for 2 minutes per side, or until crisp and slightly charred in sections. Remove, then cut into squares


Tear or cut the beet leaves into manageable pieces, place in a bowl and pour over the olive oil and lime juice. Massage into the leaves, making sure all leaves are coated and rubbed. When ready to serve, gently toss through the onions, nectarines and tortilla croutons.


Serve with your favourite protein!



Grilled Nectarine Panzanella Salad

Grilled Nectarine Panzanella Salad
Grilled Nectarine Panzanella Salad
Grilled Nectarine Panzanella Salad

Tuesday, December 30, 2014

Summer BBQ - Pumpkin and Miso Slaw

Summer BBQ - Pumpkin and Miso Slaw

I am lucky enough to have just over a week off for my company's Christmas shut-down and I had grand plans to make up for the current decline in my blog posts and prep a whole bunch for the new year. Then I would catch up on reading other blogs and spring clean my desk area and re-arrange the spare room and do some gardening. And. And. And I have done none of it. Today is the first day I've even been willing to turn my computer on. This has been officially my laziest Christmas break. I've actually used it as a break! Lots of book reading and beach going and lazy shopping.

Hopefully everyone has had a fabulous holiday period. I certainly did, celebrating with both families, eating up a storm. In lieu of a big night tonight (with Lance not getting January 1st off), we also had our now traditional New Year's Eve Eve Eve Eve Eve BBQ. But tonight we will have a quiet BBQ at home with the best of intentions to stay awake until midnight. And we will be eating this salad. 

This is currently one of my favourite salads. It is super easy to make, and can be made a day or two in advance if necessary. It is the perfect salad to take to a BBQ. It is a vinegar-based slaw, rather than the mayonnaise based coleslaw that most Australian's are more familiar with, which makes it a much lighter dish. Instead of carrot, I use pumpkin with red onion and silverbeet (chard) for colour. The salt comes from the delightfully savoury taste of miso paste, whilst maple adds a sweet touch against the vinegar. A touch of sriracha adds a faint spice, without too much heat. Toasted pumpkin seeds round out the texture perfectly.

I am not the hugest fan of raw onion in salads, which is why I added the step to sit the onion in vinegar first. It takes a little of the onion's punch out. Feel free to skip this step if you are an onion lover.

This makes a large amount of salad, but as I said, it keeps a few days in the fridge so you can have it as leftovers if you aren't serving it to a crowd.

Happy New Year my lovely readers, and I promise my posts will get a little more on-track in 2015!


Summer BBQ - Pumpkin and Miso Slaw
Summer BBQ - Pumpkin and Miso Slaw
Summer BBQ - Pumpkin and Miso Slaw
Summer BBQ - Pumpkin and Miso Slaw



Pumpkin Miso Slaw

1 small butternut pumpkin
¼ head cabbage
3 leaves silverbeet
¼ cup toasted pepitas
½ white onion
1/4 cup + 2 tbsp apple cider vinegar, divided
2 tbsp miso paste
2 tbsp maple syrup
1 tbsp olive oil
3 tsp sriracha (or to taste)
Salt & pepper to taste


Thinly slice the onion into half moons, cover with the 2 tbsp apple cider vinegar and set aside whilst you prepare everything else.


Grate (by hand, or in a food processor) the pumpkin, finely shred the cabbage and silverbeet. Mix together in a large bowl.


Add all the dressing ingredients to a jar and shake until well combined. Taste for seasoning, adjust as required. Pour over the salad and mix well to coat everything. Mix the onion into the salad. Set aside for half an hour for the acid in the vinegar to soften the pumpkin.


Just before serving, toss through the pumpkin seeds


Summer BBQ - Pumpkin and Miso Slaw
Summer BBQ - Pumpkin and Miso Slaw

Tuesday, August 5, 2014

Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple

Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple

There’s a restaurant in Perth that sells dessert nachos. Whilst dessert pizzas are a bit of a thing these days, I’d never heard of dessert nachos before. Whilst I haven’t had them, the description was unsalted tortilla chips with fruit sauces (strawberry and mango if I recall correctly) that are designed to look like salsa and cheese. It sounds delicious, and it sounds like something I’ll definitely be wanting to try at some point BUT it got me to thinking – why plain tortilla chips? Why not flavoured? That could be a thing, yeah?

I decided upon trying my hand at chocolate tortillas. And then I decided I wanted to make dessert tacos, instead of nachos. If I’m making the tortillas fresh, I might as well eat them fresh, too, right? We don’t often eat dessert in my house. Occasionally there’ll be a bowl of ice cream, but more often than not if there’s sweets after dinner it’s just some squares of chocolate or something snacky like that. I just can’t be bothered making dessert for two of us, especially on weeknights. So the obvious next choice for dessert tacos was as a lovely breakfast or brunch spread. You surely all know by now that I love breakfast!

The fillings for the tacos were mainly based on things I had in the house already and things that work for breakfast. The combination of which would feel decadent, but not super rich. I wanted it to be basically a healthy breakfast. Knowing that I had two different types of homemade caramel sauce ready to go in the fridge (the caramel sauce from my pavlova and a homemade dulce de leche) the other accompaniments had to have minimal sweetness. Even the tortillas themselves had minimal sugar to keep them fairly neutral (but chocolatey!). Add Philly cream cheese for dairy, peanut butter, fresh banana, toasted walnuts, cacao nibs and a spiced apple mix and it made a pretty awesome DIY taco bar. My favourite combination was cream cheese, dulche de leche, spiced apple and walnuts. Feel free to add whatever other fillings you have on hand. Strawberries or blueberries would be amazing. Nutella to ramp up the chocolate factor. Cream and Ice Cream if you want to forego the illusion of healthy.

This makes a lot more tortillas than 2 people need for brunch. But the leftovers make amazing chocolate tortilla chips. Sprinkle with cinnamon sugar!
Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple
Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple
Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple
Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple
Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple
Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple

Chocolate Tortillas

3 cups masa harina
¾ tsp salt
¼ cup sugar
1/3 cup cocoa powder
2 1/3 cups warm water

Whisk together the masa, salt, sugar and cocoa powder until completely combined. Add the warm water, starting with the two cups and knead until it becomes a smooth, slightly tacky ball. Set aside to rest for 10 minutes.

Heat a pan to medium high heat

Grab two bits of baking paper about the size of a tray. Pick up golf ball size pieces of dough, roll into balls, then place between the two bits of paper and roll out with a rolling pin into a tortilla.

Gently peel the tortilla off the paper and place in the hot pan. Flip after 30 seconds, cook for 45 seconds (it will puff up), flip and cook for another 30 seconds. Set in a shallow flat bowl (or plate) lined with a clean kitchen towel and cover to keep warm.

Repeat for the remaining tortillas.

Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple
Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple
Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple


Spiced Apple

3 pink lady apples, finely diced
½ teaspoon cinnamon
¼ teaspoon ginger
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
Juice half orange
1 tbsp maple syrup

Stir the orange juice, maple syrup, vanilla and spices together in a small saucepan. Add the apple pieces and stir to coat. Place over low heat and simmer for 10-15 minutes until the apple has softened, but still holds it’s shape

Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced AppleBrunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple
Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple
Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple
Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple
Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple
Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple
Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple
Brunch Stars - Chocolate Taco Bar featuring Chocolate Tortillas and Spiced Apple

Wednesday, July 16, 2014

Hot Damn - Tasty Hot Vegan Dips

Hot Damn - Tasty Hot Vegan Dips - White Bean Dip and Roast Beet Dip

On a ‘oh-my-god-these-are-so-cute-AND-on-sale’ whim…I bought a set of individual casserole dishes. And I LOVE them. But to justify my purchase of said cute-but-not-entirely-necessary dishes, I want to use them all of the time. We were having people over for some casual drinks one cold night and I thought of the perfect plan for using the casseroles and having a delicious snack to go with said drinks. Hot dips. In my experience, if you get served a hot dip it’s invariably cheese based. Often served in a cobb loaf. Nothing terribly wrong with that…but we were having mac and cheese for dinner. Didn’t want to over-do the cheese. Plus one attendee doesn’t really do cheese. My mind was blown when I was first served warm hummus – essentially chick pea mash and now it’s become a frequent side dish in my house. Which made me think of my white bean dip. I love it because it only contains a handful of ingredients, all of which are always in my pantry so it can be made in under 5 minutes when unexpected guests come around. That is pretty much flavoured white bean mash if you heat it up!

Knowing a few of my readers are vegan, and already rebelling against the hot cheese dip in my head, I thought I would make the second dip vegan too, seeing as my first one was by sheer coincidence. I had some roasted beets waiting for me in the fridge and basically came to the same conclusion as with the white bean dip. I could make a beetroot mash and serve it as a dip. To the beets I added coconut cream to help loosen the mixture while adding that sweetness that pairs beautifully with the earthiness of beetroot, and then chia seeds to help it gel and give it a lovely texture.

Pop both in casserole dishes, heat in the oven for 30 minutes and voila!

Hot Damn - Tasty Hot Vegan Dips - White Bean Dip and Roast Beet Dip


White Bean Dip

One tin white beans
5 sundried tomatoes in olive oil
1 tsp mixed dried Italian herbs (basil, thyme, oregano, parsley)
1-2 tsp sriracha (to taste)
Salt & pepper to taste

Preheat your oven to 150C

In a food processor, combine the white beans, sundried tomatoes, sriracha and herbs. Process until a smooth paste. Add olive oil from the tomatoes if you need more liquid to form a proper dip consistency. Taste and add salt and pepper.

Put in a casserole dish and heat for 30 minutes or until warm through.

Hot Damn - Tasty Hot Vegan Dips - White Bean Dip and Roast Beet Dip

 Roast Beet Dip

2 roasted beetroots
¼ cup coconut cream
¼ tsp caraway seeds
2 tbsp chia seeds
Salt & pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 150C

Chop the beets into quarters and add to your food processor with the coconut cream and caraway seeds. Process until smooth. It will be fairly liquid at this point. Add salt and pepper to taste. Add the chia seeds and pulse to distribute.

Put in a casserole dish and leave to sit for 15 minutes while the chia seeds absorb some of the liquid and makes it a more dip-like texture. Heat in the oven for 30 minutes or until completely warm through.

Hot Damn - Tasty Hot Vegan Dips - White Bean Dip and Roast Beet Dip
Hot Damn - Tasty Hot Vegan Dips - White Bean Dip and Roast Beet Dip
Hot Damn - Tasty Hot Vegan Dips - White Bean Dip and Roast Beet Dip