Once you pop..

You know how sometimes you reallllly fancy a cookie, but making a whole batch is not really a great idea. Not that I have some huge ethical objection to eating a huge batch of cookies, I just feel that after cookie number 2, you don't really enjoy them as much... and if you spread them out over a few days by the time you get to the last cookie it's gone kinda soft on the outside and dry in the middle.

No, for me, two cookies per person is just about perfect. It's one of the annoying things about living in an Omni driven world... I can't just pop into Millies Cookies when I'm in town and get a choc-chip cookie on a Saturday and enjoy that and move on. Sure, there are some nice pre-made cookies, Nana's Cookies for one are lovely, but they aren't fresh made that day, and they aren't nice and warm and fresh from the oven.

So, homemade is the way to go, but most recipes make at least a 12 cookies, if not more. Imagine then, how happy I was to see I'm not the only person wantings smaller cookie batches... and even more so that someone had done the hard work for me and posted a recipe. Yes, Kris of Nom! Nom! Nom! Blog had blogged a great Cookies for Two recipe.

So, me being me I like to play. I've halved the recipe, and made a few changes, mainly because Mr Derious loves oats in his cookies, and I think he would pout without them.

Cookies for Two - Ms Derious Style

2 tbs flour
3 tbs rolled oat flakes
1/8 tsp baking soda
Sprinkle of salt
2 tbs sugar
1 tbs margarine, softened
1 tbs apple sauce
1/8 tsp of vanilla
1 tbs soya milk
1 - 2 tbs chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 180C

Mix flour, oats, salt and baking soda together
Mix marge, apple sauce and sugar together. Add soya milk and vanilla (You could just use vanilla sugar if you wanted)
Add dry ingredients in batches
Fold in choc chips

Place four equal dollops of cookie mixture on a lined baking sheet and bake for 10-12 mins until yummy looking.

Allow to cool

Eat all four while no-one is looking, claim you forgot to make dessert ;)



Again, thanks for Kris for this recipe, it's really nice to have just a few cookies as a treat.

Slow, Slow, Quick, Quick, Slow

I've been having a bit of a trouble getting into blogging since the seasons turned. I think in part this is because food photography is so hard without either daylight, or failing that good artificial lighting. This tends to make my food look very washed out, and not very nice.

So, I'm going to try posting some shorter, snappier posts until I get my groove back. So, some apologies for the poor photos and the brevity of the posts.

Anyway, today was the switching on of the Christmas Lights in my town, so we went out to see that. There was a great band playing, but so loud my ears hurt now! I knew we would want something warm and yummy when we got back, and a sticky, hot, pudding like chocolate cake sounded like the way to go.

I love my mums 'Chocolate Fudge Pudding' which is a sticky, gooey pudding cake which cooks bathed in it's own sauce. However, I shy away from attempting to cook it myself because

• It's a very non-vegan recipe, eggs as well as dairy
• It makes enough for 8-10 people
• Requires about an hour in the oven, costly and my oven is a little unpredictable

I also don't like cooking things my mum does as it never tastes the same and I then feel my version is 'wrong' rather than just different. My Mum is an amazing cook, so I feel I have some big shoes to fill if I follow her recipes.

I remembered I'd recently 'starred' a Google Reader post that had caught my eye, and nipped off to go see exactly what it was.

I follow a few omni blogs that concentrate on more frugal foods, one of these being 'Passionate Homemaking' who are currently running a Nourishing Crockpot Carnival with loads of crockpot recipes. I knew I'd seen a link to a post making a cake in the slow cooker, and sure it was... sat on Sarah's Musings (another blog I instantly added to my bulging Google Reader list) Double Chocolate Cake with Hot Fudge Sauce



This is a yummy recipe, not great for you, but by no means as terrible as some, and cooks in just one step in the slow cooker, over the hours of 90mins + 30mins cooling time. This meant I went out immediately after sticking the slow cooker on and came back to a slow cooker full of cooked cake. It's much better for my electricity bill not to have an oven on for an hour!

One of the things I liked about this recipe was that it cooked straight in the pot, most slow cooker recipes ask for some steaming arrangement, and since my slow cooker is quite small they aren't really suitable for me.

I shan't post the recipe, since I made very few changes and I would love you all to pop over there and check out her blog yourself, but I will give you a quick rundown of the adaptions I made.

Substitute milk with homemade soy milk
Used half white flour and half wholemeal
Chopped nuts were slightly less then 1/2 a cup
Chocolate chips were probably less then a 1/2 cup, using one small 100g packet

I was also not clear on how much water to use in the last step so stuck it out at one cup full, which as it turned out was perhaps a little scant as the sauce was not as thick as I would like. The sauce is found right at the bottom of the slow cooker once the cake is done. I guess if you wanted to you might be able to turn it out onto a plate, but I think it's fine how it is.

Some things to note with this recipe.
The batter will seem runny - Its okay. Don't panic
The 'sauce' will also seem runny
As soon as you pour the sauce over the top some of the cake batter will bubble up and you will think it's ruined. It's not

So, it's one of these 'have faith that it's going to work' recipes, a bit like the first time you make seitan.

30mins is the perfect time to leave this to cool. The pot will be cold enough to touch, and the sauce still runny and hot.

While we are on the subject of Chocolate... feel free to check out Chocolate Covered Katie's Operation Chocolate Covered Kindness. A quick click doesn't take much, and it could help someone out.

The UK Vegan 100

Well, shall I just skip the whole 'I've not been blogging, I'm a naughty girl' bit, and move onto posting again... one hopes.

The main thing to note is that Pippin had her cancerous growth removed, and it doesn't seem to have returned at the moment.

On the job front, well, I've been working part time in a high street retailers....and I start a new full time job in two weeks time. I'm very happy.

Okay, quick post today. I've been looking at all the Vegan 100 lists online and sobbing into my barley cup because its been mostly US products. Finally, I've seen two UK vegan lists online, one from Where's the Revolution? The other from Cooking the Vegan Books. So, I can finally play, and now, you can too.

1.Copy this list onto your blog

2.Bold the things you have eaten

3.Cross out anything you really wouldn't eat

4.Pass it on.

If something looks non-vegan, like haggis or butter, you can just go ahead and assume that I mean a vegan version.

A bought pizza with cheese in the UK

Aldi croissants

Anything at Dandelion and Burdock

Anything at Saf

Anything at Vbites

Bacon buttie with tomato sauce

Beanfeast

Beans on toast

Beef and Tomato Pot Noodle

Bird’s custard

Birmingham’s curry mile

Blue Sheese

Booja Booja ice cream

Booja Booja truffles

Bourbon biscuits

Bread and butter pudding

Bubble and Squeak

Champ

Chip shop curry sauce and chips

Christmas pudding

Churros at Terre a Terre

Clive’s pie

Co-op donuts

Colcannon

Cranachan

Crumpets (I love these, esp with yeast extract)

Eccles cake

Elderflower cordial

English muffins

Evesham asparagus

Faggots

Fry’s Peppermint Cream

Granose Mock Duck

Haggis

Hampshire watercress

Henderson’s relish

Hobnobs

Holland and Barrett fruit flapjacks

Holland and Barrett Porkless Pie

Hot cross buns

Innocent Smoothie – Don't drink this now because of the link to coca-cola

Irish stew with dumplings

Irn Bru

Jersey Royal potatoes swimming in butter

Kent black cherries

Linda McCartney country pie Scallop (potato fritter)

Linda McCartney sausages and chips

Marigold bouillon powder

Marigold braised tofu

Marmite breadsticks - Don't eat Marmite any more because its owned by Unilever, who use horrible animal testing methods)

Marmite on toast

Masala dosa

Mashed carrot and swede

Melting Mozzarella Cheezly

Mildred’s mushroom and ale pie

Montezumas chocolate

Mushroom ketchup

Mushy peas

Nuttolene

Parmezano

Paskin’s full breakfast

Pease pudding

Piccalilli

Pickled onions

Pickled walnuts

Pimms

Potato farls

Potato from the Baked Potato Shop in Edinburgh

Pringles Again, I don't consider products by animal testing giants such and Proctor and Gamble as vegan

Realeat fishcakes

Rhubarb crumble with Swedish Glace

Ribena

Rice pudding

Roast parsnips

Ryvita

Sarsaparilla

Scones and jam

Scotch broth

Scottish raspberries

Scouse

Semolina pudding with jam

Sesame Snaps

Sosmix

Spotted dick

Spring cabbage

Staffordshire oatcakes

Sticky toffee pudding

Summer pudding

Sunday roast at The George

Tartex

Victoria plum

Vimto

Wagamama Yasai Chilli Men

Walker’s prawn cocktail crisps – I haven't had these in years!

Warehouse Café bangers and mash

Weatherspoons curry

White chocolate

Worcestershire sauce

Yorkshire pudding

Looks like I've eaten about 60% of the items, which surprises me.

Anyway, I'm going to try to get back into the blogging now I can skip the contact search for jobs!

Green Bean Casserole and Poached Marsala Pears

Most importantly, Pippin, has had her operation. The x-ray didn't show up any spread to the tumour, but she has an irregular shaped heart. They think they got all the main lump of the tumour, which is evidenced by an huge scar.

Other than that, it's been a bit of a slow week on the cooking front. I've not been making anything very interesting as I fell into a bit of a rut, being sidetracked by the concept of a novel I'm planning to write.

I have two very nice new dishes I made, one being a Vegan Green Bean Casserole based on a recipe posted by Chris from vegalicious.org . Green bean casserole doesn't seem to be, as far as I've ever seen, a very commonly ate dish over here in the UK, so it was a first for me, and I can't therefore compare it to any I've eaten before, but it really was lovely. I made my own fried onions, simple soaking a big onion in some milk, covering them with flour, and then frying in very little oil. I suspect it wasn't very authentic as far as french fried onions go, but it was very tasty!

I also made the most gorgeous pears baked in maple syrup and garam masala sauce, with seasame seeds. This is another recipe from La Dolce Vegan. It was gorgeous, and I'll certainly make it again if I find myself over burdened with pears.

Long Overdue Update

I do love keeping my blog. It makes me very happy to sharing cooking with others, and to hopefully show people that sometimes being brave and trying new recipes really pays off. However, when I just banging out standard cook book fayre, or the same thing over again, I don't much feel like sharing. This is why I have an occasional tenancy for hiatus. When I'm stressed or down about something, its easy for me to slip back to the same meals I know I can safely do with little or no real effort.

I have had, however, a few nice meals of late, most enjoyable of which was a Mushroom Noodle dish, with a little toasted nori for good luck and iodine.

Mushroom Noodles - Serves Two



Neutral tasting oil for frying (Oil, Sunflower etc)
100g Mushrooms
2-3 Spring/Salad Onions
1 Clove of Garlic
1 Cup of Miso Soup (250ml)
1 Pack of 'Wok Ready' Noodles. Blue Dragon are suitable for vegans
1 Tbs of Soy Sauce
1 Tbs Gomashio
Sheet of toasted Nori

1. Finely slice your mushrooms. Remove just the very roots of your spring onions off, and finely slice all the rest. This means the green bits too.
2. Stir fry in a little oil for 2-3 mins
3. Add the garlic, cook for a few moments, then add the miso soup and bring to a simmer
4. Add the noodles and stir until mixed in, now add the soy sauce and 'plate up'
5. Roll the nori into a tube and use scissors to slice ribbons of nori onto your bowls of noodle. Mix this in, then sprinkle with gomashio.

This is a very quick meal, and very filling.

I may well not post another recipe for a short time. One of my three cats, Pippin, will be going into the vets for an x-ray and biopsy on a small tumour on her chest tomorrow. Due to Pippin's age (16) and the location of the tumour, it is likely that it will have spread and we may not have her much longer.

As anyone who knows me will tell you, I love cats. I think because we all use the word 'love' too much, it's easy for that to be underestimated. Cats bring me a joy very little else does. They are so utterly honest in their affections. A cat won't sit with you unless it wants too, likewise, should a cat want to sit with you, it's going to be pretty insistent about it.

When myself and my Husband got married just under 10 years ago, we hadn't lived together first, and as such, we didn't have a honeymoon, instead deciding to spend the time off work setting up the new house. I had known from the start this would involve a cat living with us. We wanted to give a home to a rescue cat, and were introduced to Diva and Hobbit, who soon came to live with us. Diva and Hobbit had various health issues and a background which meant they needed to live indoors only, and we soon got used to the endless cycle of litter tray cleaning etc.

In late 2007 we noticed a lump on Hobbit's face. It turned out to be an inoperable tumour, and at Easter, we had to make the decision to take the pain away from her.

Diva pined for her sister, becoming anxious and unhappy whenever we left the house, and we decided that she needed another cat in the house to keep her happy.

We looked about, and in late May 2008, Maisie and Pippin came to live with us too. Maisie and Pippin were 15, and were life long housecats, so needed a new family that were happy to have older cats that would need to stay indoors. I fell in love with them instantly, and within a few weeks, they had integrated with Diva and they all became friends. Pippin's 'slightly enlarged thyroid' turned out to require daily drug therapy, which I suspect if why her former owners no longer wished to look after her.

Pippin often sits with me as I surf the net or blog, and amuses me by attempting to help herself to my drinks. She is a loving cat, who likes being held and purrs loundly at the slightest touch or glance. She has a special personality, and I love her very much. If it wasn't for my cats, I don't know that I would understand how wonderful animals are, and how much like us they are... and how very wrong it is for us to use them to fill our stomachs.

About two weeks ago I noted a small lump by one of her nipples, and arranged a vets visit. My vet echoed my concerns and performed a needle biopsy. The results came back how we feared, and so she's going in tomorrow.

I write this in part to find an outlet for sorrow, which copious tears doesn't seem to free, and in part because I want to ask that anyone reading this just mentally sends whatever positive thoughts they have to my baby when she is with the vet.

Plough(wo)man's Lunch

Any of my fellow Brits will be familiar with the concept of a Ploughman's Lunch. What they are less likely to be familiar with, is the concept that it might very well be a bit of a ploy from the 1960s by the Milk Marketing Board to get people eating more cheese. This is disputed, as you'll see from my Wikipedia link, but it's interesting none the less.

Before I became vegan, I was convince giving up cheese would be impossible. I have found that I don't really miss it that much. Now and then I have a nice meal which would traditionally be expected to have some cheese in it, and I don't really miss it. More for my Husband, I have Tofutii Cheese Slices on top of pizza, but that's about it.

At the moment, I'm trying to eat a few more nuts, but without just sat there eating a handful of nuts each day. Enter, cashew nut cheese. I'm not going to post a recipe, as there are many of these on the web and I just used a recipe from La Dolce Vegan. I will be making this again, as its very tasty, but I might mix it up a bit.

You can see here, my lunch on Saturday, using some of the Beetroot Bread from a few days ago, I was so pleased to have a mostly home made lunch. The alfala was home spouted, the lettuce home grown, the cashew nut cheese was home made. I can't claim to have grown the brazil nuts, but the beetroot in the bread was from my Dad's garden.



I followed this up with a nice, crisp apple. Now, feel free to tell me this doesn't look like a 'real ploughman's' but I liked it.

Beetroot Bread

I didn't make much of note today, other than some bread containing raw beetroot.

I made this mainly because I still have some of the beetroot my Dad gave me last time I went to visit, and partly because I've recently sown a few seeds myself, and I need something to do with them when I (hopefully) get a glut as a last crop of the year.

Also, it looked a very pretty pink hue in the photo in the recipe book... and is rather red in real life! The inside of the bread itself is nicely flecked with bits of beetroot, and is pinker then the baked crust of the bread.

I haven't included a picture of this cut bread, because the light had failed by the time I sliced it, and all the photos came out badly.

I followed a recipe almost identical to this one on http://www.selfsufficientish.com with the difference that my recipe only call for one tsp of yeast, not the two shown here. My bread didn't rise as much as I like, so I would actually recommend the 2tsp instead. I think the beetroot weighs the dough down a little.

This recipe is taken from "Bread Machine" by Jennie Shapter. The nice thing about this book is that in most of the loaf recipes give you the option of small, medium or large. Small is always big enough for the pair of us.

I never bake bread in the bread machine itself though, using a Pyrex Bake a Round instead. This doesn't give a bread that's the right size for sandwiches, but which is just about perfect for a hunk of bread or a small bit of toast. I got mine from a charity shop, and am now searching endlessly for another one. I would get them off e-bay, but they seem to be a US only thing, and if you google it you'll see they are often used for non bread making reasons.

In gardening news, the courgettes are starting to come through now. Since we only have the one plant that's producing anything, I'm fairly pleased with getting one or two courgettes off it a week. The French peas now have rapidly growing pods on them, and the Raspberry the very start of some fruit. Considering this is my first year growing my own food, and I did start very late, I'm quite pleased.